Calling all ponies

[Scared Silly]

If you haven't purchased your regs yet, I'm going to make a sugestion. I dive 'frankenregs'. ATX 100 on my right post and XTX 200 on my left. Before I doubled up my 100's, my main reg was my ATX 100 and my pony was my XTX 100.

I would not worry too much about the "frankenregs." Many start out that way. At least you have regs all from the same mfg. Which helps when it comes to having them serviced.

All that said having a good reliable reg is important no matter what post it is on. Many people have a fine primary reg then get a low end octo. I donate my primary so I do want a low end octo to breath off of. Or if you give and octo so someone who is OOA and it breaths like crap I can guarantee that they will not be asking for your primary but taking it. The same for what you put on any bottles that you sling.

Shameless plug I have a DIN/Yoke pony reg up for sale.

 

[GeorgeC]

I love the spare air. Whenever I am on my boat without scuba equipment and I pick up eelgrass in the engines strainers I have the spare air to get me under the boat for a few breaths. In the past I would hold my breath going back and forth under the boat and to the surface. My friend got the spare air from work and he does not dive so I figured I would take it.

BTW: I sling a 30 cf when I dive.

 

[tmorg]

Here is my 30 pony,homemade rigging.I carry it on my left side clipped to the top and bottom D ring.Ranger BC.

 

[LouieLouie]

No sane person would use Spare Air for redundancy. What you should look into is rather whether a pony or some small doubles is the better way of fulfilling your needs.

I'm diving doubles myself, and for me switching to a pony is out of the question. Most of my dives are in the 100-130' range, in Arctic conditions, wearing a drysuit.

 

[OldNSalty]

Wrecks30,

You asked a very general question with little info about yourself-you are going to get a lot of answers that will not apply to your diving. For some people a 19 is perfectly reasonable, for others nothing less then a 40 would make sence.

Where do you dive now? How deep do you go? What activities are you doing? More info from you might help you get a better answer IMO.

 

[jsado]

Sling it - 19cf or bigger

 

[Amphibious]

another vote for slinging. an AL30 rigged nice and clean (I like the way the DIR lads do it) says under your arm and out of the way. it's easily removable in water for entanglement clearing and passing up when you're climbing back into a boat. I really like limiting the amount of cutter I have on my back. a piggy-backed pony is a massive entanglement hazard, requiring you to remove your gear to deal with.

an AL30 gives you more then enough air to do a 30fpm assent with a 5min safety stop from any recreational NDL depth. when choosing this setup I practiced swapping to my bailout at 130', no worries.

check my profile pic for what my solo rig looks like, you get the idea...

 

[Buoyant1]

SpareAir is a wonderfully unique piece of gear - it's the only piece of scuba equipment that can enable a diver to run out of air TWICE on the SAME DIVE!

Man! I snorted out beer on that one!!!

 

[Buoyant1]

Wrecks30,

You asked a very general question with little info about yourself-you are going to get a lot of answers that will not apply to your diving. For some people a 19 is perfectly reasonable, for others nothing less then a 40 would make sence.

Where do you dive now? How deep do you go? What activities are you doing? More info from you might help you get a better answer IMO.

40's are more logical if you are going to take your diving to the next level. The price differential between anything smaller and a 40 isn't enough to really be an issue. May as well just get the 40 and be done with it. If you are diving with an 80 you have 50% more gas, if you are diving larger tanks you have at least 1/3.

Anyway... since I'm using mine as primarily a bailout (because I dive in cold water) I have a button gauge. (I'm going to upgrade to a short hose and small gauge eventually when I decide to take advanced Nitrox, but the small gauge is STILL easy to read.)

Slinging is probably the best bet because you can hand it off if necessary.

 

[Reg Braithwaite]

SpareAir is a wonderfully unique piece of gear - it's the only piece of scuba equipment that can enable a diver to run out of air TWICE on the SAME DIVE!

And we know that it is ridiculous to plan for two fatal diver errors on the same dive. Running out of air twice on the same dive requires the diver to (a) make the mistake of running out of air, while simultaneously (b) making the mistake of depending on a SpareAir for redundancy.

Seriously, how likely is this to happen?

;-)