Unpressurised Dry Suit for Shallow Surface Supplied Air Diving

[formernuke]

I would not trust that to supply breathing air.

 

[MB NZ]

I was just thinking how relaxed diving forums have become. 20 years ago, the only message you would have got is that you're going to die!

 

[formernuke]

There is so much wrong with this......

 

[Orthodoxality]

>I would not trust that to supply breathing air.

Because it lacks an air quality meter? I assume that goes double for something like this Mini Scuba Tank ! Would you trust a hand pump?

I could probably compensate for a lack of pressure with volume.

Is there any mini electric pump you would trust?

 

[formernuke]

>I would not trust that to supply breathing air.

Because it lacks an air quality meter? I assume that goes double for something like this Mini Scuba Tank ! Would you trust a hand pump?

I could probably compensate for a lack of pressure with volume.

Is there any mini electric pump you would trust?

I don't trust any of stuff you've mentioned. Go for real dive gear and fills from a good dive shop.

 

[iliketopetsharks]

A 7l Al Stage wouldn't bankrupt you and provide you with an appropriate Bail-Out for your purposes. Those "mini-scuba" contraptions and portable compressors are rarely worth their money...

 

[lowwall]

... a lot more time consuming in the middle of a shoot on location.

It looks like you are talking about commercial diving. Even if you are willing to ignore all the laws/regulations that apply to commercial diving in your jurisdiction (presumably S.I. No. 254/2018 - Safety, Health and Welfare at Work (Diving) Regulations 2018 ), you need to come to an understanding with yourself that this is a serious endeavour and your safety depends on doing it properly. These regulations are written in the blood of deceased divers and the fatality rate for DIY commercial diving is far higher than the real thing, despite the much greater inherent risks of many commercial diving operations. You aren't talking about a boat bottom cleaning operation where you are going to 2m max. 12m is real diving.

I would suggest that with surface supplied air, at minimum you would want a tender (an assistant at the surface to watch the pumps and haul you up if you give an emergency signal), a suitably sized bailout bottle, and either a surface supplied hot water system with a wetsuit or a real scuba drysuit (and drysuit certification) that is plumbed into the bailout bottle.

 

[Orthodoxality]

Thanks to everyone! I'm avoiding individual responses to reduce clutter, but have found the feedback really valuable.

I'll back off for a bit. I had been thinking of this as more like boat cleaning than real SCUBA, because 12m feels more like fun depth than real diving, but clearly that was foolhardy. I'll look into drysuit certification before pursuing that.

Before I go, is there any portable compressor you'd find credible? The whole project requires that I operate continuously off-the-grid. I wouldn't mind hand-pumping a larger tank to 120 bars or whatever for the bailout/drysuit bottle or using one of those minidives and changing the filters frequently, but if hand-pumps and mini-compressors are just inherently unusable (e.g. due to valve corrosion caused by unavoidable water ingress), I may just have to accept that it's a non-starter.

Thanks again.

 

[Orthodoxality]

To clarify, the project is only commercial in the sense that it would be nice to get paid for any artsy project, but with no real expectation of recompense. I mostly intended to place video cameras and return for them, operating out of an area of interest. 12m was the hard limit of the Airbuddy, but I anticipated most cameras being placed within 6m of the surface i.e. where a lot of the visible biodiversity hangs out.

 

[lowwall]

To clarify, the project is only commercial in the sense that it would be nice to get paid for any artsy project, but with no real expectation of recompense. I mostly intended to place video cameras and return for them, operating out of an area of interest. 12m was the hard limit of the Airbuddy, but I anticipated most cameras being placed within 6m of the surface i.e. where a lot of the visible biodiversity hangs out.

OK, that's a different kettle of fish. BTW, It would have been very helpful to know this upfront.

If all you are doing is dropping off and retrieving video cameras, then you are needlessly complicating everything. It'll take you maybe 5-10 minutes on average to do this, which means a wetsuit will be fine. Buy (or rent?) two or three 15l steel tanks, you should get around 1.5-3 hours off a tank at 6m. That's a whole bunch of 5 minute dives. You could potentially go for several weeks before you needed to head for somewhere with a compressor to get your tanks refilled.

Let us know any other pertinent details. This obviously won't work if you are spending a year-long hermitage on an uninhabited island.