I recently decided to try the BP/W thing and opted to go with a Transplate harness for the plate. Have not yet tried it out and was looking for some opinions on this harness. I was also looking at the OMS comfort harness but could not bring myself to buy one of their products, after a few emails to them with no repsonses that told me that they were not especially interested in customer relations. Diverite was quick to respond and offered some good suggestions, my hat is off to them, thanks again Kathleen !
Transplate Harness ?
- Thread starter Shellback
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eriediver2002
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I recently purchased a transplate harness too. Have it all set up but haven't been able to dive it yet. Hoping this weekend.
RICHinNC
Contributor
I dive that harness and love it. I found, for me, putting the weight pouches as far back and as close to the plate as possible helped with the trim a lot.
If you are planning on going techie and hang 50 heavy bottles off of you I would probably recommend a single piece web harnes....hog. But if you just dive standard rec dives then dont let the worries of the "plastic pieces of failure" bother you. I have a lot of dives on my harness and they have never failed.
If you are planning on going techie and hang 50 heavy bottles off of you I would probably recommend a single piece web harnes....hog. But if you just dive standard rec dives then dont let the worries of the "plastic pieces of failure" bother you. I have a lot of dives on my harness and they have never failed.
Thanks for the info RichinNC and eriediver2002. I had spoke to the owner of my LDS and he loved his DR Transpac which he has used for over 10 years so I figured if DR products were good enough for him then they certainly would work for a casual Rec diver like myself. Thanks for the tip on the weight placement.
Never used a BP/W setup before although when I first got my cert in '83 I had a hard plastic plate with a continuous web harness. I am really hoping that I can use a minimal amount of weight with this new setup and now have to dig deep to get me a steel tank.
Never used a BP/W setup before although when I first got my cert in '83 I had a hard plastic plate with a continuous web harness. I am really hoping that I can use a minimal amount of weight with this new setup and now have to dig deep to get me a steel tank.
Steve_Dives
Contributor
I have the same harness, steel plate, and the rec wing. I've dove AL80 and LP100 on it, in fresh or salt, and slung a 40. I'm still fussing with it a little (adjusting straps, webbing, wing, etc.) but I loved it on the first dive. The rec wing is a lot of lift for an AL80 and I should probably use something smaller...or buy bigger tanks. 
I started my route to BP+wing system with the TransPlate but later converted to the single piece harness webbing and never look back. How about consider the standard webbing system and save the money for some other gears.
Just my 2 cents....................
Just my 2 cents....................
I can never figure this out when people post this sort of thing here.
How does anyone "opt to go with XXXXXXX" before they try it out? If you haven't tried it out, you're just guessing. If you're just guessing, why not go with a single piece of webbing for $20 first and thread up a hog harness. You might find you guessed right and save yourself some money and not have to bother with some clips and buckles and releases and padding and other stuff you don't need.
I agree that someone asking for opinons after he or she has already opted for something is problematic. At best the person will get a few posters who chose the same option who will validate that other people do in fact choose option "X". And a subset of those people will usually have diving styles similar to the OP, but none of that has much to do with whether option "X" is really optimum or the best available option for the OP. It is argumentum ad populum support for a decision already made. But logical fallacy or not, people often find some comfort in that, especially in an equipment intensive sport like diving where, unfortunately, there is as much bad advice floating around as good advice and most of the advice one way or the other is often not attached to any logical rationale that could aide in decision making so asking after the fact is in some cases not much worse than asking before the fact.
Worst case you get 50 posts saying "X" is garbage and a complete waste of money and/or totally unsuitable for what you want to do with it. The result is you feel bad, you sell "X" at a loss on e-bay, you get depressed, you stop diving and take up golf so you can take out your frustrations by beating the bejeezus out of a poor little white ball with an iron club. The ball mocks you by slicing off into oncoming traffic on the 9th fairway. Consequently, asking after the fact posting can result in dented quarter panels, broken windshields, and angry motorists and should be avoided if possible.
That said, I faced the same decision several years ago which is essentially:
1. A transplate/comfort harness,
2. A pivot ring harness (with or without quick release and with or without neoprene shoulder strap pads)
3. A one piece Hogarthian/GUE/DIR harness (with or without neoprene pads for the shoulder straps).
After a few years of watching other divers walking along trailing nuts. bolts, screws and broken bits, I am not a real fan of anything with screws, bolts or small clips that can come loose, get lost or break. The Dacor RIG with whatever number is behind it is the grand champion in that regard (most of those divers have long since taken up golfing and discovered the deductible on their homeowers policy). To give it credit, the transplate is not nearly as bad in comparison.
I am ok with a large (2") plastic fastex quick release (QR) buckle on a harness provided you have a reason for it (for example ease of exit in a dry suit and dry cloves with cuff rings in extremely cold water/weater situations, or you had recent shoulder surgery and are still increasing your range of motion, etc) as it could in very extreme situations break or come loose. But there are three major problems. 1. They are usually on the left shoulder (where all the deco bottles get carried) rather than the right where they would be slightly less stressex. 2. To be readily accessible with either hand, they are usually mounted where the shoulder D ring needs to be in order to be equally accessible. 3. Most people who have them have no reason to have them and seldom use them making them a vestigal attachment that would be better off absent. #3 is often the case because pivot ring harnesses come with a QR whether you want it or not. If you use one, give priority to D-ring placement and live with the lower than optimum buckle placement.
