What's with the UTD haters?

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Hi Subcool,

I am always open to discuss things, in your case you are not informed well.
Please, read a bit more or ask before you make statements.

First of all, I am very aware of the great things being achieved by divers diving on independent sidemount, I have chosen to teach a clear methodology
and am now diving a sidemount z-system.
That sytem comes with a clear methodology of how to dive it and with a set of skills that are well documented and consistent with backmount, unlike any other agency has (SM) or piece of equipment. (please, if you guys come up with something else , let me know).

Anyways...

1. I have no spare regulator in my pocket, I have an isolatable manifold, under a cover on my back.

2.I dive single cylinder also in a drysuit, I just dived single AL80 in Belgium during the winter.
(why do you think you can't?)

3. I don't know how you can always donate from independent cylinders, except if you have 2 longhoses.
The whole world knows that the donating part is not the strongest point of indep. SM..that's why you need to feel what you have in your mouth.

In case of OOG or some other issue,

a.You will have to think what you have in your mouth, not very effective... if **** hits the fan and it just did, you are having an OOG, it is without a doubt more effective to be able to donate 100% from your mouth..not 50%.

b. If you are breathing of the shorthose and the OOG occurs.. you will have to look for a regulator, hope you will find it and yank on it and hope it will come off, if you are diving with cannister lights, multiple cylinders etc..this can become a challenge.

Remember, I am into teamdiving, not into solo diving...2nd..I am teacher..and teachers need materials and didactics.

Regards
Mike
 
Sorry Mike ... but a lot of your rationale sounds contrived to me.

You don't need two longhoses to donate with a standard, independent setup ... you only need one. "The whole world knows" is usually a lead-in to a bad sales pitch. You don't need to "feel" what's in your mouth. If you don't know which tank you're breathing off of without doing that, you have no business diving independent doubles in the first place. Among other things, you should be monitoring your SPG on the tank you're breathing off of.

Dive the way that works for you ... but spare me the false rationalizations and back-handed comments about "solo diving" ... I team-dive regularly with independent doubles, as do the sidemount divers I dive with. Particularly my cave diving buddies ... I have yet to see a UTD sidemount system inside a cave.

... Bob (Grateful Diver)
 
Sorry Mike ... but a lot of your rationale sounds contrived to me.

Contrived? That's only the half of it, he didn't even mention having to alternate which tank you're breathing off by shutting one off and turning the other on.
 
First of all, I am very aware of the great things being achieved by divers diving on independent sidemount, I have chosen to [-]teach a clear methodology
and am now diving a sidemount z-system.[/-] drink the Kool-Aid.

That sytem comes with a clear methodology of how to dive it
congrats?
and with a set of skills that are....consistent with backmount
Not at all. If it were consistent with backmount, you wouldn't have to take a class to learn how to use it. If it were consistent, there wouldn't be additional skills. If it were consistent, there wouldn't be additional failure points.


1. I have no spare regulator in my pocket, I have an isolatable manifold, under a cover on my back.
Congrats, no spare reg. Neither do we. Isolatable manifold? Congrats on the additional failure points and lack of benefit.

2.I dive single cylinder also in a drysuit, I just dived single AL80 in Belgium during the winter.
(why do you think you can't?)
So can indy SM divers. Again....congrats?

3. I don't know how you can always donate from independent cylinders, except if you have 2 longhoses.
The whole world knows that the donating part is not the strongest point of indep. SM..that's why you need to feel what you have in your mouth.
No, with indy SM you just donate your long hose. Period. Always. "The whole world knows" is absolutely wrong. Only UTD Kool-Aid drinkers spew that kind of garbage. I always know what reg I'm breathing off of, and if something goes sideways I just hand over my long hose. Period. Whether I'm diving with SM, BM, or CCR....I know my fixes. One funny thing to mention: In indySM, there should be no way of being surprised by being OOA. In the UTD method, there is. Point there goes to indy.

