Welcome to the Dark Side….we have lovely Black Techie stuff

     Since former Yugoslavia, and the purchase of my SUUNTO Solution and my first ever dry-suit, (the DMS 5mm Neoprene “Bravo”) my kit had, again, stabilised for the last couple of years ’94 to ‘96 or so. Perhaps it is the rhythm of forces life, we moved between units every 3 years or so and you got used to the cadence, maybe that was the same with diving kit….more likely it took at least 2 years to get enough money to pay for an upgrade, at least that is what seemed to limit me! I had just come back from the Falkland Islands dive expedition and my conversations with Don Shirley were leading me astray, I had taken my first Nitrox course with Don and qualified as a Nitrox Diver, that led me to get my 12L Cylinders “Nitrox Cleaned”, out came the neoprene “O” Rings in the cylinder valve, and in went “Viton” equivalents (neoprene derivatives do not tolerate higher concentrations of Oxygen well, becoming a fire risk due to degradation, Viton O Rings tolerated the higher Oxygen….but ironically do not last as long) which meant partial pressure blending wouldn’t be an issue. The cylinders were cleaned of all hydrocarbon debris and would stay so for 12 months as long as I didn’t get a fill from standard, uncleaned air-sources, as most of my fills were from Stoney cove, from a clean air system that wouldn’t be a problem! Last of all I got a nice shiny sticker just above the stab-jacket cylinder band, advertising the fact I was a Nitrox Diver…..the real purpose, of course, being my cylinder should not be confused with those to fill with anything other than clean air or a gas blend

    The most important decal on the cylinder was its clean date and its “status” or O2 cleanliness, both carried on a neck decal applied at the time of cleaning by the service centre. The decal indicating the date of cleaning (and therefore the “in service” date for the cylinder), had punched out holes marking the cleaning date and the type of cleaning the cylinder had been subjected to, which indicated the % of Oxygen that could be used with the cylinder, and restricted the gas mix it could carry, “Oxygen Enriched” or “Nitrox Clean” meaning mixes up to 50% maximum and “Oxygen Service” meaning mixes up to 100%, to facilitate richer mixes for decompression purposes. These were mandatory for getting gas fills, no decal? out of date inspection?……no gas! It had to be that way, the use of pure Oxygen in Nitrox fills, although not the only way of achieving a gas blend, was by far the most common, Oxygen is a catalyst, it encourages fire, acting as an accelerant and the last thing anyone wants in their filling station, usually half full with dozens of pressurised dive cylinders…..is a fire

    I had also purchased a 3L cylinder after Yugoslavia, it had sat in my “Pony Bag” alongside my 12L cylinder for around 2 years now and Don suggested it would make a decent enough decompression set-up, if suitably cleaned and put into Oxygen service. I liked the idea, it was minimum investment and offered a great way of getting use out of what had, to date, been just a safety passenger on my dives, a very welcome one, but I had yet to use it other than in practice to swap my regs and ensure they worked and that I maintained the skill-set. I had the pony “cleaned” and Stoney kindly supplied another shiny Decal…….”Decompression Gas” and another neck decal, this time punched out for Oxygen service!

    I liked the decompression set-up, despite it not being quite so compact and squared away, it was to my front and at my Right hand side, I could see it and access it which felt more comforting and, having sight of it during a dive, you could see the gas wasn’t quietly bubbling away through a leak, far safer in my opinion. I achieved the transformation with a readily available quality piece of kit from Lumb Brothers, consisting of a webbing strap running the length of the cylinder, with a clear plastic tube as a handle, a neck ring and a stainless steel worm clip at its base, at either end, just below the neck ring, and again below the worm clip, were two loops with piston clips on them for easy “clip-on….clip-off” operation. It was well thought out and I have used several since, I even keep a spare although they are now for my two 7L 300 bar travel & deco gas cylinders. The move from rear to front was more of an issue whilst diving, the additional weight was slightly higher on the body and there was more “clutter” to your front which, for the first few dives, took some getting used to, but the advantage of being able to check your gas supply and to see everything was accessible and to hand soon outstripped any feeling of inconvenience  

