New Zeagle Bail-out System

[Adobo]

Well, there is your problem right there, I don't care what PadI says and go to great lengths to do the opposite of everything they say. Despite what you learned in PadI 101 a pony is a good solution for a single tank profile where one either has no buddy or wishes to be prepared and independent for themselves regardless of the buddy. Not all dives require doubles or deco and therefore a small pony is an excellent way to provide REAL redundancy.

Should we not separate the solo diving issue and the issue that is in this thread? I was under the impression that solo diving required different training and equipment than what vast majority of divers receive and have.

In buddy diving, I thought it was insufficient to get back to the surface safe and sound, I thought it was also your obligation to make all reasonable effort to ensure that your buddy makes it to the surface safe and sound. Already, one respondent to this thread has looked at this as solution to the "just in case I am not close enough to get gas from my buddy" issue. Even if that were true, only the person with the bailout system is covered. The buddy on the other hand, would be SOL should he have an OOG emergency if he did not have his own bail out bottle. And really, all we are talking about here is insuring against OOG emergencies. Should a diver be entangled in kelp, a occurrence not uncommon in the waters I dive in, there is nothing a bailout bottle can do to help that diver.

If Zeagle's intent is to market this as a more convenient solution to qualified solo divers, I understand. My question is, are they marketing this to those who have bad buddy diving skills and/or inability to plan a dive properly?

WRT PADI, are you saying that everyone should throw out everything they learned in OW classes? Or are you saying that experienced solo divers approach diving in a different fashion than the buddy diving that is taught in PADI?

 

[Chad Carney]

Myth:

A buddy team of relativily new divers in a real OOA situation, making a text book sharing air ascent from 100', ascending @ 33 fpm, monitoring their rate all the way, and then making a rock steady safety stop at 15 ft for 3 to 5 minutes.

Reality:

Given that one of them is OOA, the other is probably not far behind. Their ascent rate would definitely exceed 60 fpm, probably double it, with zero ascent rate monitoring occurring. They probably couldn't even check their psigs. They would likely not be able to make a safety stop even if they wanted to, or had any gas left to do so, and certainly could not hold the depth steady.

Second Myth:

Diver's with redundant breathing systems are poor gas managers, and rely on them.

Reality:

They are usually far better planners & managers than those without.

My truck has airbags... I don't drive less safe because it does.

I've done a couple real OOA sharing air ascents with newer divers and found it challenging to just get a peak at my psig. Both were from about 75 ft and I took a stab at a guessed ascent rate of around 60 fpm and slowed it up a little as we got closer to 15 ft. Neither time was I even close on air, so we hung off for about 3 minutes before surfacing.

I had been teaching for about 5 years when the first one happened, in pre-computer days. She was a total stranger using rental gear on a group dive.

The next one was about 5 or 6 years later, with a new employee at our dive shop who got excited learning to spearfish, and he signalled that he was going to blast off. He didn't when I offered him a regulator.

In those days I didn't have a bail out system. I wished I had!
You really wonder how long your air supply is going to last when you see an OOA diver blasting it from your regulator!

Peace and dive safe!

Chad

 

[Nemrod]

Adobo, I think you have pointed out to yourself that you should not purchase their product. To many of your thoughts have flaws, on occasion, even the best buddys can get split up--enough so that in PadI 101 don't they even give you a procedure for relocating your buddy that finally results in your returning to the surface to look for that buddy? In such a case you have no redundancy unless you have a pony or a system like the one being discussed. The world is not perfect, buddys can get split up, beach diving in surge with low viz in California, diving low viz lakes, many things can work to seperate a dive team. More than that, it occurs in fact that between pure solo and pure buddy diving many expereinced divers loosely team up for their dives often going their own way and then rejoining. This is a common REAL world practice of many divers inlcuding photogs and spearos. This system would provide such dives an extra level of safety with very little penalty. It is pure fantasy to think that you can never be seperated from your buddy.

I guess all this safety stuff comes from two observations, !) todays divers have less training and poor swimming skills or even none and 2) todays equipment is unreliable and failure prone and beacuse of (1) todays divers depend heavily upon it thus needing layers of redundancy--because they don't have basic water skills to fall back upon. Rather than carrying more and more equipment maybe it is time to refigure some basic elements.

N

 

[Adobo]

Myth:

A buddy team of relativily new divers in a real OOA situation, making a text book sharing air ascent from 100', ascending @ 33 fpm, monitoring their rate all the way, and then making a rock steady safety stop at 15 ft for 3 to 5 minutes.

