Moving to Doubles

[BluewaterSail]

Heading over to blog right now....

 

[TSandM]

Honestly, I think you could argue that either doubles or sidemount is unnecessary complexity for recreational diving. The best answer is simply a bigger single tank -- UNLESS you are doing deep dives where redundancy starts to look nice.

But not every decision made in diving, especially in recreational diving, is made with an eye to absolute minimizing of failure points and simplification of equipment. Sometimes, you just want to dive doubles because you like them. I have to say that cruising around the Red Sea in 30 feet of water in a set of Al80s is just absolutely delightful -- you have no pressure to end the dive from gas constraints, no deco to worry about, and you're warm and comfortable. We did a lot of 90+ minute dives there that way.

I think that, for someone who doesn't intend to go into technical diving, and who is diving warm, relatively shallow water -- and diving with people who don't understand or use manifolded doubles -- a sidemount setup might be almost ideal. You don't have to procure double tanks, which can be hard to source unless you own them. You aren't dependent on a buddy to help solve any failures that occur behind your head, because you can see all your gear. You only need to make sure you have rock bottom in the tank you can donate, because you aren't in an overhead environment. The only added complexity is watching your gauges and switching from time to time -- and I'll offer that anybody who isn't capable of doing that shouldn't be thinking about EITHER configuration.

GUE is a fabulous system to dive, if you have buddies who dive it; and it's perfect for people who think they might want to go on to technical or cave diving, because it scales. It's simple and efficient. But a GUE-style diver in an entire world of people who don't dive that way is a bit of a fish out of water, and some of the benefits of the system are really lost to them.

 

[BluewaterSail]

I suppose that watching 2 guages isn't so much more complicated than watching one guage. Dunno. Never tried it. Maybe I will some day.

 

[DevonDiver]

You might want to contact the guys at Team Blue Immersion - whilst based in Dahab, they often run courses up in Eilat. They're a very credible tech outfit - and able to offer a wide spectrum of training - good instructors too... very active on the tech scene and trail-blazing some new courses etc.

 

[BluewaterSail]

You might want to contact the guys at Team Blue Immersion - whilst based in Dahab, they often run courses up in Eilat. They're a very credible tech outfit - and able to offer a wide spectrum of training - good instructors too... very active on the tech scene and trail-blazing some new courses etc.

Thanks. I'll look them up.

 

[lowviz]

You may find this interesting: http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/te...4-diving-independent-doubles.html#post4263707 contains a lot of the "thinking" behind sidemount.

 

[1978davidw]

Dont anyone use 2 first stage regulators and no manifold? i use back mounted doubles all the time and use a scubapro MK25 with a single SPG and an S600 on my right tank routed under my right arm with the spg routed in with my bc inflator hose ..my left tank i have a MK5 scubapro first with a R109 second stage routed over my right shoulder, a spg console with compass and depth gauge routed under my left arm and clipped off on my chest. i use the old style 72 bands (with 72's) bolted to a seaquest back inflate black diamond bc 30# lift. Cheap setup really..redundancy on everything. I dont have to fool with any valves and if one side of my setup fails i just switch to the other (thats never happened).

 

[Paladin]

There is another option for someone who wants to dive doubles yet still keep it simple and that is a traditional, single outlet manifold with the regulator post in the middle. Such a setup is as simple as a single to use while increasing one's air supply. I currently have a pair of AL53s doubled but have used steel 72s and AL80s.




One thing to be aware of is the big buoyancy shift when diving doubles and take care with your weight configuration.

 

[rhwestfall]

There is another option for someone who wants to dive doubles yet still keep it simple and that is a traditional, single outlet manifold with the regulator post in the middle. Such a setup is as simple as a single to use while increasing one's air supply. I currently have a pair of AL53s doubled but have used steel 72s and AL80s.


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One thing to be aware of is the big buoyancy shift when diving doubles and take care with your weight configuration.

I was pondering that for a pair of AL63's.... but then again, SM is also looking interesting....

 

[Paladin]

Buoyancy wise, a pair of Al63s would be like diving a single AL80. Not a bad choice.