In case of OOG or some other issue
IndySM has like 2 different responses....1) shut off post, 2) Donate longhose. Z-thing has a bunch of different options. Point goes to IndySM

a.You will have to think what you have in your mouth, not very effective... if **** hits the fan and it just did, you are having an OOG, it is without a doubt more effective to be able to donate 100% from your mouth..not 50%.
It's absolutely WITH a doubt that it's more effective that way. What's the difference in donating from mouth vs donating off the shoulder, considering shoulder isn't slower and shoulder reg was recently used. In my view, using both regs frequently prevents people from buying a cheap octo OR from diving with a defective octo w/o knowing.

b. If you are breathing of the shorthose and the OOG occurs.. you will have to look for a regulator, hope you will find it and yank on it and hope it will come off, if you are diving with cannister lights, multiple cylinders etc..this can become a challenge.
"Look for your regulator"??? I thought UTD claimed to be all DIR/Hogarthian?? If you have to "look for your regulator" you probably shouldn't be diving any advanced setup....certainly not with "multiple cylinders and canister lights." Having said that, if you're diving multiple cylinders, you should know that your long hose is NOT always the best answer. In the case of diving multiple cylinders (greater than 2), donating from your mouth is easiest if not on mains. Canister lights also should provide no issue.

Remember, I am into teamdiving, not into solo diving
I'm into team diving as well. I also solo dive when practicable. I have that flexibility. UTD? Not so much.

2nd..I am teacher..and teachers need materials and didactics.
Maybe you shouldn't be teaching if you NEED materials and didactics to teach. All of the instructors I've found either just parrot what an agency tells them without any thought because that's what's easiest and they don't TRULY understand the issues at hand, or the GOOD instructors understand ALL of the knowledge innately and follow agency guidelines only as far as they have to, but often exceed it with their own skill and knowledge. GUE, known for their parroting of identical verbiage, is also known for parroting every single bit of advice FOLLOWED BY SOUND REASONING, and every instructor can back up every single decision they make using their own logic.
 
I just saw that Kev capitalized "Long Hose Paradigm". That plus the "Instructor Andrew" thing is just
top notch.
 
Contrived? That's only the half of it, he didn't even mention having to alternate which tank you're breathing off by shutting one off and turning the other on.

Hey, c'mon now....CLEARLY rotating two knobs full-open to full-closed and full-closed to full-open is WAY easier and quicker than, y'know, switching regs.
 
Hey, c'mon now....CLEARLY rotating two knobs full-open to full-closed and full-closed to full-open is WAY easier and quicker than, y'know, switching regs.

I am trying to understand something here... If you have both tanks connected to the manifold would it be necessary to have one off? Why not have them both on and shut down when you need to?




Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
... In case of OOG or some other issue,

a.You will have to think what you have in your mouth, not very effective... if **** hits the fan and it just did, you are having an OOG, it is without a doubt more effective to be able to donate 100% from your mouth..not 50%.

I think this part of the argument is correct and should be acknowledged as such.

The OOG issue noted arose in my case during training. During cavern in Florida, I was diving SM single cylinder with 7' primary second stage always in my mouth (backup on a necklace). OOG was straightforward since I always donated the one I was breathing. My instructor sprung a bunch of those while I was task loaded. Not a problem.

During rescue diver training I had to use backmount (wouldn't allow SM) which was fine since again single cylinder with same configuration as above. OOG drills were no problem, always donating the one in my mouth.

During TDI AN/DP training, I was using two LP85s, long hose on second stage reg 1, and shorter hose (still looped around my neck) second stage reg 2 on necklace. I switch second stages at about 400 PSI difference. With fresh fills I always start out breathing from the long hose, but I was in a second dive breathing from the short hose as it had 300-400 PSI more remaining. Instructor sprung on OOG, I instinctively donated the one in my mouth which was long enough to do the OOG but clearly not good. Long hose sits on top of short hose, both looped around my neck, hence not a good situation.

In the second OOG sprung up on me (while breathing from the short hose), I almost donated the one I was breathing before awareness kicked in and I unclipped the long hose and OOG went fine. Well, except for the fact that it introduced a 4-6 second delay. In addition to awareness, in cold waters with thick gloves, unclipping is a tad more time consuming.

