Buy my own reg or keep renting?

[going2aussie]

I've started to dive more, but it's still more a lot of diving a few times a year vs a more steady amount. I've always rented equipment except for mask, fins, etc. I'm looking at getting a BCD now and my own computer. Should I bother with my own reg setup? My thoughts are that the rental stuff is maintained by people who know a lot more than me. Am I better off given my dive frequency to stay renting or is buying worth it? If the latter, is used a good option?

Thank you.

 

[gr8jab]

I can't comment on your dive frequency and renting vs. buying.

Most of the rental gear I've used has been junk. They may be inspected and maintained properly, but I have no idea. They certainly are ugly and look like leftovers from Flipper or Sea Hunt. I'm supposed to put this in my mouth? Yuck.

If you are going to get a BC and computer, get the reg too. Mine are about 15 years old, used twice a year for a week at a time, and are still in perfect shape. I expect them to last for another 15 years. I personally do no maintenance. I wash them in fresh water and drip dry. I follow the 2 year professional maintenance schedule. That's it.

In fact, I probably spend more time cleaning, washing, repairing, and maintaining my BC than my regs. If you put a BC in storage poorly, it comes out bad.

 

[Diver0001]

I've started to dive more, but it's still more a lot of diving a few times a year vs a more steady amount. I've always rented equipment except for mask, fins, etc. I'm looking at getting a BCD now and my own computer. Should I bother with my own reg setup? My thoughts are that the rental stuff is maintained by people who know a lot more than me. Am I better off given my dive frequency to stay renting or is buying worth it? If the latter, is used a good option?

Thank you.

I think the big question is the quality of rental equipment where you live.

That said, if you're diving a few times a year then having a full kit of your own gear will feel like freedom to you. I know when I got my own gear that the cost of a day of shore diving and the hassle involved in getting it organised were both significantly reduced and as a result I started diving more often.

The rest is a question of budget and finding buddies.

R..

 

[apostle228]

I would say, how much is it to rent just a regulator setup? Compare that to the cost of regulators you are interested in purchasing, and see how many dives on the reg it will cost to pay itself off in terms of rental price... I.E. if it is $20 to rent regulators for a day, or $1000 to purchase a full setup of first stage, second stage, and octo... It would take 50 dives to pay itself off. If you dive often enough that would totally be worth it.

It also seems to me that if you own your own gear, you are more likely to dive more often (assuming you live near enough to water), just like Diver0001 pointed out. So that is something to think about as well.

 

[victorzamora]

I've started to dive more, but it's still more a lot of diving a few times a year vs a more steady amount. I've always rented equipment except for mask, fins, etc. I'm looking at getting a BCD now and my own computer. Should I bother with my own reg setup? My thoughts are that the rental stuff is maintained by people who know a lot more than me. Am I better off given my dive frequency to stay renting or is buying worth it? If the latter, is used a good option?

Thank you.

The bolded part definitely isn't always true. And they're certainly not maintained by people who care more than you do. Most dive shop regs are cheap regs treated just well enough to keep them kinda working....and when they stop working they're patched into working. Dive shops don't typically make loads of money, so they don't spend loads on keeping everything perfect and pristine. Plus, cracking open my first "vomited-in" second stage sold me on buying my own. Regs might be more expensive down under, but in the US they pay for themselves pretty quickly. What dive websites do you have access to and what shops are close to you (so we can pick out good reg sets to recommend).....and how much do reg rentals run?

 

[Solacequest]

Regs are a very personal choice. We all have dove ones we love and some we hate. No offense if anyone lies them,, But I would HATE to have to dive the Sherwood Bruts most DS around here use for Rentals. Like with kayaks, backpacks, running shoes..etc the only way to see what you like is try different models. The DS I did my OW class with many moons ago would let ppl "borrow" a number of dif regs and computers from their rental fleet and some of their personal gear to find what they want. I'd recommend trying as many as you can, and then buying what you like. It's like having a bbq and reaching blind into a bag of mystery meat, when you could have a perfect fillet minion every time.

 

[Diver0001]

The bolded part definitely isn't always true. And they're certainly not maintained by people who care more than you do. Most dive shop regs are cheap regs treated just well enough to keep them kinda working....and when they stop working they're patched into working. Dive shops don't typically make loads of money, so they don't spend loads on keeping everything perfect and pristine. Plus, cracking open my first "vomited-in" second stage sold me on buying my own. Regs might be more expensive down under, but in the US they pay for themselves pretty quickly. What dive websites do you have access to and what shops are close to you (so we can pick out good reg sets to recommend).....and how much do reg rentals run?