    The last step in the transformation was my regs, I loved my Spiro Arctic, it was a great reg, it was environmentally sealed meaning it didn’t suffer in the frigid North Sea, and it was a very low effort to breathe (work of breathing) which meant no real problems from additional Carbon Dioxide build up on deeper dives, so parting with my main regulator was going to be a tear….my secondary was the first reg I’d ever bought and it had served me well, the Scubapro R190 was rugged and functional, it had been with me for over 4 years and never let me down, I trusted it, even though it was a basic “no-frills” reg. However, I had been offered the chance to dive Poseidon Jetstream’s when I was in the Falklands, Don had negotiated a significant discount for the expedition divers, from Poseidon, and had bought a full team’s worth with Army funding, he trusted the regs having been into technical diving for several years now, he wanted regs he knew and could service whilst we were isolated from anything other than self-support on the distant Southern Ocean Islands

    The idea was that whoever wanted the regs after the expedition, could buy them from the expedition and the remainder would stay with the Army Sub Aqua Diving Association (ASADA), under the care and stewardship of Mal Strickland and Jimmy Dowling. I had struggled a bit at first with the Jetstreams, being a 45’ side vent the diaphragm could, in the right current, lift a little and lead to a wet-breathe, which I wasn’t used to and at first did not like one bit, but over the weeks we spent there I’d persevered and they had grown on me, and on deeper dives they were sweeter than my Spiro, which came as a shock. There was another advantage, the Cyklon had a very different “feel” being a completely different shape to any other reg I’d seen, ideal for distinguishing high Oxygen mix from a travel gas should my diving ever get beyond basic Nitrox diving, into longer decompression phases, or dare I say it Tri-Mix……the ultimate Devil’s Gas

    So I took the plunge, I bought a Jetstream and a Cyklon off the expedition when I finally parted company with the Army in June of 1996. It had been 13 years since I’d joined the T.A at Grace Rd in Liverpool, it had been 9 years since I had enlisted in the regular army, and I knew I was going to miss it, this was a kind of leaving present to myself, one I could not have afforded in any normal circumstance, well perhaps could not have justified at least, but I now owned two of the best (and most expensive) regulators of the day. It stands as a tribute to the design and durability of the Poseidon regs, that I am still using them today, and I will keep using them until I’m gone or my diving comes to an end, it goes to show, not everything you like immediately is good enough to keep, and not everything you don’t immediately take to won’t end up being your favourite “go-to”

As my Nitrox diving gradually took over from air diving and I began to want to spend longer underwater, (perhaps as a result of the experience of foreign dive trips and distinctly warmer waters), I took my advanced Nitrox course in May of ’97 and in August of that same year took my first Red Sea live-aboard, with a couple of the divers I had trained through Deep Blue Diving. The months leading up to the Red Sea trip were all Nitrox and I knew I would eventually take on the IANTD Instructor course with Don Shirley. Don had taken his Instructor Trainer course and I was hoping to be his first Instructor Student, I knew that would lead to more kit purchases, but if I could teach another level of diving, then I could justify the expense with the additional students

    I needed more Gas, I had looked at a reasonable transition and decided on buying 2 of the 7L 300 Bar cylinders, the idea being I could use them with adaptor bands on the Buddy Commando stab jacket, (I was now diving the Commando “TD” the “Tech” version of the jacket with additional lift and a set of D Rings placed strategically to clip deco cylinders and DSMB’s) with the 3L pony as deco, that meant I could extend my depth or my duration accordingly, pumped to 300bar the smaller steel 7’s would have the same gas as twin 12L cylinders at 232 bar, give or take 600L or thereabouts….. Once I’d got enough funding together I would buy a wing and move to twin “manifolded” 12L cylinders, at that point the 7L 300 bar cylinders would become my “travel” and “Deco” side slungs, that was the plan. I have to say, the twin bands worked ok, the jacket held up with the twin 7L set-up and I dived it for a while until I could make the cash available, through the Deep Blue business, to buy an OMS wing, I was lucky, Don was upgrading his and was happy to pass it on to me at a “mates rates” price, I was delighted, all I needed now was an isolation manifold and the job was done

