The Right CCR for starting on?

Gilles

Please accept my apology . Not meant as a dig (not disrespectful at least) at all.

I intended to taunt you out with your opinion(s) based on all the different units you have (or had).

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Gilles
http://www.dirrebreather.com

cj-62

Can we assume you disagree with Mr. Chase? Or were you just busting his hump for fun?

After 10 years you must be an expert. Okay Sensei, what are your recommendations. Can you post your mission specific unit prescription based on currently available Rebreather's/options packages.

Thanks for your time,

Drmike

Some advice Phi gave me when I first started:


"your first Rebreather will not be the only one you will ever own"


So I wouldnt fret too much trying to make the perfect decision now. Get a solid reputable unit that will hold its value get you in the water and build up your experience on it. Once you know what you like and dont like about it you will sell it and buy what you know you want or keep it.

Meg*, KISS**, Inspo - all capable reputable units - you wont go far wrong with any of them - let your budget decide. Meg/kiss may give you more flexibility


I havent dived a Meg or KISS but theres no doubt that they are both capable units with good track records. As Mark pointed out stock KISS isnt very flood tolerant which I think is important (to me at least) when cave diving


*Just keep a bit of an eye on her cells especially if you flood it.
** with new VR3 style handset

__________________
Cave diving is a sport
Wreck diving is a sport
Diving in general is a sport

'Rebreather diving' is not a sport
its the delusional obsession with a highly dangerous and often inappropriate piece of equipment

Mark Chase

My decision to spend £1500 on a Hammer Head and have a CCR with a spare head was simple. I couldent afford to buy a Vision with a spare head.


Having done a few years on CCR now i think I am starting to know what to look for so I have an opinion.


The Hammer Head is an excellent controller with good functionality when it works, but i hesitate to recommend it based on the significant number of problems i had with the three HH units I owned. I am looking forward to seeing the new HH units and hopefully some real world testing going on. but it wont be me doing the testing.

The Vision (which i have dived in both Vision and Evo form) is reaching a point where most of the bugs have been ironed out but it (IMHO) still retains the core problem of having too much wizardry in one box so it has more opportunities to fail. However in terms of a ECCR with deco program built in theres the Vision the HH Optima and the Boris.

Out of those three id reluctantly (because AP really pissed me off)go for the Vision for reasons of cost, practicality and reliability.


The choice on ECCR without all singing and dancing hand sets is surely the Inspo Classic and the Meg with Apex2 head. The Apex2 has a couple more functions than the Classic (not that thats such a good thing if your going for simple) and they both share OTS lungs. I don't think the meg is anything special but the owners I know (and trust) who have the Apex2 heads tell me they are solid and reliable. I dive with two of them regularly and the other source of advice is Dave Cooper.

So apart from the price, id go for the Meg Apex2 option.


In the MCCR arena I know and dive the KISS and i have researched and had a good fiddle with the rEvo. Ill ignore the Pelegan as i know nothing about it.

Id go for the rEvo because.

HUD comes as standard
The scrubber design is clever and useful especially with the expedition option.
The position of the counter lungs means more water can be tolerated in the unit before it affects the scrubber.
Modular design again with interesting options afoot
I like the dill add button
I like the low profile
I like the simplicity of the ADV design
I like the way you can easily integrate a stand alone computer

Have i dived it? No. But Dave has and he reckons it dives great and thats good enough for me because diving it is the least of my worries. Its a KISS valve MCCR with rear mounted lungs???? whats to know. It either trims out well or it doesn't.

AndyP's rEvo should be with us by the end of July so ill be having a go on that.

I totally agree that research is less valid than diving experience but in the end Id be more interested to read your reasons why you think I am wrong. It will add to my research.


ATB

Mark Chase

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finbar.taylor

I'm only going to coment on the unit's I've dived.

I love the KISS and my only reason for buying the inspo was the lack of CE mark on the KISS.

When I moved to the inspo the solenoid stuck close on the first dive due to experiance on the KISS this was a very managaable problem and I quite hapily continued the dive and it is for this that I would recomend going MCCR first. It get's you in the habbit of checking handsets, running a unit manualy and all the other skills you still need to know on an ECCR for if it fails but will not (if like me) practice as often as you should.

MCCR I feel gives a very good grounding in diving CCR so that if you move to ECCR you have the skills and mind set alreday in place.

Fin

ps I hope you get what I mean from this but it's clear to me what I'm sugesting just struggling to put the words across

prharris

I'd agree with Fin (but then I would as we have consecutive Kiss's ).
Having only had the one Rebreather, although considering a second, it's only fair that I comment on the Kiss.

The best analogy that I can give is when I learnt to use a camera, my first was fully manual, wet film, with no built-in metering let alone auto-focus, so I had to learn all about that good stuff, plus depth of field and even how different b&w films reacted to different lights.

I feel that this gave me a thorough grounding that has served me well even using cameras underwater.
Sure it's great to set them to full auto and bang away for 95% of the time, but somtimes you just need to take manual control.

Having been on mixed Rebreather courses, I can think of two instances where the eCCR students have been a bit 'fazed' when a problem has been thrown at them which would have just been part of the Kiss Diver's SOP.

r
Paul

ps
Usual caveat - check out the other guys who have responded, they have more time on more Rebreather's than I.

pps - my photos are still shite

decoweenie

Mark,

I never said you were wrong, but I was surprised to read the choices you gave - none of which you owned and only one dived a borrow unit.

And I am sure your reasons to make those choices are sound in your mind.

However same as your experience with the HH, I am sure you were just as sure before making the purchases of 3 HH units - you just don't know until you owned something for a while and started to know its problems intimately. And now, you have changed your mind.

So all I was questioning is...

Is it a "good" recommendation coming from someone's research and/or opinion instead of factual first-hand knowledge ?

Personally, I don't make recommendations (anymore) and will only relay my personal experience with units I owned when asked specific questions. (See the reply to DrMike on his post). IMHO, too many people are making factual-sounding statement from personal opinion...

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Mark Chase

You have a good point but its fair to say I didn't know any one who dived a Hammer Head before I bought one and I got all my ideas from the website that sells them. My Classic head failed and I was left without a CCR just before a week long dive trip., The HH came available so I bought it. I have to say I loved it till it went wrong. I even ditched the Classic head and bought a second HH.

Visions and meg divers I dive with all the time and the rEvo is conceptually a good unit but it is again fair to say i am basing my desire to own one on a concept and not on experience diving on it or with other divers that own them.

ATB

Mark Chase

__________________
Is it supposed to make that noise ?

I took my unit to the dive shop and demanded they bolt on every thing that would fit.

Join my elite diving teem and get a Tshirt

"Doing It Chasey"Hammerhead Eccr Advanced Diving System

decoweenie

Mark,

I don't think anyone could blame you for that.

And I am just as guilty as you about trying new things or even try to combine things for my own use if a good idea-sounding product doesn't yet exist.

But we shouldn't really push these notions about our "ideal" product for someone else to try...

Other than that, I had no argument with your recommeded choices. Except I wouldn't go for 2 of them, personally.

__________________
"...after a while you get bored offering advice to a bull that like to keep butting the fence with its head rather than walking through the open gate..."

- Rebreather World PM

decoweenie

It was a joke, I wasn't offended at all.

I thought I had written a post about in the past, but can't remember which thread. Too lazy to do it again...

__________________
"...after a while you get bored offering advice to a bull that like to keep butting the fence with its head rather than walking through the open gate..."

- Rebreather World PM