Rebreather recommendations

[Mark Chase]

Plenty of young divers are given a rebreather when they join various branches of the military around the world and do a considerable number of dives on them. All things being equal, they should die at the same rate as older divers. The high recreational death rate being down purely to whether or not the unit runs a solenoid is utterly ridiculous, even allowing for Brad's bullshit reckoning of reliability I can't swallow it.

As well you know, I was talking broadly about trends and groups. Picking an individual case to prove a point is just stupid and why trying to have a discussion with you goes nowhere.

It was an example of bulshit info in bulshit info on the list nothing more.


Why you slag the list off for doing its best I just don't know. I think you personal issue with me and people like Dias clouds your judgment

I don't have any illusion about changing your mind, you'r too set in your ways which is odd as a KISS diver for many years and then a MK15 5 which is surely one of the most intuitive units out there simila to the bearly ECCR JJ In my view. Very few bells and whistles on a 15 5

But if it manages to convince one new CCR diver to consider using his head rather than reliance on cheep dodgy electronics, then I am happy

[Paulo]

I refer to it because he was young (id guess late 30s) and fit (keen mountain biker) so it wasent an underlieing health condition

I know nothing of the case you are referring to or who it was either.

However being youngish and active does not preclude you from underlying medical issues. My Dad was 40, around 11 stone and ran 30 miles a week when he had his first heart attack. Sometimes shit just happens

[dwhitlow]

I refer to it because he was young (id guess late 30s) and fit (keen mountain biker) so it wasent an underlieing health condition

Youth is no indicator of good underlying health, although the odds of an underlying problem do increase with age. Just to illustrate that point, there are numerous footballers, in high state of fitness, why collapse and die on the field.

I also refer to it here because the information on the incident only bears scant resemblance to what actualy happened which is understandable because no one really wanted to say anything

Which I refer to on this thread as a clear demonstration of bullshit in bullshit out for the incident lists.

BSAC data is no better. Who and what does that list serve? Why would people improve the quality of that data?

[ebt]

Why you slag the list off for doing its best I just don't know. I think you personal issue with me and people like Dias clouds your judgment

Doing its best at what though? A lot of people share the view that the list is inherently biased and its goal seems to be purely to justify whatever particular direction open sore wish to promote.

[gobfish1]

She realy wasn't she was just out of training but her instructor bigged her up

Top level divers don't lose buoyancy and freak out just because they got to the depth they were planning on going to anyway on a unit that's designed for the job and gassed up for the job.

I am thinking more like Nic Gotto and Keith Milbern

Cant say i know much about keith only know that he death was in 4m of water , after bailing out to his inboard 3l o2 that was turned off
why did he do that ? unless unit was full of water no need , the dill was breathable cant have been mix ,frist dive was not deep just crab hunting in 12m i think ,

Nic gotto i remember well as i did the same dive a few weeks after his death , the rabbit shit wreck .

I think most of what was posted at the time is prob bullshit , ie o2 hit , due to a down draft says he was at 10m on 1.3 than got pulled down to 25, that dont work for me , unless he put the o2 in him self ?, Even then so what he had an o2 spike , ( fix it )
Think i also read some place his scrubber
had a fair bit of use / unchanged , maybe co2 helped him towards said o2hit ,
but going from 10m to 25m he would have needed to top up the lungs by hand, maybe that caught him out , who knows (no ADV back then)

Both divers passaway on dives that should not have been a problem , rabbit shit wreck 2nd largest wreck in the world, you can do one end to the other on a 12l cylinder ,

Just more bad choices ,
and to short a time traning for noddy1 back in the day ,
roll on 19 year and noddy1 traning is still bollox tho lots of time that could be used teaching usfull things that could / would save your life , but alass thats not happing, litigation and lawsuit,s seem to get in the way. so its bail out if you THINK your having a problem.
and thay toss in a free nitrox course ,

and a few cu6ts like D&H sat on the fance like vulture,s dont help

As soon as noddy straps on his off board 7l the course is fooked from a learning point of view,

[notdeadyet]

It was an example of bulshit info in bulshit info on the list nothing more.