(bold added by me)

I'm not a regulator tech but I have rebuilt my regulators on several occasions and I can tell you something.

First of all, most dive shop regs -- at least in our local area -- are NOT cheap regs (most are mid-range regs from the big-5 - Aqualung, apeks, mares, Sherwood and Scubapro) and not not badly maintained.

Dive shops here are required to keep records of maintenance (based on serial number) of every regulator they have in the rental stock and to fully maintain them every .... I believe ... 6 months. Shops here have a maintenance regime and the guys who rebuild these regs do maybe 6 or 8 dozen rebuilds a year. Nobody touches one of the rental regs (even if they think they know what they are doing) if they are not certified. I am one who is not certified. If I notice a problem with a reg I put a "tag" on it and on the tag I write down the date, my initials and the issue I noticed and it goes straight into maintenance. Any abnormality mean the reg is taken out of circulation and sent straight to maintenance.

My friend, the one I dive with most of the time, is one of these regulator techs. He isn't "throwing in a parts kit", which is the criticism you see a lot on the internet and I don't think you can call him out for "not caring". He's told me that if he wouldn't give it to his best friend (which is me) to use that he won't put it back in rental. Others are slightly less picky but the rules seem to work since I don't know of any shop in the Netherlands where poor maintenance of the rental stock was the cause of a serious incident.

Moreover, and this kind of gets to the core of my point, I agree when I hear that nobody will care about your reg as much as you do..... but caring isn't enough. I've asked my buddy to watch while I rebuilt my reg on a number of occasions and usually somewhere 1/2 way he says to me, "I'm sorry.... but I have to take over." Caring.... even a LOT... doesn't automatically make you competent! My friend as rebuilt thousands of regs of the same type I use and I've rebuilt.... 6 or 8.

I'm not saying you shouldn't try it.... but the justification I keep hearing on the internet about how only YOU can be trusted to rebuild your regs even though the tech at the shop may have done thousands...... Meh.... I think that's just a rationalization..... it's an excuse for not wanting to delegate or not wanting to pay for it.

In any case I've stopped maintaining my own regs aside from minor stuff. I asked my friend for a list of people he would recommend and 9 times out of 10 I wait until I know he's on the roster and I'll put them in then.
R..

 

[victorzamora]

ro: that's interesting. I've never heard of mandated maintenance records or regimes like that. Every shop I've dealth with always had a policy of diving it until it broke, and then patching it until it needed a real rebuild. I'm a certified reg technician for one major brand, and have rebuilt regs from at least 5 major brands....including a few non-standard rebuilds.

But when I said "maintained" I didn't just mean rebuilds and parts kits. I meant the rinse, adjustments, etc. I've never dealt with a shop that does a rinse as well as I rinse my own. Every shop I've dealt with breaks all of the rules of rinsing regs....like depressing purge buttons under water while not pressurized and dunking first stages with little rubber caps that offer no protection, etc. A careful diver can do much better than most shops I've dealt with, but wouldn't do any worse than even the best shops I've dealt with.

 

[editmojo]

I'm a vacation diver, maybe 15-20 dives a year. I rented for years until getting some really poorly maintained stuff in Mexico. I new what I wanted and started looking on Craigs list and closeouts on websites. Put my kit together very inexpensively but good quality stuff. I figured it payed for itself in rental savings in about 2 years. But the best part is I'm a better diver because I know how my stuff performs. My buoyancy is really good because I know my BCD. I trust my reg because I check it over before every trip. I can close my eyes and grab my octo or my cutter or my smb because they are always in the same place. Piece of mind. Priceless.

 

[bmlbytes]

If the latter, is used a good option?

My girlfriend and I just started diving in January. We went on Craigslist and I was able to buy a complete used setup for $200 (BCD, wetsuits, fins, mask, snorkel, regulators, gauges, tanks, everything). I had the BCD, regulator and tanks inspected and serviced, and that all probably cost me another $150. For $350 I'd say I got a hell of a deal. I wouldn't expect everyone to get a deal like that, but it can be done.

It costs me $5 per tank to have them filled at my dive shop. I think it would cost about $70 a day to rent all that stuff. Because of this alone, I can tell you that I dive a lot more than I would if I didn't own my own gear.

I know that not everyone is selling a complete setup like mine for $200, but you can still find really good deals. My girlfriend got her setup for $300. She got everything except the tanks. It's a good thing my setup came with two tanks.