The pivot ring harness will use 1" webbing sewn to the rest of the 2" harness webbing to attach the rings and despite the naysayers this arrangement is strong enough to resist anything that would not have already ripped you apart anyway. The resulting geometry and chest strap make the harness quickly adjustable if you switch from for example a t-shirt or 3mm wet suit one week and to a dry suit the next as the chest strap can readily take up the extra slack of the thinner suit. It also creates a bit more distance between straps, shoulder D-rings and armpits and is a bit more comfortable. On the downside, when your plate starts to wear on the straps, you can't just slide everything an inch one way or the other so they have a much shorter service life and they cost a lot more to replace than 10 or 11 feet of webbing. Also a non-QR pivot ring harness is not really a one size fits all proposition as the distance between the rings is now fixed and the greater thickness where the seams are will not readily feed through the slots on most plates (which is why they come with a QR and a resulting free end of strap on one shoulder). Consequently a non QR pivot ring harness is pretty much a do it yourself proposition. Not hard but you need to have a sewing machine.
Neoprene shoulder pads are inexpensive and will give you about 85% of the comfort of a comfort harness or transplate harness with a lot less expense and with the increased durability and security of a hog harness, so I am not real sure why anyone would ever go the transplate route if they have any serious technical diving aspirations - leaving the transplate pretty firmly in the "within recreational limits" category.
As an aside, I had a similar non responsive customer service experience with OMS. I suspect it may be due to them not having the courtesy to curtail internet sales, but as a bone to throw to OMS brick and mortar delaers, they do not provide on-line or phone support to on-line customers. That approach is not real helpful to the potential OMS customer who lives 500 miles from the nearest OMS dealer and who consequently ends up going with Dive-Rrite instead.
Worst case you get 50 posts saying "X" is garbage and a complete waste of money and/or totally unsuitable for what you want to do with it. The result is you feel bad, you sell "X" at a loss on e-bay, you get depressed, you stop diving and take up golf so you can take out your frustrations by beating the bejeezus out of a poor little white ball with an iron club. The ball mocks you by slicing off into oncoming traffic on the 9th fairway. Consequently, asking after the fact posting can result in dented quarter panels, broken windshields, and angry motorists and should be avoided if possible.
That said, I faced the same decision several years ago which is essentially:
1. A transplate/comfort harness,
2. A pivot ring harness (with or without quick release and with or without neoprene shoulder strap pads)
3. A one piece Hogarthian/GUE/DIR harness (with or without neoprene pads for the shoulder straps).
After a few years of watching other divers walking along trailing nuts. bolts, screws and broken bits, I am not a real fan of anything with screws, bolts or small clips that can come loose, get lost or break. The Dacor RIG with whatever number is behind it is the grand champion in that regard (most of those divers have long since taken up golfing and discovered the deductible on their homeowers policy). To give it credit, the transplate is not nearly as bad in comparison.
I am ok with a large (2") plastic fastex quick release (QR) buckle on a harness provided you have a reason for it (for example ease of exit in a dry suit and dry cloves with cuff rings in extremely cold water/weater situations, or you had recent shoulder surgery and are still increasing your range of motion, etc) as it could in very extreme situations break or come loose. But there are three major problems. 1. They are usually on the left shoulder (where all the deco bottles get carried) rather than the right where they would be slightly less stressex. 2. To be readily accessible with either hand, they are usually mounted where the shoulder D ring needs to be in order to be equally accessible. 3. Most people who have them have no reason to have them and seldom use them making them a vestigal attachment that would be better off absent. #3 is often the case because pivot ring harnesses come with a QR whether you want it or not. If you use one, give priority to D-ring placement and live with the lower than optimum buckle placement.
The pivot ring harness will use 1" webbing sewn to the rest of the 2" harness webbing to attach the rings and despite the naysayers this arrangement is strong enough to resist anything that would not have already ripped you apart anyway. The resulting geometry and chest strap make the harness quickly adjustable if you switch from for example a t-shirt or 3mm wet suit one week and to a dry suit the next as the chest strap can readily take up the extra slack of the thinner suit. It also creates a bit more distance between straps, shoulder D-rings and armpits and is a bit more comfortable. On the downside, when your plate starts to wear on the straps, you can't just slide everything an inch one way or the other so they have a much shorter service life and they cost a lot more to replace than 10 or 11 feet of webbing. Also a non-QR pivot ring harness is not really a one size fits all proposition as the distance between the rings is now fixed and the greater thickness where the seams are will not readily feed through the slots on most plates (which is why they come with a QR and a resulting free end of strap on one shoulder). Consequently a non QR pivot ring harness is pretty much a do it yourself proposition. Not hard but you need to have a sewing machine.
Neoprene shoulder pads are inexpensive and will give you about 85% of the comfort of a comfort harness or transplate harness with a lot less expense and with the increased durability and security of a hog harness, so I am not real sure why anyone would ever go the transplate route if they have any serious technical diving aspirations - leaving the transplate pretty firmly in the "within recreational limits" category.
As an aside, I had a similar non responsive customer service experience with OMS. I suspect it may be due to them not having the courtesy to curtail internet sales, but as a bone to throw to OMS brick and mortar delaers, they do not provide on-line or phone support to on-line customers. That approach is not real helpful to the potential OMS customer who lives 500 miles from the nearest OMS dealer and who consequently ends up going with Dive-Rrite instead.
Steve_Dives
Contributor
Good points on using a Hog harness. My diving is of the recreational variety, so when a deal came up on the transplate I went for it. For now it gets the job done, probably better than a traditional BC. At least, I'm not worried about a slung tank ripping the D-ring off the Transplate harness.
Checking a couple websites, the Transplate harness is about 60-65 more than the DiveRite basic harness. If it takes $20 in webbing to turn it into a Hog, that path costs a total of about 90 more than going straight to Hog.
Checking a couple websites, the Transplate harness is about 60-65 more than the DiveRite basic harness. If it takes $20 in webbing to turn it into a Hog, that path costs a total of about 90 more than going straight to Hog.
eriediver2002
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Yup, those qr's sure have killed lots of divers (note the sarcasm not readilly available on an internet forum)
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