Sidemount as a first own setup?

[MichaelMc]

The OP wants to dive caves. He has a new idea about cave diving every other week. This week instead of getting a drysuit to dive steel doubles (so he's not a brick in event of a wing failure) he's decided to stick with his wetsuit but jump on the sidemount bandwagon. Despite those of us "in the woodwork" that realize that actually cave diving in SM is not necessarily a seamless transition.

You may be confusing this OP with a different one. That I see, this OP has only two posts, both in this thread, with no mention of caves.

 

[runsongas]

Hi
SM doesn't necessarilly mean two tanks.
For rec dive, a single SM tank is perfect.

while monkey diving a single al80 can be done, a pair of al40s or lp45/50s still dives better if you have access to them

 

[Celt]

There is no reason you can’t go straight to side mount with training. None. It isn’t rocket science, you could train a monkey to dive. Forget the naysayers if it’s what suits you go for it. Over the winter I split my back mounted 12ltr steel twinset which I dived for 40 years, replaced the valves, reconfigured my regs and mounted them on an XDeep stealth harness and went diving and the only reason was I was struggling to get the steel twins back into my boat as all my diving last year was solo.

 

[CaveSloth]

Why are your bands, manifold, and backplate 14lb negative?

I way miscalculated. My crossbar and bands are 6.2 lbs and my backplate is 2lbs Aluminum so losing them would only net me around 8 lbs less negative buoyancy.

Another benefit of sidemount in the BC failure / doubles steels / wetsuit scenario is that I could theoretically ditch a tank.

 

[grantctobin]

I way miscalculated. My crossbar and bands are 6.2 lbs and my backplate is 2lbs Aluminum so losing them would only net me around 8 lbs less negative buoyancy.

Another benefit of sidemount in the BC failure / doubles steels / wetsuit scenario is that I could theoretically ditch a tank.

Please tell me how you’re going to feel ditching half of your reserve gas at potentially your deepest penetration point back in a cave and swimming lopsided throughout the remainder of your exit while relying on a single first stage, single second stage, and an inevitably higher SAC rate. At best, you’re going to end up with donated gas from your buddy/team (don’t dive thirds in a no flow cave in a team of two) and worst case without a buddy and dead. Ditching a steel cylinder of appropriate cave sized magnitude on open circuit sidemount in a wetsuit is not an appropriate solution to the problem you seem hell-bent on not confronting.

 

[CaveSloth]

In a cave can't I just crawl out on the rocks if my BC has failed? I've tried it a few times in the springs... letting all my air out and rock climbing up features in caverns. Seems to work pretty well.

 

[SandyRobinson]

In a cave can't I just crawl out on the rocks if my BC has failed? I've tried it a few times in the springs... letting all my air out and rock climbing up features in caverns. Seems to work pretty well.

You may crawl up the rocks if at a chimney or you may crawl along the rocks on the main passage at JB and parts of Ginnie, the Peanut tunnel. But if there is a silt floor such as Twin caves, Hole in the Wall, Orange Grove, parts of P1 and P3, and a lot of other caves, you will be SOL.

 

[CaveSloth]

Fine I will get a dang dry suit.

 

[jale]

while monkey diving a single al80 can be done, a pair of al40s or lp45/50s still dives better if you have access to them

Yes, you are right but SM with a single tank is not monkey diving if you mean monkey diving as diving a stage without the BM
For simple rec diving where you use a single al s80, you can perfectly SM the tank instead of BMing it.
Furthermore, for SM with one or two alu tanks, you don't even need to buy any specific SM equipment.
Indeed, just remove the plastic backpack of your BM jacket, use the tank strap for one tank and add a bungee to get the tank(s) under your armpit and voilà

 

[runsongas]

that post made not a lick of sense. post some pics of what you mean.