How do you sling your tanks and why?

rogeringebo

Hi!
I had long talks with techdiving friends regarding how to sling tanks.
I always have my bailout under my left arm and everything with higher O2 contents under my right arm.
I find it easier to reach a reg on the left side and it comes more natural for me being righthanded therefore ideal for bailout.
Grabbing something from the right side is harder and require more thought and fumbling wich gives more time to get it right therefore better suited for decogasses. I even use a dogclip on the O2 reg.
Some find it better to have everything under the left arm....
What do you think and why?

Cheers
Roger

Abbo

I come from the 'Lean on the Left, Rich on the Right' school. The richest mix goes in the regulator bag. If I have 3 or more tanks then everything gets labels in big potato-print numerals. I believe the DUE marionettes stick all their tanks on the left, whether they are left-handed or right-handed: I'm left-handed, so that wouldn't suit me much. They say that's better for scooters, but I rarely use them, and I reckon silt-outs are bad enough without the added stress of playing Russian Roulette with the tanks. GUE and I just wouldn't get along: I do stuff my way until somebody's logic persuades me there's a better method. My response to the 'wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command' is unprintable but involves a tub of vaseline, advanced yoga skills and the place where the Sun don't shine.

kieranu

Ditto - doesn't being left-handed suck when it comes to technical diving. Its hard enough dealing with bailout/stage cylinders (at the surface in particular) without the added disadvantage of being cack-handed and hanging them on your left-side.

jhaaja

I sling all on the left. Normally the maximum is 2 or 3 tanks. Many times we run team bail-out in a way that everyone has their own deep bail-out and one decogas. In caves we just drop the decogasses on correct depths.

I have the armadillo ccr sidemount system and it is really nice

JH

Mark Chase

Left right for me as well. If I have to bailout I don't need the extra faf of deciding which tank to breath. Also diving this way means i can fill the tanks to the max and still trim out. This way i can get away with a ali 80 of 50 (blown to 230) and a steel 10 of 18/45 (blown to 250) and do 45@65 with adequate bailout.

Two tanks or more left with full gas is going to be imposable to trim out. Doing the same dive with the same gas id need a third tank as you can only blow the alis to 170ish bar of Nitrox and expect them to remain neutral.


ATB

Mark Chase

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Abbo

Have a read of Prof. Stanley Coren's book 'The Left-Hander Syndrome
Amazon.com: The Left-Hander Syndrome: The Causes and Consequences of Left-Handedness: Books: Stanley Coren There is no evidence that left-handers are cack-handed, but left-handers can look that way in certain situations: just try, as a left-hander, sitting on a packed bench using chopsticks, with a right-hander doing the same on your left-hand side: he's always going to blame you when he drops his sushi on his winkle. Only 8-15% of the population are left-handed, but they punch above their weight because they are useful in sports and they reportedly have a significantly higher percentage of people with above-average IQ.

My point, though, is not to accept anyone who says there's only one way of doing things. Being left-handed gives me half an excuse to flip them the birdie, but I'd probably do that to them anyway out of bloody-mindedness.

decoweenie

About 99% of the dives I have done, stages go to the left.

This came from day 1 when I started to do tech diving seriously (i.e. 10 years ago). The logic was explained in details from the original Hogarthian approach, and everything makes perfect sense (to me).

DIR pushes the Hogarthian approach beyond the gear configuration more toward team, gas, safety focus. But the basis is still relying heavily on using logical explanations for everything used, and contrare to casual observers, it is a slowly evolving system to implement more features as the technology progresses.

There isn't much that I don't support the Hogarthian/DIR viewpoint in general, the only thing that I don't support is their view of CCR use in non-exploratory diving (99.9999% of the diving done).

Independent if I am diving OC or any Rebreather unit, the frontal configuration is standardized exactly the same way. The only thing (really is) different is the gas source on my back (twinset or RB unit).

All things evolve, so I am in the process of testing the Golem CCR stage side-mount method, but it has been a slow process to abandon abruptly a system that works so well for the last 10 years (for me) but I am still trying...

Don't flame me as I truly want to understand the view-point from left-handers...

I use my left hand to put on/take off my stages. And I teach the students to do the same, using both at the beginning but striving to be able to do with a single (left) hand even while moving (in perfect trim) as the goal.

So why is it difficult to handle the stages on the left for left-handers ?

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jhaaja

I have been doing the same. My sling left came from hogartian way of OC diving. I really have not changed anything from those days. The only new thing is the sidemount set. I sling the deep bailout in the sidemount and it is connected directly to my BOV. Richer gases are hanging in the normal D-rings on the left side.

kieranu

No argument here

Abbo

In all honesty, it isn't: my left is my more dextrous hand, though I am reasonably ambidextrous. Surely, two clear disadvantages of putting all tanks on one side are trim and increased risk of mixing up the tanks: I can't see what advantages would outweigh that, though I'm perfectly happy to be persuaded there's a better method. I'm here to learn, and I understand you're a very experienced diver. I understand that the main reason for DIR gentlemen to hang left is to mount their scooters right-handed: that wouldn't suit me.