Posted by CalAbDiver on September 17, 2001 at 10:30:03:
With my tech diving class progressing fine, our group of divers will be in the Ocean after next week for the first of about a dozen tech dives towards a TriMix certification. Our class is not GUE limited, we are free to configure our gear as we like. The instructor specifically wants to allow flexibility in gear choices, and therefore I appreciate TDI's training flexibility in that respect.
I will be using two reels instead of only one, the first with 350 ft of line, and the other with 50 ft of line. The second is for use as an upline. Then I will use a spool with 50 ft of line on it as a backup to the upline reel.
Our first dive day will consist of 3 dives in one day to 100 fsw, 75 fsw, and 50 fsw. We will be practicing running reels and sending uplines and switching gas to EAN50 bottles.
Our next dive day will be a single dive to 150 fsw for 20 mins plus deco. I drafted my dive plan and deco plan yesterday afternoon. Everyone else is using Abyss software, whereas I prefer to use pencil and paper plus the Navy/NOAA tables modified conservatively to go to the next deeper depth and the next longer time, together with deep stops at 1/2 egressions. When I do this with the Navy/NOAA tables I find that they roughtly agree with the deco algorithm in my Suunto Vyper wrist model dive computer. The deco stops for a 150 fsw dive become 75 fsw for 2 mins, 40 fsw for 2 mins, 20 fsw for 7 mins, and 10 fsw for 21 mins. Total deco for the 20 min dive to 150 fsw becomes 32 mins and total dive times becomes 52 mins. My planned bottom mix is EAN25 and with that you dont need a travel mix.
I rigged my Halcyon back up light to my B/C inflator hose with two pieces of bike innertube and a clip. It works perfectly since that way it shines forwards and down, and I can release it with a single pull. I saw that on the instructors GUE backplate/backstrap rig and it seems like a very good idea, although his light is attached to a shoulder strap in the GUE fashion. [He is not requiring us to have backplates.] By mounting tank strap weight pouches high on my twin PST HP 80 tanks, I get really good trim since the weight is high that way, almost exactly like a backplate, AND I CAN STILL DITCH THE WTS!
Canister lights look impressive, but I havent decided about that issue yet. There are plenty of other large lights besides canister lights available.
Since my interests have moved on from ordinary shallow-water Joe And Sally Resort Diver scuba, into the area of deeper technical diving, I am moving on from this SoCal Scuba B BS board to another board that is tech diving related, restricted access, and there are no sockpuppets. [Dont cheer all at once, sockpuppets & JeffB & JRM.]
I am glad I met some of you, particularly ChrisG, seahunt-MikeB, MHK-Mike, STeve, KenKurtis, and a few others. I might email each of you from time to time. Ken if I am in SoCal I will stop by your store and resupply there. Each of you has been very helpful in passing on valuable knowledge and skills about scuba. Goodbye folks.
/s/ Karl
TDI Tech student