Info Are Pony Bottles Dangerous?

[OMyMyOHellYes]

Instead, the "things that catch [his] attention" make a lot more sense if someone that is highly judgmental about someone else's diving choices. "Look at Joe with his pony bottle, he must suck as Scuba diving, which is why he needs training wheels." "Doesn't bob know swivels are failure points?" "Split fins? Lol, what a newbie!" "Yoke? What a joke! Doesn't he know Din is superior?" He lumps that in with "poorly fitting" "rookie mistakes."

Dang it!!! Musta been a rookie poster yer quoting there! Totally forgot the MOST telling factor: SCHNORKELS !!! Dang it man! Everybody knows that anybody with a schnorkel is a bad/inexperienced/uninformed diver! Or anybody that has anything except a Shearwater DC!

 

[34109411]

I don't agree. Doubles, can be little more complicated than your standard open-water configuration, if it's simply manifolded and you use the same regulator. The only real difference is twice the weight and gas. If your dive plan uses a lot of gas, there's little reason one cannot use doubles.

If you start getting into configurations with a little more complexity, like independent doubles, it helps to seek out additional information and advice, and practice. For example, practicing manipulating the valves of each tank, and making sure you can flawlessly switch regulators. It can also be helpful to learn about hose-routing and ways of retaining regulators when dealing with multiple tanks, which don't require a class, but are likely to be covered in some technical classes.

Where it gets a little sketchy would be self-teaching SideMount. I did "self teach" SideMount, using the materials at SideMounting.com and a lot of free time, though I don't recommend that. (If a brand new open water diver, put on a sidemount kit, and with no training of any kind jumped off the side of a boat, I'd consider that

Il

 

[SlugLife]

Serious question. If someone was interested in trying sidemount and already had regulators what would be the investment in gear enough to fly to a destination to use it?

Your biggest cost would probably be training. As mentioned in my previous comment, I did "self teach" SideMount, though I did pay about $200 for the SideMounting materials, and had a LOT of free time, patience, and a location to practice those skills.

A "gear you'll need" list would be covered in a SideMount course, but essentially you need:

• SM BCD: Ideally, you want a BCD designed for SideMount. There are ways of modifying a backplate BCD, and "slinging" 2 tanks, but it won't be as streamlined, or the "real" experience. Since you mention travel, it might be worth starting a thread asking which sidemount BCDs are good for travel. My "DIY" SM BCD is great for travel, but it's not very repeatable. My "nicer" commercial one is terrible for travel.
• 2 regulators, configured for SM. If you have 2 regulators, you may still want to buy hoses the proper lengths for a proper sidemount experience.
• 2 tank rigging, configured for SM. SideMounting.com goes over tank rigging. It's not as simple as slapping on a "stage sling kit" if you want your tanks to sit right.
• Butt-Pouch - Technically not required, but many sidemount divers have one.

 

[billgraham]

A pony bottle can be dangerous and I have had the experience to prove it. But I still think it would be more dangerous to have a full primary failure at depth with no pony...... and most definitely the case if diving solo.

Tried to Kill Myself but Failed!

So I’ve been on the fence on whether or not to post this……because it’s really hard to openly and publicly admit when you do something totally stupid. But then I thought more about it last night and figure that if it might provide some productive and positive food for thought and discussion…..or...

scubaboard.com

A friend and legendary wreck diver told me a similar story except he took the reg out of his mouth and looked at it, and realized he had been breathing his 50% deco gas for 20 minutes at 120 feet.

 

[SlugLife]

A friend and legendary wreck diver told me a similar story except he took the reg out of his mouth and looked at it, and realized he had been breathing his 50% deco gas for 20 minutes at 120 feet.

Breathing the wrong gas can obviously be extremely dangerous, and sometimes deadly. I'm glad your friend is still alive and able to tell that story though.

On the topic of this thread, I would classify that as being different from pony bottles. A pony-bottle is meant to only act as a redundancy device. It would typically contain a gas that can be safely used at any point in the dive, usually just air or occasionally nitrox.

With technical/deco diving, and dealing with mixes of air (beyond nitrox), that typically requires specialized training, and the tank is usually called a "stage bottle" (or occasionally "bailout") and used quite differently from a pony bottle. These gasses are also part of the dive-plan, even if that bottle is intended only for redundancy or emergencies. Since I don't have technical-dive training, I'm going to be careful to not step too far outside my areas of knowledge.

The danger of using the wrong gas isn't "pony" related, because we're instead talking about divers with more specialized training and equipment, being used for a different purpose. That includes the divers being trained on how to manage multiple bottles and regulators, with multiple gasses.

 

[SlugLife]

Dang it!!! Musta been a rookie poster yer quoting there! Totally forgot the MOST telling factor: SCHNORKELS !!! Dang it man! Everybody knows that anybody with a schnorkel is a bad/inexperienced/uninformed diver! Or anybody that has anything except a Shearwater DC!

Snorkels can be dangerous. But only in the right hands.

 

[billgraham]

Breathing the wrong gas can obviously be extremely dangerous, and sometimes deadly. I'm glad your friend is still alive and able to tell that story though.

On the topic of this thread, I would classify that as being different from pony bottles. A pony-bottle is meant to only act as a redundancy device. It would typically contain a gas that can be safely used at any point in the dive, usually just air or occasionally nitrox.

With technical/deco diving, and dealing with mixes of air (beyond nitrox), that typically requires specialized training, and the tank is usually called a "stage bottle" (or occasionally "bailout") and used quite differently from a pony bottle. These gasses are also part of the dive-plan, even if that bottle is intended only for redundancy or emergencies. Since I don't have technical-dive training, I'm going to be careful to not step too far outside my areas of knowledge.

The danger of using the wrong gas isn't "pony" related, because we're instead talking about divers with more specialized training and equipment, being used for a different purpose. That includes the divers being trained on how to manage multiple bottles and regulators, with multiple gasses.

This was in the infancy of mixed gas diving. The point is also that if you've got a pony bottle mounted to a bracket on a single tank behind you, you'd better be sure you know which regulator is in your mouth.

 

[billgraham]

Another good one that I did, also deco gas but relevant: I had a single tank with an H-valve and a slung 30 with O-2. I got to my 20 foot stop and grabbed the O-2 reg with my free hand, pulled it out and the first stage (yoke) was just hanging there. Doh! Depressurized and fell off so I got rid of that the same week in favor of a din reg and valve.

 

[grantmac]

Serious question. If someone was interested in trying sidemount and already had regulators what would be the investment in gear enough to fly to a destination to use it?

Buying everything new maybe $800? But I'm into my latest setup for $200.
Just research anything you look at since some of it is junk.

 

[Angelo Farina]

i dont know any agencies who will let you dive with double in regard of obtaining a open water certification for recreational diving from 0 to 42m. If you know one let me know.

So in that sense no matter what, you need to go to some sort of technical diving in order to dive with double. (if i am wrong let me know but far as i am concern this how it goes).

In my case i did intro to cave diving both with IATD and NACD but didn't finish the full course will i did practice a lot after that with double.

I think padi offer the tech 40 course in order to use double. prerequisite is AOE if i am not wrong.


Personally i find that double are not for everyone anyway.. Unless you are very skills and complete diver.

No "agencies", but no profit organization, such as CMAS and BSAC, routinely use compact doubles for recreational diving, even at first level.
These organisations also teach "light deco" (no gas switching), within their recreational program, at 2nd or 3rd level.