Aow=bs

[Garrobo]

I just knew when I posted this that there would be a LOT of people responding who got their AOW immediately after their OW simply by writing a check for two or three hundred dollars and an afternoon with an instructor. That's the point. It's a cash cow for PADI and other cerification agencies and nothing else. That is unless it is taught by Ber Rabbit of someone else who really makes it worthwhile.

 

[Bob Vincent]

Are you sure that wasn't a new candid camera hoaks are something for a best home video meets this is so funny?

 

[wreckchick]

An afternoon? Obviously you've not taken the class.

How bout this, I'll give you a case of food poisoning and throw you in the surf in California in a shorty. I'll bet you'd look pretty slick.

Most divers with sub-par skills are well aware of it and really do want to do better and what they get is someone who's arrogant and making fun in a public forum instead of a guy who might have some pointers but chooses to let it go in favor of the humiliation route, kudos to you!

Rachel

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

Dive 3 is my favorite. We have 8 bottles with headings suspended at various depths throughout the area. Not only do you have to navigate to the bottle, but you have to hit the depth also....then on to the next at another depth. We encourage students to use the Nav Finder or slate for notes, because you must also draw the course after you finish. Nailing a bottle in mid water, can't see bottom or surface with vis in the 10' range, is not very easy for most.

But would that exercise be any good for a diver who was going to do most of their diving in a body of water with current &/or surge? (Ocean!)

 

[D_B]

I just knew when I posted this that there would be a LOT of people responding who got their AOW immediately after their OW simply by writing a check for two or three hundred dollars and an afternoon with an instructor. That's the point. It's a cash cow for PADI and other cerification agencies and nothing else. That is unless it is taught by Ber Rabbit of someone else who really makes it worthwhile.

Yep, right out of OW
Nope, cost $150
Nope, days more than an afternoon .. have you taken a course?
If you have a bad instrutor why would it matter what the training course was?

No way did I think I was advanced after taking the course, but I was a better diver after, and we had great fun doing it ... why do you think that you need a better reason than that

 

[Beachlover]

I just knew when I posted this that there would be a LOT of people responding who got their AOW immediately after their OW simply by writing a check for two or three hundred dollars and an afternoon with an instructor. That's the point. It's a cash cow for PADI and other cerification agencies and nothing else. That is unless it is taught by Ber Rabbit of someone else who really makes it worthwhile.

Garrobo, we may not all be the "diving god" that you are.How many dives do you have in your TWO YEARS of experience? Were your diving skills that honed when you only had 25 dives under your weight belt? Remember, we all were new to diving at one time,too.As for this AOW class being a cash cow for PADI,etc., they are here to teach,and that means charging $$$. What do you think should be the next class taught after open water, and what should be the requirements be for that class?

 

[MauiScubaSteve]

I've assisted in 3 OW confined pool sessions, and I have not seen any instructor truly try to help their student get the "peak" weighting.

My belief is that at the end of each OW pool session, the student should simply purge their reg until they have 500 psi, try to maintain neutral buoyancy (either with fin pivot, lotus position, etc), then go up on the surface and keep shedding weight until they are near neutral with an TRULY empty BCD and no fin kicking.

Certainly it can be done at the beginning too, but then one have to add 6 lbs for an 80 CF tank, and less for smaller tanks.

Why do the student's have to wait for trial and experience before they learn this themselves? It is alot of BS that "losing the lbs" will take more experience.

As an instructor who's open water is ocean and confined water is pool, there are very few new students who can dive well with the proper weight for when they are a better diver. We have to give them enough weight to dive at their current skill level, which is usually more for the first open water dive than for the 4th open water dive, which is still more than for the 25th dive.

Many new divers have some anxiety going under for their first time, leading to bad breathing patterns. If they have limited experience with the ocean they use their arms a lot and naturally point their head towards the surface (air). For most students I've seen, there is no way to do the first dives with the proper amount of weight for calm breathing and horizontal trim. I can also tell you from experience that it is way harder to dive with too little weight than with too much, so the ONLY option is starting with too much weight.

If we have to start with too much in the open water, wouldn't it be better to practice in the confined water with too much weight? After the first OW dive, do the buoyancy check, but keep in mind most people hold more than a normal size breath. The only way to really get it right is to figure out how much you need to stay in control when ascending after the safety stop from a demanding dive, and that takes more experience.

 

[RJP]

It's the number of dives, end of story..............

Nonsense. I've seen people with 100's of dives that still don't have buoyancy/trim worked out properly.

 

[RJP]

That is unless it is taught by Ber Rabbit of someone else who really makes it worthwhile.

Of course that's the case with any course, now isn't it?

 

[Colliam7]

He had logged 25 dives up to then, mostly in springs and a couple of cave dives.

Which ceratinly may put him at a disadvantage on boat dives. I feel fortunate that my OW checkouts were done from a boat. A lot of our student divers do quarry checkouts. While the dives meet the standards, the divers miss something, and later find that out when they do their first boat dive.

Wore a 5mm Farmer John and 5mm shorty in Keys water. (You can figure the lead he carried.)

Something else that we supposedly 'go over' in OW, but probably need to add greater emphasis to, is the need to obtain local information before diving. While something beyond 3mm is possibly appropiate for the supposedly warm water of the Keys, this diver's suit does sound like a bit much for the environment, and I suspect he never thought to call ahead. I was in Islamorada weekend before last, on the Duane and the SG. The water temp down to about 50 feet was 77. Passed through a thermocline at 50 that dropped it to 75. At about 90 feet, right as I approached the deck of the Duane, I passed through another one and it dropped to 72. In a 3mm full suit and a Microprene hooded vest, I was pretty cold as I started my swim around the deck. Warmed up with the swim, but felt it at first. The seas were 4-6 and there were quite a few folks on the boat feeding the fish, including one of my dive buddies.

Had trouble hooking up his regs correctly, couldn't figure out the giant stride, had a hell of a time getting his BC on and fins off and onto the boat. NO buoyancy control. Puked after both dives. Swam with his arms mostly and used up air like a steam engine.

Wish I could say that all my dives therse days were pretty. I actually find that spending a lot of recent time in tec training in some ways has been detrimental, because I go out on boats on coastal dives less frequently than before. On our Keys trip, I did a real nice face plant, instead of a giant stride, on one dive (my excuse was the pitching boat and the weight of the double 120s on my back, not my own clumsiness, of course). The ladder on the boat we were on was 'enclosed' (i.e. the outer ends of the rungs were connected not just a vertical center post (which I find more challenging anyway). The mates made it clear that the best way to ascend the ladder was to take the fins off in the water - perfectly appropriate, even if inconvenient. But, another one of my dive buddies (DM, several hundred dives, lots of coastal / boat experience) lost a fin when he took it off and draped the spring strap over his arm, and one end of the strap came unhooked and the fin disappeared in the current before he could grab it. We all have days of thunder, and days of thuds, I guess.