What's with the UTD haters?

[Kevrumbo]

You have turn off the left and right valves intermittently to balance consumption between the 2 tanks. Unlike a manifolded doubles diver who swims around with all three valves open. If you forget, you use up one tank while the other remains full. Or worse if you leave them both open you use up one and then the other sequentially. Your buddy would never know and pretty much can't see your gauges, unlike with doubles where the (one) gauge is on a much longer hose and the whole thing can be shown to a buddy if need be.

The bigger question is: why are you diving in "mixed teams" at all? What benefit does having 2 widely different equipment configurations and valve/gas management requirements bring to the table?

I dive a conventional DIR/HOG set of doubles when I can, its simple and easy for nearly everyone to understand. When they don't fit or the hike is far to long to carry them, I dive sidemount. I dive a Hollis SMS100 with the "Edd" modifications. Hoses are as I set them up. Gas management like independent sidemount, which means for all practical purposed I can't run out. With your low pressure manifold you can go OOA (twice even).

As mentioned, you are not the only person donating a long hose to an OOA diver while in sidemount configuration. Although diving without that silly manifold actually decreases (to nearly nil) the probability of having a catastrophic gear failure which renders you OOQ in the first place. You have a lot more complicated crap back there which really doesn't add boo to "safety" despite all marketing claims to the contrary.

Because Richard . . .when GUE Instructor Trainer Kirill Egorov, who was beta testing a JJ CCR just happens to show up at the same time as I did in Truk last December, I know for a fact I'm perfectly compatible to dive with him and his Russian teammates with either my Z-system sidemount or conventional DIR/Hogarth backmount. [The Russian teammates didn't speak much English, but there was no problem communicating with them at all underwater with standard hand signals, and of course using the Metric System. . .]

 

[PfcAJ]

I think Trey wrote something about focusing on a single phobia while ignoring all else...

 

[ScubaInChicago]

Because Richard . . .when GUE Instructor Trainer Kirill Egorov, who was beta testing a JJ CCR just happens to show up at the same time as I did in Truk last December, I know for a fact I'm perfectly compatible to dive with him and his Russian teammates with either my Z-system sidemount or conventional DIR/Hogarth backmount. [The Russians teammates didn't speak much English, but there was no problem communicating at all underwater with standard hand signals and the Metric System. . .]

Are you saying you were one of Kirill's teammates or one of his Russian teammates teammate?

 

[Kevrumbo]

Are you saying you were one of Kirill's teammates or one of his Russian teammates teammate?

Yes to both: teammates with Kirill & the JJ CCR and Truk Stop Dive Mgr Rob McGann on Open Circuit doubles, on the San Francisco and Aikoku Maru wrecks; and his other buddies on Open Circuit (and me on Z-system sidemount) diving the Shinkoku Maru Tanker.

Nice fellow . . .left his TLS350 Drysuit gratis with the Truk Lagoon Dive Center/Truk Stop Hotel (the diveguides didn't want it and it fit me --so I traded a canister light for it!)

 

[gearhound]

This really is true.

Something tells me KevRumbo will chime in soon with Truk references. 5....4.....3.....2....

Hahaha!

Kev, You're too much! You crack me up! I love it! It's like you're compensating for...well, I better not say.

Anyway, I think a lot of us got our start in backmount and were rigged Hogarthian. I'm not sure where you think it came from, but it has it's roots in cave diving and was adopted as the universal way to Tec dive. It's what DIR is based on. So GUE/UTD are not the founders or the only people diving this way. I think many divers are aware and practice these procedures.

One of the tenets of Tec diving is to be self sufficient. However, if someone came up to me whether in backmount, sidemount or ccr and signalled out of air, I would donate a long hose just like I learned in backmount. No new skills to learn. I'm not sure why you think that you absolutely need a manifold on your back to be able to donate a long hose.

What's your procedure for switching gases? Do you have to plug in the new gas into the system? Is that an extra step? Do you have to unplug both bottles before hooking up your new one? Or do you notox switch like the regular tec divers? I'm assuming you still confirm your buddies gas after the switch. How do you know which bottle he's breathing from? Now, I'm not sure of the procedures for you. But more than one of you have said that this is one of the advantages of the QC6 system, that you just plug in the new gas. If it is, how does your buddy confirm your gas? I just trace the hose back to the tank that he's breathing from, but you're hooked up to a system with two tanks.

 

[Kevrumbo]

Hahaha!

Kev, You're too much! You crack me up! I love it! It's like you're compensating for...well, I better not say.

