Katana 2 vs. XDeep vs. Other?

[UCFKnightDiver]

I've been thinking of getting into sidemount and was curious about the different set ups available. I was at Cave Adventurers yesterday and of course they were pushing the Katana 2. I'd love to hear others' experiences with the various systems out there. What do you like? What don't you like? Would you recommend one vs. another? For those who have dived both, I'd love to get a bit of a compare/contrast.

Edit: Perhaps I should have posted this in the Cave Diving sub forum. Much more interested in perspectives from those diving the systems in caves

 

[rddvet]

I normally dive an xdeep and was an early adopter starting with the classic. I also dove a katana for almost a week. I used to hate the Hollis rigs ( started in sm in an sms100). I actually surprisingly liked the katana2 comparatively. It’s an obvious rip off of the stealth combined with an sms. It dives well and is comfortable. It’s also very very easy to adjust and is made to fit the sidewinder easily. Still if I had my choice I’d lean stealth. Pros to the stealth is it’s very minimalist so it’s packs down to nothing for travel. It also dives like a dream. Negatives are the butt dump for some people it can sometimes be hard to reach for people. The katana shoulder dump is very nice. As a whole everything about the katana2 is nice. For me the biggest negative is it’s far from minimalist amd it’s bulkier than the stealth. I don’t like all the excess material and padding and it doesn’t pack as well. If the katana2 didn’t exist I would say hands down the stealth wins over all Hollis sm bc’s. But honestly it’s a bit of a toss up now between the stealth and the k2 (and I’m a huge xdeep fan). If I was buying I’d go stealth. Depending on a person’s goals though, a k2 is a very very close second. If you’re diving al80s mostly then stealth all the way. If steels, toss up. If Travelling a lot, stealth. If you’re new to sm amd want extreme ease of adjustment, k2.
Basically, you can’t go wrong with either. My choice would 100% be the excess bulk of the k2 and Hollis’ horrible customer service place it as number 2. If you have any bit of shoulder mobility issues though, xdeep may not be for you.

 

[Marie13]

There’s a thread with Katana info and a number of dives this year. Seems to get a lot of love.

 

[helodriver87]

I'm also new to SM, but I've really enjoyed the stealth. Works equally well with 108s and AL80s. Dives really nice and adjusts pretty easily. I can see why the butt dump might be hard for some people to reach, but I never had issues. I'm happy with it. Put it through some pretty tight cave after class and had no issues.

 

[Addison Snyder]

Was also interested in this question. Rebreathers out of the question (not gonna take into account the versatility with a 5-10 thousand dollar purchase). I dive LP85s sidemount, and really like steels for caving.

If I plan on sticking to 2 steel cylinders and maybe an aluminum stage or two (in a drysuit), is the katana a clear winner then?

One of the things I sometimes get tripped over is a blog post about the "two schools of sidemount diving, and everything in between is an abomination" (ok, I might have exaggerated his views a little). That issue nags me somewhat because the hybrids seem to be the most popular nowadays. Am I taking that thought process too seriously?

Eventually I plan to try both, but was just wondering if anyone could offer advice.

 

[rddvet]

[QUOTE="Addison Snyder, post: 9208823, member: 499724"
If I plan on sticking to 2 steel cylinders and maybe an aluminum stage or two (in a drysuit), is the katana a clear winner then?

.[/QUOTE]

Absolutely not. I have 100s of cave dives between both my original stealth classic and newer stealth tec using 85s or larger, carrying 2+ stages and a deco bottle. The katana does not blow the stealth away in that regard. I also have dove probably 100 cave dives in mexico in my stealth with al80s. The stealth handles them both well. The katana is way nicer than I expected it to be and it's a strong challenger to the stealth, but for me the stealth wins. Very rarely the butt dump of the stealth can be annoying. But we're talking maybe 2 out of 100s of dives. My only concern with the shoulder dump of the k2 is when carrying multiple stages. My SMS100 would often burp the shoulder dump when I had 2 stages. Edd looked at it multiple times and tried to fix it but it would never stop. I am a little biased against the k2 due to that and the fact that I dislike Hollis' need to put tons of unnecessary stuff and material on their units. I prefer minimalist. Add to that the fact that in this area when you see the big red hollis bc there's often a particular type of cave diver you want to avoid dressed in it. But that's a totally different story.
If you plan to dive al80s ever I prefer the stealth.