Why you slag the list off for doing its best I just don't know.

I think we must be reading different lists. The one I look at is just a list of unknowns with little bits of data scattered along the way. It is the Fox News of diving, it records that an event may have happened but the data around it is questionable.

Yes, they have been quick to change things. But that system is reliant on people raising it with them. In many cases the errors were painfully obvious, like the cave diver they listed while the rescue was still ongoing and was assumed to be still alive. Or the member of RBW who was listed as dead even though he was still active on the forum. If no-one raises it, it stands. And that's poor data collection. It suggests to me that it is not a robust study and I would question what fact checking is going on before they publish it.

And yes, I do have a problem with Horn and Deas using a list of the dead and a supposed analysis as a sales brochure. If nothing else, it shows what little savvy they have to release and maintain it under the corporate banner. It is immediately tainted by the fact that they are selling a commercial product.

I think you personal issue with me and people like Dias clouds your judgment

The only personal issue I have with you is that I think we have vastly different ideas about what constitutes fact, compelling evidence and opinion. Your repeated use of a very biased opinion as fact is disingenuous and makes any reasonable discussion impossible. Remember this started with your assertion that the majority of eccr divers are incapable of diving their units properly based purely on your sole observation and snowballed from there with increasingly shaky assumptions being used as evidence. I've had far bigger arguments with Graham over the years.

I don't have any illusion about changing your mind, you'r too set in your ways which is odd as a KISS diver for many years and then a MK15 5 which is surely one of the most intuitive units out there simila to the bearly ECCR JJ In my view. Very few bells and whistles on a 15 5

I don't think I have taken any side in this whole discussion. Just because I don't agree that mCCR is safer than eCCR does not mean that I believe eCCR is better. What I have said all along is that your assertions have no foundation. That does not mean I have the opposite view. My view is that eCCR is not more dangerous because there is no evidence to back up that theory and it is pretty easy to shoot holes in it with a bit of critical thinking.

I dive an eCCR. As I said many times in the past, the only reason I bought a HH was because I needed monitoring for my Mk15. I looked at a Nat90/SW solution but it looked overly complex, wasn't a simple fit and was way overpriced for what I wanted. The HH was a far better fit for the Mk15 straight out of the box. I ran the HH stock for a while to see what it was like, it held setpoint very, very well so I've left it running. I don't use the deco functions as I don't like computers. I still dive mCCR units, I have a few homebuilds that I still like to piss about with, I have an O2 unit that I like playing with, I dive a manifolded twinset as well, I also dive sidemount and I dive a single and pony now and again, too. I'm pretty stuck in my ways.

I work in an environment where understanding evidence and understanding human factors in failure is vital. The consequence on the projects I work on is people die. In numbers with zeroes on them. Critical thinking and not making easy assumptions is hammered into us on a daily basis.

The things that I am yet to be shaken on:

- Most eCCR divers do not monitor their ppO2. There is no solid evidence for that.
- recreational eCCR's are dangerous. Where is the evidence of a proportionate level of severe near misses?
- eCCR is dangerous. Where is the high death rate in the military diving world?
- mCCR forces you to monitor your ppO2. It doesn't, you can go a very long time without checking your ppO2 on a CMF unit without anything bad happening.
- According to Deas's list, eCCR is dangerous. There is as much evidence that depth and age are as big risks or worse, not even considering the massive holes in the data
- Health and fitness in the over 40's is not a big factor in accidents. Evidence from DAN and from other sports and medicine in general would suggest otherwise. I would be very surprised if this did not turn out to be a far bigger factor than anything else should a decent study ever be done. If not the largest amongst over-40's.
- Based on Deas' xls, you can draw conclusion "X". You can't, it is too full of unknowns.

But if it manages to convince one new CCR diver to consider using his head rather than reliance on cheep dodgy electronics, then I am happy

I was being facetious earlier when I said "you win" but I do think you win. People like headlines and soundbites and I will bet cash money that anyone undecided will read this thread, read your assumptions, read Deas' xls and just shrug and say "eCCR is really unsafe".

