The Chairman
Chairman of the Board
Picking a rebreather used to be rather simple as there were only a few choices out there. Over the last five/ten years the number and quality of available rebreathers has exploded. In addition, accidents and even fatal accidents have plummeted. Rebreathers have made the transition from being a "box of death" to becoming very main stream.
The first question you need to ask yourself is: Do you need one? Or is it just "want"? Does that even matter? While they have a far better 'success' rate, rebreathers are still dangerous. As I move into this phase of my diving, Elena wants to be sure my will and living will are in order. So why do I want to dive a rebreather? Cave diving. I'm toting two LP120s and stages now and am still not making the distance that I would like. It's not so much the distance as it is the time. There's a lot in the beginnings of these caves that I've never gotten to see simply because air has always been a concern. Then there's the deco obligation. So much less than OC that it's almost criminal. I remember the first time I saw an SF2. Tom McCarthy was side mounting it in the Devil's System. We were down for about the same time and I had a deco obligation. Poor Tom had a buddy obligation. He was freezing while I was doing deco. In addition, I would like to do tri-mix and believe that doing it on a rebreather makes the most sense.
The second question is which rebreather. This was the hardest question by far. I trained on a Revo, but the politics surrounding that have soured me to the unit. There's just no 'feature' that can't be found in other rebreathers without all the drama. So, I've set out to dive as many rebreathers as possible. Sometimes this was at a try-dive event and more often it was with an instructor for the unit. There are a couple that I would still like to try, like the Op2tima. In actuality I narrowed my search down to three with the SF2 becoming my choice. Why? It's the only rebreather that's been designed to be back or side mounted straight from the factory. No futzing around trying to modify a unit designed for back mount to be used as a side mount. I'll be doing my crossover on the back mounted unit, but I will be getting the side mount mods in the not too distant future. The other aspect that really intrigued me was the design of the counter lung. I'll be posting pictures as the next few days unfold, showing what I'm talking about. This unit is designed to deal with the condensation and small leaks that are inherent with rebreathers, and provides an easy way to get rid of it. I've had a caustic cocktail before, so this is important to me.
Today, will be my final prep day before tomorrow's class starts with Tom McCarthy @Tmccar1. I'll be going through the Petrel 2 CanBus manual one more time as well as adding a whistle and knife to my BCD. I've already made one mod to the harness system to that it slides like my other BCs. I've had this unit for about a month now. It came in a beautiful bag and I've already built it out. Here's a picture of it in my Sprinter.
So stay tuned. I'll be taking a number of pics of the next few days and maybe even some video. We'll see how much Tom changes my kit around.
The first question you need to ask yourself is: Do you need one? Or is it just "want"? Does that even matter? While they have a far better 'success' rate, rebreathers are still dangerous. As I move into this phase of my diving, Elena wants to be sure my will and living will are in order. So why do I want to dive a rebreather? Cave diving. I'm toting two LP120s and stages now and am still not making the distance that I would like. It's not so much the distance as it is the time. There's a lot in the beginnings of these caves that I've never gotten to see simply because air has always been a concern. Then there's the deco obligation. So much less than OC that it's almost criminal. I remember the first time I saw an SF2. Tom McCarthy was side mounting it in the Devil's System. We were down for about the same time and I had a deco obligation. Poor Tom had a buddy obligation. He was freezing while I was doing deco. In addition, I would like to do tri-mix and believe that doing it on a rebreather makes the most sense.
The second question is which rebreather. This was the hardest question by far. I trained on a Revo, but the politics surrounding that have soured me to the unit. There's just no 'feature' that can't be found in other rebreathers without all the drama. So, I've set out to dive as many rebreathers as possible. Sometimes this was at a try-dive event and more often it was with an instructor for the unit. There are a couple that I would still like to try, like the Op2tima. In actuality I narrowed my search down to three with the SF2 becoming my choice. Why? It's the only rebreather that's been designed to be back or side mounted straight from the factory. No futzing around trying to modify a unit designed for back mount to be used as a side mount. I'll be doing my crossover on the back mounted unit, but I will be getting the side mount mods in the not too distant future. The other aspect that really intrigued me was the design of the counter lung. I'll be posting pictures as the next few days unfold, showing what I'm talking about. This unit is designed to deal with the condensation and small leaks that are inherent with rebreathers, and provides an easy way to get rid of it. I've had a caustic cocktail before, so this is important to me.
Today, will be my final prep day before tomorrow's class starts with Tom McCarthy @Tmccar1. I'll be going through the Petrel 2 CanBus manual one more time as well as adding a whistle and knife to my BCD. I've already made one mod to the harness system to that it slides like my other BCs. I've had this unit for about a month now. It came in a beautiful bag and I've already built it out. Here's a picture of it in my Sprinter.
