Spare air

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Ah! I see we have another Spare Air thread, off and running, developing legs of its own. I wonder if we should just set up a Spare Air Forum?

I think so. Obviously not enough has been said about it already. :D
 
Four pages and running :D
 
First of all I don't own a spare air and never will. Dive responsibly and stick reasonably close to your buddy.

I do find all the calculations very interesting though. But here is how I look at it. (Assume this is a typical rec dive and my max depth was no more than 120 to 130 ft with no deco required) I'm at 99ft and out of air. OUT OF AIR. OUT OF AIR! All I would need out of a spare air is enough air to get me to the surface. Maybe I would swim to the surface a little faster than normal. I'm not talking about rocketing to the surface but still a little faster than normal. Am I going to worry about a 3 minute safety stop? No way. I'm OUT OF AIR! Are safety stops a good idea? Of course. Should we do them 99% of the time? Of course. But will missing a safety stop for 3 minutes kill me? No way. Not even close. So if a spare air would give me the 2, 3 or 4 breaths to get to the surface, then it would be worth it. But like I said, I'll never own one.

BDSC
 
I do find all the calculations very interesting though. But here is how I look at it. (Assume this is a typical rec dive and my max depth was no more than 120 to 130 ft with no deco required) I'm at 99ft and out of air. OUT OF AIR. OUT OF AIR! All I would need out of a spare air is enough air to get me to the surface.

BDSC

I don't think this point is being argued. The original poster asked if it was true that a spare air would get a diver from 99ft to the surface including a 3min safety stop. He was told that by a dive shop. Basic math indicates that not only was the information incorrect, but incorrect by a very wide margin. And now, he knows that not only is it incorrect, he knows why. And additionally, he knows how to calcuate what amount of air WOULD be required to do it safely.

After that discussion was had, the thread devolved into what you see now.
 
I have read other threads about this now and see that a pony bottle is A LOT BETTER. Now this is to say if your buddy is mr. Magoo and he took his class from scuba steve.


I trust my pony more then Mr. Magoo


Thanks for the fast response divers

I don't think we're done here just yet...:coffee::coffee:
 
I don't think this point is being argued. The original poster asked if it was true that a spare air would get a diver from 99ft to the surface including a 3min safety stop. He was told that by a dive shop. Basic math indicates that not only was the information incorrect, but incorrect by a very wide margin. And now, he knows that not only is it incorrect, he knows why. And additionally, he knows how to calcuate what amount of air WOULD be required to do it safely.

After that discussion was had, the thread devolved into what you see now.

You're right on with that. I was just trying to point out that a three minute safety stop would be the least of my worries if I were out of air. I've never been out of air and hope I never am, but my tail is going up up up to some good old fresh air when it happens. (If there is no buddy around or my wife swims away for the insurance money)

BDSC
 
You're right on with that. I was just trying to point out that a three minute safety stop would be the least of my worries if I were out of air. I've never been out of air and hope I never am, but my tail is going up up up to some good old fresh air when it happens. (If there is no buddy around or my wife swims away for the insurance money)

BDSC


I have to agree with BDSC. I carry a 6 CF or a 19 CF bottle depending when doing rec. diving. 6 CF if I fly & 19 if I drive. Never had to use either and hope that I never do. I'm a single diver and rarely know my buddy beforehand. So the extra bottle is a little insurance. I'm mostly concerned about first stage or hose failure. If I run out of gas, I'm stupid and deserve whatever happens (natural selection takes over).

I agree that when I need the bottle, I'm not really worried about a safety stop. Doing non-mandatory deco diving, I'm supposed to be able to go directly to the surface. And based on the calcs in this thread, I can get there at a rate near 30 FPM, maybe a little more. But that's the least of my worries.

I can recover from DCS, but not from drowning.

When I'm doing mandatory deco diving, I carry a 40 CF bottle, but that's another question.

Just my opinion.
 
I'm still on page one- I have my settings set for max # of posts on a page... so, really, it's just one page and counting.
Did you go back to and adjust your options when they did the upgrade a while back? It used to be that 40 posts per page was the maximum, but I've been pleasantly perusing 50 posts per page since then.

Basically, that means it's a lot easier to breathe a Spare Air dry before getting to the second page. (There, does that make this post on-topic? :biggrin:)
 
This is just another inane useless post - (like most of the others in this thread) - just here to make a useless thread even more so. And longer. I bet that it goes to more than 10 pages by this time people are finished flogging this old horse!
 
https://www.shearwater.com/products/swift/

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