Reality:

Given that one of them is OOA, the other is probably not far behind. Their ascent rate would definitely exceed 60 fpm, probably double it, with zero ascent rate monitoring occurring. They probably couldn't even check their psigs. They would likely not be able to make a safety stop even if they wanted to, or had any gas left to do so, and certainly could not hold the depth steady.

Second Myth:

Diver's with redundant breathing systems are poor gas managers, and rely on them.

Reality:

They are usually far better planners & managers than those without.

I've done a couple real OOA sharing air ascents with newer divers and found it challenging to just get a peak at my psig. Both were from about 75 ft and I took a stab at a guessed ascent rate of around 60 fpm and slowed it up a little as we got closer to 15 ft. Neither time was I even close on air, so we hung off for about 3 minutes before surfacing.

I had been teaching for about 5 years when the first one happened, in pre-computer days. She was a total stranger using rental gear on a group dive.

The next one was about 5 or 6 years later, with a new employee at our dive shop who got excited learning to spearfish, and he signalled that he was going to blast off. He didn't when I offered him my octo.

In those days I didn't have a bail out system. I wished I had!
You really wonder how long your air supply is going to last when you see an OOA diver blasting it from your octo!

Peace and dive safe!

Chad

Okay if I back up one step? I am a newbie and I am trying to understand what problem this new bailout system is meant to solve.

Is it meant to facilitate new divers to dive 100ft?
Is it meant to be a more convenient solution for solo divers?
Is it meant for instructors who get stuck with students that they don't know from Adam?

BTW, I never said that people who have redundant systems are poor gas planners. What I did say is that getting redundant systems is not a suitable alternative to poor gas planning. And that those who are at risk of running out of gas should think first about how to plan dives properly. Would you not agree?

I am also saying that having a bad buddy exposes you to more risk than, "what do I do if I run out of gas." Would you not agree to that as well?

 

[Wayward Son]

Especially spearos. I spear fish on most dives. When we hunt, we're "same ocean/same site" buddies & do not stick together. The exception is when my wife dives with me. She does not spear, so she follows me around while I hunt. That's the only time i can count on having a buddy immediately at hand. And not even then if my daughter comes along, as they will buddy up & I'm back on my own.

PADI, NAUI & other classroom instruction is one thing. I'm not going to be critical of it. However, our reality often is somewhat different.

 

[Adobo]

Rather than carrying more and more equipment maybe it is time to refigure some basic elements.

Nemrod - I cannot claim to know be infallible in anything. But I did sleep in a Holiday Inn last night. BTW, just about all of my diving has been low vis, long distance, shore dives through the kelp beds in Monterey. Occassionally we get decent vis. Occassionally.

What you are saying here is exactly what I am saying as well. What we might disagree with is what constitutes basic elements. If someone has a need to buy more than the basic equipment and the reason behind it is that some of the basic elements are faulty, then the first question should be, why aren't we addressing the basic elements.

PADI, NAUI & other classroom instruction is one thing. I'm not going to be critical of it. However, our reality often is somewhat different.

Like you said, your reality and quite likely every solo diver's reality is far different than the over the 90% of the people take up scuba, no? Would it be fair to super impose your knowledge and your skills and your needs on the vast majority of divers who are different than you?

Hey... I got no issues with everybody being trained to be solo divers. I got not issues with people buying bailout systems and thinking they are now qualified solo divers. I got no issues with newbs being led to believe that because they are carrying bailout systems, they are now qualified to dive to 100ft. I don't even have any issues with them thinking that bailout systems are suitable alternative to having good buddy skills.

Honestly, I don't really mind whether people agree with me or not. What would trouble me is if no one, not one person opened their mouth and pointed out that if you are in the market for one of these things, there may be more fundamental problems that you should be thinking about as well.

With that, I will excuse myself from this solo diving thread...

 

[Nemrod]

"And your reality is far different than the over the 90% of the people take up scuba, no? Is it fair to super impose your knowledge and your skills and your needs on the vast majority of divers who are different than you?"

No, this is not a true statement,how do you know what 90% of divers do if as you say, your new to the sport? Your suba 101 class is not the final word.

