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Jeff Jackson wrote:
> Well, I have on occassion been a baaaaad boy and relied on my pony bottle for
> my acent (breathing my main bottle down to 500 or less). I have worked hard on
> not allowing myself to do this as I do realize that I then no longer have a
> safe second. I like to take a full five-minute safety stop, and I have once or
> twice tried to do a slow ascent from ~100fsw on the pony and found it held
> *just* enough gas for the ascent and the stop. This led me to think that if
> something were to keep me in the water too long and I ended up with a ceiling,
> I wouldn't have enough gas to complete my deco. So I decided to get a 30cuft
> pony (actually, I haven't purchased it yet as I just sold the 13).
>
> I know that eventually my gas consumption rate and my knowledge of deco theory
> will improve and I won't need to get into all this siliness, but until I get
> more dives and more training under my belt, I like the added margin of
> safety. There has been very little response to this post, so I don't know if I
> am being ignored because I am just too naive (sp?) or whether nobody has any
> experience with this. I am interested in knowing how others deal with
> redundancy outside a cave or wreck.
>
> Jeff.
> --
Jeff,
Before diving with doubles I used a steel 95 and a 30cuft pony for
my deeper dives. The pony was intended to be used in emergencies
only. I strapped the pony to the 95 using a homemade bracket, and
ran its 2nd stage over my right shoulder where it was clipped to my
BC. An octopus from the 95 was also clipped to the BC, with a
different 2nd stage. Although I never dived alone, I wasn't always
near my buddy and liked the thought of having a completely redundant
tank on my back. This sounds like your situation.
This worked well until I ran out of air at 150ft. Upon entering the
water, the pony's 2nd stage came unclipped from my BC. Because
I was moron and had identical 2nd stages for the pony and the main
reg on the 95, I inadvertentally inserted the pony's reg in my mouth
and began the dive. A couple minutes into the dive I checked my SPG
which had dropped a couple hundred psi, so I assumed everything was
fine. At exactly 12 minutes into the dive my reg began to breath hard.
I checked the SPG again, and couldn't figure out what was going on
because it said I had lots of air. I reached for my pony reg on my BC,
but of course did not find it there. Some of you may say that I
shouldn't have had the octopus still on my 95, but I was happy I had it
then. I shoved the octopus in my mouth (quite pleased that I could
breath again), and found my buddy who was on the other side of some
wreckage. We made a controlled ascent together.
I later figured out that the drop in pressure of my 95 was due to the
temperature dropping from 70F on the surface to 50F on the bottom.
I also figured it was time for some training before I killed myself.
Conclusions:
1) If you mount the pony on your back, USE A DIFFERENT 2ND STAGE THAN YOUR
MAIN TANK.
2) Just before going under, be sure your 2nd stages are where they should be.
3) Get more training. Nothing exotic like "Extreme Wreck Nitrox Penetration,"
but something involving pony bottles, stage bottles, and such. It seems
really easy to do things yourself, but one little oversight can kill you.
Although I live in Los Angeles, I flew out to Florida and learned from some
WKPP guys. I now dive Hogarthian, and use doubles for deeper dives. I use
surgical tubing and clips to secure my 2nd stages to my harness, and would
like to think my head is a little farther out of by butt than it was 5 years
ago when I ran out of air.
Hopes this helps.
-Tim Bakken
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