Should I check out other dive ops?

[ggunn]

Do you really think it should be a required item of scuba gear? IMO the only required pieces for OW dives beyond the basics are an octo and a cutting tool. DSMBs definitely have a place depending on the dive, just like snorkels and lights and pony bottles and towed dived flags and gloves. But I don't think they should be a requirement for all dives.

FWIW, only a tiny fraction of all the dives ever made have been accompanied by a DSMB. Even if we restrict it to the last 10 years or whenever they started including it in OW courses, they are still only carried by a minority of divers. Are they all doing it wrong?

If you are really concerned about separation, DSMBs may not even be the best signalling device depending on conditions. And nothing compares to the effectiveness of an EPIRB or PLB in getting you found.

I do not presume to tell anyone that any gear is "required" for them. I can give advice but no one is bound to take it. I won't dive in current without my SMB, but you do whatever you want.

This is turning into yet another stupid pointless internet argument. I have said my piece and I stand by it; carry on if you must.

 

[BRT]

Interesting take. What I get from this story is that carrying gear you don't know how to use is not particularly helpful. It's certainly not a substitute for staying with your group in a DM-led drift dive.

On our dives in Cozumel it is common for different pairs to come up at different times and in different places. Nice and safe to say "Just follow the DM" but that is not reality with some dive ops and some divers. And it is never a sure thing, regardless.

 

[BRT]

You also missed the point that I made about learning how to use it. Telling any diver, new or old hat, not to carry a DSMB is something that I will never agree with, which is what you already said. If you are now changing what you said it to say 'carry it but don't deploy it at depth until you've had some training/practice', that I can get behind.

Hard to get the training if you don't deploy it. I learned by doing. Didn't go well every time.

 

[Shawn C]

Do you really think it should be a required item of scuba gear? IMO the only required pieces for OW dives beyond the basics are an octo and a cutting tool. DSMBs definitely have a place depending on the dive, just like snorkels and lights and pony bottles and towed dived flags and gloves. But I don't think they should be a requirement for all dives.

FWIW, only a tiny fraction of all the dives ever made have been accompanied by a DSMB. Even if we restrict it to the last 10 years or whenever they started including it in OW courses, they are still only carried by a minority of divers. Are they all doing it wrong?

If you are really concerned about separation, DSMBs may not even be the best signalling device depending on conditions. And nothing compares to the effectiveness of an EPIRB or PLB in getting you found.

What I believe should be mandatory dive equipment isn't the point. But I'm not the one telling new divers to not bother bringing an important piece of safety gear with them while at the same time trivializing the risks - you are.

 

[Shawn C]

Hard to get the training if you don't deploy it. I learned by doing. Didn't go well every time.

It's easy enough to get some free training if you speak to your DM ahead of time and ask him/her to show you how to do it. When I did this he showed me a couple of times on his, then observed me shooting mine and offered suggestions for improvement once at the surface. If you don't have a DM that will do this (maybe find a new dive op?) you can also hire a DM for a couple of dives and practice.

And, yeah, it often doesn't go according to plan at first. It's also why I will shoot mine several times a trip, even with the DM having already shot his, just to keep practicing and refining my technique.

 

[ggunn]

Hard to get the training if you don't deploy it. I learned by doing. Didn't go well every time.

Yo tambien. The first time I attempted to deploy mine I ended up at the surface with about 50 feet of yellow string in a cloud all around me with my wife off to the side laughing her head off. I have seen videos of divers in the same situation (something like "How Not To Deploy An SMB") but I wasn't able to find one to post here.

As I said earlier, I deploy mine a lot in order to hone my technique and so that I can get a little negative and hang from it at the safety stop. I think that carrying an SMB and knowing how to deploy it makes me a safer diver, but that's just what I do and it works for me; I don't presume to tell anyone else what they should do.

 

[Charred]

We should be careful here about SMB and DSMB.

SMB you deploy from the surface and isnt it a requirement to deploy one as part of OW? This is not hard.

DSMB is deployed from depth and takes skill.

While a DSMB might be ideal, not sure that is required or even advisable without practice. But a SMB doesnt really take skill, can be practiced on your couch at home and why not clip it on in case you need it? I'm not getting the logic on not having one.

 

[ggunn]

We should be careful here about SMB and DSMB.

SMB you deploy from the surface and isnt it a requirement to deploy one as part of OW? This is not hard.

DSMB is deployed from depth and takes skill.

While a DSMB might be ideal, not sure that is required or even advisable without practice. But a SMB doesnt really take skill, can be practiced on your couch at home and why not clip it on in case you need it? I'm not getting the logic on not having one.

Substitute DSMB for SMB in everything I have ever posted.

Are the buoys themselves any different apart from that one has a spool of string attached and the other doesn't?

 

[Shawn C]

Substitute DSMB for SMB in everything I have ever posted.

Are the buoys themselves any different apart from that one has a spool of string attached and the other doesn't?

I've always thought of SMBs as quite different from DSMBs. SMBs, to me, are those torpedo shaped things that get towed along (in other words deployed throughout the dive and always on the surface). I'm ready to be educated if this assumption is wrong!

 

[Racer_X]

We should be careful here about SMB and DSMB.

SMB you deploy from the surface and isnt it a requirement to deploy one as part of OW? This is not hard.

DSMB is deployed from depth and takes skill.

While a DSMB might be ideal, not sure that is required or even advisable without practice. But a SMB doesnt really take skill, can be practiced on your couch at home and why not clip it on in case you need it? I'm not getting the logic on not having one.

SMB deployment is not always an OW cert requirement. At least for my certs it wasn't.

Deploying a DSMB really isn't hard either.