dumb nitrox question

[Drew Sailbum]

Heck, let's go straigh to the source to clear this up. From the PADI Specialty Course Instructor Manual:

II. PADI Enriched Air Diver Course Requirements

1. Prerequisite certification: PADI Open Water Diver, or equivalent.
2. Minimum age: 15 years.
3. Confined water training or practical application sessions may be added at the instructor's discretion. As a preassessment, the instructor may hold a confined water session that includes a scuba skills review prior to the course.
4. Because this program applies Recreational Dive Planner use and skills extensively, the instructor should ensure that students are familiar with the RDP table and how to use it because the Enriched Air RDPs are in table format.
5. Student to instructor ratio is eight to one (8:1), to certified assistant four to one (4:1).
6. Enriched air training dive data.

There are two enriched air training dives required for certification. These may not exceed 30 metres/100 feet, or exceed a PO2 of 1.4 ata., whichever is shallower.

Integrating Enriched Air Diver with Other Courses
Instructors who offer Enriched Air Diver courses may integrate the two required training dives with other PADI continuing education courses. This does not apply to PADI Scuba Diver and Open Water Diver. Specifically PADI Enriched Air Diver students who are also enrolled in another PADI course may complete their Enriched Air Dive at the same time they complete other training dives. To take advantage of this option, student divers must complete the knowledge development portion of the Enriched Air Diver course prior to making either of the required enriched air dives.

The way I see it, there is no minimum number of dives beyond the Open Water certification. Additionally, it seems that the certification dives may NOT be combined with Open Water certification dives. Finally, if your O/W instructor was a freak and taught the Wheel, then you will need a little training on the use of the table format of the RDP prior to an Enriched Air course.

 

[padiscubapro]

Drew Sailbum once bubbled...
Heck, let's go straigh to the source to clear this up. From the PADI Specialty Course Instructor Manual:

The way I see it, there is no minimum number of dives beyond the Open Water certification. Additionally, it seems that the certification dives may NOT be combined with Open Water certification dives. Finally, if your O/W instructor was a freak and taught the Wheel, then you will need a little training on the use of the table format of the RDP prior to an Enriched Air course.

I guess I'm a freak ... I teach both.

The wheel can't be beat for multilevel dives...

 

[zboss]

melfox26 once bubbled...
For Nitrox to be of any benefit anyway, you'd have to be at depths deeper than what you would be certified for just OW. I waited until after AOW to get my Nitrox cert.

Mel
PADI Rescue Diver

I am not an expert diver but I am Nitrox certified and what you state is not exactly correct. Nitrox is a benefit at most dives in the recreational dive limits, except perhaps above 20 feet where exposure to nitrogen loading in all except the longest of dives is mitigated.

Nitrox is especially useful when diving 3 or 4 dives a day where nitrogen exposure can be reduced and as long as the diver stays within the o2 exposure limits.

 

[Soggy]

Genesis once bubbled...
There is even an ONLINE Nitrox course available.

Where? I'd be interested in doing this over the winter.

 

[SubMariner]

I didn't pull the quote directly out of the EANx Specialty Instructor Manual, thinking that the single sentence synopsis would suffice. (hehehehe.. try saying THAT three times! )

Wrong!

Anyways, you are correct: to take the PADI EANx (Nitrox) course a diver must be at least Open Water level or equivalent. And this is the ONLY Specialty where a single dive CAN count towards two Specialties. For instance, if the diver were doing u/w photo while using Nitrox.

Also, as you already stated, the course requires use of the table version of the Recreational Dive Planner(32% & 36% O2). Students are also taught how to determine PO2 using the regular, non-Nitrox RDP in conjuction with a conversion table.

Now back to your regularly scheduled program, already in progress....

~SubMariner~

 

[dcostanza]

Aaron BBRown
Look up TDI on the internet. I'm looking at the course and it is offered through American Dive Center located in Boca Raton or Coral Springs. It is the online course I am currently wrapping up. I got impatient waiting for the LDS to offer the course so in talking with my dive buddy this past weekend, he turned me on to this group. He got his certification through them as well. Appears to be fairly informative, but then I don't have anything else to compare it to. Cost is $90. You purchase the password for $25. which allows you to download the course then you have 6 months to complete it. Then send in the "final" with the remainder of the cash and that's about it. They say they get your certification to you 10 days later. I'll let you know in twelve days as my "final" won't be sent in for another 2 days.

Best Regards
Don Costanza

 

[MrMojo]

Heres the link
I'm interested my self i wonder if the let the brits have a go !!

nitrox course

Regards

MAL..

 

[Jarhead]

That webpage says you have to pass the test

at our Boca Raton or Coral Springs facility, during regular business hours, with no appointment needed, pass a simple multiple choice test, get hands on experience in using an Oxygen analyzer, fill out some paperwork, then pay $90.00 for the course, and you will be a certified Nitrox diver.

Maybe I missed something, but it looks to me like you can get the study material online, but you gotta take the test in person in Boca Raton or Coral Springs.

Did I miss something?

 

[Genesis]

I don't know if they'd let you take it through the mail if you called them up and explained that you lived half a country away!

Worth a couple of dimes to find out though, no?

 

[jeffsterinsf]

Sheesh -- I hope you need to take the test in a controlled setting, otherwise it seems as meaningful as a mail-order degree...

Here in the SF Bay Area I know that you can take SSI classroom courses for about $85. One shop will even do your choice of SSI, PADI, or NAUI. I look at $85 as being the cost of a (marginally useful) textbook and an hour of a (hopefully quite valuable) trained instructor's time. A decent deal, IMHO.