Potential Weight with travel style BC

[anse cochon]

It has to do with both reducing packed weight and geared up weight. If you read my first few sentences, I suffered a totally ruptured achilles on a dive trip about 6 weeks ago(not during diving) and left my gear on this island as I was in a wheelchair with crutches and my wife could not manage the stuff along with our luggage. She had a staph infection in her foot too, it was a terrible couple of weeks ( non diver FYI). Vacation started great and ended up lousy. I dont expect to be 100% again and anything I can do to go light without getting tech stuff & spending a lot is my goal. Have been house bound except for surgery & docs appts since returning in early December. When you feel your tendons ripping like individual strands of rope or a braided wire, and are immediately unable to stand and fall down, its a hard thing to explain to other people-the incident and what happens afterwards. This has been costly to me in a lot of ways.

 

[halocline]

I did read about your ruptured achilles tendon, that's why I asked what exactly you were wanting to do. I'm aware of serious an injury that is, and I'm sorry to hear you're going through it. By far the easiest way to minimize travel weight is to have your gear already at your dive destination. I really don't think buying lighter scuba gear is going to solve much in terms of ease of travel; the so-called 'travel' gear is not much lighter anyway, often over priced, and often with some compromises in dive performance. Far better to simply change the way you get your gear from one place to the next; maybe leave gear in a place that you frequently dive, or pay someone to help you lug it around at airports. Typically you can reduce luggage weight far more efficiently by dropping weight in non-dive parts of your baggage, like the bags themselves. There's as much as a 10lb+ difference in weight between a simple duffle and complex rolling bag, for example. Another good idea is to leave a wetsuit and a pair of fins at your dive destination; that's a LOT of weight without spending a fortune on extra gear.

For reducing on-land geared-up weight, I believe the most efficient thing is to make sure you're not diving with gear that has positive buoyancy, so that you have to add lead in order to sink the gear. The two big offenders in this situation are AL tanks and heavily padded BCs. You might be adding almost 10lbs of lead just to sink the empty tank and the BC. I'm not sure what your air consumption or tank availability is, but IME the best tanks to get around on land with are LP72s (steel tanks that are neutral empty and weigh a mere 26lbs on land) followed by AL63s, which weigh a small amount more and have some positive buoyancy, but are still a big improvement over AL80s. Again, your ability to pick your tank will depend on what's available and how much gas you need for the dive. For deeper/longer dives, a HP100 (steel, 'special permit' 3442 PSI tank) weighs only slightly more than an AL80 but is about 6lbs less buoyant, meaning you can reduce your added lead (and therefore your on-land weight) by that amount.

For the BC, your best bet IMO in terms of packability/weight/lack of buoyancy/performance is to get an AL or plastic backplate with a very small wing and a simple webbing harness. Oxycheq and Deep sea supply both make excellent, reasonably priced set ups. If you have an aversion to "tech" gear that's only based on your current impression of 'tech' vs 'rec' dive gear, that might be something to re-consider. Every time I have seen a recreational diver exchange a jacket-style BC for a simple hogarthian BP/W rig, the diver in question has never looked back. And I'm fairly skeptical of the idea that the latest/greatest bit of dive gear makes much difference in your dive experience.

One thing I noticed in your post; you seem to be confusing BC rated lift and inherent buoyancy. The travel BC you mentioned might have a smaller rated lift, meaning the air bladder holds less air, but there's nothing in there about how much weight it takes to sink the empty BC. Manufacturers rarely publish that.

Good luck, I hope you can work it out!

 

[scubajo007]

My first BCD was an old fashion bulky Scubapro, which I have replaced with a Cressi Travel Light, and there is no difference I need the same amount of weight, one difference is that the Cressi has integrated weights so the distribution is slightly different. I know it sounds a bit odd but I think the best is if somebody will carry your weight belt until you get in the water and then you put the belt on and vise versa when you get out again. Travelling on land a wheel bag may help and of course ask airport crews etc. to help out.

 

[Jim Lapenta]

I would not consider that a travel bc. Looks bulky and has unnecessary padding that is going to require weight to sink. Also seems to get a few complaints about the pockets being too small to put anything is so it now has that negative. Leisure Pro has it for 425.00! That's nuts for a travel bc. The Zeagle Express Tech retails for $250, has no inherent buoyancy, is easily modified, and infintely adjustable. That or an al plate and 20 something lb lift wing would be a bit more say in the 350 range, but better for travel than that BC.