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Chris
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Too comfortable for my own good?

Wed Aug 23, 2017 12:09 am

So I'm looking for constructive or not criticism from old school divers that dove in the 80's and have kept up with the modern times. on a recent dive, we were called reckless, stupid and crazy. We typically dive 130 to 150 in the deeper lakes where there is something to see. Last year we ended up at 170. Yes we monitor our air supply. So we decided to set our limit this year and try to do 200. No deeper. We made dive plan, planned our stops, air supply, had redundant systems, three computers, and did our dive. We ended up turning back at 190 when we became uncomfortable with the change between 180 and 190. We decided our depth limit would be 170 or less. Some of our small local community of educated divers, appalled at what we dared to do, called us the before mentioned names and started giving us all the horror stories of divers that take out their mouthpiece remove their mask and swim down never to return. My defensive response was to remind them that all the Andrea Doria plates on ebay were gathered on air, some died, but today divers are spending hundreds on merit badges, thousands on equipment, and still die. So, was I as reckless as they say, or are divers as uncomfortable in the water as I think they are?
On the brighter side, the hoses on my Phoenix didn't collapse like they say they will.

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ScubaLawyer
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Re: Too comfortable for my own good?

Wed Aug 23, 2017 12:55 am

Back in the 70s we were doing 170' beach dives in La Jolla Canyon in San Diego on air using twin 50s and 170' to 220' dives in Truk and Palau on air using single steel 2250 71.2 tanks on our backs with stage deco tanks hung at 30, 20 and/or 10 stops. Occasionally we clipped on a pony bottle. We taught ourselves deco procedures by reading everything we could on the subject and then trying them in the real world. And, yes, we got really really narked on occasion. Still here.

One person's reckless is another persons calculated risk. You will never please everyone. Don't try. The minute you swim against the tide of dogma pervasive among many in the diving world you risk ridicule. Water off a duck' s back and all that. Sounds like you have the soul of a true explorer.

P.S. I believe the hoses on a Phoenix don't collapse until there is a confluence of depth and stupidity. :D

My 2 psi. Mark
"The diver who collects specimens of underwater life has fun and becomes a keen underwater observer. .. seek slow-moving or attached organisms such as corals, starfish, or shelled creatures." (Golden Guide to Scuba Diving, 1968) :D

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Chris
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Re: Too comfortable for my own good?

Wed Aug 23, 2017 1:08 am

My decision to turn was largely that the tenitis in my ears had gotten louder in the last ten feet, I could definitely notice tunnel vision, and the fog was starting to roll in. Tried to get a picture of my depth, but the buttons were pushed in on my $30 gopro knockoff. I was diving twin 72's with a 20 pony bottle for sorting out any emergencies. Dive was 10 min to depth, one at 190, and around an hour taking our time following the slope back up. And yes, my paycheck is the only thing keeping me from exploring for Oregon coast wrecks.

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Chris
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Re: Too comfortable for my own good?

Wed Aug 23, 2017 1:14 am

"confluence of depth and stupidity". I like that.

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couv
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Re: Too comfortable for my own good?

Thu Aug 24, 2017 1:44 am

ScubaLawyer wrote: One person's reckless is another persons calculated risk.
^^^ Pretty much sums it up. ^^^

We were taught decompression procedures in Basic Open Water back in the 70ies-we did not do any during the class, but we were given the information. Some of the class discussion went something like this,
"You make a dive to X number of feet for Y number of minutes, how many stops, at what depth, and for how long on each stop." What is the total ascent time? What will be your Group letter upon reaching the surface? How long must you wait before you can dive to Z depth for T number of minutes without having a deco stop?

The twits who thought your hoses would collapse need a good read of the manuals we had back then.
A sincere THANK YOU to all at VDH who make this wonderful resource available and to all the thoughtful contributors.

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georgeaustin
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Re: Too comfortable for my own good?