Using your head would mean that you understood that there is no evidence and no conclusions that can be drawn and that everything one way or the other is purely a biased opinion. I don't think human nature works like that but I hope it does.

[cathal]

I think we must be reading different lists. The one I look at is just a list of unknowns with little bits of data scattered along the way. It is the Fox News of diving, it records that an event may have happened but the data around it is questionable.

Yes, they have been quick to change things. But that system is reliant on people raising it with them. In many cases the errors were painfully obvious, like the cave diver they listed while the rescue was still ongoing and was assumed to be still alive. Or the member of RBW who was listed as dead even though he was still active on the forum. If no-one raises it, it stands. And that's poor data collection. It suggests to me that it is not a robust study and I would question what fact checking is going on before they publish it.

And yes, I do have a problem with Horn and Deas using a list of the dead and a supposed analysis as a sales brochure. If nothing else, it shows what little savvy they have to release and maintain it under the corporate banner. It is immediately tainted by the fact that they are selling a commercial product.



The only personal issue I have with you is that I think we have vastly different ideas about what constitutes fact, compelling evidence and opinion. Your repeated use of a very biased opinion as fact is disingenuous and makes any reasonable discussion impossible. Remember this started with your assertion that the majority of eccr divers are incapable of diving their units properly based purely on your sole observation and snowballed from there with increasingly shaky assumptions being used as evidence. I've had far bigger arguments with Graham over the years.



I don't think I have taken any side in this whole discussion. Just because I don't agree that mCCR is safer than eCCR does not mean that I believe eCCR is better. What I have said all along is that your assertions have no foundation. That does not mean I have the opposite view. My view is that eCCR is not more dangerous because there is no evidence to back up that theory and it is pretty easy to shoot holes in it with a bit of critical thinking.

I dive an eCCR. As I said many times in the past, the only reason I bought a HH was because I needed monitoring for my Mk15. I looked at a Nat90/SW solution but it looked overly complex, wasn't a simple fit and was way overpriced for what I wanted. The HH was a far better fit for the Mk15 straight out of the box. I ran the HH stock for a while to see what it was like, it held setpoint very, very well so I've left it running. I don't use the deco functions as I don't like computers. I still dive mCCR units, I have a few homebuilds that I still like to piss about with, I have an O2 unit that I like playing with, I dive a manifolded twinset as well, I also dive sidemount and I dive a single and pony now and again, too. I'm pretty stuck in my ways.

I work in an environment where understanding evidence and understanding human factors in failure is vital. The consequence on the projects I work on is people die. In numbers with zeroes on them. Critical thinking and not making easy assumptions is hammered into us on a daily basis.

The things that I am yet to be shaken on:

- Most eCCR divers do not monitor their ppO2. There is no solid evidence for that.
- recreational eCCR's are dangerous. Where is the evidence of a proportionate level of severe near misses?
- eCCR is dangerous. Where is the high death rate in the military diving world?
- mCCR forces you to monitor your ppO2. It doesn't, you can go a very long time without checking your ppO2 on a CMF unit without anything bad happening.
- According to Deas's list, eCCR is dangerous. There is as much evidence that depth and age are as big risks or worse, not even considering the massive holes in the data
- Health and fitness in the over 40's is not a big factor in accidents. Evidence from DAN and from other sports and medicine in general would suggest otherwise. I would be very surprised if this did not turn out to be a far bigger factor than anything else should a decent study ever be done. If not the largest amongst over-40's.
- Based on Deas' xls, you can draw conclusion "X". You can't, it is too full of unknowns.



I was being facetious earlier when I said "you win" but I do think you win. People like headlines and soundbites and I will bet cash money that anyone undecided will read this thread, read your assumptions, read Deas' xls and just shrug and say "eCCR is really unsafe".

Using your head would mean that you understood that there is no evidence and no conclusions that can be drawn and that everything one way or the other is purely a biased opinion. I don't think human nature works like that but I hope it does.

Regarding that list I could not have put it better


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[fibre]

And after you wrote in with the accurate information what was there response?

