User:Bob Kierski

From ODC

Open Water Certified: 8-2000
Advance Open Water Certified: 10-2000
Dive Master Certified: 4-2007
Other Certificates: Nitrox, DPV, Deep, Rescue, Dry Suite

January 27, 2010 - Owatonna Junior HS - Full Face Mask

John Chapman was kind enough to allow ODC members and friends to try his Full Face Mask. I wasn't sure how it would go as John had previously indicated that he didn't care for the Full Face Mask. John has been talking about this trial event at several ODC meetings, and I was looking forward to the new experience.

It was a little difficult to rig up since John had it on a 1st stage without any other hoses for BC inflater, etc. Once I resolved to not being able to automatically inflate my BC, I got over the fact that I didn't have my usual tangle of hoses. John has the mask on a quick release. I wasn't able to get the quick release to release, so it was attached to my tank while I put my BC on. I would be uncomfortable having such an expensive mask flopping around on the end of a hose, while donning, for regular use, so the quick release is a good idea. I just have to figure out how to release it.

It was amazingly easy to breath from. The large lens made for an incredible field of view. I noticed right away how much easier it was to move my head from side to side, and up and down without having to worry about loosing the regulator. The air in the mask was also warm and moist. But surprisingly, this didn't cause the lens to become fogged. In fact, at no time during the dive did I use anti-fog or have problems with the lens becoming fogged.

At first, I wasn't too sure how to equalize. You don't really have the ability to pinch your nose, and I've never been able to do the jaw motion thing. Assuming someone had already worked out this issue, I simply pressed the mask against my face and blew out my nose. It certainly wasn't as forceful as the nose pinch, but it worked. In fact, in really cold water, if I were wearing gloves or mitts, this would probably be easier since you press the entire mask up -- not just the silicone around your nose.

At the end of the dive, I tried a few mask skills -- flooding and clearing. Trying to flood the mask was difficult. If I pealed the seal along the top as I do to flood a regular mask, the regulator kicked in and flooded the mask with air -- causing a horrendously loud noise. To flood the mask, I had to look up, and pull the entire mask away from my face. Clearing the mask is yet another (non)challenge. On a regular mask clear, you blow air from your nose. To clear this mask, you simply press the purge button and wait for the air to push the water out the bottom of the mask while looking straight ahead... or down. I'm not sure the position of the mask really matters when you're clearing it. But the bottom line is... Unless something catastrophic happens (like a broken lens) I don't think this mask could ever be flooded because any extra water is pushed out as you breath.

I can certainly see that this sort of mask would be great if you were diving in frigid or dirty water. I didn't notice any jaw fatigue during or after the dive.

After the dive, I got to wondering about some of the normal dive issues:

If I run out of air, how do I do an alternate air procedure?
How do I use a snorkel with this mask?
Can I surface swim with this mask?
What other safety issue do I need to be aware of?

February 3, 2010 - Owatonna Junior HS - Discover Scuba

The Owatonna Dive Club puts on a nice program for Discover Scuba. In addition to the instructor, we generally have 3 or more Dive Masters and Dive Master Candidates in the water, and 1 or 2 deck hands per student. If anything negative could be said about this, it's that there are a lot of people and it's not clear to the students who the students are, and who the deck hands and Dive Masters are.

As the schedule indicates, there is some sort of presentation given in the lunch room prior to the pool session. I didn't get to Owatonna early enough to view that presentation so I have no comments about it.

I'm a bit concerned about the way we prepare the student's equipment prior to getting wet. I have never seen any other group do Discover Scuba so I have nothing to compare it to. At ODC, we don't set up the student's weights until they're in the water with their BCD on. This seems rather backwards to me. It's much easier to put your weight belt on and then put on your BCD than to put your weight belt on under your BCD while standing in the water. The acoustics of the pool are rather poor and trying to communicate weight related information is difficult when they're in the water. But I assume this is the way it's been done for hundreds of years, so... it is, what it is.

In any event, we had the pool from 7 to 9. There was plenty of time for the newbies to get acquainted with SCUBA and plenty of time for the oldbies to horse around.

When I have free time in the pool, I like to work on a variety of skills as well as "play." During this particular event, I decided to play at the bottom without my SCUBA. Basically, I took my BCD and tank off, then swam around the bottom of the pool... blowing little bubbles... and back to the regulator for the next breath of air. In some cases, I was able to make it the entire route I planned without needing to take a breath. Several times, I had to fight traffic and wound up sucking air off someone else's alternate air source.

I don't know that my experience was valuable. I do feel more comfortable not having to breath all the time. It was really nice being able to swim without the drag of all my equipment.

February 17, 2010 - Owatonna Junior HS - Second Day of Class

The Owatonna Dive Club does class and pool a little differently than most PADI stores/groups. Class and pool is done over an 8 week period with additional pool sessions at the end for make-up work or just extra time in the pool. To me, this makes for a more relaxed experience. When I took my class and pool it was two consecutive weekend days. I felt a bit rushed.

For this class session, we had only 2 students. We had 1 instructor, 3 Dive Masters, and a few deck hands -- far more than we needed. At first I had resolved to not get wet since it was clear I wasn't needed in the pool. Then I realized I needed to consume the air in my tank so that I could get a club VIP tomorrow (Thursday) on that tank. So... I got wet.

I don't recall all that I did. It seemed to take a long time for my gage to get to 500psi. At one point, I just pressed the fill and vent buttons on my BCD to just let the air out. I made several laps around the deep end of the pool -- my thighs will be sore tomorrow. Some of these laps were done facing up... some facing each side. I was trying to be a bit more creative than just swimming back and forth.

I also experimented with a variety of turn techniques. I tried a swimmers turn -- flip, then do a barrel roll. I tried a variety of barrel roll type turns as well. I've found that I get water in my ears when I flip or roll.

As dive experiences go, this is probably not going to be my most memorable. But I think I got a good workout.

February 24, 2010 - Owatonna Junior HS - Third Day of Class

I knew we were going to have 4 Dive Masters today, and at most, we would have 3 students. It turned out we had only 2 students. There wasn't even anyone interested in doing a refresher or an ad hock Discover Scuba.

I needed to make the trip anyway because I still had one tank that needed to be emptied and I'm not about to just open the tank in my garage and let all that air go to waste.

Before heading down to Owatonna, I adjusted the position of my glue-on lens. I have a hard time reading my gauges in dim light while under water. Except in the pool, most of the time I'm diving, I have dim light. I can usually see that there are numbers on the gauges, but I usually can't tell what those numbers are unless I hold the gauge out at arms length. I bought the glue-on lens at Wall-mart for about $5. It was worth the $5 just to experiment with it.

The glue-on lens is really not glue-on. You get the lens wet (with regular water), press it on the inside of the mask lens and let it dry (for a couple of hours). Once the lens has dried, there is little or no risk of it coming off, even if the mask is flooded.

When I originally purchased the glue-on lenses (a pair of them), I installed them in the lowest part of the mask on both sides. I quickly figured out that I only needed one since everything I need to see close up is on the left side of my head. If there is something on the right side, I can easily turn my head. So, in my opinion, the right lens was a waste (or a spare). I also discovered that the lowest part of my mask is much too low. While it's nice to have peripheral vision in that area, it's hard on the eye muscles to look down that much.

Tonight, I moved the left lens up. Unfortunately, I moved it too high. The lens interfered with my ability to see mid range objects. I'll have to move the lens down just a bit before my next dive.

Cleaning the inside of the mask thoroughly was very helpful. The glue-on lens isn't made of optic material and anything on the mask just contributes to the distortion. With the lens I could clearly read the gauges. My $5 will pay off I'm sure.