Thu Aug 24, 2017 8:33 am

It is a different world. Dive shaming is common among new practitioners of the sport and one reason for this is because their first level of training is fresh in their personal experience. Many of them presume they have the lastest version of best practices regarding scuba. Head over to scubaboard and read some of the more dangerously ignorant Dear Abby advice to beginners and "dive hobbyists"

As couv said above, a lot of us had to enjoy training ourselves in advanced dive procedures and methods - or what they call technical diving nowadays ( in order to sell training programs)

One of the benefits of getting to be a grumpy old man is not really giving a rip about the opinions of those that sadly missed out on the era of personal responsibility.

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SurfLung
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Re: Too comfortable for my own good?

Thu Aug 24, 2017 9:53 am

georgeaustin wrote:
...One of the benefits of getting to be a grumpy old man is not really giving a rip about the opinions of those that sadly missed out on the era of personal responsibility.
- THAT is great comment to fit so many modern situations. Thanks for sharing it. I think I would like to use that on a few people! :)

- When I got back into diving thru Vintage (5 years ago), I was self conscious about my solo diving as well as my "Old" looking gear. It was a big confidence builder to read the thoughts and philosophies of divers on this forum... Some of who are extremely experienced dive professionals.
SurfLung
The Freedom and Simplicity of Vintage Equipment and
Vintage Diving Technique are Why I Got Back Into Diving.

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Chris
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Re: Too comfortable for my own good?

Thu Aug 24, 2017 10:36 am

"Old looking gear", my new diver opinions started changing when I got curious, took apart my new first stage and and old one out of the garbage can, and said "wait a minute....."

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georgeaustin
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Re: Too comfortable for my own good?

Thu Aug 24, 2017 11:00 am

I took the PRAM/HPR/DBE out for a night beach dive solo last week and since my back has been complaining about all the carrying of heavy equipment, I decided on a 2mil shorty, Blue Steel Faber HP80 on a VDH plate with no wing and no weight belt and a BF Aqua Lung shark fighting knife strapped to the OUTSIDE of my leg. - makes climbing the stairs post dive tolerable. Nearing the end of the dive I swam back to the other side of the cove and encountered an instructor and DM with 5 students on the bottom at 40 ft getting their PADI Night Diver course finished. As I began getting a little video on my GoPro of the class, the instructor hurriedly swam up to me frantically pointing at the can area of the PRAM - "oh, I've seen this before, I thought" - "he thinks the exhaust is a blown tank valve ring." I nodded and signalled "OK" - The students looked at me like I was some certifiably nutty lost extra from and old Sea Hunt episode. I swam off to deeper water (exhaling really hard) and continued the rest of my dive.

Getting out of the water, the students and staff were standing on the beach doing a post dive brief. The instructor said to his students loud enough so that I could hear - " See that? - that is how to NOT to be properly equipped for diving, no BC, no exposure protection, I think he's lost his weight belt and some garage sale regulator" - "and he's diving alone, I guess or he's lost his buddy"

Now those students will go out into the world and repeat that to everyone they come into contact with until such a time as they learn differently. Chances are better that they'll give up diving before they do - but everyone got their money from them so all is good, right?

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ScubaLawyer
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Re: Too comfortable for my own good?

Thu Aug 24, 2017 11:59 am

georgeaustin wrote:The instructor hurriedly swam up to me....
That's funny. I encountered a class on the bottom once and the same thing happened, the instructor swam over to me quickly writing on his professional wrist - mounted dive slate "your o ring blown." I was out of air anyway so I swam back to the beach. Talked to the guy later and explained it was just exhaust. He was really cool and instead of giving me the no-BC instant death lecture he asked how I was able to maintain such perfect trim/buoyancy without a BC. After our discussion he said he had always wondered how the "old timers" did that. Apparently he had asked the same question of his instructor trainers and none of them had an answer for him that made sense. He said one told him it was the rigorous exercise program all dive trainees in the old days had to undertake and that you had to be constantly swimming hard to keep off the bottom. He said that made no sense and figgured it was just good fine tuned weighting and practice with different lung volumes. Although he was not going to advocate no BC in his classes, he said he would incorporate the example of a guy he once met diving using old style techniques (me) as part of his lecture on buoyancy control.
"The diver who collects specimens of underwater life has fun and becomes a keen underwater observer. .. seek slow-moving or attached organisms such as corals, starfish, or shelled creatures." (Golden Guide to Scuba Diving, 1968) :D

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georgeaustin
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Re: Too comfortable for my own good?