This all side tracked from the original post which announces a very much updated small pony system that tucks neatly and cleanly away. it would not replace a 30cf pony I use on my deeper solo dives but I could certainly see the logic of it for a buddy team or more "indendent" minded divers. In the real world 90% of divers don't hound one another constantly giving the OK signal--about the third time somebody does that to me I am gone into the blue--lol---but I admit, Iam a one percenter, the Hells Angles of the diving world, big knife and no buddy and I do like the concept originated in this thread. Very clean design.

N

 

[Wayward Son]

"Would it be fair to super impose your knowledge and your skills and your needs on the vast majority of divers who are different than you?"

Who's imposing anything? Most people here seem to have stated that they like the general idea but would prefer greater gas capacity in it for their use.

You are the one that has consistently hammered about how bad it is to even offer such a product. I have not said one word about how I think anyone else should dive. All I've done is discuss in brief what it's like on the dive boats I go on. I do not have any sort of pony rig at all, but I have been thinking over what I want for about 2 years now. This product isn't quite it.

Good buddy skills are something that must be developed. Many people do not hunt, but also do not have a regular buddy. They pair up with whoever is available on the boat. Might be a great buddy, might be less than useless when the feces hits the oscillating air mover. These people tend to prefer to be self sufficient, able as much as possible to save themselves if need be, simply bc they do not know that they have a buddy that can be relied on. This product may well appeal to them.

While I would not buy one for myself, simply bc it's too small a gas supply IMO for my diving, I will not have anything critical to say of those who do want one. They know their dives, conditions & needs far more than I do, it's their decision, not mine.

 

[Web Monkey]

Totally agree. But, again, what about when you can't find your buddy, he/she is too far away, or he/she panics and is of no help?

Bring a pony. Just bring one that's big enough.

6 Cu Ft is just scary.

30 is nice. 40 is nicer.

 

[Chad Carney]

Zeagle does not tell divers how large of a bail-out system they might want. That is up to them to determine if they so choose.

I carry a 30 cu ft deco stage tank when diving beyond 132 ft, more commonly 170 ft to 220 ft. I use it on every dive and it still provides adequate deco gas for 3 deep dives.

I personally would never carry a pony tank of 30 cu ft or more as a bail out tank in recreational depths. It's just huge for that light use, IMO.

The new 6 cu ft bail out system is so light I can take it on every recreational dive tucked into my BC with no hassle, or along on my deep dives as an emergency aid to get me up to a deco ceiling depth. (13 cu ft and up size ponies are too big too fit under a wing and must be carried elsewhere.)

My SAC breathing rate in the earlier test dives was .39 cfm on #1 completely at rest for 13 minutes.

My SAC was 1.1 cfm while swimming at 160 fpm, with no ascending buoyancy assist, covering 769 ft in 4.8 minutes.

Here's a few possibilties, using the pony tank spread sheet on the bottom of www.spearfishingmagazine.com:

A basic recreational dive:

1. Input Data:
SAC Rate (cu-ft/min) 1.0, very high considering buoyancy assist & the slow swim.
Ascent Rate 60 fpm, very slow for an OOA diver.
Safety Stop Depth 15 feet
Safety Stop Time 1 minutes
Max Depth of Dive 100 feet (in increments of 5 ft)

Results:
Gas used on Ascent 4.32 cu-ft
Gas used on Safety Stop 1.45 cu-ft
Total Gas Volume Used 5.77 cu-ft


A more realistic and advanced recreational dive:

Input Data:
SAC Rate (cu-ft/min) 0.7 average to moderately high.
Ascent Rate 90 fpm fairly realistic swim speed.
Safety Stop Depth 15 feet
Safety Stop Time 2.85 minutes
Max Depth of Dive 130 feet (in increments of 5 ft)

Results:
Gas used on Ascent 3.08 cu-ft
Gas used on Safety Stop 2.90 cu-ft
Total Gas Volume Used 5.98 cu-ft

A deep non recreational dive:

Input Data:
SAC Rate (cu-ft/min) 0.7 average to mod. high
Ascent Rate 120 fpm fairly fast.
Safety Stop Depth 0 feet
Safety Stop Time 0 zero - switch to deco tank at 30 ft.
Max Depth of Dive 220 feet (in increments of 5 ft)

Results:
Gas used on Ascent 5.66 cu-ft
Gas used on Safety Stop 0.00 cu-ft
Total Gas Volume Used 5.66 cu-ft

Note in the above examples the diver would also have a 4 x, 5 x or almost 8 x volume increase in his primary cylinder on each respective dive.

None of the above are recommendations, just possible realistic examples.

YMMV.

Chad