If you didn't write in then shut up

A data base is like a computer. Bulshit in = bulshit out.

Don't sit back and slag it off, do something about it.

Why should I correct a list thats maintained by a known troll and used for his own commercial benefit? I reported the incident and the circumstances to the necessary people. The manufacturers of various part of his equipment were contacted and they assisted with the equipment investigation.

If Deeplife wish to maintain a record of incidents then its beholden on them to ensure that the information is correct. If they established a reputation of being accurate then more people would volunteer information, surprisingly they havent and so people dont!!

[fibre]

This is an interesting point.

SO 10% of CCR users died as you say from user error?

No, if you re-read my comment, I said that many incidents, not all of them.

How many incidents, both fatal and non fatal have you heard of where people turn off cylinders, Sorb was run to the limits of its lifetime, cells were being used well past the recommended lifespan. These are not uncommon nor are they limited to one type of rebreather. These are all user error based decisions which can then become a incident.

I agree that there has been a massive increase in knowledge within the CCR community, mainly through the internet. I certainly learned more from reading the forums than I learned on my courses. However at the same time, I know that the first RB course I undertook in the 90s and the last RB course a few years ago were light years apart in the level of information on the underlying issues of rebreather diving.


I will say though, relying purely on the internet for information is a recipe for disaster too. Think back only a short while ago when everyone was arguing about deep stops, or even longer ago when GI3 told us all we were going to die because we didnt use aluminium cylinders. Discussion of a problem is one thing, making broad sweeping statements about one method, one piece of equipment, one theory on deco just eventually backfires.

[Mark Chase]

I think we must be reading different lists. The one I look at is just a list of unknowns with little bits of data scattered along the way. It is the Fox News of diving, it records that an event may have happened but the data around it is questionable.

Yes, they have been quick to change things. But that system is reliant on people raising it with them. In many cases the errors were painfully obvious, like the cave diver they listed while the rescue was still ongoing and was assumed to be still alive. Or the member of RBW who was listed as dead even though he was still active on the forum. If no-one raises it, it stands. And that's poor data collection. It suggests to me that it is not a robust study and I would question what fact checking is going on before they publish it.

And yes, I do have a problem with Horn and Deas using a list of the dead and a supposed analysis as a sales brochure. If nothing else, it shows what little savvy they have to release and maintain it under the corporate banner. It is immediately tainted by the fact that they are selling a commercial product.



The only personal issue I have with you is that I think we have vastly different ideas about what constitutes fact, compelling evidence and opinion. Your repeated use of a very biased opinion as fact is disingenuous and makes any reasonable discussion impossible. Remember this started with your assertion that the majority of eccr divers are incapable of diving their units properly based purely on your sole observation and snowballed from there with increasingly shaky assumptions being used as evidence. I've had far bigger arguments with Graham over the years.



I don't think I have taken any side in this whole discussion. Just because I don't agree that mCCR is safer than eCCR does not mean that I believe eCCR is better. What I have said all along is that your assertions have no foundation. That does not mean I have the opposite view. My view is that eCCR is not more dangerous because there is no evidence to back up that theory and it is pretty easy to shoot holes in it with a bit of critical thinking.

I dive an eCCR. As I said many times in the past, the only reason I bought a HH was because I needed monitoring for my Mk15. I looked at a Nat90/SW solution but it looked overly complex, wasn't a simple fit and was way overpriced for what I wanted. The HH was a far better fit for the Mk15 straight out of the box. I ran the HH stock for a while to see what it was like, it held setpoint very, very well so I've left it running. I don't use the deco functions as I don't like computers. I still dive mCCR units, I have a few homebuilds that I still like to piss about with, I have an O2 unit that I like playing with, I dive a manifolded twinset as well, I also dive sidemount and I dive a single and pony now and again, too. I'm pretty stuck in my ways.

I work in an environment where understanding evidence and understanding human factors in failure is vital. The consequence on the projects I work on is people die. In numbers with zeroes on them. Critical thinking and not making easy assumptions is hammered into us on a daily basis.

