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Crunkjuice posted:This is better than either of those you linked http://www.dorcy.com/p-163-41-0467-220-lumen-dive-ii.aspx . It's still in the backup light category, but it will work fine for your AOW class. Its my current backup and a lot of tec divers i know carry them as their backups. Walmart has the older 180 lumen version for 42 bucks online, but the 220 i linked is their current model. I have two of these as my backups and I can vouch for them. Solid little lights. Tovatec has a similar one as well.
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May 16, 2013 16:36
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pupdive posted:I had a thing about that, but a student, who knew defog went on the inside, say that defog on the outside helps when walking to the entry with a mask on.
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May 16, 2013 18:41
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Trivia posted:If you have time, take a flight / ferry to Japan, then another flight / ferry to Okinawa. Diving is an expensive sport, especially if you go overseas. As for close, warm waters with nice wildlife, Okinawa is the place that springs to mind (at least for your situation). raffie posted:I've heard of diving at Jeju island, off the southern coast. Or grab a cheap flight out to southeast asia. Thanks for these. For Japan/SEA, is language a problem? I can speak Korean fine and Jeju won't be a problem, but I am wondering if I'll run into a language barrier in Okinawa/SEA. Also, since it was on the last page: Archer2338 posted:tl;dr: Tried OW in east ocast of Korea, sucked. Looking for good alternatives/warmer water in Korea/nearby.
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May 16, 2013 20:47
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Well, you always have to do your homework, and anywhere you go to dive will surely have English speaking guides (except maybe Japan, I'm not sure though). I've been diving in Thailand, Maldives, Palau, Malaysia, and the Philippines, and have never once had communications problems. A lot of the operators there hire lots of foreign guides. You'll meet people from all over Europe, as well as locals. English is pretty much lingua franca for operators, so it won't really be a problem.
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May 17, 2013 00:37
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Jeju has ok diving if you like black volcanic rock and no fish. Take this from another waygook; get on an air Asia flight to Thailand, Gulf of Andaman owns.
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May 17, 2013 01:11
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Loving Africa Chaps posted:I've heard the amount of fishing on the reefs exploded with the revolution and tons of previously pristine reefs are now covered in fishing line. Good reason to head further south. My wife and I dived in Eilat about a month ago. It was surprisingly good. Huge variety, almost as much as the GBR, and very easy beach entries (we usually dive in Sydney where the beach entries are a pain). According to the locals they got rid of fish farms and the whole beach strip was declared a reserve. If you're in the area, I'd definitely recommend it.
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May 17, 2013 02:50
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MA-Horus posted:Jeju has ok diving if you like black volcanic rock and no fish. Going to the Surin and Similan Islands is great. You don't have to do liveaboards, but I'd highly recommend it. I think I went with Princess Divers (or something, can't remember). Do a search for Similan liveaboards and you'll be fine. Four days of diving, 15 total dives was about $600 bucks, but that was a few years ago. If you're lucky you might find a similar deal. You had better like diving and nothing else though, since there's not much else to do except read. You wake up, eat a small breakfast of coffee and toast, then dive. Come up, eat big breakfast, sleep, then dive an hour later. Then come up, eat lunch, dive again. Do your last dive, then eat again. Then you promptly pass out. Liveaboards are nothing but eating and diving (and it's awesome).
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May 17, 2013 03:03
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Archer2338 posted:Thanks for these. For Japan/SEA, is language a problem? I can speak Korean fine and Jeju won't be a problem, but I am wondering if I'll run into a language barrier in Okinawa/SEA. English is the de facto official language for any area with diving in Southeast Asia.
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May 17, 2013 05:05
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So I made a pony bottle powered vomit rig that is 100% concealed in my rig, with vomit being creamed corn/oatmeal/food coloring coming out a hose in my hood for when I surface panicking. It will be good.
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May 18, 2013 05:44
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Crunkjuice posted:So I made a pony bottle powered vomit rig that is 100% concealed in my rig, with vomit being creamed corn/oatmeal/food coloring coming out a hose in my hood for when I surface panicking. It will be good. 
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May 18, 2013 05:50
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Mr.AARP posted:Also, if you're serious about continuing night diving I would highly recommend one of the DRIS lights. I have their 1k shorty with the goodman glove and couldn't be happier. I am looking the shorty and also the DRIS 1000 regular. Anyone have thoughts on the regular one, especially versus the shorty?
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May 18, 2013 15:03
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Crunkjuice posted:So I made a pony bottle powered vomit rig that is 100% concealed in my rig, with vomit being creamed corn/oatmeal/food coloring coming out a hose in my hood for when I surface panicking. It will be good. Projectile Vomit!