Anyway, I think a lot of us got our start in backmount and were rigged Hogarthian. I'm not sure where you think it came from, but it has it's roots in cave diving and was adopted as the universal way to Tec dive. It's what DIR is based on. So GUE/UTD are not the founders or the only people diving this way. I think many divers are aware and practice these procedures.

One of the tenets of Tec diving is to be self sufficient. However, if someone came up to me whether in backmount, sidemount or ccr and signalled out of air, I would donate a long hose just like I learned in backmount. No new skills to learn. I'm not sure why you think that you absolutely need a manifold on your back to be able to donate a long hose.

What's your procedure for switching gases? Do you have to plug in the new gas into the system? Is that an extra step? Do you have to unplug both bottles before hooking up your new one? Or do you notox switch like the regular tec divers? I'm assuming you still confirm your buddies gas after the switch. How do you know which bottle he's breathing from? Now, I'm not sure of the procedures for you. But more than one of you have said that this is one of the advantages of the QC6 system, that you just plug in the new gas. If it is, how does your buddy confirm your gas? I just trace the hose back to the tank that he's breathing from, but you're hooked up to a system with two tanks.

Doing switches to deco gases conventionally -I prefer not to configure my deco bottles with the QC6 while traveling just yet (that probably will change though: I just bought a UTD MX KISS mCCR Rebreather today so in order to stay on the Loop nominally, I'm gonna have to learn the procedure of plugging in deco gases via QC6).

And yah! --four separate trips in 12 months to Truk along with an expedition to the Atomic Fleet at Bikini Atoll-- it was an epic tour last year!

 

[gearhound]

Oooh! That's awesome Kev! You must have all the girls on those internet chat lines lining up to date you! You must own a Ferrari jacket too.

Just so you know, having more gear doesn't make you a better diver...being a better diver makes you a better diver.

So that is the way you do gas switches? How does that make you compatible with DIR/GUE? And do you have to isolate then to do a gas switch? Can one of the UTD instructors answer this. I'm not trying to be facetious, I'd really like to know how the gas switch is done in sidemount. I remember seeing AG saying that you just plug the gas in.

 

[Kevrumbo]

Oooh! That's awesome Kev! You must have all the girls on those internet chat lines lining up to date you! You must own a Ferrari jacket too.

Just so you know, having more gear doesn't make you a better diver...being a better diver makes you a better diver.

So that is the way you do gas switches? How does that make you compatible with DIR/GUE? And do you have to isolate then to do a gas switch? Can one of the UTD instructors answer this. I'm not trying to be facetious, I'd really like to know how the gas switch is done in sidemount. I remember seeing AG saying that you just plug the gas in.

Actually going to places overseas and diving with different divers internationally (implies being Metrically competent also) --makes you a better diver.

Same standard deco bottle set-up and procedure -with the option of an additional QC6 male and a 1st stage port OPV with Omni inline shut-off valve for the auxiliary second stage reg. Swap out/disconnect left side bottom mix tank, plug in deco bottle, turn on tank cylinder valve of deco bottle. Turn off tank cylinder valve of right side bottom mix. Or just use the auxiliary reg for a conventional switch/deco bottle share or hand-off in case a teammate on conventional backmount has a loss of deco gas contingency.

Easy overview enough to understand "un-facetious" gearhound?

 

[gearhound]

Actually going to places overseas and diving with different divers internationally (implies being Metrically competent also) --makes you a better diver.

Same standard deco bottle set-up and procedure -with the option of an additional QC6 male and a 1st stage port OPV with Omni inline shut-off valve for the auxiliary second stage reg. Swap out/disconnect left side bottom mix tank, plug in deco bottle, turn on tank cylinder valve of deco bottle. Turn off tank cylinder valve of right side bottom mix. Or just use the auxiliary reg for a conventional switch/deco bottle share or hand-off in case a teammate on conventional backmount has a loss of deco gas contingency.

Easy overview enough to understand "un-facetious" gearhound?

So you guys don't have a standardized procedure for a gas switch? Aren't you guys harping about how much of a team you are and how others suck because they're allowed options? And so much for the Tec principal of KISS.

I apologize if I was being facetious, but at least that beats being pompous.

Btw, I live in Canada where we use the metric system. I didn't realize that made me superior.

 

[SanDiegoSidemount]

So you guys don't have a standardized procedure for a gas switch?

Yes, it's on page 57-60 of the UTD Student and Diver Procedures Manual, right after the standard procedure for doing a gas switch with a backmount system. It's described in excruciating detail, right down to the expected hand signals, MOD confirmation, flow checks, buddy responsibilities and buddy positioning.