Landlocked123
Contributor
The only disadvantage of the setup you have, which by the way is the exact same i dive, is that you do not have an alternate way of accesing your back gas. If your son (or other buddy) goes OOA you will need to extend your primary reg giving him/her access to you back gas while you will be limited to the 19 pony. Given the type of diving you do ( I am assuming 100 feet and shallower) this should still work. But again if you had an octo on your main tank , or integrated octo in your bc inflator hose you would have more options as you now would have a backup access to your back gas. The pony would at this point be an additional safety cushion. If you believe that having options is a good thing then I think that the integrated bcd Hose / reg would be value added. Some people like these types of regs, some dont, and I have heard plenty of reaons on both sides of the equation. On a seperate note what length hose is your primary regulator (on your main tank) on? The reason i ask is that since you will be donating your primary to the OOA diver you may want to consider a long hose configuraiton. The reglar octo is normally as you know on a longer hose . The standard primary hose lenght is really too short to facilitate air donation to ohters. As I stated I dive your setup and feel it works very well for myself, just not sure its an ideal setup for my buddy. Getting the long hose would improve your setup. The integrated BC hose reg could also extend the available options you have.