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May 19, 2013 03:09
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We're committed on our AOW next week in St. Lucia, and there was a limited set of elective dives we could do, so we are doing Aware Fish ID, PPB, and wreck. The other two possibles were drift and boat, both of which we have done a lot of so this seemed like the best option. I know wreck probably won't be anything special, since we've been through several wrecks (including an airplane in Turks and Caicos), but it was better than boat and drift. Anyway, looking forward to adding a cert! Deep dive seems like a thing we've done with wall dives in Bimini and Turks and Caicos, but cool. Navigation will be good since we know compass and landmark navigation, but I am looking forward to learning current/tide navigation. And as dumb as this sounds, fish ID is the one I am most excited about. I love seeing all the reef life and hate that I end up googling what they are with stupid rear end search terms.
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May 20, 2013 01:45
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Complete success. We had a few good surprises for them. While they were on a "break" there was an emergency in water they had to deal with they were completely unprepared for. My puke rig worked perfectly, it gurgled everything out nicely and made a big ol mess in the water and freaked out the student. I had it hooked up to a spare inflator hose missing its schrader valve, connected to a sprinkler valve i pulled off one of my air cannons, connected to a bunch of pvc tube i had coiled between my wetsuit/bcd filled with the "puke". We had a bag or two of fake blood coming out of ears after surfacing while a diver yelled "WHAT" a lot, making them have to calm them down/take control without verbal commands. A few gear malfunctions underwater that made for some interesting panicked diver scenarios. The best was when they were in the middle of towing the two unresponsive divers/exiting/doing cpr, i went over to the next pavillion and recruited some actors from another class to be our unruly crowd. "THATS MY HUSBAND, NO THATS MY BOYFRIEND!! I SAW THIS IN A MOVIE ONCE LET ME HELP" etc, etc, and had about 8 people interfering with the rescue forcing them to delegate someone to crowd control. One of our actors had a "heart attack", stretching 4 students to 3 victims, task loading them like hell. We had cpr dummies so they had to rotate CPR providers when they got tired, as "emergency services" wouldn't arrive for 15 minutes (a rough estimate of how long its taken them to show up before according to the park owner). We also had both instructors kids wailing about their dead dads, making for a very theatric setting. They were all white with stress/exhaustion at the end of their last scenario. They all loved it. They failed a bunch at the beginning since they all immediately went into "individual rescue/show the instructors my technique" mode rather than stopping and thinking how to manage an incident before chucking on dive gear and getting it together on the fly. Once they learned to work as a team, delegate tasks, they became MUCH better rescuers very quickly, and they all knew it too. We all went out after dinner and they all picked up our tabs, thanked us for a memorable course and went our separate ways. I know one of the crowd had a camera out taping it, so i'll see if i can't track down what shop that was and get video to show you guys. It was a hoot. Man i've missed teaching rescue classes.
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May 20, 2013 01:48
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Sounds like fun to me! This is a thing I need to do for DM right? Looking forward to it.
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May 20, 2013 01:54
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Crunkjuice posted:Fun Rescue Stuff Man that sounds much more intense than anything I've had to deal with on a rescue course! Good job! I've got a question/scenario about dive guiding and group management when you have more than one potentially vulnerable student. I guided two group dives yesterday, including an absolutely lovely old lady who was in her late 70's (!). The first dive was fine, with the old lady and two other very competent divers (an AOW with 500 dives and a visiting Japanese master instructor who was just there as a customer). when it was time to ascend from 28 metres, the old lady just couldn't do it, she was kicking up, with a bit of air in her bcd, but wasn't actually going anywhere, so I brought her up, controlled the ascent (she also wasn't venting) kept hold of her during the safety stop and it was all good. The second dive I had the same three, but also four more newly qualified open water divers, including a guy who was an air hog. I briefed them all on the surface to stay with me, and asked the two more experienced divers in the group if they would mind keeping an eye on people too. We had a very fun dive, checked out some small swimthroughs and easy open caves at around 16 metres. It was all good. I checked one of the inexperienced guys air - he had 140 bar after 35 mins. I then asked the air hog guy, and he was down to 60! Time to ascend. I asked the instructor underwater to watch the rest of the group, and I ascended, same deal as before, taking the old lady with me. Of course by the time I'd swum over to get the old lady, the air hog guy had already ascended - I suspect he omitted his safety stop, but I'm not sure and the other inexperienced guy who had lots of air was swimming off, followed by the experienced diver and the instructor. After my ascent and having gotten the old lady out of the water, I stayed in waiting for the others to return. The instructor and the experienced guy show up at the boat and then about 5 mins later the inexperienced guy and his buddy surface away from the boat - it was fine, but they had separated underwater. I guess I'm thinking, was I right to let them stay down on their own, or should I have brought the whole group up early due to one guys heavy breathing?
