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Deefstes
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2 Questions RE Suunto Dive Manager
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stiebs
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Good thinking. As a general rule in rec diving, if you have any equipment failure, its time to call the dive. If your SPG breaks, start your ascent. You don't need it once you've started your ascent. If your depth guage or watch break (or computer), start your ascent. But you will need these for your safety stop. OK, you don't need them, but its better to have depth/time than guessing.
But you do have your buddy's watch and depth guage, so you should be able to make a safe ascent without your own. If you don't want to rely on a buddy, what I someimes do if I'm making a deepish dive with a same-ocean-buddy, is take my old depth guage (from a combo guage I used once upon a time) and leave it in my BC pocket. That way if I do have a computer malfunction, I've got a depth guage handy. I'm more likely to take it if I've just replaced my computer battery or if its just about time to replace it
At the end of this very interesting thread is a the question of "backing up" dive computer based information (depth, air, compass) with analog gauges/watch.
As a reasonably old diver who started pretty young (1966; double hose regulators; j-valves) I have only recently bought what most of you would consider a "fully-featured" dive computer (Cobra 2).
I'm still carrying a complete analog gauge console. It's heavy and it's bulky and it's largely a pain to put up with.
But someone else in this thread said something like 'if you did what I do for a living...."; I used to be a jet pilot in my youth, too; I haven't yet reached the point where I'm willing to go without all that information in case of the myriad ways the single-point of the integrated DC can suddenly withold meaningful information.
....I can't remember to whom to attribute to quote, but I'm sure I read somewhere that for a paradigm shift to occur, all the old guys have to die off....
As a reasonably old diver who started pretty young (1966; double hose regulators; j-valves) I have only recently bought what most of you would consider a "fully-featured" dive computer (Cobra 2).
I'm still carrying a complete analog gauge console. It's heavy and it's bulky and it's largely a pain to put up with.
But someone else in this thread said something like 'if you did what I do for a living...."; I used to be a jet pilot in my youth, too; I haven't yet reached the point where I'm willing to go without all that information in case of the myriad ways the single-point of the integrated DC can suddenly withold meaningful information.
....I can't remember to whom to attribute to quote, but I'm sure I read somewhere that for a paradigm shift to occur, all the old guys have to die off....
I started out a few years ago with a Cobra 1 on a HP hose, instead of a console. So I get all the usual console stuff plus deco information. In case the batteries were to die or it would otherwise stop working, I backed up the Cobra with a Suunto D3 bottom timer, so I'd have depth and time for managing my way up.
But then I got to thinking what I would do if Murphy would make my Cobra die while I'm on a dive vacation. That got me to the concept of duplicating it, which I did, in the form of a Vytec wrist computer.
The Vytec replicates everything the Cobra does except pressure, so at this point I was still vulnerable to Murphy's whims. To beat him I had to decide between a mechanical pressure gauge and a pressure transmitter for the Vytec.
Now, you need to know that after my student days I migrated from a jacket BC to a backplate/wing system, and in the new system I found that unclipping and reclipping a pressure gauge was extremely inconvenient and distracting. So I tumbled for the pressure transmitter.
Now I think I have Murphy beaten. In summary, my instrumentation is entirely duplicated: a Cobra 1 on a HP hose, and a Vytec on my wrist with pressure transmitter on a HP port.
Expensive? Yeah, but I consider it as vacation insurance and considerably improved reliability.
PS
A little off-topic, but I moved my console compass to a retractor clipped to a chest D-ring. That lets me get the lubber line EXACTLY lined up, which I couldn't do the old way.
But then I got to thinking what I would do if Murphy would make my Cobra die while I'm on a dive vacation. That got me to the concept of duplicating it, which I did, in the form of a Vytec wrist computer.
The Vytec replicates everything the Cobra does except pressure, so at this point I was still vulnerable to Murphy's whims. To beat him I had to decide between a mechanical pressure gauge and a pressure transmitter for the Vytec.
Now, you need to know that after my student days I migrated from a jacket BC to a backplate/wing system, and in the new system I found that unclipping and reclipping a pressure gauge was extremely inconvenient and distracting. So I tumbled for the pressure transmitter.
Now I think I have Murphy beaten. In summary, my instrumentation is entirely duplicated: a Cobra 1 on a HP hose, and a Vytec on my wrist with pressure transmitter on a HP port.
Expensive? Yeah, but I consider it as vacation insurance and considerably improved reliability.
PS
A little off-topic, but I moved my console compass to a retractor clipped to a chest D-ring. That lets me get the lubber line EXACTLY lined up, which I couldn't do the old way.
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