In subsequent OOGs, no problem.

But this needs practice. I did practice with sidemount, but for some reason it always happened to be scenarios where the long hose second stage was in my mouth. Hence clearly deficient (that is my practice). The backmount doubles guys always donate the long hose they're breathing, so, yes, it is an advantage in this regard. I have experienced it (thankfully) during training.

However, the reason why I don't think it's a critical disadvantage: It can be overcome with training/practice. I think the saying that "rigs don't kill divers, divers do" is correct. With any rig, you can screw things up if not sufficiently trained. The second argument is: despite the import of OOG, the incident stats seem to indicate that failure of a buddy to effectively execute OOG sharing is not a significant causal factor of fatalities. Buddies becoming separated, the solo diver encountering a problem (health issue, free flow, etc.), possibly panicking, leading to drowning seems to be predominant. As such, targeting the vast majority of problems (as in any safety endeavor) is the prudent thing to do. Kinda like the isolation valve in backmount manifolds where cave diving incidents indicate that it's not a useful safety device in practice (clearly useful in principle) and some argue a "failure point" (physical or due to human error) to be removed.

Let me qualify that I don't agree with UTD's (or GUE) somewhat dogmatic and, in a way, overly simplistic approach to safe dive rigging. I prefer sidemount for its many advantages and plan on diving SM only in both open water and overhead environments. However, there is nothing wrong in pointing out its disadvantages.
 
I am trying to understand something here... If you have both tanks connected to the manifold would it be necessary to have one off? Why not have them both on and shut down when you need to?

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With the Z-Manifold, the manifold is AFTER the first stage. So they're not sharing HP, they're sharing IP. That means if your IPs are set differently, there will be a pressure difference between the tanks and gas will flow from one tank to the other, backwards through the first stage. This could very quickly become very bad, especially with balanced and overbalanced regulators

With Independent SM, you DO leave both tanks on and just shut it down when you need to....kind of like with doubles......and you simply change regs (what, about 2 seconds tops?) when you want to switch tanks.

With the Z-Manifold, you HAVE to, by virtue of the location of the regs in the hosing, keep no more than one tank active at a time.....which takes MANY seconds, MUCH longer than the 2-sec reg switch. However, it's heralded as the "simpler solution" since you have no required reg switches.
 
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The OOG issue noted arose in my case during training. During cavern in Florida, I was diving SM single cylinder with 7' primary second stage always in my mouth (backup on a necklace). OOG was straightforward since I always donated the one I was breathing. My instructor sprung a bunch of those while I was task loaded. Not a problem.

I agree, and I have encountered the same situation training sidemount doubles in the Z. No matter what kind of cluster**** I was in the middle of, it was still a no-brainer to donate from my mouth, switch to the necklace and carry on.

As for the reality of OOG situations, the further you go in tech, the more likely some type of OOG scenario becomes with switching stages, deco bottles, toxing, etc. It's a quick and easy way to stay safe while you sort out a problem, if one should arise.

Yes, we do have to switch tanks in Z doubles, alternating every 500psi. As Vic mentions, it's because they won't drain evenly if the IP on the first stages doesn't exactly match, which it almost never does. Not as easy as a reg switch. Nobody said it was simpler. But I also find it good practice for valve drills, stage switches, etc.

Choosing a gear configuration is all about tradeoffs. I like the idea of donating from my mouth being a total no-brainer. I also like the flexibility the Z offers, and the ease of donning/ditching tanks in the water, on the fly. Singles, doubles, surface supplied ... I can switch between all of these without leaving the water.

Also when I don my tanks in the water, I don't get a squirt of water on my chest along with the first puff into my drysuit because I was able to connect the Z inflator before I jumped in. A minor thing, sure, but at this level we are all quibbling about the details.

I'm willing to accept the extra LP connections on my back and bottle switch routine in exchange for the benefits I get from the Z.
 
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