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May 20, 2013 02:58
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Crunkjuice posted:Complete success. We had a few good surprises for them. While they were on a "break" there was an emergency in water they had to deal with they were completely unprepared for. My puke rig worked perfectly, it gurgled everything out nicely and made a big ol mess in the water and freaked out the student. I had it hooked up to a spare inflator hose missing its schrader valve, connected to a sprinkler valve i pulled off one of my air cannons, connected to a bunch of pvc tube i had coiled between my wetsuit/bcd filled with the "puke". We had a bag or two of fake blood coming out of ears after surfacing while a diver yelled "WHAT" a lot, making them have to calm them down/take control without verbal commands. A few gear malfunctions underwater that made for some interesting panicked diver scenarios. Wow. I wish we had a class that awesome in SoCal.
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May 20, 2013 03:58
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Tomberforce posted:Man that sounds much more intense than anything I've had to deal with on a rescue course! Good job! (This is a great case study.) There is never any one right way, and I think you did great with it, handling things just right all the way around as they happened. I tend to brief wildly mixed teams beforehand that ascent does not have to happen as a group, and as certified divers they need to be able to handle going up by themselves. If that gives any of them pause, then I just let them know they are going up with me, and we are sticking as a group. That lets everyone know whether and how they may split (or may not split up) underwater. I got lost on the count there, but it sounds like Mr. Japanese Man, and AOW-500 went off with a buddy pair of rookies. Then there should have Air Hog and his buddy, and Little Old Lady going up with you, right? That's how I get 7 (3 from the first, 4 for the second). Air Hog needs to learn how to ascend early anyhow because he probably will be doing it alot. I would use the situation to remind him that we use less air shallower, so if he ascends sooner, he can spend time shallower, and still be in the water as long as everyone else. For some guys, unless they process and act on that advice, they wil just continue to run low and jet straight up to the surface, because they do not think they have a better option. Are you an instructor or a DM?
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May 20, 2013 04:48
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pupdive posted:(This is a great case study.) I'm a DM, well technically still a DMT, but at the very end of a long internship - I've signed off everything except the mapping project. It was my first time guiding without an on staff instructor assessing me in the water. Yeah your understanding is basically right, Air Hog had an inexperienced buddy who came up with us, but she was fairly peripheral to my worries so I don't think I mentioned her. We started ascending together, but the Old Lady, who still had plenty of air couldn't ascend with us, so I went to get her to bring her up myself as I knew it would take time to bring her up and I couldn't leave her down there without me. While I was doing that I think Air Hog ascended to the surface because bringing Old lady up I expected to see him on the ascent line, doing his safety stop, but he wasn't there! Yeah that's a good idea mentioning about gas usage and depth, I didn't think of that at the time - I'm sure he'll learn eventually! I find that I'm always shocked how much air I use when I'm guiding people who actually need it (as opposed to just guiding experienced divers who I don't need to worry about). My air consumption is normally excellent, but I guess I just find guiding stressful. Constantly looking back and trying to keep track of everyone in your group in the water, especially when there are lots of other divers in the water and the vis isn't that good is pretty hard!!
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May 20, 2013 12:27
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Crunkjuice posted:Complete success. We had a few good surprises for them. While they were on a "break" there was an emergency in water they had to deal with they were completely unprepared for. My puke rig worked perfectly, it gurgled everything out nicely and made a big ol mess in the water and freaked out the student. I had it hooked up to a spare inflator hose missing its schrader valve, connected to a sprinkler valve i pulled off one of my air cannons, connected to a bunch of pvc tube i had coiled between my wetsuit/bcd filled with the "puke". We had a bag or two of fake blood coming out of ears after surfacing while a diver yelled "WHAT" a lot, making them have to calm them down/take control without verbal commands. A few gear malfunctions underwater that made for some interesting panicked diver scenarios. I sure wish I had access to training of this quality around me. Nice work, man. 