Thu Aug 24, 2017 1:20 pm

Sometimes after doing a SH dive down there I take the bottle up to LSS for a fill. I just leave the Trident plastic pack attached as it's got handholes in it to make carrying easier. It's about 50/50 that I'll either get the "is this your paintball rig?" "Cleaning the boat hull, today?" "are you diving?" to not even batting an eye with a few of the guys up there.
I find that the buoyancy of the plastic pack + rubber straps + 2 mil wetsuit is just about perfect for that +8lbs negative when full Faber HP80 and I can easily tell when I have a half tank left as I really feel the 2 or (maybe) 3 lb offset. I still carry an SPG but as soon as I feel the swing, I look down and - yep - 1700psi give or take.

I was noting how great the VDH plate is yesterday for eliminating any tank roll when not using the Oxy18 or what not with the little anti roll bags sewn on it. The Trident plastic pack of course has the concave area that the tank seats into but if anyone is new here reading this questioning the tank stability when using the inside slots on the VDH plate for controlling tank roll - man, that is nice. Very stable.

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Chris
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Re: Too comfortable for my own good?

Fri Aug 25, 2017 1:04 am

Well, the next time someone calls me crazy, I'll just tell them I "identify" myself as an 80's diver. Then it should be acceptable.



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Bronze06
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Re: Too comfortable for my own good?

Mon Sep 04, 2017 7:40 am

tripplec wrote:Well, the next time someone calls me crazy, I'll just tell them I "identify" myself as an 80's diver. Then it should be acceptable.



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This IS one of those situations where the PADI Vintage Diver Cert. or the NAVED card will shut their little snowflake hole right the hell up. Who knows, they might accidentally learn something in the process. I screw with the newbies over here all the time. By newbies, I mean DI's and DM's that have like 150 fricken dives and "think" they know it all. That is until I show up with vintage on! 90% of the folks I deal with (military and ex-military think it is the shit! I now have three new acolytes who are learning vintage diving. They rightfully acknowledge, that by doing vintage diving, they become better and more confident divers, not the "MPH" types that shops are turning out now. (M=MY P= another word for a kitty cat H=Hurts).
Folks, there is nothing wrong with DECO diving either, it's just like any other dive in that (and yes I'll say it) "PLAN THE DIVE AND DIVE THE PLAN!" As long as everyone is on the same sheet of music before, during and after the dive, there is NO problem. I regularly dive from 130- to 175 here and do double planning. I also drop down with two 80 HP double tanks and a 19cuf pony! I have a slate with times and stops as well as a computer that defaults to DECO mode once the NDL is reached. That all said, deep down, really, when you dive it's just you! I borrowed that from the 82nd Airborne who say "When you jump, it's just you!" There is so much unspoken truth to that statement. You can have all the fricken training in the world and have over 5000 dives and shit can and does happen. That is why "Plan the dive and Dive the plan" still holds water. Like sky-diving, scuba is equipment intensive and said equipment must be kept in top shape as well as PMCS'd (Preventative Maintenance Checks and Services) before, during and after the dive. These are the areas that most modern dive courses gloss over in my book. Back in the stone age, it was nothing for a certified diver to tear down, reassemble and perform functions checks on his equipment. The Navy dive school still does (unless that has snowflaked out too). As far as being too comfortable for your own good? Bullshit, you did everything right and started your ascent when you felt uncomfortable. As we say" Joke em' if they can't take a F@#K!"
"Where'd ya get that ol' thang, don't cha' know them thare things ill kill ya!"

Live From the Red Sea,

Russ

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Chris
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Re: Too comfortable for my own good?

Mon Sep 04, 2017 12:05 pm

Thats verry well written Bronze06.

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antique diver
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Re: Too comfortable for my own good?

Mon Sep 04, 2017 2:59 pm

Russ, I think you have an "attitude"... and I Like It! :lol:
The older I get the better I was.

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