Triton rebreather or Hollis Prism2. Getting into CCR diving with a recreational diver background.

[makar0n]

Hi divers

My local dive shop has two rebreather available which are prism 2 and triton from M3S. My primary reason to get into CCR is because I want to increase my bottom time at the recreational depth limit without have to keep coming to the surface and change tanks. I also like the bubble free diving and helps with my photography due to the lack of bubbles.

I am not trying to get into technical diving, but just purely want to enjoy the CCR’s benefit at a recreational level.

What are your thoughts??

I am definitely planning on traveling with my CCR so a triton fits my needs. I do plenty of shore dive and boat dive. One of the nice thing about triton is that I can still use my OC gear with my CCR. Prism 2 is just too expensive and hard to travel with. I am not a big fan of ECCR because electronics sometimes not very reliable. Mechanical CCR however doesn’t have that issue. That’s why I’m leaning towards the triton than Choptima

+1 for Choptima. Had the same background/plans, went with Choppy despite living in EU and having to travel a fair bit to test @DiveTucson teaching patience . It is about the same size/weight as Triton, you can use it with the very same OC gear. Whole unit (sans cylinder) fits hand luggage easily in terms of traveling. Triton is nice, but mCCR. As @boriss says:

(...)
You can run an eCCR manually (I did so for 2-hours today). You can't do the opposite.
(...)

With mCCR you will have to fiddle with things. eCCR does it for you...meaning you don't have to let go of the camera

 

[jale]

+1 for Choptima. Had the same background/plans, went with Choppy despite living in EU and having to travel a fair bit to test @DiveTucson teaching patience . It is about the same size/weight as Triton, you can use it with the very same OC gear. Whole unit (sans cylinder) fits hand luggage easily in terms of traveling. Triton is nice, but mCCR. As @boriss says:


With mCCR you will have to fiddle with things. eCCR does it for you...meaning you don't have to let go of the camera

Fiddling "with things" is not a negative point when you are on a rb.
I suggest you beware of the "eccr does it for" me.

 

[Marie13]

Don’t expect to get CCR trained and then pick the camera right back up. You need to get some hours on your unit before you dive with a camera again.

 

[makar0n]

Fiddling "with things" is not a negative point when you are on a rb.
I suggest you beware of the "eccr does it for" me.

Well if I am task loaded I prefer to have less fiddling than more. And this does not mean that I am not keeping an eye on the pO2 or not paying attention to anything else, same as I would have on any xCCR. But to each their own

 

[jale]

Well if I am task loaded I prefer to have less fiddling than more. And this does not mean that I am not keeping an eye on the pO2 or not paying attention to anything else, same as I would have on any xCCR. But to each their own

Yes to each their own but I don't get why people say that an mccr is extra fiddling when it is only as fiddling as with a wing or DS inflator

 

[Marie13]

I am definitely planning on traveling with my CCR so a triton fits my needs. I do plenty of shore dive and boat dive. One of the nice thing about triton is that I can still use my OC gear with my CCR. Prism 2 is just too expensive and hard to travel with. I am not a big fan of ECCR because electronics sometimes not very reliable. Mechanical CCR however doesn’t have that issue. That’s why I’m leaning towards the triton than Choptima

Do you know anything about the local instructor? Are they any good? I went with my WI cave instructor for CCR (Kiss Spirit), but she is very good, great reputation, and her teaching style worked well for me. Instructor’s shop is two hours away and dive site is four hours. All training on weekends has a full time job doing something else (maritime archaeologist).

 

[JMBL]

Concerning the Triton, this is my experience with it (certified 3 years ago next July, air diluent deco, trimix in the near future), but as already stated by other members, it's not because it's the right machine for me that it'll be for you.

What attracted it me to the Triton and why I like it :

- extremely easy to assemble and disassemble (I can compare with my buddies who dive AP Inspi/Evolution or Revo),
- easy to maintain (even when you're not an experienced mechanic, and I'm not one),
- no annual maintenance at the manufacturer needed,
- easy to carry on (knicknamed 'le sac à main' i.e 'hand bag' by many divers around here), so easy to travel with,
- can be operated either BM or SM, I dive it backmount, didn't need any change anything in my rig, the rebreather is just an extension. If I need/want to dive OC, I just take a larger tank (15L) and leave my Triton,
- very compact while diving : 10L BM used as diluent and BO, good enough for 99% of my dives
- large choice of electronic (no computer connected, hardwired Petrel 2 or Nerd. I chose a Petrel 2),

Underwater, it's very comfortable and easy to operate, and contrary to what is often said, I find it really easy to breathe on.

