What reels to travel with?

[NorthWoodsDiver]

Lets assume for a minute you are taking a trip with 2 or 3 other full cave certified divers down to Q. Roo for some cave diving fun. All dives utilizing preexisting line but there will likely be jumps and gaps at every site.

With the new luggage requirements I dont want to bring more than necessary and I dont want to have to rent much gear either.

I currently only own some spools as I borrowed the reels for my full cave cert so I will need to buy something.

After extensive reading I settled on the salvo 400 for a primary and I really like the Larry Green reels for safety and jump use.

but since there are multiple divers going how many of everything do we need as a group. I figure depending if the forth person goes we will either have 1 team of 3 or 2 teams of 2 but lots of variables come into play with this as there could potentially be 7 divers total if the stars align.

do you think all members (assume 3-4 for now) should bring 1 primary, 1 jump, and of course 1 safety. Maybe we only need a couple primaries, even with 2 or 3 teams we will all be on the same lines and technically planning the dives as a group so either way we will probably end up with to many reels in total. I just dont want to bring to much and no one else does either. Thanks

 

[stairman]

I woulnt think a few extra reels matter but if they do,1 safety per diver,1 primary per team.Find out about gaps from your orientation.

 

[ucfdiver]

Just curious (as I've yet to get any training off the gold line), why don't you use your spools?

 

[NorthWoodsDiver]

Spools work fine for gaps, but after a feel its gets to be a pain reeling them in.

A few extra reels dont matter, but I dont want to fly with them as they are bulky and heavy.

 

[TSandM]

One primary reel per team, and the people I dive with carry jump spools, not reels. Each diver has a safety spool, and then you have enough other spools on the team to do what you plan with the dive.

Sharing a reel is discouraged, but I will admit that, when we were at sites where there were a LOT of teams going into a given area, we would prearrange to share a reel so that we didn't spiderweb out the cavern. But it's a good idea to have enough reels so that each team CAN have one, because you may decide to go different places, even if it's running different tunnels from the same cenote.

 

[Meng_Tze]

Just bring spools. They are small, light and hold a lot of line. Yes they take a little more work to reel in, but that is part of the work to do to get to cave dive.

 

[rjack321]

Since this sounds like your first trip to MX...

I would suggest not being too ambitious with the jumps. The mainlines are way cool by themselves. Maybe a couple jumps in a cave you've dove a few times. You aren't going to be doing 4+ jumps on your first trip (well you can but I would really recommend a much more conservative, progressive approach. The mega jump dives with be there for next time).

For the group I would bring:
2x primary reels, the Salvo 400 is nice and light.
1x 150ft safety spool per diver (100ft is not long enough).
1x 100ft jump spool per diver plus one or two extras.

While there are a few jumps cut way way back, they are a rarity. You are not likely to be doing those on your first trip to the area. There are very few gaps in the popular systems, basically one in the Sac Aktun system on the way by Ho Tul. Most jumps are 2 to 40ft long and 100ft spools are totally fine. Light weight and jam proof.

I have about 75-80 cave dives in the area including all the major "must see" systems.

 

[Meng_Tze]

How far is the primary tie off to the main line? On average? More than 100/160ft?

 

[KMD]

The mainlines vary depending on the system. Going through the spectrum you have:

Mainline starts at the surface - Chan-Ho, Tortuga

Mainline is in overhead, but visable from O/w (20 to 40 feet) - Dos Palmas, downstream Dos Ojos

Mainline is not visable from cave entrance (40 to 250 feet) - Downstream Carwash, Mayan Blue

Mainline is waaaaay back in the cave (250 to 400') - Upstream Carwash, Chamber of Ancients


If I had to average them out, I would put the number around 120 to 140 feet.


Bottom line is you are going to want to bring one penitration reel per team. While it sounds nice to say that the teams will share reels, in practice it doesnt always work quite as well. People want to go to different sites, gear up at different times as well as some caves have multiple mainlines that can be used.

Kevin

 

[NorthWoodsDiver]

Sorry I was not clear, this is not my first visit to MX but last time was my full cave class and the instructor and some friends had all the reels we needed during the class and post class.

Right now the cave of interest to the group is chan-hol since that was a group fav last time. I dove tortuga, vaca-ha, chan-hol, pet cemetary 2, mayan blue, dose ojos (east and west), chac moul, tajmahal, temple of doom, labna-ha, and tuhs kapaxa during the 16 days on the ground and several sites were 2 dives. I'm sure I butchered the spelling on most of those so I'm sorry.

Most of the jumps I did then were visible and I think the longest was about 80ft but since I dont have maps or anything I have no idea what jumps exist right now. I appreciate the guidance. Thanks