Do you actually see people diving with pony bottles?

[rek_diver]

You could see what's in it at depth if you wanted to. When my pony was back-mounted, I had a pressure gauge on a long-ish hose clipped with a bolt snap to my left D-ring. When I switched to slinging it, I have the pressure gauge on a 6-inch hose tied in a typical way that it's kept where I can always see the pressure. Some people use a little button gauge.

It's good to be able to see the pressure of your pony/stage bottle in case it's leaking, since it is your emergency back up.

The only way I could see my pony bottle gauge at depth is to remove my entire rig.

I use a button gauge on my pony bottle which is mounted to my main tank. I check the pressure before the dive when I turn the pony tank valve on, and in I go. The odds of it developing a leak that drains a considerable amount of gas out of it (aside from a free flow from the secondary regulator that is tied just below my chin which I would notice) is infinitely small.

 

[H20doctor]

i think this thread and topic is a good one and ive read Almost the whole thing and all the replies .. i never used a pony , and i didnt see the need for one or understand why a diver would use one if they planned a dive and dived the plan .. if a diver was safe , and and skilled , and followed dive rules , then a pony shouldnt be needed .. right ? as i thought and observed over all these years .. many divers here in puget sound carry ponies and back up air ..
i wasnt until i had an Oh crap moment , i realized how important a pony is .. my pony saved a divers life , and i got them to the shallows , and through a safety stop .. i unclipped it , threw it on them , and got them up ..
i think what this topic needs is , How did your pony and back up air , benefit you and How was it useful and Help you in a bad situation..? what were the Benefits of carrying a Pony ?
is a Pony or backup air for you .. > maybe , maybe not .. For me , its a Life saving tool when diving throws me the unexpected.. and the unforeseeable

 

[Dan]

That would be a stage bottle, which in some agencies is partially used at the beginning of the dive or at a specified point in the dive.

Yea, I confused myself earlier on the difference between the pony bottle & stage bottle.

 

[RayfromTX]

OK I've been hesitant to post this because it is off topic in the strict sense but at this point the topic has wandered a good bit. When I started diving I talked to a coworker that had been diving for many years and he told me a story that I have heard him repeat to others. He told me that he was diving with his wife in cozumel and she went OOA and took his octopus. Rather than heading to the surface the went to find the dive master and lo and behold he had someone else breathing from his octo. The four of them headed for the surface but before they got to the surface my friend and his wife went OOA and so all four of them buddy breathed off two regs while they did their safety stop. My only response was "SAFETY STOP??!!?"

To bring it back on topic and to tie into H2Odoctor's post, the pony isn't always for your emergency.

 

[rek_diver]

ll four of them buddy breathed off two regs while they did their safety stop. My only response was "SAFETY STOP??!!?"

Why not a safety stop? If they've got a few hundred psi in each of the two remaining tanks that's probably going to be enough to sit at 15' for the better part of 3 minutes, and if they had just ascended from a deep dive why not use the gas if they have it to avoid a possible case of DCS?

 

[boulderjohn]

OK I've been hesitant to post this because it is off topic in the strict sense but at this point the topic has wandered a good bit. When I started diving I talked to a coworker that had been diving for many years and he told me a story that I have heard him repeat to others. He told me that he was diving with his wife in cozumel and she went OOA and took his octopus. Rather than heading to the surface the went to find the dive master and lo and behold he had someone else breathing from his octo. The four of them headed for the surface but before they got to the surface my friend and his wife went OOA and so all four of them buddy breathed off two regs while they did their safety stop. My only response was "SAFETY STOP??!!?"

To bring it back on topic and to tie into H2Odoctor's post, the pony isn't always for your emergency.

Correct--the safety stop was not a good choice, but if a DM and 3 of his clients went OOA on a dive, then that would have to be the most incompetent DM in the entire history of Cozumel diving.

 

[rek_diver]

Correct--the safety stop was not a good choice, but if a DM and 3 of his clients went OOA on a dive, then that would have to be the most incompetent DM in the entire history of Cozumel diving.

I think you're being a bit harsh. First of all we don't know if the diver breathing off the DMs octopus was OOA. I've seen divers grabbing some air from a DM because they're getting low and the DM doesn't want to call the dive for the benefit of the other divers so they share air for a bit. Nothing about the post said the DM was out of air, and as far as the woman diver running out of air, I guess that the DM could have been more attentive but it really comes down to the diver to monitor their own gas supply, and let the DM know when they're below a specified amount. Not the DMs fault if he told all the divers to signal when at 1000 psi and the woman diver just kept right on diving until she got nothing from her regulator.

 

[boulderjohn]

Why not a safety stop? If they've got a few hundred psi in each of the two remaining tanks that's probably going to be enough to sit at 15' for the better part of 3 minutes, and if they had just ascended from a deep dive why not use the gas if they have it to avoid a possible case of DCS?

Buddy breathing has pretty much been eliminated from modern OW instruction because it is considered too likely to result in a double fatality.

Glen Egstrom, Berkeley professor and one time director of NAUI, studied buddy breathing decades ago. He determined that for a buddy team to be able to perform the skill confidently under real OOA circumstances, they would have had to have had about 17 successful practice sessions prior to that. He also determined that the skill was perishable--that buddy team would have to practice it regularly to be confident they could do it in a real situation.

I would not do it with anyone on a safety stop. I would just head for the surface. the odds of a problem occurring because of a missed safety stop on a recreational dive are close to nil.

If for some incredible reason I was somehow involved in a buddy breathing situation at depth on a recreational dive with someone I barely knew (as in this situation), I would let the other diver have the working regulator, and i would do a CESA to the surface. that is a lot safer than having that diver kill me.

 

[rek_diver]

Buddy breathing has pretty much been eliminated from modern OW instruction because it is considered too likely to result in a double fatality.

Glen Egstrom, Berkeley professor and one time director of NAUI, studied buddy breathing decades ago. He determined that for a buddy team to be able to perform the skill confidently under real OOA circumstances, they would have had to have had about 17 successful practice sessions prior to that. He also determined that the skill was perishable--that buddy team would have to practice it regularly to be confident they could do it in a real situation.

I would not do it with anyone on a safety stop. I would just head for the surface. the odds of a problem occurring because of a missed safety stop on a recreational dive are close to nil.

If for some incredible reason I was somehow involved in a buddy breathing situation at depth on a recreational dive with someone I barely knew (as in this situation), I would let the other diver have the working regulator, and i would do a CESA to the surface. that is a lot safer than having that diver kill me.

They were not buddy breathing they were using another divers octopus.

OH WAIT

Never mind I get it now

 

[boulderjohn]

think you're being a bit harsh. First of all we don't know if the diver breathing off the DMs octopus was OOA. I've seen divers grabbing some air from a DM because they're getting low and the DM doesn't want to call the dive for the benefit of the other divers so they share air for a bit.

Rereading the post, I see a need for more information: "The four of them headed for the surface but before they got to the surface my friend and his wife went OOA and so all four of them buddy breathed off two regs while they did their safety stop."

That means that the two OOA divers were buddy breathing from the DM and the other diver who had previously been breathing from the DM's alternate. So the DM only allowed two of his divers to go out of air, and one to be low on air. He wasn't as bad as I thought--merely horrible, in fact.

EDIT: I really am confused about this.