uwstlth wrote:So just be careful modifying equipment unless you think of all the possible ramifications- and do BOOM drills with your configuration as often as you can- like every time you dive.
uwstlth,
Always sound advice even if one doesn't modify one's equipment, but simply *changes* equipment! I was reminded of this this past summer when I took my new-to-me Phoenix-modified DAAM diving for the first time. Using a double hose reg was not new to me. My initial cert course (in 1986) used them, mounted on a 72 and plastic backpack with D-ring harness and no BC, for fully half of our pool skills. So, regulator recovery, and doffing and donning, and U/W swimming while cradling the scuba in one's arms, and buddy-breathing while wearing or cradling the scuba, etc., are all deeply ingrained within me. These are things one doesn't forget, especially when one spent several semesters over several years as a TA for the scuba course, as I did.
However, I had never before dove a double hose reg in open water, and never with a BC. I think all of you seasoned double hose reg divers would have had quite a laugh at my expense last summer if you had been observing me learning how to orally inflate my BC while diving my DAAM: Remove reg from mouth, and then ... what!!?? If move reg down to chest, then the BC inflator hose is too short to reach *around* the reg hose to allow me to comfortably orally inflate. If I reached *through* the reg hoses to grab the inflator, then raising the reg (to purge it) tangled everything up! Alternately, if I moved the regulator up to my forehead (so that my oral inflator would have an unobstructed path to my mouth), my reg free-flowed! It was too funny.
My kids, playing on the surface above me, wondered why I was causing so many bubbles!
I finally figured it all out, though. I'm just happy that my first time orally inflating wasn't during some crisis situation!
Safe Diving,
rx7diver