- Messages
- 93,495
- Reaction score
- 91,887
- Location
- On the Fun Side of Trump's Wall
- # of dives
- 2500 - 4999
Did my first sidemount dive in Puget Sound last evening. Showed up for our usual Thursday night dive only to find out that in my absense my buddies had planned a long, multi-stage, multi-scooter, multi-deco tour of Elliott Bay. Not wanting to get into something that aggressive for my first cold-water dive in sidemount, I opted for a solo dive ... just me and my scooter. Since this was my initial cold-water dive in the rig, and I already had my scooter along, I had opted to leave the camera home. Sorry I did ... about mid-way through the dive I came across a smallish (about five feet in length) sturgeon ... only the second one I've ever seen while diving.
I was pleased to find that the way Rob and I had set up my bungees works perfectly while wearing dry gloves. The pull dump, on the other hand, is going to need some modification ... or a slightly larger knob ... I had a lot of trouble finding it because of the lack of being able to feel it with the gloves on. And that's not something you want to be spending several seconds hunting around for ... when ya need it, ya need it right now. So this week-end I'll be addressing that issue. Otherwise, the dive was intentionally short, because I didn't take enough weight and when my tanks got down to about 2000 psi I could tell that if I let them get too much lower I was gonna be light. So I headed in.
This rig definitely feels more streamlined on a scooter than my backmount rig did ... even with those fat ol' LP95's under my arm. Gonna be much nicer with HP100's, I suspect ...
... Bob (Grateful Diver)
I was pleased to find that the way Rob and I had set up my bungees works perfectly while wearing dry gloves. The pull dump, on the other hand, is going to need some modification ... or a slightly larger knob ... I had a lot of trouble finding it because of the lack of being able to feel it with the gloves on. And that's not something you want to be spending several seconds hunting around for ... when ya need it, ya need it right now. So this week-end I'll be addressing that issue. Otherwise, the dive was intentionally short, because I didn't take enough weight and when my tanks got down to about 2000 psi I could tell that if I let them get too much lower I was gonna be light. So I headed in.
This rig definitely feels more streamlined on a scooter than my backmount rig did ... even with those fat ol' LP95's under my arm. Gonna be much nicer with HP100's, I suspect ...
... Bob (Grateful Diver)