Love:Hate relationship with Compass

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Is it just me or does anyone else have a love/hate relationship with their compass?
I love my Suunto and I definitely rely upon and need a compass for my diving.. but I am getting so frustrated with durability and reliability issues. In the last 6 years, I have gone through 3 of these and at $100+ it is so frustrating to keep replacing.
Latest one is now not working and needs to be replaced. Has a water bubble in it. Does anyone have a wonderful compass that has been lasting the test of time? After the first one going bad and getting flooded, I have babied and handled the last two as if they were my first born and still..... Is 1-2 years and 100 to 150 dives a year just the general lifespan for a compass? Would love to hear what kind of compasses others are using and your experiences.

Suunto SK8 Compass

"The most difficult part of using a compass is learning to trust it." ...was a catchphrase we used when I was an instructor. This made it all the more embarrassing when the card came off the gimbal or seized up under pressure.

One of my favorite compasses was/is the super simple Ikelite. It's the only one I know of that has no lag time. However, like all good things it has a limited life span.
 
Is it just me or does anyone else have a love/hate relationship with their compass?
I love my Suunto and I definitely rely upon and need a compass for my diving.. but I am getting so frustrated with durability and reliability issues. In the last 6 years, I have gone through 3 of these and at $100+ it is so frustrating to keep replacing.
Latest one is now not working and needs to be replaced. Has a water bubble in it. Does anyone have a wonderful compass that has been lasting the test of time? After the first one going bad and getting flooded, I have babied and handled the last two as if they were my first born and still..... Is 1-2 years and 100 to 150 dives a year just the general lifespan for a compass? Would love to hear what kind of compasses others are using and your experiences.

Suunto SK8 Compass

I really like the compass that's built into my Teric. Being digital, it's more robust to non-planar orientation, does not present an additional point of failure or thing I have to wear, I don't have to remember a reference orientation (because I can set it at the beginning of the dive and it remembers for me), and if I needed to do some complex navigation underwater, I don't have to do any mental arithmetic to add or subtract angles because I can just rotate the mark visually and then set a new mark.
 
I guess it does come down to personal preference. I have good digital compasses on both my computers, but much prefer my analogue SK8. No button pressing needed

I had little success with cheaper compasses because they would leak, I presume because of the high summer temps here

I have my sk8 affixed to my muck stick, so when simply grasped in both hands the stick is a natural pointer which is aligned to the lubber line. Since my stick is always on my kit, so is my compass.

While I'm a fan of technology, the analogue is just simple - turn the bezel and you have a new heading.

I found once while guiding on air, I was obviously narced in low ish vis, and I couldn't do the math to work out my reciprocal, whereas its dead easy with a manual bezel.

I will on occasion set a mark on my digital compasses a a "reminder" but my analogue will always be my preferred option.

I also have an analogue compass mounted to my Scooter, much easier to quickly read than a digital one (IMO)
 
I really like the compass that's built into my Teric. Being digital, it's more robust to non-planar orientation, does not present an additional point of failure or thing I have to wear, I don't have to remember a reference orientation (because I can set it at the beginning of the dive and it remembers for me), and if I needed to do some complex navigation underwater, I don't have to do any mental arithmetic to add or subtract angles because I can just rotate the mark visually and then set a new mark.
Yep-- I have abandoned the analog compass altogether and am using the compass on my Perdix AI. Loving it and as you mentioned, one less thing accompanying me on my dives.
 
While I'm a fan of technology, the analogue is just simple - turn the bezel and you have a new heading.
A couple years ago, my top level leader sat in our lunch room making jokes about using pen and paper these days, well into the 21st century and the digital age. While I love technology and have no compulsion about using modern computer tools when that's appropriate, I also realize that some times old-fashioned pen and paper is the best tool for the job. And at those times, that's the tools I'm gonna use.

Similarly, I know of few instruments that do the job better than an analog magnetic compass. So I'm still strapping on my SK7 on every dive.
 
Love my teric but learned on and still use my Ikelite pro compass (thing will outlive dinosaurs)
 
https://www.shearwater.com/products/perdix-ai/

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