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Howdy all….

Now that we have (mostly) decided to be civil here, on to the business at
hand, which is the –polite- sharing of knowlage. In one of my posts, I posed
a
hypothetical question regarding the ‘Jersey Reel’, which I am surprised was
not recognized as a simplistic example question, a ‘troll’ as it were.
Responses
that were returned range along the following lines:




>>P.S. Come on Dave, you can do better than the old
>>Jersey reel thing. How about posting some details
>>about how you configure your gear and why you do it
>>that way. How have you planned for contingencys etc.
>>Why is your system fool proof?


But, upon reflection, I see that even this obviously easy question to answer
(Cave reel V/S Jersey Reel) has more to it than meets the eye. If I may:
(and this may be an example of the doctrine that what is ‘simplistic and
obvious’
to one group may be an arguable point to a second one), it’s alll the more
reason why opinions that differ from your own should not be discarded
without
consideration. A simple change in environment may change the mission, thus
the selected technique. I’ve converted to a cave reel some 15 years ago, so
am not in the ‘rope on a stick’ school of reel use (at present). But the
question is more complex than it seems, so read on:

It would seem obvious that a cave reel is a more practical answer to several
of the reasons that a wreck diver carries some system of line storage. For
my
analysis, the following reasons are those that I might use to decide that
carrying a
reel is a requirement on any given day. Note that a reel is –not- considered
by me to
be a general (IE ‘always carried’) piece of equipment in the NE wreck diving
environment, but is used when required.

Reasons to carry a reel:

1: Obviously, wreck penetration. This is not, however, the usual case in the
NE, as wrecks are very often mere junk piles and the prospects for
penetration are
often not available.

2: To use to secure lift-bags from drifting when sending those valuable
goodies to the surface. Nothing sucks worse than working for 5 or 6 trips on
a nice
porthole, only to have it drift to England after you send it up on a bag.
For the
pessimist, it also makes it easier to find a lost goodie after your worn-out
lift bag
sinks halfway  through your deco, sending your precious brass back into the
briny deep. On
your –next- dive, just look for the long white line running across the wreck
and
follow it to your brass (been there, done that…).

3: Emergency deco line, This is the old ‘send up a lift-bag’ (preferably not
the one that leaked before and caused you to lose yer brass…) and hang on
the
string.  Works ‘OK’. Not great, but OK. Hard to hang onto in a current,
although as
my esteemed buddy Will pointed out if you wrap it around your hand it works.
In an emergency deco it’s the ticket, and far better than drifting to
England with that other porthole we were talking about.

4: Running a line from the anchor line to your work site for return. Not a
popular use. Mainly because you rarely return via that same route, and also
because
when you jump 10-20 divers on a wreck it soon turns into a circus if
everyone does this. I’ve done it once or twice, and only when the vis was
shit and I
was going to go did in one spot for a long dive and needed the anchor line
for a
hang. I do not use this technique anymore and generally do not recommend it.

All of these missions are best met by use of a standard cave reel. No doubt.
Hard to find anyone who will disagree. –But-, there is a place and time for
a Jersey Reel, and for that reason its use should not be overlooked by the
thinking diver. This is the scenario:

Divers DS and WS want to dive the wreck of the SD off of the dive-boat W.
D&W want to dive an area of the bow and do some looking around up
there, but the Captain, a certain JB, likes to tie into the stern. (Those of
you who know where we are will recognize the initials, the rest can guess).
W is of the school that D’s “Jersey Jerk’ reel is of little value, but D
says ‘watch this’and carries it anyhow, realizing that he can always teach
as
well as learn… ;-)

D&W make the several hundred yard swim to the bow and select their
entry point for the penetration. The standard protocol applies, in that the
team will tie in a cave reel at the entrance and use it for a traverse line
into the area where all sorts of unique goodies are to be found. Since
this hypothetical day was long before D&W got their shiny mixed gas
rebreathers, we are going to be skosh gas when we poke our pointy-heads
back out of the hole. We want to be able to begin deco ascent immediately
upon exit, without swimming all the way back to the anchor. Note that this
is a –planned- off anchor deco, not an emergency one. Our plan is to tie
in a 50 pound lift bag and send it aloft –before- we enter, knowing that we
will not be able to predict perfectly the time required to perform this
task, thus it is best to get it out of the way to begin with rather than at
the
end of the dive. The two divers kneel facing each other and one holds the
reel
with both hands while the other inflates the (non leaking) bag. Now here
is where the system changes from the cave-reel system: A lift-bag
–without ballast- will soon capsize and sink, however we expect to need
this to float for over an hour while we penetrate the wreck. We want to be
able to securely tension the line, and actually we want to –submerge- the
lift bag to a depth of maybe 2-3 feet at wave crests. To do this we can
either:

A: Weight ourselves so we can pull 50 pounds negative buoyancy on the
bottom (not likely),

or we can

B: run the line –under- some convenient
protrusion on the wreck and while pulling down with one hand on the
ascending line, also pull upward with the other on the bitter end, thus
allowing us (meaning –me- in this case) to exert 50 pounds of tension
on the line no sweat. Here is where the diameter of the ¼ line works to
our advantage: Since we are wearing thick 3 finger dry mitts, we can
hold and pull the thicker line with far greater ease. Try doing this with
cave-cord and tell me how it works. Plus, since this is a –planned- deco,
not an emergency one, we can look forward to a comfortable hang on a
decent diameter line at the end of our dive. Actually, we might even have
a second team follow at a half-hour interval and share the line with us if
we are so inclined. Important step: Hang your lift bag from your backyard
swing or whatever the day before doing this and fill it with water to test
the rigging webs for rot and the bag for leaks. If you shoot a bag for deco,
it’s now life-support equipment and needs to be treated as such. But of
course I also have my cave reel and another lift bag, so I’m redundant
there as well. And I only carry my ‘string on a stick’ when I plan a dive
along >these lines. I’ve also used it in North Carolina when drift-diving
down-wreck >and then setting up a hang, with the boat picking us up
down-current post
deco. Try hanging onto a cave-string in a 3 knot current and tell me your
hand does not –HURT- after a few minutes.

This is just one example of different techniques being used to solve
unique problems. Now I’m just waiting to see where the WKPP guys
carry their sledge hammers, crow-bars, chisels, goodie bags,
crescent and pipe wrenches, etc., etc…….. (see, it’s –not- all the same…)

But whattheheckdoIknowanyhow. Just been doing this for 25-ish years.
Like Monty Python said “I’m not dead yet!”

Now, here is the good part: Anybody got a better way? Rude comments
cheerfully deleted. Thinking answers contemplated. If you have a better
system, I’ll adopt it.


Regards to all, apologies to none.


Dave Sutton



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