Handing Off a Pony Bottle

[redacted]

I have never seen an OOG diver period.

I have seen OOG divers. They were not doing 30 FPM and they were not concerned with a rest stop. I did not sense any panic - they just surfaced. Some even did do the nest dive.

 

[DaleC]

When I dove a Titan 1 missile silo I included my pony gas as part of my dive plan. I used a smaller St72 for back gas because we had to hump all our gear up and down a ladder and walk through half filled tunnels. I calculated I needed 20cuft rock bottom to ascend but had a 40cuft pony bottle so I designated half my pony as divable gas. Seems logical.

Who makes up these silly rules...

I like a slung pony because it is portable and can be swapped from person to person or unit to unit with ease but like some others, I would not waste time with that if I actually donated it to an OOA diver unless the circumstances dictated. Just go to the surface where everyone can get over it with nothing more than bruised egos.

 

[boulderjohn]

When I dove a Titan 1 missile silo I included my pony gas as part of my dive plan. I used a smaller St72 for back gas because we had to hump all our gear up and down a ladder and walk through half filled tunnels. I calculated I needed 20cuft rock bottom to ascend but had a 40cuft pony bottle so I designated half my pony as divable gas. Seems logical.

Who makes up these silly rules...

I like a slung pony because it is portable and can be swapped from person to person or unit to unit with ease but like some others, I would not waste time with that if I actually donated it to an OOA diver unless the circumstances dictated. Just go to the surface where everyone can get over it with nothing more than bruised egos.

It's just words. Calculate total gas needs and calculate a good reserve. Plan for plenty of gas. Terms like "pony bottle" and "stage bottle" can sometimes interfere with one's ability to make those plans.

 

[azmodan50]

Who makes up these silly rules...

The person carrying the pony bottle.

To me, including my "get out of trouble free" air is just asking for trouble. But, I also dive a steel 108, so I usually have plenty of air. I only bring the pony when I plan on diving deep.

 

[justbillin]

I’ve wondered about this same scenario myself in the past. There’s a lot to factor in besides just a panicked out of air diver. Their BC may have chintzy (and brittle) little plastic D-rings that might be hard to attach your bottle to, and they may not know how to handle a 40” hose and wrap it around their neck one time if you rig things the stage bottle way.

 

[cool_hardware52]

There are many reasons to carry "extra gas" in a slung bottle.

1) It's easier to solve any entanglement
2) It's easier to access and operate the valve, making it practical to carry this gas with the reg charged, but the valve off. This of course prevents loss of gas via un noticed fee flows.
3) It solves allows ditching the bottle if it becomes *any* sort of liability
4) The bottle can be donated if necessary. Entangled diver, tight spaces etc. While these are unlikely in recreational diving they remain possible.

Carrying slung bottle does not require it be donated, it only makes it possible
Donating a bottle does not require abandonment of the OOG diver

I'd suggest the real question is "What are the advantages of having your (shudder) pony bottle fixed to your rig?"

Tobin

 

[DaleC]

• A pony bottle is never part of your dive planning.
• Therefore, it doesn't exist.
• It is not an additional resource to extend a dive.
• I do not donate the pony...

Well, it is true that it is your pony and you can do what you want. I just see it as another piece of equipment and try not to saddle myself with artificial rules that restrict what I can do with it. I know how to think about what I am doing and seeing as this is the advanced diving section I would hope others do as well.

But let me ask, why do you not donate the pony. Do you have some alternative plan when your buddy goes OOA other than ending the dive. Is it hard to refill. Does that gas cost more than back gas or is the mouthpeice difficult to disinfect.

 

[Omisson]

Well, it is true that it is your pony and you can do what you want. I just see it as another piece of equipment and try not to saddle myself with artificial rules that restrict what I can do with it. I know how to think about what I am doing and seeing as this is the advanced diving section I would hope others do as well.

But let me ask, why do you not donate the pony. Do you have some alternative plan when your buddy goes OOA other than ending the dive. Is it hard to refill. Does that gas cost more than back gas or is the mouthpeice difficult to disinfect.

In diving there are few absolutes but general rules learned from dive accidents.

Sheck Exley used accident analysis to craft cave diving rules. Disregard the norms at your peril ( see the the normalization of deviance).

As a general rule - there is a difference between a pony and stage bottle. A pony being a reserve, a stage intended to be used.

Can you donate your reserve? Sure. Is it a good idea? As good an idea as diving with the guy who needed your reserve.....

 

[boulderjohn]

OK, I want to talk about terminology a little, and to do that, I want to start with describing a relatively serious tech dive.

The diver enters the water with 5 tanks: 1) 2 backmounted doubles with 10% oxygen and 70% helium (10/70), 2) one AL 80 with 21% oxygen and 35% helium (21/35), 3) an AL 40 with EANx 50, and 4) an AL 40 with 100% oxygen. On descent, the diver does not want to use the 10/70 tanks because the oxygen level is so low, so he breathes from the 21/35 until he reaches the depth of 190 feet, at which time he switches to the 10/70 tanks on his back. After completing his bottom time at about 300 feet, he ascends to 190 feet, at which point he switches to his 21/35 tank to begin his decompression stops. After about a dozen such stops, at 70 feet he switches to the 50% tank, and at 20 feet he switches to the 100% tank.

Horrors! He used the the same 21/35 tank for both his descent and his decompression! That means he used the same cylinder both as a stage bottle (or travel gas) and a decompression bottle! He used one bottle to serve two purposes! Shouldn't he have used two different tanks so he could have given them two different names? Well, as horrific as that sounds, it happens all the time.

So how does this relate to this thread?

People use pony bottles in recreational diving to give them a last resort source of gas that will get them to the surface in a dive that does not require anything more than a direct ascent to the surface. How much gas does that require? Not much. Actually, you don't truly need anything--a CESA will do the trick in a real emergency. If someone takes an AL 40 for a pony bottle, what is it other than the phrase "pony bottle" that prevents him from planning (key term) to use it during the dive for a short period of time (stage bottle!), leaving plenty of reserve for use in an emergency (pony bottle!)?

 

[dumpsterDiver]

There are many reasons to carry "extra gas" in a slung bottle.

1) It's easier to solve any entanglement
2) It's easier to access and operate the valve, making it practical to carry this gas with the reg charged, but the valve off. This of course prevents loss of gas via un noticed fee flows.
3) It solves allows ditching the bottle if it becomes *any* sort of liability
4) The bottle can be donated if necessary. Entangled diver, tight spaces etc. While these are unlikely in recreational diving they remain possible.

Carrying slung bottle does not require it be donated, it only makes it possible
Donating a bottle does not require abandonment of the OOG diver

I'd suggest the real question is "What are the advantages of having your (shudder) pony bottle fixed to your rig?"

Tobin

No, that was not the real question raised in this thread. It was simply the idea of handing off the pony. I read (again) last night in another thread where someone mentioned this handing off issue... and since I didn't want to derail that thread, I thought it was worthy of a discussion of that particular point.

Obviously, handing off a pony bottle does provide a certain level of flexibility to handle a very unique and unusual emergency, but I just don't see it as being worth mentioning within the hierarchy of potential benefits of having a slung bottle as opposed to a back mounted one.