This being said, I'm not an expert on rebreathers, tried several, but it wasn't love at first sight. As far as diving is concerned, I was certified in 1990, I've logged more than a thousand dives, I'm OC Trimix normoxic and Intro to cave.

Hope it helped.

 

[tbone1004]

Hi divers

My local dive shop has two rebreather available which are prism 2 and triton from M3S. My primary reason to get into CCR is because I want to increase my bottom time at the recreational depth limit without have to keep coming to the surface and change tanks. I also like the bubble free diving and helps with my photography due to the lack of bubbles.

I am not trying to get into technical diving, but just purely want to enjoy the CCR’s benefit at a recreational level.

What are your thoughts??

I skimmed the responses but should be reasonably close to what's already been said. I do say this with my primary rebreather being a mCCR, so keep that in mind.

Within the confines of recreational diving limits a rebreather will not extend your bottom time by any appreciable amount if you are constrained by NDL. I do say appreciable amount because if you're only at 60ft it can certainly give you the "best mix" for that depth and that will extend the run times but it certainly won't double them.
Any rebreather diving is technical diving in my opinion despite PADI having type R units like the Poseidon Se7en where you can actually get your initial open water certification on the unit.

Triton is an exceptionally bad unit for underwater photography IMO. You have a mCCR which requires you to actively pay a lot more attention to the unit than an eCCR does and it puts a ton of "stuff" on your chest. It's a great unit, but it wouldn't even be on my short list for this application. Photography is distracting and most all professional underwater photographers when on a CCR will dive with a babysitter who's job it is to make sure they don't do something stupid on the unit because nearly 100% of their attention is on the camera rig. mCCR just compounds this because it is not actively maintaining a breathable ppO2 it is only slowing the decay of ppO2. If you want a chest mount unit get the O2ptima CM which will at least try to keep you alive if you forget to pay attention to it. Also the O2ptima is the same price as a Triton but is made and supported in the USA and is an eCCR so much better choice than from France.

Prism2 is what it is and it's a perfectly adequate rebreather despite what we tend to say about them in the cave diving world. Issue here is you still need to carry your bailout so now you have a rig on your back that is heavier than what you're diving now, have a slung stage bottle on the side for bailout, and your camera rig which is starting to become a lot of gear to mess with.

You should look at double hoses with something like a FX133 for a tank if you want to extend bottom times and put bubbles behind you. Unfortunately Bryan passed away and the Kraken is a bit up in the air for new availability but they are still out there and there is plenty of support for them in New England especially with @Luis H up in Maine.

 

[WOB0.01J]

Concerning the Triton, this is my experience with it (certified 3 years ago next July, air diluent deco, trimix in the near future), but as already stated by other members, it's not because it's the right machine for me that it'll be for you.

What attracted it me to the Triton and why I like it :

- extremely easy to assemble and disassemble (I can compare with my buddies who dive AP Inspi/Evolution or Revo),
- easy to maintain (even when you're not an experienced mechanic, and I'm not one),
- no annual maintenance at the manufacturer needed,
- easy to carry on (knicknamed 'le sac à main' i.e 'hand bag' by many divers around here), so easy to travel with,
- can be operated either BM or SM, I dive it backmount, didn't need any change anything in my rig, the rebreather is just an extension. If I need/want to dive OC, I just take a larger tank (15L) and leave my Triton,
- very compact while diving : 10L BM used as diluent and BO, good enough for 99% of my dives
- large choice of electronic (no computer connected, hardwired Petrel 2 or Nerd. I chose a Petrel 2),

Underwater, it's very comfortable and easy to operate, and contrary to what is often said, I find it really easy to breathe on.

This being said, I'm not an expert on rebreathers, tried several, but it wasn't love at first sight. As far as diving is concerned, I was certified in 1990, I've logged more than a thousand dives, I'm OC Trimix normoxic and Intro to cave.

Hope it helped.

The main attraction for me is the ease to travel and size of the unit. I am going to dive in BM with one smaller tank than what I used to dive which is usually a 100 or 80. How much was the whole rebreather when you’ve purchased it ?

 

[WOB0.01J]

Do you know anything about the local instructor? Are they any good? I went with my WI cave instructor for CCR (Kiss Spirit), but she is very good, great reputation, and her teaching style worked well for me. Instructor’s shop is two hours away and dive site is four hours. All training on weekends has a full time job doing something else (maritime archaeologist).

I scheduled a try dive with my local instructor, to test on the unit as well as to get to know the instructor. He seems very reputable and experienced… but we will see