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May 20, 2013 16:26
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Tomberforce posted:I find that I'm always shocked how much air I use when I'm guiding people who actually need it (as opposed to just guiding experienced divers who I don't need to worry about). My air consumption is normally excellent, but I guess I just find guiding stressful. Constantly looking back and trying to keep track of everyone in your group in the water, especially when there are lots of other divers in the water and the vis isn't that good is pretty hard!! Wait till you get to instructor work and have do the ascent skills CESA (and, depending on scheduling Alt Ascent). I can pretty routinely blow through half a tank getting a class of 8-10 done with just those two skills.
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May 20, 2013 19:35
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So I got two words for you guys.... Heli UM!! I have started diving helium on all my dives pretty much regardless how shallow its very compelling stuff. I find the breathing to be so much easier its quite amazing. Does anybody else also love the effect helium has after the dive? I mean it might just be due to my rebreather and partial pressures but I come up feeling like I havent even dove after 3 hours its NUTS. Note: Costs me about 2$ per dive
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May 20, 2013 20:02
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Love the pictures in the thread. I just signed up for my OW class and picked up my fins, mask and snorkel, have never seen my bank account dwindle so fast.
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May 20, 2013 23:02
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Haha, there's more to come, a wet suit for example. But every additional piece of equipment you buy is one less you need to rent so while there can be a big investment up front it pays off over the long term. Not to mention it's so much better diving with your own gear.
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May 21, 2013 00:35
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Unimpressed posted:Haha, there's more to come, a wet suit for example. But every additional piece of equipment you buy is one less you need to rent so while there can be a big investment up front it pays off over the long term. Not to mention it's so much better diving with your own gear. Yes Sir, I spent 4 hours soldering stuff the other day 0_o *scary* *scary* LOL But yeah owning your own gear is great unless you leave it in another country HAHAHA.. Yes I did that 
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May 21, 2013 01:12
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SlicerDicer posted:Yes Sir, I spent 4 hours soldering stuff the other day 0_o Well, assuming you took it there to go diving, maybe it was your subliminal consciousness telling you should go back What were you soldering though? Sounds like something more complicated than regular dive gear.
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May 21, 2013 02:21
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Unimpressed posted:What were you soldering though? Sounds like something more complicated than regular dive gear. Its a modified mark 15 rebreather, I tore out the factory horseshoe board and replaced it with one from Laguna Research, by doing this I have isolated sides and two independent computers for setting my setpoint. The oxygen sensors attach to this board and allow me to know what I am breathing so essentially its the heart of my breather and I was having issues with some old potting compound. Apparently some RTV silicones can actually cause issues with corrosion? At anyrate I got what I needed a MG Chemicals Connector Coating that is inert resists sunlight, alkaline/acidic environments, moisture, tearing etc. Essentially I have to be my own repair center and sometimes that means soldering my crap back together LOL
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May 21, 2013 05:10
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SlicerDicer posted:Its a modified mark 15 rebreather, I tore out the factory horseshoe board and replaced it with one from Laguna Research, by doing this I have isolated sides and two independent computers for setting my setpoint. The oxygen sensors attach to this board and allow me to know what I am breathing so essentially its the heart of my breather and I was having issues with some old potting compound. Apparently some RTV silicones can actually cause issues with corrosion? At anyrate I got what I needed a MG Chemicals Connector Coating that is inert resists sunlight, alkaline/acidic environments, moisture, tearing etc. Essentially I have to be my own repair center and sometimes that means soldering my crap back together LOL You are the Tony Stark of tec diving. I thought i was badass servicing my own regs/bcd but no, here you go repairing a goddamn rebreather.
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May 21, 2013 05:37
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SlicerDicer posted:Its a modified mark 15 rebreather, I tore out the factory horseshoe board and replaced it with one from Laguna Research, by doing this I have isolated sides and two independent computers for setting my setpoint. The oxygen sensors attach to this board and allow me to know what I am breathing so essentially its the heart of my breather and I was having issues with some old potting compound. Apparently some RTV silicones can actually cause issues with corrosion? At anyrate I got what I needed a MG Chemicals Connector Coating that is inert resists sunlight, alkaline/acidic environments, moisture, tearing etc. Essentially I have to be my own repair center and sometimes that means soldering my crap back together LOL Could you make a post (in this thread or your shark thread) detailing just how you got into rebreather diving/advanced tec diving? I feel like it would be really informative and entertaining to see the process of going from open circuit to, as Crunkjuice very accurately puts it, the Tony Stark of tec diving.
