Armadillo Style Pony Mounting

[b1gcountry]

All this talk about pony bottles has me curious...has anyone tried to mount their pony similar to how the Armadillo system mounts the sidemount tanks?

For those not familiar, the armadillo is a sidemount system that has two bungees under the armpits coming out of the backplate that get wrapped around either tank valve. The system is supposed to be very streamlined, and typically uses 80cf or larger cylinders. The botton gets hooked onto a special butt-plate.

The Butt-plate might be hard to do, but it would be pretty simple to add some bungees to the BP.

Tom

 

[Kangy]

If you already have a back mounted cylinder on a traditional BP why would you switch from using clips and d-rings to using bungie to hold your pony? The streamlining from the armadillo style mounts would not be any benefit considering you already have one or two cylinders on your back to begin with.
Unless your talking about using the Armadillo style harness to hold a cylinder on each side for redundancy and removing the back mounted cylinders all together.

 

[JimC]

Many CCR divers have begun to 'sidemount' there bailout. I know a couple of cave divers who have begun to 'sidemount' there stages. I would have to say that sidemounting an AL30 or AL40 would get it completely out of the way, tucked right up. I would sugest it would be perdy slick.

As for how; http://www.golemgear.com/pc-220-2-armadilloccr-sidemount-system.aspx

You could easily rig something up with a bit of webbing a tri-glide and a bungee loop for one side. Perhaps throw a u-bolt on the bottom corner of the plate instead of going to a full on buttplate so you can still sitdown easily on the boat.

P.S. the 'dillo doesn't have a backplate in it.

 

[b1gcountry]

No, I'm not talking about taking the tank off my back. The people I've heard from who use the armadillo system say it really streamlines the tanks as opposed to using the chest and hip D-Rings. I started thinking, if it works for an 80cf cylinder, it should work for a 20/30/40cf one.

I notice additional drag even carrying a 19cf pony...if it was up under my armpit though, I'm not sure there would be much more drag.

 

[b1gcountry]

You could easily rig something up with a bit of webbing a tri-glide and a bungee loop for one side. Perhaps throw a u-bolt on the bottom corner of the plate instead of going to a full on buttplate so you can still sitdown easily on the boat.

I have a FredT backplate, and it has holes already drilled along the sides. I was planning on just passing the bungee through the holes, and putting a knot in both ends to secure it-like in the link you posted. I wasn't sure how exactly they hold the valve with the bungee though.

Tom

 

[JimC]

Idealy you need a left hand valve for your left side. You then just pull the bungee loop around the valve handle and it pulls in nice and tight. You can do this with a right hand vavle, but you have to face the regulator outboard instead of inboard and then the regulator itself interfears with the bungee loop.

http://www.advanceddivermagazine.com/armadillo.html

Page 12 of the 'dillo manual showes this.