Why are jacket style BCD's the most common??

[loosenit2]

Hogarthian straps are not a requirement for BP/W. Just an extra secure aspect of it. One can use adjustable shoulder straps or rollers at the hip to let the waist/shoulder strap slide freely. I'd think one plate fits most, and the ruggedness of BP/W would be an operating cost advantage. Certainly I'd read of some independent instructors using them to cut down the number of BC sizes they needed to stock.

Absolutely true. Now let’s see if the BP\W warriors acknowledge that anything but hogarthian harnesses exist. I’ve had a few folks on SB try to tell me that deluxe harnesses were just an attempt to grab cash by manufacturers and that no one really used them. If you really want to make BP/Ws an industry standard it will be necessary to give up some of the purity of their origin and recognize that there are competing business requirements.

 

[wetb4igetinthewater]

Absolutely true. Now let’s see if the BP\W warriors acknowledge that anything but hogarthian harnesses exist. I’ve had a few folks on SB try to tell me that deluxe harnesses were just an attempt to grab cash by manufacturers and that no one really used them. If you really want to make BP/Ws an industry standard it will be necessary to give up some of the purity of their origin and recognize that there are competing business requirements.

That is a fair point. There is still the crotch strap, but now we are talking about 1 adjustment instead of 3.

 

[TMHeimer]

It is what most if not all dive shops use as part of their rental fleet. Students use them for their classes so they learn on them and are comfortable in it and familiar with it. That is probably what they want to buy when they are ready to buy because that is probably all they know and have tried. Shops stock what people want. That helps turnover in inventory, not stocking things people may not want to buy. Shops tend to use the jacket style in their rental fleet because of how they make someone feel at the surface when they may be a bit more nervous and inflate them all the way full. There are probably a lot on the market at lower price points which lends itself to better ROIs. It probably offers the students a more secure feeling to have the entire air bladder wrapped around the them, similar to how a flotation device or a life jacket might feel around them.

This makes a lot of sense. I'm not gunna read the rest of the posts since I always used a jacket since OW, know nothing of BP/W other than what I read, am comfortable with the same old jacket from day 1, and really can't afford to buy something else when this works fine.

 

[wetb4igetinthewater]

This makes a lot of sense. I'm not gunna read the rest of the posts since I always used a jacket since OW, know nothing of BP/W other than what I read, am comfortable with the same old jacket from day 1, and really can't afford to buy something else when this works fine.

Hold on! You've been diving a while. Given that jacket style BCDs will kill you, how have you cheated death for so long?

 

[CAPTAIN SINBAD]

I'll play.

You can either make a surface flotation device that will float a panic stricken person on the surface or you can make a buoyancy compensation device that will compensate for buoyancy at depth. You can not do both. Jacket style is designed more as a flotation device and less as a buoyancy compensator. This means that if you are an instructor handling a group of new students then having them all in a life-jacket makes group management easier. People's heads are two feet out of the water and waves are not splashing into their face so you have less of a workload of calming people as an instructor. Think of it as a bike with training wheels. It is not meant for optimum efficiency but instructor can insure that you will not fall and kill yourself.

If you are running a resort or a dive shop and you wish to stock rental inventory then getting jacket BCDs in a variety of sizes makes the job of refitting the group much quicker and easier than a back plate and wing. BP-wing need to be adjusted to each body type and if a group of 12 walks in to rent your shop then adjusting the Hogathian rig to each person would take a long time.

BP-Wing is more ownership friendly and not at all rental friendly.

Once we train divers in a jacket then they purchase the same thing. Ultimately, this results in a culture of diving where training / rental friendly gear is the most widely owned gear. As I look back into my earlier days of diving, it was scubaboard that opened my eyes to BP Wing. LDS did not carry it so I had to order online. It came unassembled so I took it to the LDS for help in assembly. None of the staff knew how to thread it so I was referred to a tech instructor who put it for me.

 

[lowwall]

The answer to the original question is: Scubapro.

The big S essentially built the retail dive industry as is existed in the late 60s through the millennium. They would only sell through dive shops that offered instruction and they made it easy for dive shops to use them as they had a complete line of gear, good terms, excellent quality, new products each year (they had the biggest engineering department in the industry) and fixed pricing that discouraged cross-shopping. They were also professionals in an industry where a lot of the smaller players were a bit flakey. If you are running a busy dive shop, you do not want to deal with a bunch of people who can't be depended on to deliver product when you need it or who won't answer the phone if you have a problem.

What's this have to do with jackets? Well, Scubapro literally invented the jacket bcd with wrap around air cells. It was called the Stabilizing Jacket, which is why old timers still call that style a "stab jacket". It was a real improvement for basic dive instruction (if not for actual diving), because it made new students comfortable on the surface during those critical first couple of days where most course dropouts happen. Eventually these divers naturally bought what they'd been trained in.

Also before the web became widespread, the only sources of info for new divers was the LDS and dive magazines. Scubapro was the 800 pound gorilla in the magazine world too. They were the biggest advertiser in the industry and they famously refused to buy ads in publications that accepted ads from companies selling basic gear direct to the consumer. The claimed this was for safety since they didn't want untrained divers to get equipment, but it certainly didn't escape Scubapro's notice that the biggest chunk of gear sales from dive shops was of their products. To keep Scubapro and the handful of other major advertisers happy, the magazines made little to no mention of non-mainstream kit. If you weren't personally acquainted with a cave or wreck diver in the 80s or 90s, it's unlikely you'd ever even hear of a BP/W.

It was the internet, especially forums like this one, that finally started to change this. All of a sudden you could find out about different approaches and then go to the websites of the small companies or individuals making the gear and buy it directly.

 

[pauldw]

I'll play.

And you won!

They were the biggest advertiser in the industry and they famously refused to buy ads in publications that accepted ads from companies selling basic gear direct to the consumer.

Tidbits like this endlessly fascinate me. I've never understood how the dive industry works, and the workings of dive shops have never made much sense to me. This is really interesting, and informative. What else ya got?

 

[MichaelMc]

You can either make a surface flotation device that will float a panic stricken person on the surface or you can make a buoyancy compensation device that will compensate for buoyancy at depth.

It being the more easily managed bet for divers of unknown skill and nervousness seems the stronger part of this argument than the sizing argument. On sizing speed, you could stock BP/Ws with strap lengths suited already to S, M, L, XL, and with adjustable straps to boot. But the keep them calm, argument is hard to refute.

Unless you went to the extreme of a wing that wraps around to the front, which seems a tad silly of an approach. It is an idea though. Maybe an extra add on that screws onto the rear dump valve as an air source attachment point. It does add a significant extra failure point though. Plus the need to decide which customers get the slim wing or also the extra float bladder. Not a very serious thought, but an interesting one.

lowwall's history seems plausible.

 

[pauldw]

Unless you went to the extreme of a wing that wraps around to the front,...

In other words, a hybrid BC? Which Mares and other make, but they don't seem to be best sellers.

 

[MichaelMc]

In other words, a hybrid BC?

More to still be modular, but having a wing with extra buoyancy extending to the front sides that you can swap for a regular wing once you no longer need it. Not likely to work in practice. It makes the training/nervous lift rather obvious. Some that need it might not want to seem to need it. Renting jackets makes everyone renting have it. Unless you bring your own. Thus, a bit, proving you don't need the extra front side lift.

All of that is unlikely to happen. And a bit impractical. Rentals offering a few BP/W's might be an option. Why they would, I'm not sure for business, beyond some clients would want it. For good training, some here seem to feel they have the advantage.