Rec Vs. Technical???

[tbone1004]

if you buy all of your stuff from Mike et al the odds are they will help you out if you stay loyal with them. Undergarments can be acquired at LL Bean, REI etc, Polartec is polartec, it may not be quite as nice as the stuff from 4th Element, but nothing is. The Arctics are really the only undergarment worth buying commercially, especially for the diving you are doing, and you can DIY replacement seals or have the suit ordered with rings which will allow you to DIY the seal replacements and use dry gloves which will also help for that long of exposure.

Regarding depth, you should have learned how to calculate MOD at various PPO2's.
1.3 and 1.4 are generally considered max PO2's for normal diving, 1.6 for deco
At 1.4
28%-136 FFW
30%-125 FFW
32%-115 FFW

Well within the realm of normal nitrox diving, then you calculate your EAD and cross reference it against the NDL's and you realize that with 32% you are running 1.5PO2 at 120FFW, and depending on which tables you use, have somewhere between 25-35 minutes of NDL diving starting as a fresh diver.

 

[Octopusprime]

Yea I have been looking at DUI with replaceable seals or the whites... Did my dry suit in a DUI extreme. 5 deg air temp 40 deg water temp. The DUI was nice but chaffed a bunch and the arms were too long. If I do the whites it will shrink to fit better but with the whites front zip when your each across to reach dump valve because of zipper the dump moves away... I'm going to have to try them both on

 

[tbone1004]

DUI suits with zip seals are a waste of money because of how expensive the seals are, rings are much better investment. Shouldn't have to reach over to the dump..... Usually you just leave them wide open and roll to dump. Any suit can be ordered with rings btw if you're buying new

 

[a878bob]

The road to being a competent tech diver is long and expensive. I think and...and...and... is a good way to some it up. It never seems to end. And diving deep in the great lakes is not the Caribbean. Will you be interested ? Who can say? One step at a time. Just diving in a dry suit with heavy undies is tough onto itself. Start there. Don't get too far ahead of yourself. And dry gloves, and a couple of shearwaters, and a good light, and deco software, and gas, and getting back on the rocking boat with doubles, and reels, and bags, and real doubles cylinders, and..... and .....and.......


And then...... you'll want to do it in sidemount!

 

[Jack Hammer]

OP, tech diving is expensive, gear intensive, and truly requires specialized training. Used gear is a great way to keep expenses down, especially when starting out. If you are unsure, take an intro to tech class from a reputable instructor who tech dives frequently. Many local tech divers also practise skills at Haigh Quarry and are easily approchable.



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[KevinNM]

Yea I have been looking at DUI with replaceable seals or the whites... Did my dry suit in a DUI extreme. 5 deg air temp 40 deg water temp. The DUI was nice but chaffed a bunch and the arms were too long. If I do the whites it will shrink to fit better but with the whites front zip when your each across to reach dump valve because of zipper the dump moves away... I'm going to have to try them both on

I just got back from doing a gui primer, in preparation for a fundamentals class in June. Glad I did, but it was kind of humiliating. There is a huge difference between the skills that are perfectly adequate for a normal rec dive and the skills in buoyancy and maneuvering you need for tech. We'll see if I can get there in a few months of practice now that I have some idea what I have to do.

The suggestion from a guy who fixes a lot of dry suits was that the only DUI suit to look at today was the flex extreme. Someone else mentioned there was some construction differences between this and the other DUI suits and this was the suit they hadn't had trouble with due to minor supplier material changes. Right now I'd recommend against bare (I'm kind of annoyed about my new one), but otherwise I don't know enought about dry suits to say.

 

[Patoux01]

My 2 cents:

Keep calm, take the time to do quite a bit of reading on the interwebz, just so you'll get an idea of what technical diving actually is. At this moment, they way you're talking about it seems completely wrong to me. If it still seems interesting, go and have a chat with the divers you may see around you (once they've doffed their gear of course), most of them will be open to questions and guide you except if you get there with questions like "if I get 12 tanks, will I be able to go to 200m and come out alive?". Then, if you still want to go, look at the instructors around you. Is there anyone that is widely recommended, if so why?
Once you'll have done this, you'll get where you want. The hardest part is probably the instructor. I've been looking around for 4 months now, and have yet to find one where I feel I'll really learn something from.

Technical diving is not just about fitting tanks, putting through hours of deco after having been to 100m. It's also and mainly a state of mind, that some just don't get. If you don't see fun in planning a dive, and doing that plan, working as a team with rules, working on yourself, I wouldn't suggest going into technical diving.

 

[Octopusprime]

Thanks everyone for the information... I'm going to start this year with a couple wet no deco LM dives this year and a couple trips to the hole at haigh. I had a 24 min total dive to the bottom but did not push bottom timer. I will have to check my log for how much air I had left.

Im im going to do a DUI dog days so I can try on a couple suits and dive them. Go from there...

---------- Post added February 1st, 2015 at 10:53 PM ----------

My 2 cents:

Keep calm, take the time to do quite a bit of reading on the interwebz, just so you'll get an idea of what technical diving actually is. At this moment, they way you're talking about it seems completely wrong to me. If it still seems interesting, go and have a chat with the divers you may see around you (once they've doffed their gear of course), most of them will be open to questions and guide you except if you get there with questions like "if I get 12 tanks, will I be able to go to 200m and come out alive?". Then, if you still want to go, look at the instructors around you. Is there anyone that is widely recommended, if so why?
Once you'll have done this, you'll get where you want. The hardest part is probably the instructor. I've been looking around for 4 months now, and have yet to find one where I feel I'll really learn something from.

Technical diving is not just about fitting tanks, putting through hours of deco after having been to 100m. It's also and mainly a state of mind, that some just don't get. If you don't see fun in planning a dive, and doing that plan, working as a team with rules, working on yourself, I wouldn't suggest going into technical diving.

patoux... You obviously did not read my first post... Not looking for extreme deep... Just looking to extend bottom time on Lake Michigan dives... Not looking for zero to hero... You say do a lot of reading on the interwebz... What do you think this is... Your profile says your at 50-99 dives.... So I prober lay have more dives than you... I have no desire to ever go to 200ft. Just want more than 13 min bottom time.

I was looking to chat with some divers with real experiance...

 

[TSandM]

As I have continued to read the thread, I'm getting the feeling that you are exploring this for much the same reason that I got my tech cert. I wanted to go dive the cloud sponges in Saanich Inlet, which start at about 100 feet, but get dense enough for good photographs about 120. I didn't want to dive the Doria -- I just wanted a reasonable length of time at the depth where the things I wanted to see were to be found.

For me, that had to be trimix, in part because I'm simply too stupid to dive down there without it. But the UTD Tech 1 class, with 25/25 and O2 deco, was perfect for what I wanted to do. I took the class and then went up and did the dives just as I had envisioned doing them, and they were fabulous fun and we got some great photographs.

25/25 is not prohibitively expensive, and the gas supply for a reasonable dive (not 60 minutes!) at those depths is quite manageable.

 

[Max Speed]

Skip the dry suit. Diving wet you'll be thinking that 20 minutes of bottom time and no deco is just fine.