Which Wing To Buy

I'm not enrolled in a DIR-F course yet because of work schedule conflicts, but plan to in the not so distant future. In the meantime I have the book and will be getting thoroughly familiar with it and thought I'ld get a head start by investing in some of the gear I'll be needing.

I'm not (yet) trained in the use of doubles so to start with I'm leaning towards the purchase of an Eclipse wing vs a Pioneer and not sure whether to get the 30# or 40#. The salesman at the LDS who is also DIR said that most start out with the 40# but find after diving with it awhile that the 30# is plenty.

I won't be buying any of the gear until I've talked it over with the instructor though, just to make absolutely sure I'm making the right choices. That said, I'ld like to get the opinions of the DIR divers on this board who have already gone thru this phase so I can learn from your experiences to assist me in making my decision.

Thanks...
Jim

divenut2001:

I'm not enrolled in a DIR-F course yet because of work schedule conflicts, but plan to in the not so distant future. In the meantime I have the book and will be getting thoroughly familiar with it and thought I'ld get a head start by investing in some of the gear I'll be needing.

I'm not (yet) trained in the use of doubles so to start with I'm leaning towards the purchase of an Eclipse wing vs a Pioneer and not sure whether to get the 30# or 40#. The salesman at the LDS who is also DIR said that most start out with the 40# but find after diving with it awhile that the 30# is plenty.

I won't be buying any of the gear until I've talked it over with the instructor though, just to make absolutely sure I'm making the right choices. That said, I'ld like to get the opinions of the DIR divers on this board who have already gone thru this phase so I can learn from your experiences to assist me in making my decision.

Thanks...
Jim

Click to expand...

I have the Pioneer 36 wing. I like the way it dives and it has plenty of lift for me diving the coldwaters of the upper midwest diving dry with a steel tank. If the Eclipse was out at the time I purchased my Pioneer, I'd of gone with the Eclipse just because of the extra durability it has over the Pioneer. I've had to patch two puntures in my Pioneer wing with Aquaseal and a buddy of mine has had to do the same with his wing.

I dive a Pioneer 27 in a drysuit with a steel tank in 32F water. Its a bit under powered but works. The 36 would have been a more apropriate wing though.

No Cal diver... 36# wing... single steel 80 tank.... drysuit...

Works well for me

Do you dive a wetsuit or a drysuit?
If you dive with a wetsuit, how much weight do you wear?
If you need a lot of weight, then 30lb may not be enough.

Say for illustration you need 30lb with a AL80 tank to be correctly weighted. 4lb of this is to offset the positive buoyancy of the tank at the end of the dive, so if you are neutral at the surface with an empty tank, then it means your suit is about 26lb positive, assuming you yourself are roughly neutral. If you go to 100ft, the suit will compress and lose 3/4 of its buoyancy. So you will become 20lb negative.
At the beginning of the dive with a full tank, your tank is also 6lb heavier than when it is empty, so you will be 26lb negative at 100ft with an empty wing.

When you take into account that the wing often does not provide its full rated lift due to being squeezed by hoses etc. then it becomes obvious that a 30lb wing may not be enough. The numbers may be a little different if you are wearing less weight (better), more weight (worse), or use a tank with more gas(worse). At any rate, I think a 40lb would be a safer choice if you are diving a wetsuit in cold water.

Now if you are diving with a shell drysuit (neoprene drysuit will be similar to wetsuit, although somewhat better) then it is a different story, as during the dive you only need to compensate for the gas in your tanks, which will be 6lb for an AL80. Even when your drysuit floods, you don't lose too much buoyancy, and you can always swim up in such cases even if you are a few lbs negative.
So a 30lb wing would be more than enough.

Sorry, should have included that I currently dive with a shell dry suit in Monterey. With al 80s I use 32lbs, with steel 95s I use 28lbs. So it looks like the 40# Eclipse should do it.

Is everybody pretty happy with the Halcyon? It appears to me to be of high quality but some comments on another board lead me to beleive it has some problems with sticky inflators, even with the older plastic ones. I know about the recall on the newer SS inflators and understand the replacements may have the same problems.

Jim

divenut2001:

Is everybody pretty happy with the Halcyon? It appears to me to be of high quality but some comments on another board lead me to beleive it has some problems with sticky inflators, even with the older plastic ones. I know about the recall on the newer SS inflators and understand the replacements may have the same problems.

Jim

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I havethe older style plastic inflator and haven't had any problems with it. I know a couple people that I dive with have the new SS inflators and have had no problems with those either.

divenut2001:

Sorry, should have included that I currently dive with a shell dry suit in Monterey. With al 80s I use 32lbs, with steel 95s I use 28lbs. So it looks like the 40# Eclipse should do it.

Is everybody pretty happy with the Halcyon? It appears to me to be of high quality but some comments on another board lead me to beleive it has some problems with sticky inflators, even with the older plastic ones. I know about the recall on the newer SS inflators and understand the replacements may have the same problems.

Jim

Click to expand...

I have the new SS inflator on my Eclipse. It was replaced in the recall. The original did begin to automatically inflate after a month or so of use. The replacement functions properly but all the same, I like the old plastic ones better. They both inflate and dump faster. Halcyon deliberately engineered the slower inflation with the idea that it would help the user fine tune buoyancy but I think it's just a pain. I certainly wouldn't pay extra to get an SS inflator. I might pay extra to not get it.

I have a pionner 36lb and really like it, I use an aluminum 80 and dry suit. However I had a major problem with the SS inflator, At first it just leak by and fill up slowly but one day after a dive the inlet button came right out of the inflator. I have a new SS inflator and it working good so far.

I bought the 40# wing for much the same reasons as others. Diving in a 7 requires lots of weight for me. I will eventually move to steel tanks, and I wanted to be prepared when I do. When I worked out the math, the 40# gave me a bit of a fudge factor, while the 30# was a touch too light.

I have had my inflator replaced under the recall. I did have problems with auto-inflation with the original inflator, but the new one works like a dream. I don't use my inflator hose to deflate the wing unless I'm on the surface preparing to sink, and I've found the rear dump valve to work just dandy at dumping gas when I need or want to do so.

I haven't had a problem with the wing dumping too slow, but then I seem to be doing fairly well on my weighting so I often don't have too much air in there to begin with. My only beef is the short inflator hose, but I'm getting used to it, and it's not short if you only use it to inflate.

I love the durability of the shell.