Axiom i3

[JohnnyPella]

Thanks diversteve, you made a good point and will take up on that. Guess I was too excited and wanted to rush into things. Good suggestions

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[diversteve]

Yes the best bet would be to use a horse collar without auto inflation. It was good enough for me to learn with and very simple!

I do suggest that if you get the i3 you avoid diving with buddies who can't adapt to 'up is inflate, down is deflate'. They most likely won't know how to read their dive computer.

I do agree with getting a couple of dives in before you buy though. Not everyone takes to it for many reasons.

It's funny that on the Dimension I3 page, they felt the need to include directions for both ways to inflate the BC as features. Maybe they're not as confident in it as you are?

The integrated i3 control system provides a single touch control for both inflation and deflation

Flat e-valves are very streamlined and effective. One-way design keeps water out

The multiple dump feature means that when you depress the i3 lever, all of the flat e-valves open at once! No more reaching for the wrong valve

What does this actually mean? Is this a problem for people who buy Aqualung Gear? Or just more marketing hype.

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Pull down oral inflator is easy to deploy and stow

Thanks diversteve, you made a good point and will take up on that. Guess I was too excited and wanted to rush into things. Good suggestions

Probably none of what I posted will ever happen to you. Most of what I posted has happened to someone here at some point. Get certified, do a few dives and see what others use/like. Then buy the I3 if you still want it. Occasionally someone fails certiification for reasons not known to either themselves or the shop when they signed up. I'd hate to see you lose money on gear if that happens.

 

[ams511]

Don't assume your shop is selling you the best or safest thing. Sometimes their motives are driven by profit margins. Or in these times, a desire to keep the doors open. It's sad but it's just business. They have one good shot to sell you a lot of overpriced options before/during certification that you don't have the experience to understand yet if you do/don't need them.

You are correct here. Dive shops will gladly sell you the most profitable items in their inventory. It is a numbers game. New students come in and you can sell so many full sets and others just basic gear and still others nothing (they hate those).

SSI (I'm certified with them) has a reputation for up-selling new divers during the certification process.

Here is where I take exception. SSI is a certification agency nothing more. They have no incentive to sell you anything except another course. The hard sell on equipment is from the dealer or the instructor. My instructor sold me a bunch of overpriced crap too before I knew any better. I was certified originally with a PADI shop.

 

[diversteve]

Here is where I take exception. SSI is a certification agency nothing more. They have no incentive to sell you anything except another course. The hard sell on equipment is from the dealer or the instructor. My instructor sold me a bunch of overpriced crap too before I knew any better. I was certified originally with a PADI shop.

You're correct. I'll clarify that to say my SSI dealer. (type A)

 

[ams511]

Guess I was too excited and wanted to rush into things. Good suggestions

Exactly. All dive shops know this and many (not all) will exploit your excitement and naivety by selling you unnecessary gear.

 

[They call me Tater]

Near as I can tell every bcd has an alternate oral inflation. It is NOT in a zippered pocket and in fact is easier to use than the typical style. But the OP knows that already because he has tried it on. ALL equiment can fail including inflator buttons. Care and maintenece for ALL gear. Enjoy your dives!!!

 

[ams511]

Near as I can tell every bcd has an alternate oral inflation. It is NOT in a zippered pocket and in fact is easier to use than the typical style. But the OP knows that already because he has tried it on. ALL equiment can fail including inflator buttons. Care and maintenece for ALL gear. Enjoy your dives!!!

Tater the main complains against I3 system fall into two categories. 1) It is different so your buddy may not know how to operate it in an emergency. If my buddy wears a conventional BC I know how to manually inflate it if he wears an I3 I don't. In an emergency you do not want your buddy fumbling. 2) Complication, the I3 system is more complicated then a normal inflater. The more complicated it is then the higher the probability of something going wrong. I am not sure how valid this claim is because the same could be said about regulators too. A MK25 is more complicated than a MK2 and an S600 is more complicated than a R195, yet all are reliable.

Conventional BCs do require care but they do NOT require an annual service.

As an aside, I think it was Mares that had a similar system yet they abandoned it. I have to wonder why.

 

[diversteve]

Near as I can tell every bcd has an alternate oral inflation. It is NOT in a zippered pocket and in fact is easier to use than the typical style. But the OP knows that already because he has tried it on. ALL equiment can fail including inflator buttons. Care and maintenece for ALL gear. Enjoy your dives!!!

