Which dives for AOW class?

[bdshort]

I'm planning on starting my AOW class in October. In addition to the Deep and Navigation dives, the LDS also requires the Night dive, so I have 2 electives. I'm looking for advice on which ones to take. Presently, I'm thinking the Search and Recovery class might be worthwhile, and either the Boat Dive or the Peak Performance Buoyancy. Should I look at others that folks here recommend?

Brian

 

[Code4medic]

My vote: Peak performance bouyancy. Some of the others wont matter if you keep bashing yourself into things.

 

[victor]

Yes do Buoyancy it is the most important.
Getting Buoyancy and trim right will make all your diving so much more enjoyable.
It should be compulsory.
Search and Recovery is also a good choice, but ask to do Buoyancy first. Search and Recovery is so much easier when your are not fighting your gear, bouncing off the bottom, etc.

 

[rhyz]

When I did my AOW, (I redid 4 of the dives becuase the weekend my old OW classmates did their dive I was there and just joined them) I did the:

Nav - 2 great skill and a basic one I think

Search and Recovery - 2 good one to know just to understand it and think it will go hand in hand with Rescue later on.

Night - 2 Did that because I love night diving and get you a totally different feel of a site than doing it during the day. Very cool.

Deep - 2 Well basic also as I'm doing some deeper wrecks.

Wreck - 1 Another good one if you like wrecks. I've done about 1/2 of all my dives on wreck and find them totally fascinating.

Peak Bouyancy - 1 Just because I think that is one of the most important basic skills to learn, and still practicing it trying to get everything right.

Just a list of the dive and reasons I did them for my AOW, hope it helps. Like my Instructors said you need 5 but can do as many as you like.

 

[300bar]

Do yourselff a favor take PPB+S&R buoyancy and some extra nav.skills is what you raely need
forget about the boat thats BULLS**T:shakehead

 

[Dive-aholic]

Definitely PPB. Boat isn't worth it. Especially if you're doing your dives off a boat anyway. Then you basically get the information for that dive anyway.

 

[jbd]

The search and recovery can be a good dive, involving team work while trying to attend to the other tasks of diving. Some search techniques involve the use of a compass along with other navigational techniques.

Whether or not you would gain much from the Peak Performance Bouyancy(PPB) class would depend on your prior training. Looking at your profile, it looks as though you are diving dry and I would expect that your instructor has you pretty squared away on bouyancy control, proper weighting and trim. If so PPB wouldn't really benefit you a lot. If not, it could benefit you a lot. Think about how you feel about this while UW and talk with your instructor and then decide.

You mentioned in one thread something about taking a camera on adive. If you have an interest in photography then maybe UW photography would be a good choice if you can find an knowledgable instructor or DM that can do that dive with you.

If you have an interest in wreck diving beyond just a sightseeing tour then maybe a well done external wreck survey would be interesting. This involves researching something about the wreck before doing the dive, finding out what caused the wreck etc, etc. During the dive you make note of the direction the wreck is lying on the bottom. What attitude it is in on the bottom, what condition it is in etc etc. After the dive you could make a simple map/sketch of the wreck site.

An environmental survey dive can be interesting. In this dive, you define a survey area which can be fairly small or kind of large and survey i.e ID and count the marine species in that defined area. One of the DM's on my first dives in the Fla Keys was involved in an ongoing large survey program of the Keys. Her information was turned into the project agency and was used to keep trzck of the health and well being of the Fla reef systems.

I agree with the others that Boat Diving is a waste of time no brainer.

Think about what your interests are and make decisions based on that.

 

[The Kraken]

Given that "deep" and "navigation" are required:

My suggestions . . . those three that will directly affect other aspects of your diving career;

1: Peak Performance Buoyancy... as so aptly stated above, keeps ya from bumping into things.

2: Search and Recover... helps you learn how to keep from silting up the place, also a very functional course

3: Night... helps you learn how to maintain a constant depth in less than perfect visibility conditions

the K

 

[bdshort]

Ok, thanks for the replies. I'll skip the boat diving. All the diving I've done so far is from shore, but I guess there really isn't too much to diving from a boat. When I was talking to the instructor at the LDS about the AOW class, she said they could work on buoyancy while doing some one on one dives, or just include that as an extra, so it sounds like I could pick one of the other dives. She recommended multilevel and computer diving, just so I can understand how to set up or record a multilevel profile, even though I do use a computer to dive.

So far then: Deep, Nav, Night, S&R, 1 more

Brian

 

[AevnsGrandpa]

Went up to Haigh Quarry in Illinois this last weekend with a bunch of OW cert students and did my 5 dives for AOW.

I agree with what all has been said, do Deep, Night, Nav and PPB. I wanted to do search and recovery but was told we didn't have enough people to do it (??) SO I ended up doing a DPV dive. Lots of fun but not worth too much to me in the long run. I was trying to pick things that would help with my diving.

It was a good time even though it rain cats, dogs, and ducks for 2 hours!

Jeff