Full Face Specialty - worth it?

Please register or login

Welcome to ScubaBoard, the world's largest scuba diving community. Registration is not required to read the forums, but we encourage you to join. Joining has its benefits and enables you to participate in the discussions.

Benefits of registering include

  • Ability to post and comment on topics and discussions.
  • A Free photo gallery to share your dive photos with the world.
  • You can make this box go away

Joining is quick and easy. Log in or Register now!

Over-pressure masks don't change the dead-air space issue and the need to adequately ventilate that increased volume. Over-pressurized masks are especially helpful in contaminated environments (like PSD and habite based hyperbaric welding). Depending on the diver's position in the water, overpressurization can encourage greater lung inflation, but that doesn't improve ventilation when the divers shallow-breaths at the higher lung inflation.

My experiences would suggest otherwise; and I am well aware that OP masks are helpful in contaminated environments -- probably why I don't put the "hep" in hepatitis, from work, over the years, in harbors.

Venting air visibly escapes around the OP FFM skirt, enough for the manufacturer to require that it be mounted over a hood, rather than under -- certainly a sufficient flow to exchange a scant 0.5 liter inner volume; and my only headache-inducing experiences, related to potential CO2 accumulation, etc, stemmed only from poorly-tuned on-demand masks in the past . . .
 
@Akimbo & @RainPilot

In your experience, are the Kirby Morgan M48s as problematic for C02 given the relatively lower volume of the oral-only cavity? [Context: OC, pod sealed, and NOT on the mouthpiece.]

I've been considering trying one primarily for comfort/jaw fatigue and better sealing. (I have deep temples and I've tried a lot of masks - some dives are OK, but others I'm still fighting the leaks continuously.)
The mouthpiece in the pod is very long so I find that I can just rest my mouth around it without needing to hold it with my jaw so no CO2 issues. On occasions when I have spent a fair chunk of time on comms so not using the mouthpiece I have not particularly noticed any CO2 issues.
 
No expert here, as I don't think I've even SEEN a ffm. I would not take the course. It SEEMS like something one SHOULD be able to read about & figure out without a course.
 
No expert here, as I don't think I've even SEEN a ffm. I would not take the course. It SEEMS like something one SHOULD be able to read about & figure out without a course.

While I generally agree with your take on inane specialty courses, and I didn't attend any (they didn't as yet exist); though, there are some potential, unusual FFM safety issues, specific to those masks of which divers should be made aware. The onset of bradycardia immediately springs to mind -- a function of the mammalian diving reflex -- should there be a sudden emergency removal or flooding damage to a FFM, and exposure of the face, to cold water of, say, 10˚ C and below. He or she may experience sudden apnea, and be temporarily unable to inhale, on a pony bottle or octopus.

At the very least, some time should be spent in a pool, getting accustomed to the adjustment and removal of the mask with gloves, under those easily controlled conditions; and the switch to an octopus and a conventional "split" mask (always carried, while on dives with FFMs) . . .
 
Required maybe not, having access to a qualified instuctor versed in the ins and outs of a technical mask with many options and parts and proper installation, hoods, mouthpieces regulator, coms etc priceless. without an actual specialty how to you develop recognition of those with the required skills to teach doning,removal and replacement safely underwater. it would increase safety in the sport at the very least and build a network of individuals with the knowledge base to share with others. These masks mostly have manuals, I think its in the best interest of the students for a training program, and in the best interest in a training program would be Quality Assurance through an organization, Requiring a course maybe draconian but courses available from providers prudent at the very least. Denying a dive to someone who has had their mask for years and is intimitly aquanted with all the nuances of the equipment becuase the dont have a c-card to use it, borders on ridiculous but i think thats the sort of stuff that goes on in a CYA industry.
 
When I first started diving FFM, in 2005, there were no instructors anywhere within 1000 miles of me. I took my Neptune to the pool and very carefully got myself used to it. When I did a flood and clear, I came the closest I have ever come to drowning. I was shallow enough to stand up and even when I did, I had a mask full of water that I couldn't get off.

Bear in mind, at that stage I was an OWSI, with ten years of free diving, spear fishing etc etc behind me. I was VERY comfortable underwater.

Looking back, the mistake I made was a simple one that would have been avoided completely if I had an instructor say one sentence to me, but I didn't know what I didn't know.

No, you dont need to do an agency-specific course if you dont want one, but at least find someone experienced with the mask you are using to give you some help when you are first trying it. Also, DO NOT do this alone. Its not like most other gear tweaking pool dives you can do on your own. If you screw up badly enough you can drown yourself really fast. FFM are not any more dangerous in and of themselves, but you dont want to find the edges of that envelope without someone to assist if needed.
 
I would not take the course. It SEEMS like something one SHOULD be able to read about & figure out without a course.
Having taken and passed the formal FFM course with a bunch of first responders under the direction of World leader in Rescue Diving Courses, I would offer a counter-argument.

After I got used to the weird buoyancy, I got to like the no-fog wide field of view. Field of view nowhere near as good as an easily fogged HydroOptix, but that is another story for another day.

My big take-away from that experience is that an FFM gives you yet another level of disconnect from the medium that you are diving in. Water. Cold, warm, whatever. Thus, the shock of going onto a safe second, octopus, etc. is intensified.
 
Many (most?) FFM have the ability to plug a secondary gas source directly into the mask, so if you have an issue, you dont even have to switch regs like you do with a half mask

that was an interesting read, and this is a possibly dumb question because I know nothing about FFMs but can you handle gas switches this way?

Say you're diving sidemount and want to breath each tank down, or if you're switching from a travel to a bottom gas? Or are FFMs solely for single tank non-deco dives?
 
that was an interesting read, and this is a possibly dumb question because I know nothing about FFMs but can you handle gas switches this way?

Say you're diving sidemount and want to breath each tank down, or if you're switching from a travel to a bottom gas? Or are FFMs solely for single tank non-deco dives?
You could, but you'd have to ensure you flushed the mask with the new gas each time. It would waste even more gas than the FFM already wastes. There are also gas switch blocks. Also, most FFM users use a quick disconnect between regulator stages. it would be particularly trivial to swap gasses via the QD. Especially if you had a backup gas plumbed directly into the mask in case something went wrong during the switch. When I use multiple gasses, I don't use my ffm. Actually, these days I don't really use the FFM at all... but it was fun while it lasted.

Regarding the dead air space. Ocean Reef has a little rubber "gasket" that sort of surrounds the mouth to direct gas flow. It should serve both to help most of your exhaled gas go out the exhaust and also to help the inhaled gas "stay" around your mouth and nose. It's far from sealed, but I suspect this part is largely responsible for good respiration in the mask. Maybe that's incorrect, it's just an assumption. Something definitely causes the gas to flow around and fill the mask though. You can feel the cold tank air hit your face when you put the mask on and take your first breath. Also, that's when any fog disappears from the mask. I realize those two ideas contradict each other... in short :idk:
Here's a photo. upload_2020-2-12_9-39-35.png
 
Also, most FFM users use a quick disconnect between regulator stages.

If for no other reason; cleaning, storage, and transport of a FFM with a first stage and the gaggle of hoses (SPG, transmitter, octo, etc) is a bulky PITA. Recreational FFMs are pretty small compared to a Kirby Morgan Band Mask, (they only have a first stage for a bailout bottle) but the issue is the same.

upload_2020-2-12_7-24-35.png

Choose QDs carefully if you are diving deep. Many can introduce significant flow restriction.
 
https://www.shearwater.com/products/peregrine/

Back
Top Bottom