You're right, I confused it with the Mares Hub.

I question whether the likelihood of a standard reliable inflator - design of which probably hasn't changed much in decades failing is as likely as the more complicated I3 with it's linkages, flat valves and other Aqualung proprietary technology. I know how to take apart and clean a standard inflator - there's not much to them. I haven't looked at an I3 in detail to know about it. Have you ever serviced yours?

questions for you now.

In a potential rescue scenario - IE I'm not your buddy so I haven't been shown how to use the I3 but I have to get you back to the surface. Let's make it interesting and say you're out of air also and somehow incapacitated so you can't help. So I swim up to you find and pull the oral inflator out and breathe into it to get you moving up. Now since your tank is dry - does the I3 still work so I can vent your BC as we start to speed up? It does right because it's purely mechanical on the exhaust side - correct?

Before you suggest that I control everything with my BC, what if I'm diving a 18# wing with a steel plate so can't.

What if the I3 fails while you're diving? So you use the manual inflator. Is that your only way to also vent air? It appears to be a smaller diameter than a standard inflator - although the picture isn't very clear. Or is there a way to manually vent a flat valve also?

 

[They call me Tater]

Ok, I normally avoid these debates because minds don't usually change but it has been polite so I will indulge.

I would not say that the i3 is perfect. Nothing is. It can inflate on a crowded boat...but I never found this to be a problem. Loss of a couple breaths at best. Would I wear it if I were crawling in muck trying to find a lost ring or penetrating a wreck, No. But most divers don't EVER do those things. Can it stick yes, it can but in my short diving career, I have seen the standard inflator buttons stick more often than the i3, so do I think it is more likly to fail..No not if it is maintained.

On to the scenario. SS in your scenario, my equipement has failed, I am incapacitated, my dive buddy has abandoned me and you are level headed enough to rescue me but only if you are not too confused by my lever. Ok if all of those things happen I am in trouble. BUT one can cover all kinds of scenarios like this that don't validate the argument.

What if I am a diver with 500 dives and you are at 60 feet with a tank on your back and a sidemount and you are wearing a drysuit. I have never dove a drysuit and don't know how they work. I swim up and see you clutching your chest. I might try to get you to the surface immediately so I inflate your BCD and bring you up about 20' at which point you go inverted and rocket to the surface. Clearly driving with a dry suit is overly dangerous because a wetsuit can't fail but a drysuit can.

My intent here is not to make light or belittle your legitimate points but there are all kinds of imaginable situations. I can easily imagine that you caught your valve on a rope in a wreck while exiting up and are inverted and hung up but need to go downward to untangle the valve. You pull on your dump valve but it doesn't work because you are up side down. If you had the i3 the lower port on you vest would dump and you would be able to descend

On one of my most recent dives, a DM with over 3000 dives could not lead the group because the 2 year old plug on his high pressure port blew as he was gearing up. Another diver had air bleeding out of 4 inches of his low pressure hose. Neither situation causes a chorus of 'don't do it, it is just a gimmick to sell gear' like the i3 does.

Just as some shops may try to sell it, other shops that don't sell it may try to belittle it because they don't sell it.

I love diving with it because it makes the minute by minute dive easier and more comfortable.

Each diver should decide for themselves what is best for them.

 

[ams511]

Each diver should decide for themselves what is best for them.

Some would disagree with this statement. They believe in standardization so that in an emergency your rescuer knows your gear configuration because it is the same as his.

My old Beuchat BC has something called an "octo pocket". It is a pocket under my main pocket that is sealed with velcro. You put the octo in and seal it up and it stays there securely. If you pull on the hose it pops free. It even has a red strip of material to pull out to show where it is. The problem with it is the octo is not hanging in a place a diver is trained to look so the first thing that would happen in an out of air emergency is they would pull the regulator out of my mouth. In latter versions of this BC Beuchat did away with the feature. I only used the octo pocket when diving solo. If diving with a buddy I would use an octo holder.

Your dive master is a fool. First, port plugs do not "blow out", it was not screwed in correctly or the plug was not blown out but the o-ring extruded. A dive professional should always have an extra set of equipment in case of break down. Low pressure hoses are very reliable, if one is leaking then it is either 1) real old 2) abused or 3) defective. Usually an inspection will tell you if a hose is about to blow.