    Did all of this mean I gave up on air diving, hell no, I was teaching PADI courses all week, I still dived air on a regular basis, I still used my Commando TD almost every week and I still used my Spiro Arctic and my Scubapro R190. What it did mean is that I had become a better diver, not because I used Nitrox, but because IANTD took their diver training seriously, very seriously. This was the first time I had ever been asked to fully exhale and then fin after my buddy (given a 5m head start), attract his attention, calmly, and then commence air-sharing……. This, and the level of planning and preparation drilled into you for the use of Nitrox and decompression mixes, meant you applied the same rigor to the courses you taught and the students on them. I had initially balanced my military instruction approach for trainees, and softened my presentations somewhat accordingly, IANTD tempered that with a deeper understanding of diving, underpinning the messages of the PADI courses and giving me the unshakable belief in teaching and accepting only high standards, I would work with students relentlessly until their demonstrations were as good as my own, it meant I “back-coursed” quite a few trainees, but I believe it made a difference

  I have dived this set-up now for Twenty Years, I have never tired of it, the rig fits like a glove, every piece is where it should be for me, is it the best rig possible….for me it is, I have tweaked it over the years, playing with positioning and hose runs, lengthening hoses, changing the position of the cylinders up and down the wing for trim, but it is how I dive, and how I want it to be….are there better set-ups, probably, for other divers…..could I improve it, perhaps, and I continue to try….but the bottom line is, this set-up works for me and I love it

Until Croatia, and the UN tour mentioned in several of the sections in this blog, my kit had been pretty much static over the 2 years of my diving up to 1993 at the close of the Tour. I had, however, splashed out on a SUUNTO Solution, a dive computer, and I loved it. Up to my purchase, (tax free through my contacts in the Finnish Battalion serving with us in Yugoslavia) I had been using BSAC Tables, also Ned Middleton had left a curiosity in the Dutch bar before leaving Yugoslavia, a PADI Recreational Dive Planner (RDP), sadly in Feet, which, as I was used to metric (Meters), was confusing on Two counts, the units had to be converted to bear any semblance to a depth I understood, and, I had no real idea how to use it….but it was intriguing and I was determined to find out how to work it….eventually! So, I had moved from tables into the digital age, and I had been exposed to 15L cylinders for the first time, having used 12L versions exclusively up until Pula. I liked the 15L cylinders, I figured you could never have too much air to breathe on a dive….. and I’d seen a couple of really odd pillar valves too, double valves but on a single cylinder, and a cylinder with a reserve wire-pull down its side, when you get to 50bar, pull the wire and you get a further 50bar reserve…… Things I hadn’t seen at any of the dive-sites in the UK, all of this got me thinking……it was time for an upgrade!

I had been considering a pony set-up after seeing several at south coast dive sites, I could see the logic, an entirely separate air-source on an independent regulator. I knew this would be a step forward in safety and I knew I wanted a better regulator, not that my R190 was not serving me well, but as I had started to dive a little deeper, a little more often, I knew there were better regs out there and after 7 months on slightly better pay, it was now or never….a trip to Aqua-leisure in Melksham was in order…..

I settled on a 3L Pony cylinder in a Beaver protective draw-string bag, which attached easily to my main cylinder, and I sat it at the Right side of my Stab Jacket, moving my weights round a little to the Left on the belt to compensate for the additional pony cylinder weight on that side. I had agonised over which reg to buy, I knew the R190 would do on the pony, if I needed the pony, chances were I was on my way back to the surface, the R190 would still do in that role, I was comfy with that…. But which reg to go for, there were a few I could afford and it took me a couple of trips, and some long conversations with divers back at TIDSAC, before I finally settled on the Spiro Arctic, an environmentally sealed reg which boasted it was good for any water temperature I was likely to come across in the UK and probably many a lot worse

I needed to take one more step too, and ditch the semi-dry-suit! I had picked up a trapped nerve in my neck whilst in Croatia, one of those freak injuries that I’d have never believed possible if someone else had described it…..I was looking under the hood of a Bedford 4T truck, standard troop transport of the day, and turned my head …..something went crack and a bolt of lightening slammed my neck ……. I have never felt pain like it, and I couldn’t move my head, it was stuck…..this was bollocks wtf was going on? It turned out to be simple, I’d trapped a nerve, it would work its way out and in typical Army style I got Two “fcuk off” tablets (Paracodol) and a “goodbye” from the medics of 24 Field Ambulance…it would take nearly another month before the Americans arrived in Pleso, by which time I was self-medicating on Heineken just to get to sleep….and it was beginning to show.

