The humiliations of Fundies have already begun . . .

[MXGratefulDiver]

From the Sea Hunt Web Site:

Bridges complained about the weight of the twin tanks on his back during endless topside re-takes, "Carrying those double tanks around all the time got to be a little rough on me". Harry Redmond had copies of the twin tanks made out of balsa wood and painted them silver. Except for episodes at the beginning of the first season, Bridges is seen walking around with balsa wood tanks on his back throughout the rest of the series.

The problem is you could only jack them up to about 25 psi ...

... Bob (Grateful Diver)

 

[SeanQ]

I bet they trimmed out terribly as well!

 

[radinator]

Last weekend I had a similar experience. I had been diving my BP with wetsuit for slmost a year, and on a trip to Baja Mexico I decided to take my new drysuit out for a spin. At the end of the dive, we are supposed to doff our gear and hand it up to the (small) boat, and then climb up ourselves.

As you all know, you can't chicken-wing an arm through. I have been used to flipping my gear off over my head with the wetsuit, no problem. But with the drysuit, I had an underarm fold in the suit catching the webbing, and I could not get it up and over. I tried a couple of times - no good. I go to the boat and someone on the boat grabs my tank valve so I can 'slip under' the BP - no good. I try to grab the d-rings with my thumbs to get out, and got nowhere.

Finally, after far too long flopping around in the water next to the boat I got the BP over my head and off. Of course, I hear from soneone on the boat "That's why tech gear is not good for rec diving." As if a simple BP with bladder and straps with no gizmos is tech.

Of course, I just have to take the drysuit out more often and practice it a bit more. The problem was operator incompetence, not gear configuration.

To the OP: It does take practice. You'll be doing it all without effort in no time.

(On a side note I took my old Seaquest Balance BC into the pool yesterday so someone could practice their rescue skills on me. How did I ever dive that thing? It kept moving around behind me, and I really missed the crotch strap holding it in place.)

 

[MHK]

For the life of me, I still can't really figure out why it's really necessary since the instructor one gets for the upper level classes could easily get a recommendation from someone he or she trusts whether or not one is ready.

Dan,

As I understand it, as we continue to grow and experience changes, it is no longer practical to rely on the fact that you can just call the DIR-F instructor for a recomendation. When we were smaller and most every instructor knew everyone else, that system proved OK. Whereas today we've lost several instructors and we've added many others in various parts of the globe , so the ability to contact them and/or rely on their recomendation(s) is impractical. For example, I've had several people locally contact me about a Triox class and when I asked about their DIR-F pre-requisite they tell me that they've taken it from John Walker under the workshop format years ago. John hasn't taught for GUE in several years, nor at the time was he required to file any paperwork with HQ so it's unlikely I can get anything from him, or GUE in that regard. The simple fact is that along with growth and success comes the need to document the progress.

Moreover, at the time of the change in format, I happened to be in Florida with JJ and we spent a fair amount of time discussing the decision to change. The GUE Board of Directors felt that given the unprecedented, and frankly, unexpected success of the DIR-F class, that all too many divers initial experience with GUE had become the DIR-F class. In other words, the DIR-F class became the gateway to introduce DIR to the recreational market. As such, JJ felt that if they are going to use the DIR-F class as such a gateway then that vehicle needed to be more formalized, standards needed to be established and implemented, and lastly the workshop type format needed to comply more compatibly with exsisting GUE protocols, ie; no smoking, required gear, swim test etc. etc. etc. Under the workshop paradigm, nearly anything was allowed irrespective of how incompatible it was with DIR protocols. As you know, I did the vast majority of those early classes, and I can promise you that we saw every gear configuration imaginable ;-). The class has changed significantly since the early days, and frankly more students are better prepared for the first day of class then in the early days, so the gear modification portion of the class, which used to be a time consuming portion, is significantly reduced as time progressed. Moreover, the uniformity of class structure amongst the instructor core has resulted since the change towards certification based training. Again, in the early days it was much more of an ad hoc approach developed by tweaking this and that each and every week at the airport(s) ;-)

Anyway, that is my understanding of why GUE moved in that direction.

Hope that helps..

Regards,

 

[Reinoud]

Ok do it with double 130's then.

or steel doubles like they are used over here in the Netherlands... they weigh about 35 kilo (that's about 77 pounds).
I've seen very few people that can get into those without sitting in front of them

 

[TSandM]

Wow, this thread morphed all over the place

The good news: Today I got in and out of my harness all by myself. I unsnapped and snapped my SPG twice (we won't talk about the times I gave up and let it hang for a while before trying again -- it now has a bigger snap on it for cold, clumsy fingers). I somehow managed to trap my lighthead and long hose under my octo hose . . . hmmm. And some loop of hose was in my peripheral vision on my left the whole dive, and I kept looking over there to see what it was.

My husband took pictures of me under water, and I actually look rather like a mobile bowl of black spaghetti, and worse, one that's tilted about 30 degrees from the horizontal. More work to do!

 

[TwoBitTxn]

I don't think it would be much of a problem. Seriously. I can tricep press over 100 pounds so I don't see a 42# tank causing too much problem.

This sounds like a wonderful way to blow out a back or bounce your rig off of the first stage if it gets out of your control.

TwoBit

 

[PerroneFord]

Maybe you guys are doing this differently than me, BUT...

In flipping the system off, you are essentially holding the unit by the TANK as it comes over your head, with the straps resting against your forearms. As the unit unbalances forward it simply lays into your arms like a baby, and you gently put it down.

I would suggest, if you can't hold up a single cylinder in your arms with three points of contact, you might need to look at doing some strengthening excercises.

I helped my friend yesterday at the dive site get into a borrowed BP/W (HALCYON DAYS!) and it was weird watching him struggle with trying to chicken wing into and out of the unit. Especially trying to take it off... I asked him if he wanted to flip it on/off and he said he knew how but didn't want to. I said ok and let him struggle a bit on his own before helping.

My question is this. How do you doff your rig underwater? Flipping in and out is simple. How do you chicken wing in or out? I've never tried it.

 

[Doc Intrepid]

My question is this. How do you doff your rig underwater? Flipping in and out is simple. How do you chicken wing in or out? I've never tried it.

Identify, in some detail, a set of circumstances where - while diving with a team - the optimal response to an unforeseen problem is to doff your rig underwater.









Our team has doffed rigs at the surface to reboard a boat (Capt Leroy Crater, 'Captain's Lady', Discovery Diving out of Beaumont, NC). After some initial working technique out it became pretty smooth.

Doffing and donning a set of E8-130s mid-water is another matter. And why would you want to? I can't think of a single scenario where that is the appropriate response, unless things have already gone to hell and the team is separated. In which case you're already sucking wind. Even in a cave, getting them off and pushing them through a restriction, for example, is one thing. Getting them back on again on the other side of the restriction without silting up the cave is something entirely different. Experienced cavers doing that level of penetration would likely go in using a different rig to begin with.

Next time you're bored and in 20' of water, give it a shot. Try to doff a set of heavy steel tanks, how doesn't really matter, and then don them by yourself. Just make sure you don't have a buddy nearby who videotapes the whole debacle (like I had) I promise you an educational experience, and one which will provide no end of amusement to anyone watching...

 

[Doc Intrepid]

Anyway, that is my understanding of why GUE moved in that direction.

Hope that helps...

Thanks Mike. I wondered also, and this makes some sense. Fundies has indeed become the most broadly available introduction to GUE for the vast majority of divers, whether or not they intend to pursue other GUE courses...