Equipment suggest. for career diving?

[GetNarc'd]

I'll check those links out now, Rabbit. As for location, I'm much further north than that. I work out of the Haverstraw Marina in West Haverstraw N.Y., Rockland County. The original diver, whom I work for, did this on request, but is no longer in adequate shape to dive.

Scrubbing the bottoms of boats is relatively safe, as the dive would be no deeper than the draft of a moderately sized sailboat, and take place at a floating dock. I would be diving alone, with a man above me in a small boston whale. In terms of recovering items from the bottom of the river, the basin is approximately 15 feet deep at high tide. I did not plan on dry suit diving right now, but may be doing a dry suit, nitrox, and AOW certification all over a single weekend in April. This will get me more familiar with diving as well as introduce me to a dry suit, which i'm eager to become familiar with. I've also been told that I should get a good amount of dives under my belt before even pursuing dry suit dives.

Chris

EDIT: It seems my previous edit didn't work, so in this one i'll say that I I'd like to retract my statement about my asumption as to the safety level of doing this. I just read some of these links :-0

 

[Lukiedukie]

I would think drysuit is the only way to go. What are the water temps up there? repetitive dives and working solo in zero visibility. Tell me your at least considering redundant air sources? So you figure it is just 15' so you will be fine. I hope you go a long neck as if you get hung up and your low on air 2' under water is a bad, bad place to be let alone 15'. I wish you the best of luck the other diver who can not do this any more is he going to give you job specific training? I hope so. I have not thought about doing what your going to get paid to do and I think I have come up with 10 different problems already. WOW good luck and god bless

 

[pipedope]

I hate to be he wet blanket but what you are talking about is Commercial Diving.
It has all the risks of most of the rest of commercial diving out there and does require the same kind of training, equipment, planning and man power as other commercial diving.

I know that most operations are not doing bottom cleaning as a commercial operation but it is and you can check the OSHA site to see.

Seriously, if it is too expensive and too much trouble to do it with the proper training, equipment, planning and manpower then it is too much to do it at all.

 

[Gary D.]

More things to look at.

Who is going to carry the insurance, you or the Marina? If it’s the Marina’s policy will it cover YOU with only an OW cert.? Who is going to pay Workman’s Comp? Depending on where you are it can get quite pricey. Are the boat owners going to pay the Marina or pay you directly?

There is lots and lots over and above the safety issues to think about. Doing the wrong bottom with the wrong process can make you wish you never thought about this business.

Gary D.

 

[superstar]

I use to scrub boat bottoms and find lost items for extra beer money at the local marinas. I used old junk equipment, had no insurance, and at the time there were no agencys offering special training on bottom scrubbing. Maybe PADI should offer a bottom scrubbing c-card, maybe it's covered in dir or gue class. I know what it is, it' an overhead environment so use a long hose.

 

[superstar]

One more thing, scrubbing boat bottoms sucks, learn sailboat rigging, it pays more.

 

[Lonefox]

You might want to consider Liability insurance, given the value of some of the boats you may be working on. Damage something, and you might be looking at a hefty bill. Someone trips over your scuba gear, you got a lawsuit on ur hands.
Insurance might not be too cheap, given the level of risk involved, you may well find that that the level of work you'll need to cover the insurance payments may not warrant doing it. In fact you may even find it impossible to get insurance without commercial diving qualifications.

 

[GetNarc'd]

I hate to be he wet blanket but what you are talking about is Commercial Diving.
It has all the risks of most of the rest of commercial diving out there and does require the same kind of training, equipment, planning and man power as other commercial diving.

I know that most operations are not doing bottom cleaning as a commercial operation but it is and you can check the OSHA site to see.

Seriously, if it is too expensive and too much trouble to do it with the proper training, equipment, planning and manpower then it is too much to do it at all.

You can call it whatever you like. To say that scrubbing the bottom of a boat at 6 ft. depth with a scotch bright pad has all the risks of underwater welding and construction is a bit rediculous. I don't plan to take an extensive course to learn how to safely take off algae from a hull.

More things to look at.

Who is going to carry the insurance, you or the Marina? If it’s the Marina’s policy will it cover YOU with only an OW cert.? Who is going to pay Workman’s Comp? Depending on where you are it can get quite pricey. Are the boat owners going to pay the Marina or pay you directly?

There is lots and lots over and above the safety issues to think about. Doing the wrong bottom with the wrong process can make you wish you never thought about this business.

Gary D.

The boat owners pay our business, which is a seperate entity from the marina. Doing the wrong bottom with the wrong process? It's a mildy abrasive 3m pad. My boss has been doing it for customers for over 15 years and has never had an issue. It's mainly for the sailboaters who race weekly. I would expect to do no more than 2 or 3 20-35 ft sailboats per month.

In reference to the other post, this isn't meant as a primary source of income. It's more like a sidejob, within my full-time job.

 

[superstar]

I'd say you got a good plan worked out, go for it.

 

[ScubyDoo]

I see there are those trying to turn relatively simple and innocuos tasks into rocket science again. The level of analism on this board never ceases to amaze me.