 

[Manatee Diver]

Edd will gladly fix the XDeep's butt dump issue.

As far as lift, my XDeep handles two steel LP85s/HP100s just fine. And I am like a rock in freshwater, just barely positively buoyant with a wetsuit alone. We will see this weekend how well it handles stages.

And without making major changes to my Florida style rig I was able to adapt it to AL80s in Mexico. If I didn't need the trim weight I could probably make it more natural using the sliding D rings.

 

[rddvet]

Edd will gladly fix the XDeep's butt dump issue.

As far as lift, my XDeep handles two steel LP85s/HP100s just fine. And I am like a rock in freshwater, just barely positively buoyant with a wetsuit alone. We will see this weekend how well it handles stages.

And without making major changes to my Florida style rig I was able to adapt it to AL80s in Mexico. If I didn't need the trim weight I could probably make it more natural using the sliding D rings.

I would caution anyone from having him mod their stealth. Edd's guys do a great job, but back in the day myself, my wife, and a number of our buddies had issues with Edd's dump mods to the SMS that neither him or his guys at the time could figure out. Years later I hear more people that had similar issues. I know of one guy that had some issues with the stealth dump mod. Past experience makes me wonder if there are others with issues. My general rule is don't go making big equipment mods especially when they're not really necessary.
Are you putting trim weights on your al80s? If so, switch to sliding drings or 2 drings on the waist belt.

 

[Manatee Diver]

I would caution anyone from having him mod their stealth. Edd's guys do a great job, but back in the day myself, my wife, and a number of our buddies had issues with Edd's dump mods to the SMS that neither him or his guys at the time could figure out. Years later I hear more people that had similar issues. I know of one guy that had some issues with the stealth dump mod. Past experience makes me wonder if there are others with issues. My general rule is don't go making big equipment mods especially when they're not really necessary.
Are you putting trim weights on your al80s? If so, switch to sliding drings or 2 drings on the waist belt.

I've been running Edd's dump mod for about a year now on 80 dives. No issues here after I got it all setup. I think he got it all figured out.

I have a trim weight for a personal trim issue due to my prosthetic fin, it is something that I have to do on all rigs.

The way that Roger got me sorted out for AL80s some just to reduce the length of the leashes to almost nothing, and then hook it to a d-ring that would be able half way between the range for sliding d-rings.

I think once I get a drysuit and hopefully I don't need that trim weight anymore I can just throw a sliding d-ring on it.

 

[UCFKnightDiver]

The person I was chatting with at Cave Adventurers mentioned that at times the XDeep tends to beach ball a bit and the rear dump can be difficult to access with large steel cylinders. He also said something about gas transfer throughout the wing, but I don't remember exactly what that was. Perhaps sometimes gas can get trapped in different parts of the XDeep, but could have been the opposite. Thoughts?

Absolutely not. I have 100s of cave dives between both my original stealth classic and newer stealth tec using 85s or larger, carrying 2+ stages and a deco bottle. The katana does not blow the stealth away in that regard. I also have dove probably 100 cave dives in mexico in my stealth with al80s. The stealth handles them both well. The katana is way nicer than I expected it to be and it's a strong challenger to the stealth, but for me the stealth wins. Very rarely the butt dump of the stealth can be annoying. But we're talking maybe 2 out of 100s of dives. My only concern with the shoulder dump of the k2 is when carrying multiple stages. My SMS100 would often burp the shoulder dump when I had 2 stages. Edd looked at it multiple times and tried to fix it but it would never stop. I am a little biased against the k2 due to that and the fact that I dislike Hollis' need to put tons of unnecessary stuff and material on their units. I prefer minimalist. Add to that the fact that in this area when you see the big red hollis bc there's often a particular type of cave diver you want to avoid dressed in it. But that's a totally different story.
If you plan to dive al80s ever I prefer the stealth.

I'm curious what extra stuff/material you would want to get rid of on the Katana2? I'm a fan of the more minimalist approach, but at cursory glance, it didn't seem like the Katana 2 was super bulky to me.