New to Diving: Diving gear help

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wurmer

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good day to all the divers out there.

diving is fun indeed. just this year i got my open water license from padi and purchase some basic gears like mask, snorkel and fins. after i got my license i have my first 3 independent dive in gensan city. i don't know but i am so addicted to diving.

guys, i need help in purchasing my bcd and regulators. there are lots of brands, styles and most of all the cost. for now i only have 20K budget for bcd and regs. is there any brand new, reliable and durable bcds and regs in the market today? some of my friends suggests to buy second hand equipments and that really is not my style because first thing im considering is my safety (history of equipment). what brand should i consider for the both of them? an average or mid-range bcds and regulators will do because i can't afford top of the line products.

by the way, i'm leaning on brands like scubapro, aqualung, aquamundo, tusa...are oceanic and mares brands okay?

thanks for the input and hoping for your helpful response.
 
I wish I *only* had 20k of budget for diving toys....lol That's plenty!

Regulators - ScubaPro, Apeks, Aqualung are tried/tested brands. I'm personally using HOG as I'm budget challenged, and they work well enough so far.

I don't have a good impression of Oceanic and Mares gear.

For BCD, if you're looking for Jacket style, ScubaPro has some good ones. If you're only going to ever do recreational diving, there's nothing wrong with getting a jacket style BC. It's fast and convenient to put on and I personally like the squeeze it gives me at the surface.

Since you have deep pockets, for BCDs you might want to look at Halcyon stuff. They're very nice, but pricey. Either the Infinity or Eclipse will do you well for all kinds of diving.
 
thanks whitesands,

do you have an idea where i could purchase these products in the Philippines? thanks
 
I'm sorry can't help you there. Try looking at the manufacturer's webpage, they should list country distributors.
 
I wish I *only* had 20k of budget for diving toys....lol That's plenty!
20k of US$ or Pinoy's peso(under US$500.00)?
Try Aquamundo if it is in peso and even that may not be enough.
 
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Aquaventure whitetip sell Aqualung and Apeks. .... Asia Divers sell cressi.... you can find locations on each of their websites.
 
I'm guessing the 20k budget is Peso ($460 US), so sadly that's now quite the budget Whitesands visualises :)

The real key in getting gear to to make sure you buy something you won't want to replace very quickly, generally the better the quality of gear the higher the price, although there is a lot of poor quality gear at high prices and a lot of great quality gear at lower (but rarely the lowest) prices.

You also need to think about what type of diving you plan on doing to evaluate if you really need that equipment or now.

My advice would be to start with the more personal items that come in contact with your skin, i.e. mask, wetsuit, bootes etc. It's also well worth buying some good fins, jet fin style fins will last forever but are heavy and quite expensive, finds like Mares Avanti or similar are a good option is you don't like jet fins - avoid things like split fins and floppy fins as these don't really perform, tend to cost more and in the case of plastic fins won't last long.

Realistically at lower end prices you'd be looking at 1,000-1,500 Php for a good mask (remember a leaky or uncomforatable mask is a real pain, something small, compact and soft is a very good investment, as is a neoprene strap. A cheaper wetsuit will generally be 4000 to 6000 Php unless you can find one on a clearance sale, bootoes should be around 800 to 1000 - Add all that up and you get 6,000-8,500 Php already :-/

A regulator is easy to hire but is the single most important piece of life support equipment in most forms of diving, it's nice to know where it has been. If you are looking for a good regulator at a good price then Hog is by far the best option (or Edge, the recreational line of Hog). However, an unsealed balanced first stage with balanced first stage, octopus and SPG plus hoses is going to be hard to find new for much less than $400 (17k Php). The cheaper regs really don't perform well in most cases and the chances are you'd want to replace them quite quickly or wish you'd spent more. Looking at the average rental cost for a reg where you dive and multiplying that by the amount you are diving will give you an idea on how much it would be to rent a regulator; it's not ideal but I think you may be better off going for a high performance reg later than buying a cheap reg now.

The BCD is another item I'd say to look at hiring right now, I think it's very hard to beat a backplate system and we find most (not alll!) divers who dive a lot or want to improve their buoyancy will eventually move towards this system at some time or another. However, in general back plate systems are more expensive, espacially the Halcyon set-up which is an excellent piece of equipment but your budget would realistically cover only half the cost of the BP+W system alone. A cheap jacket style BC can be found for under 10,000 Php at stores such as Aquamundo but you may want to upgrade before too long - the same logic as for the reg is worth considering, rental cost x number of dives vs purchase costs.

The one missing item is a dive computer, if you are keen to dive seriously then this is almost a requirement these days, I'd probablly suggest going with the wetsuit, booties, mask and fins along with a dive computer, then renting the reg and BC for now. This will keep rental costs lower and allow you more time to save-up for gear that you won't want to upgrade.

In Manila I'd suggest looking at one of the Aquamundo stores for gear, outside of Manila I'm not too sure on the dive shops so can't comment on General Santos :-/ There's always the second hand market on eBay/Sulit.com too, thats probablly a more realistic market for a complete set at the prices you mention.

Good luck and I hope you find what you need!

Karl
 
I'm with Karl_H here.

Start with the essentials first. Mask, wetsuit, boots and maybe fins... then just rent the rest for the near future.
20k in peso is not gonna be enough to buy the regs, bcd, and computer.

took me over a year of saving to finally have the complete set of gears.
now i'm trying to get other safety equipment... cutting tool, light, smb+spool...

sometimes it also helps to know people.
some can give you discounts in the dive stores around the metro.

imho, aquamundo and nautilus are good places to start looking.
 
Bossing,

Re:Budget Constraint - 20k is not enough for reg and BCD. For Reg, i think HOG will fit your budget. It has the same comfort and reliability. Most of the DM's that I know from SG is using HOG.

Check-out scubapeople's website and if you want I could check the current price for you.


good day to all the divers out there.

diving is fun indeed. just this year i got my open water license from padi and purchase some basic gears like mask, snorkel and fins. after i got my license i have my first 3 independent dive in gensan city. i don't know but i am so addicted to diving.

guys, i need help in purchasing my bcd and regulators. there are lots of brands, styles and most of all the cost. for now i only have 20K budget for bcd and regs. is there any brand new, reliable and durable bcds and regs in the market today? some of my friends suggests to buy second hand equipments and that really is not my style because first thing im considering is my safety (history of equipment). what brand should i consider for the both of them? an average or mid-range bcds and regulators will do because i can't afford top of the line products.

by the way, i'm leaning on brands like scubapro, aqualung, aquamundo, tusa...are oceanic and mares brands okay?

thanks for the input and hoping for your helpful response.
 
hi everyone,

thanks for the helpful tips you have shared. upon assessing all your inputs and to mention Karl_H's dive guide i decided to buy a regulator set. I'm leaning on Apeks XTX50 1st and 2nd (do not know whether DST or DS4), Apeks XTX20 octopus and Termo gauge combo (pressure and depth). Aquaventure whitetip gave me an a reasonable offer. i was thinking of scubapro mk25/s600 but the price is way beyond my budget. Hog brand i think is cheaper but i do not know where to get them.

my next project would be my BCD. i'm confused whether to buy a backplate system or the jacket type as i have not yet mastered my buoyancy.

is it really hard to use the backplate? i am no good swimmer...:)

thanks guys...
 

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