The Yanks had a look, their Medic Captain said yep….trapped nerve, it’ll free up.…. eventually… but luckily for me the “orderly” a US Army corporal held me back after his Captain had lost interest…..I can’t offer you this “officially” because its not recognised military practice, but I am a chiropractor back in the US and if you give me 5 minutes I can help….What had I got to loose? I hadn’t slept much for a month, I was constantly half-cut and still in agony so I said, go for it! He said trust me….breathe out and this will hurt….my neck was snapped to the Right and I nearly passed out, you could hear the pistol shot “crack” as my neck reached its limit………and now the other way….and you have to relax even though you know what’s coming…….Crack, a pistol shot in my Left ear……. and he smiled at me…..and told me to get up off the trolley….I did and I could have kissed the ugly bastard….. I could move my neck, I could move my head….and the pain had gone, just like that…..gone….I was elated and promised they guy any amount of beer he could drink, whenever he wanted, and it turned out he was tee-total….result! I had to go easy on the neck for a week or so, and do exercises he showed me to strengthen the area, and he warned me it could come back any time, especially if it got cold! And so it was time to buy a dry-suit, or to give up diving as, during the very first dive after I had got over the injury I could feel the nagging pain from my Neck to my shoulder….and I knew what that meant……

So now I would lose the semi-dry suit in favour of a DMS Bravo 5mm Neoprene dry-suit. Seeing as I was back from Blue-Water diving, and once again in UK temperatures the transformation went almost unnoticed, apart from by my bank manager, with the SUUNTO, the new Spiro, the 3L Pony and the DMS I was out just over a Grand….still, I was diving and that meant everything, the money would come back, eventually, and the neck injury didn’t re-surface even in 4′ water, perhaps due to the double layer of 5mm Neoprene neck seal on the suit…..bonus!

  I’m sure you will be on this page after reading the Early Days piece, perhaps I’m wrong and you are just interested in Dive gear over the last 30 years or so? Either way, I hope the posts here will be informative and interesting. Please do note, anything expressed here is my opinion, nothing more, and will be based on what I hold dear as an influence, not what other’s might think or believe! It will serve anyone reading this to note that when people ask me “what do you think....” they are largely expecting me to agree with what they have already decided, or to say what they want to hear…….sorry folks, I’m just not that person…..and never will be………. so if you are easily offended and a kit manufacturer,  or you favour a particular manufacturer or piece of dive kit, perhaps this isn’t the place for you…………        As I have already stated, I was not then, nor am I now a “rich kid”, perhaps knowing what I was like and what I would face in the future, my Dad gave me a piece of advice I have followed for the rest of my life, or until now at least, he said “Son, you can’t afford a bargain…..” I didn’t really understand until years later, when I had bought my share of “deals” and been bitterly disappointed on pretty much every one. I promised myself, after one particular deal went Pete Tong, that, from that point onwards, I would only buy the very best I could afford