The things that I am yet to be shaken on:

- Most eCCR divers do not monitor their ppO2. There is no solid evidence for that.
- recreational eCCR's are dangerous. Where is the evidence of a proportionate level of severe near misses?
- eCCR is dangerous. Where is the high death rate in the military diving world?
- mCCR forces you to monitor your ppO2. It doesn't, you can go a very long time without checking your ppO2 on a CMF unit without anything bad happening.
- According to Deas's list, eCCR is dangerous. There is as much evidence that depth and age are as big risks or worse, not even considering the massive holes in the data
- Health and fitness in the over 40's is not a big factor in accidents. Evidence from DAN and from other sports and medicine in general would suggest otherwise. I would be very surprised if this did not turn out to be a far bigger factor than anything else should a decent study ever be done. If not the largest amongst over-40's.
- Based on Deas' xls, you can draw conclusion "X". You can't, it is too full of unknowns.



I was being facetious earlier when I said "you win" but I do think you win. People like headlines and soundbites and I will bet cash money that anyone undecided will read this thread, read your assumptions, read Deas' xls and just shrug and say "eCCR is really unsafe".

Using your head would mean that you understood that there is no evidence and no conclusions that can be drawn and that everything one way or the other is purely a biased opinion. I don't think human nature works like that but I hope it does.

Christ that was a well structured and balanced post,,, have you ben drinking

I pretty much agree with the thrust of everything you say but for the purposes of clarification of what I strongly believe:

1: ECCR properly dived is obviously safer than MCCR but IMHO the statistics for ECCR (ignoring under lieing health conditions) suggest to me its regularly not properly dived. Possably years of discussion with ECCR divers about how they dive their units has bias my opinion bassed on a small sample of 40-50 divers, I cant argue with that, but there was an overwhelming lean towards reliance on the buzzers and back ups and a disturbing beleife that calibration fixed cell errors


2: MCCR shouldn't be set to allow complacency. Id always err on the side of 10-15min intervention requirement when setting up the flow. I see MCCR v ECCR in the same way I see dynamic traction control. I throw mmy RX8 into any corner at pretty much any speed and the electronics will sort it out. Do that in my MR2 and you end up in a ditch. SO I am a LOT more careful and on it in my MR2. If I trusted ECCR electronics to just work, id dive one like I dive my RX8, but I just don't. I find peoples faith in CCR manufacturors to produce stable electronic controlers and carry out proper R&D to be seriously misguided.

3: I think ECCR training courses are week as they are written by the manufacturorwit too much bias toward bigging up their own systems

4: I Thin MCCR teaches you how CCR work and how cells react during the various stages of a dive and it builds a solid foundation for diveing all sorts of CCR

5: The Rebreather fatality list is debatably flawed but its a damed site better than what we had before which is a patchy BSAC list and sod all else.

[ebt]

r the purposes of clarification of what I strongly believe:

Strong "belief" is something you'd share with anti-vaxxers, christian fundamentalists etc etc. Its doesnt make for a good "proof" really (although it may be right).

I found your RX8 example interesting though. Isnt that kind of 'blind faith' the very thing you're criticising eCCR divers for? Would those electronics get you out of a diesel spill?......or perhaps its the case that whatever make of car you drive, there can be unexpected things that cant be fixed by equipment and instead rely on the mindset/operation practises of the operator. Im sure you see the parallels with ccr....

Having said that, Im a hypocrit. I have a belief.... that we will continue to discover new issues with rebreather diving (whether its the physiology, the equipment, or the practises), which require us to adapt/adjust what we do. An open mind is probably the best tool we have.

[JonG]

Notdeadyet do you purely use tables for deco?

[graham_hk]

///

[notdeadyet]

Notdeadyet do you purely use tables for deco?

Usually. For <40m I just use an old Aladin Pro, for mix diving I use tables generally. Sometimes I'm lazy and will use the HH like if I'm diving in Dorry where you end up all over the place. But for a wreck where it's just down, along and up then I use tables.

[JonG]

Thanks so do you follow an air algorithm on the alladdin then