What age is too old for Tech Diving.

[victor]

This thread has given me a kick up the b*m. I have been thinking of doing a tech course and possibly switching to a rebreather for a year or so but put it off as I am 60.
Why not, as you say I can carry the weight, I am not the fitest of people but this might drive me to improve my overall fitness.
As a photgrapher no bubbles or noise is very appealing.
Hmmmm oh dear this is going to be expensive. The wife is going to want 2 new handbags as compensation.

 

[lowviz]

...//... I have been thinking of doing a tech course and possibly switching to a rebreather for a year or so but put it off as I am 60. ...//...

Absolutely agree! You have lots of time, don't rush it.

 

[DCBC]

Age doesn't really have anything to do with it. Low physical ability or poor health are factors that may prohibit a person of any age from taking-up technical diving, or for that matter, diving at all.

Many of the old divers today that were certified several years back, have been tech diving for years (before the term existed). Breathing mix and using a dive computer for decompression makes deeper diving easier, not more difficult.

Many of us older guys are from the age before power steering and automatic transmissions. They don't feel they have the same need as some from a younger generation; who may feel they need automated parking aids, heads-up displays and computers that monitor tire pressure. They may be nice, but it's amazing what mankind can accomplish without such necessities...

I'm all for progress, but diving today has decidedly taken a profit driven direction. Courses for everything. Everything with little effort. You get what you pay for and too often, that's not much.

 

[Tom Winters]

You're too old when the first shovelful of dirt lands on your face.

A lot of the dives I did decades ago now have all sorts of certification requirements. I guess I was a cave diver in Hawaii when I surfaced underground in a huge dark stinky cave after wedging my way through a a crack in a reef and wiggling ever onwards. We didn't have lines - we used all of those to anchor the inflatable offshore of the sea cliffs. I just memorized all the twists and turns so we could get back the hell out. Looking back, a line would have made those dives soooooooooo much easier.

Deep diving... I was chasing one of my guys who got a little gung-ho, or narced out his gourd, in the Philippines and I had to chase him down a wall in a zillion feet of water near where they shot Apocalypse Now. I was always in enough trouble in the Navy so getting one of my guys killed would not have been good for either of us. Trimix sure would have been nice. I blew the blood vessels in my eyes so the whites of my eyes were blood-red for about three weeks in a predominately Catholic country. The local gals still loved me no sh!t but they made the signs of the cross AND the evil eye whenever they saw me. It was a real cool effect - you don't see people with bright red eyes all that often.

Do the tech stuff if you want to. One thing though... there's always the chance that something will not quite work out so all of your affairs should be in order. Before we left on deployments, all of us had to set up the paperwork in case things went south.

And geez... have fun damnit...

 

[Laurent Pilotte]

Oh, the things our generation accomplished. The freedom we had.! The thrill. For all who discover the underwater world. ENJOY. 66 and still active! Heading to live in Florida for my final 20??
http://youtu.be/F_s3e3FAeeE

Sent from my XT901 using Tapatalk

 

[rongoodman]

I'm 67 and got my rebreather(Prism 2) last summer. I've had my cave and trimix certs for several years now. I don't have any plans to quit and have started doing squats and deadlifts at the gym to get my old body back into shape, with a return visit to the Grand Teton on tap for this fall. To quote a famous line from a British comedy troupe, "I'm not dead yet!"

(OTOH, my legs definitely feel old after those deadlifts this afternoon!)

 

[shoredivr]

Last year I had the honor of diving with a guy of 78 and his early 70s wife (would not reveal her age) and they were both diving doubles and drysuits, had a workout regime and jumped off the back of the dive boat to do some St Lawrence River wrecks in the 100 to 140 ft range.

I have new role models now.

 

[Centrals]

I am just over 60 and have been diving tec since 1998. The twin set is getting heavy and I limit the tec dive to one dive per day since last yr.
The good thing of diving tec in SE Asia is that I don't have to carry the tank on and off the boat. The crew would do it willingly and I tip them afterwards.

 

[Kevrumbo]

The best wreck dives around here involves at least a little deco (i.e. tech diving). A local term of "techreational" is sometimes used. So, at the age of 67 I started tech diving classes. I can carry LP85 doubles and a 40 deco tank into and out of the water OK. I have not tried them getting on and off a boat yet. I'm having trouble with the valve drill. I've thought about moving to side mount. However, a more fundamental question might be: When is one 'too old' to be doing tech diving? Wreck divers that I talk with locally tell me to "press on" and keep practicing and learning. Then again, I am the oldest guy in whatever group I find myself in. What is the experience of the Grumpy forum?
Regards,
Ken

If you have to, go ahead & loosen your waistbelt and pull the tanks up just enough to facilitate reaching your manifold valves to do the drill, but with the added challenge of not upsetting your horizontal trim too much. . . (easier said than done!).

 

[Dr Dog]

Go get 'em Ken...

Never slow down...Never stop