wimpy computer sherwood wisdom

[jglandlord]

I purchased a Sherwood Wisdom a year ago. I love it but recently went on a liveaboard where a number of people were diving suunto mosquitos. They ganged up on me and kept telling me how unsafe my computer was since it was giving me loads of NO deco while there computers were going into the deco mode. why is this? I hate to do it but should I ditch this computer for a new one.

thanks

 

[jonnythan]

Just from reading the boards, the Suuntos are extremely conservative... and they punish you quite severely for having 'bad' profiles. I'm not sure how true that is, but it's the common SB wisdom.

 

[Charlie99]

Just from reading the boards, the Suuntos are extremely conservative... and they punish you quite severely for having 'bad' profiles. I'm not sure how true that is, but it's the common SB wisdom.

It not a case of punishment. It's a case of detecting actions/profiles that promote bubble formation, and reducing the limits on future dives in an attempt to compensate for this presumed bubble formation.

jglandlord: Nobody says you have to dive to the limits of your computer. The Wisdom, like other computers made by Pelagic Pressure Inc, uses the same deco model as the PADI tables and wheel. It does not reduce the limits as done by many other dive computers. The risk of DCS does not dramatically increase as one crosses some bright line in the deco models. OTOH, risk increase gradually as one moves through a large grey zone. The green, yellow, and red bargraph sections of the Wisdom gives you a good, depth-independent indication as to where you are.

You will find that the bargraph on the Suuntos, since it is just a graphical representation of NDL, will immediately go back well into the green as you ascend to 15' --- even though your tissues are heavily loaded.

If you want to dive conservatively, just get your computer back into the green before getting out of the water.

If you have done a rapid ascent or repeated sawtooth profiles, then you add additional conservatism.

 

[Diver0001]

I purchased a Sherwood Wisdom a year ago. I love it but recently went on a liveaboard where a number of people were diving suunto mosquitos. They ganged up on me and kept telling me how unsafe my computer was since it was giving me loads of NO deco while there computers were going into the deco mode. why is this? I hate to do it but should I ditch this computer for a new one.

thanks

Computers are not unsafe but the way they are used can be.

It's good that you realise that your computer is not very conservative. How will you change your diving to accomdate this fact?

R..

 

[DA Aquamaster]

The wisdom is fairly liberal at depth - more so even than the original US Navy tables if you get well below normal recreational depths but it requires a 30 ft per minute ascent rate and "recommends" a 3 minute saftey stop at 20 ft. When a Wisdom is compared to pelagic hockey puck computers, they are about the same at shallow and middle depths but get much below 100 feet and the Wisdom will give you a couple more minutes of bottom time before going into deco mode.

I have not had any issues with that an have done a lot of diving in the 100-150 ft range with my Wisdom. I will however do a 30 ft per minute ascent and add a deep stop before making the 3 minute 20' saftey stop. When diving along a wall prefer to make a long and gradual ascent while continuing the dive to the saftey stop.

The bar graph on the left side represents the loading of the most highly saturated compartment so on most recreational deep dives, a slow ascent and deep stop, a few more minutes spent diving at middle depths, or an extra few minutes at the saftey stop will usually put you back in the green before surfacing.

The nice thing about any computer is that the conservatisim is easily user adjustable by adjusting your ascent but ti does require that you know a little about current deco theory.