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May 21, 2013 06:20
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SlicerDicer posted:Its a modified mark 15 rebreather, I tore out the factory horseshoe board and replaced it with one from Laguna Research, by doing this I have isolated sides and two independent computers for setting my setpoint. The oxygen sensors attach to this board and allow me to know what I am breathing so essentially its the heart of my breather and I was having issues with some old potting compound. Apparently some RTV silicones can actually cause issues with corrosion? At anyrate I got what I needed a MG Chemicals Connector Coating that is inert resists sunlight, alkaline/acidic environments, moisture, tearing etc. Essentially I have to be my own repair center and sometimes that means soldering my crap back together LOL So, I didn't understand anything you wrote, and had to look up a Wikipedia article about rebreathers. It was very interesting and sounds cool, if a bit dangerous. I gather you do this for tec diving?
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May 21, 2013 06:26
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Mr.AARP posted:Could you make a post (in this thread or your shark thread) detailing just how you got into rebreather diving/advanced tec diving? I feel like it would be really informative and entertaining to see the process of going from open circuit to, as Crunkjuice very accurately puts it, the Tony Stark of tec diving. Click this link and start reading http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3467420&userid=169627
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May 21, 2013 07:05
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Unimpressed posted:Haha, there's more to come, a wet suit for example. But every additional piece of equipment you buy is one less you need to rent so while there can be a big investment up front it pays off over the long term. Not to mention it's so much better diving with your own gear. Yeah, although since I am a very fat man finding a BCD that fits through rental places may be hard, so that is probably the next piece I buy. Or I could just lose the weight. Gindack fucked around with this message at 07:15 on May 21, 2013 |
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May 21, 2013 07:05
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Frogmanv2 posted:Click this link and start reading Are you some kind of WIZARD? how did you make all my posts in one shot? I am now scared Mr.AARP posted:Could you make a post (in this thread or your shark thread) detailing just how you got into rebreather diving/advanced tec diving? I feel like it would be really informative and entertaining to see the process of going from open circuit to, as Crunkjuice very accurately puts it, the Tony Stark of tec diving. Yes I suppose I can give some backstory behind that in my shark thread I will be diving with sharks again tomorrow so once I am done I will update it. Crunkjuice posted:You are the Tony Stark of tec diving. I thought i was badass servicing my own regs/bcd but no, here you go repairing a goddamn rebreather. Here is the electronics before installed  Some assembly may be required?    Time to pot it in black goo!  ITS ALIVE!!!! Green is good right?  For those who are curious this was old potting compound. I just showed you my pink bits! You can see how it was corroding the circuitboard. 
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May 21, 2013 08:13
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Gindack posted:Love the pictures in the thread. I just signed up for my OW class and picked up my fins, mask and snorkel, have never seen my bank account dwindle so fast. Wait until you get married.
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May 21, 2013 08:15
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SlicerDicer posted:So I got two words for you guys.... Heli (I know pretty much zero about rebreathers. Are you diving straight Heliox? Are there rebreathers that do just helium and oxygen
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May 21, 2013 08:43
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SlicerDicer posted:Are you some kind of WIZARD? how did you make all my posts in one shot? I am now scared Lets go with wizard, because it sounds better than "dude who knows what the little ? under your name does"
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May 21, 2013 12:48
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I was on a LOB trip (leaving from Singapore to dive along the east coast of Malaysia) this weekend and the diving was great, then on Sunday just as we finished our last dive the trip turned to poo poo. The boat got detained by Malaysian authorities and we were held overnight for "illegal diving" because the Sultan of Johor had thrown a hissyfit. Full story from the operator posted on scubaboard: http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/malaysia-singapore/455168-diving-johor-sultan-truly-malaysian-experience.html
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May 21, 2013 13:28
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I just got back from diving North Carolina. It was my first trip down there and definitely won't be the last. Loved the diving down there. I've never that many sand tiger sharks before. On the USCGC Spar and the Aeolus there must have been seriously 75-100+ sand tiger sharks. If you looked in the sand they kept going on and on.. Most of the wrecks are in 110-120ft range. I did some short deco on all dives but most other people in the group were diving the wrecks with Nitrox 30% with an HP100/HP120 and a pony bottle. Long boat rides (2-2.5 hours). Here's a quick clip of the sand tiger sharks. I have about 3-4 hours of video I need to edit. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQIHBI5Lndw
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May 21, 2013 21:34
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Awesome Macado, Just remember the sand tigers get really aggro at night
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May 22, 2013 05:15
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SlicerDicer posted:Awesome Macado, I thought about that as I was spearing lionfish. Luckily none of them bothered me. Have heard from mates on the boat they have to be careful as the sharks will sometimes try stealing their catch.
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May 22, 2013 13:25
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