  So my kit “start point”, I had bought Typhoon Hurricane Fins, a modernisation of the old solid Rubber affairs of WWII vintage, made in a PVC or Thermo-Plastic material, they cost around £50, were Black and White and I loved them. These were “No Frills” fins, but they were rugged, the straps were robust, they fit me well, didn’t cause me cramp or blisters, were as efficient as any fins of the day, and I used them to destruction over perhaps 5 years or so. I think I learned well from my Father’s wisdom and in this case it paid off, I should say they were second hand to begin with too, they’d had some pool use as “Demonstrators” for Aqualeisure, the Melksham dive shop. I had teamed them up with a £10 snorkel and a new Tusa Liberator Dive Mask, again a no-frills mask, but one that fitted well and was a “low profile” mask, an upgrade to the One-Piece lenses of the Cousteau era and far easier to “clear” in the event that you had a mask flood, or were doing skills & drills. Your snorkel is a much underrated piece of equipment, learning to snorkel better over those long pool sessions not only improved my breathing control, but also my buoyancy control on ascent. In open water they preserve valuable air as you transit from shore to site, or from the boat to the shot in calmer water, they are also useful when “searching” from the surface in gin clear foreign waters……… I chose the Scubapro R190 reg as it was the best I could afford at the time, it was a reasonably new design, it had sufficient ports to allow the main regulator (Reg) and a “spare” or “alternate air source” reg for safe diving, an inflate port to connect to my Stab Jacket, and that was it so to speak! The reg was around £100 without the alternate, and I’d been taught how to breathe off my Stab Jacket’s air should I be desperate, so the spare reg could wait a while………… 

  I have already given a couple of lines to the Buddy Commando “Stab” Jacket which you can see in the First picture in this piece, these were a revolution to the “old School divers” in BSAC dive clubs, who had grown up with Fenzy and the like, and there was some justification for some of their criticism when you looked at the position of a diver on the surface. If a diver has an incident underwater, especially if you both had an obligation to carry out decompression stops before exiting the water, it was common practice back in the ’80’s & 90’s to inflate the casualty’s adjustable buoyancy life jacket (ABLJ) and send them to the surface. On reaching the surface, which you couldn’t do as yet (don’t become a casualty yourself….First rule of First Aid….), your buddy diver would be supported in a “head-up” position as the ABLJ, when inflated around the neck, acted like a buoyant “cushion” front and rear, as most of the buoyancy was to the front and under the chin…..unlike the “Stabiliser” (Stab) jacket which was worn around the core with the largest part of the buoyancy under the arms and to the rear, potentially landing you “face-Down” until recovered by the boat….. a potential for drowning in the eyes of many “old-sweats”, however, the younger and less entrenched divers would say the weight of your dive cylinder would act as counter-balance in such circumstances……I was with them on this point, and luckily I never had to see which came true………. 

    As you will have read previously, my first dive suit was a Beaver Icelandic 7mm, Two-Piece Semi-Dry suit. For those of you wondering what the difference is between a straight-up “Wet-Suit” and the rather more grandly entitled “Semi-Dry-Suit” it goes like this: A “Wet-Suit” is exactly that, wet! Usually a Two-Piece suit, largely neoprene rubber which had pretty much put the older Shark-Skin suits off the market. They were easier to put on, lacking wrist seals or ankle seals, and thus allowed more water in and around your core, which meant that you got colder….quicker! The last thing you need to be when diving chilly UK waters, I assure you!  The far grander “Semi-Dry-Suit” was usually the same 7mm Two piece affair as the wet-suit, giving effectively 14mm of protection on the torso where it was double thickness, however it had the benefit of tighter wrist seals, or “cuffs” as they were known. Having the same arrangement at the ankles, a “snug” fitting semi-dry suit out-performed the wet-suit, keeping the small amount of water that seeped in down the neck, or through the various zips, in place around your core, not “flushing” straight out again, thus it warmed up to around body temperature, and therefore kept you warmer, for longer…….The semi-dry-suit also had flexibility, it could be worn as a One-piece in warmer climes, where you wanted to be cooler in the sometimes oppressive heat, such as the resorts of the Red Sea………..ideal! The whole lot went under-water along with a weight belt, mine was a generic nylon web type with, rather unusually for the day, only Two large (12lb each) plastic coated, (the “Green” approach, keeping the lead from having any effect on the environment, before that was “trendy”) curved lead weights, one either side directly under the stab jacket pockets. I already had a decent dive-timer, my Casio “G-Shock” watch, pretty much de-rigueur for squaddies at that time, I also bought a dive reel and a “Surface Marker Buoy” (SMB) so I could be seen and attract attention in poorer conditions. This was an ideal set-up for me and I kept it for a year, before I decided to move on a little and get a better regulator, or at least an “alternate air-source”, as even the BSAC, not truly known for its driving innovation, or cutting edge approach to anything, was beginning to bang the drum for “Safer” diving practices……..