Signed up for Fundies

[Far_X]

When I attended a DIRF weekend in Pennsylvania, it was the first time I had dove in doubles and my trim was terrible. I highly recommend you get a fair number of hours with your intended equipment set up before the course begins otherwise you may be spending a large portion of your time in the water adjusting your equipment and not practicing the skills you are being taught.

 

[stiebs]

Its all well and good me saying that I'll get the plate and harness and borrow the rest, but that idea turned sour and I'm now the proud new owner of a Halcyon rig with Explorer wing (Hopefully without inflater problems )

The weather's looking pretty good this weekend, and my gear should arrive by then, so with any luck I'll be able to spend a good 3 hours in the water this weekend, and also get a couple of boat dives in next weekend before the Fundies course.

 

[wunat]

Just to confirm the thingy on the 'rec' and 'tech' level for the DIR-F. When I took my DIR-F in July, 2006, there were three of us doing 'tech' level and another 3 doing 'rec' level. The part of diving in double is not that bad for me although I only managed to dive in doubles once in a pool before doing the class. But the fact that we have that extra primary light cord to handle during drills can make things pretty crazy.

Anyway, I passed with a 'tech' level (lucky me). This is probably due to the fact that I have been diving with some DIR approach for some time already.

I would also agree with the others that you might want to be familiar with your rigs before the class so you won't have that to worry you. May not need to practice too much on the skills (leave that for the class) but probably focus on being comfortable with the new rigs you are doing to be diving in.

DIR-F is probably one of the best investment in dive education I have so far. Hope it will work out that way for you as well. I DOUBT it WON'T.

 

[limeyx]

Hey everybody, I don't mean to hijack the thread, but if you recieved a rec pass in fundies would you be able to do a tech checkout dive to recieve the tech pass or would you need to retake the course using the tech equipment and standards?

The only way to be sure is to check with your instructor or GUE.

However, I would *expect* that if you took the class in doubles with a light, and were close to meeting the tech pass, then you could probably do just 1-2 checkout dives.

if you took it in singles or no light etc. then you would probably have to do more of the class over (maybe the whole thing, possibly just the dives)

 

[Sea-Jay]

Im taking the DIRF in March with Mark Messersmith.
With regards to rec pass to tech,my interpretation is that you just need to check dives in doubles, with can light, i don't know if dry is required though.

Cory

 

[stiebs]

I was just re-reading the GUE course outline, and it doesn't mention having to dive dry. It only makes reference that part of the equipment requirement is an exposure suit suitable for the duration of exposure.

It also looks like the criteria for the tech-pass is more relaxed for a diver using a metric depth guage:

For a rec pass:
Demonstrate good buoyancy and trim , i.e. approximate reference maximum of 30 degrees off horizontal while remaining within 5 feet/1.5 meters of a target depth

For a tech pass:
Demonstrate good buoyancy and trim , i.e. approximate reference maximum of 20 degrees off horizontal while remaining within 3 feet/1.5 meters of a target depth

 

[SparticleBrane]

How do they measure trim? Break out a protractor?

 

[amascuba]

It also looks like the criteria for the tech-pass is more relaxed for a diver using a metric depth guage:

Sweet! I'll just program my gauge to use metric instead of imperial.

 

[limeyx]

Im taking the DIRF in March with Mark Messersmith.
With regards to rec pass to tech,my interpretation is that you just need to check dives in doubles, with can light, i don't know if dry is required though.

Cory

Might want to check into that, because skills like valve drill are somewhat different in doubles compared to singles. Depends on how many checkout dives you do I guess.

 

[Sea-Jay]

Might want to check into that, because skills like valve drill are somewhat different in doubles compared to singles. Depends on how many checkout dives you do I guess.

A procedure change on valve drills in double for was in affect on Nov 2006.