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Does Nitrox make my Butte look Big or make my dive safer?


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#16 gcbryan

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Posted 22 June 2006 - 12:21 AM

Most boat captains have a clue. It doesn't however sound like you have ever been on a dive boat charter.

In many cases it's easy to use up an hour moving from dive site #1 to dive site #2. It's also not going to hurt anyone to sit out an hour to offgas, rest and hydrate (all help with offgassing) especially for 3 tank charters.

Yes, with the proper dive profile you can "clean yourself up" pretty well but slow tissues over multiple dives are continuing to build up.

In any event unless you have your own boat you will be doing what just about every boat captain would like for you to do.

It helps to have done something before you post about it.

Nitrox in a quarry...I think the point was that there isn't much too see and that they probably don't want longer bottom time and the reduced nitrogen is a shallow quarry isn't much as an issue.

Nitrox is good for shorter deco times but no one posting said anything about doing deco.

Nitrox is good for deco, reducing nitrogen levels over multiday, multiple dive days if used on air tables and at shallower depths. So it's useful for certain dive locations and not as useful for others.

Overall it's much more important for divers to manage their ascent profile. Doing this is what makes you feel better after you get out of the water. You stay shallow on Nitrox so you end up automatically with slower ascent profiles in most cases but good technique is what is really needed. Air works fine.

For reducing narcosis sure add helium. Other than as a deco gas Nitrox in my opinion does little that good diving technique on air can't match.

#17 finGrabber

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Posted 22 June 2006 - 05:57 AM

If I bring my own, then I have to rent or own the Nitrox tanks for the number of dives I'm doing

that increases my cost because the tanks rent for more than a Nitrox fill costs

I guess it's harder to find boat captains who actually have a clue. Oh well.

Why wouldn't you use Nitrox in a murky quarry? I don' understand wha visibility has to do with gas choice. Maybe I'm just missing something here.

As for bringing your own, I always bring my own. Why is that more expensive? Do you mean it's actually cheaper to get gas on-site than bring it in yourself?

Here's a question. Are you guys paying for nitrox by the tank, or by the cubic foot?

-P




Perrone,

alot of boat captains will tell you how long you'll stay out of the water...it's a by-product of our sue-happy society

and I wouldn't dive Nitrox in a murky quarry either...the one's here in Texas have at best 5 to 10 vis and not much to see...not to mention that most quarries here don't offer Nitrox so you have to bring all your Nitrox with you which increases the cost



#18 Walter

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Posted 22 June 2006 - 06:15 AM

Very interesting.

Deco? I think if you're making deco dives, you're beyong the point of asking if nitrox is the gas for you. If you're not, you are asking specific folks you respect and not the "world."

Benefits of nitrox do include longer bottom times and shorter surface intervals OR a bigger safety margin, but NOT both.

Feeling better after a dive is a benefit many experience, but evidence suggests it's a placebo. The only double blind study conducted to date showed no difference. Of course, if you feel better, you feel better, the reason isn't all that important.

Narcosis is approximately the same with nitrox as with air, some suggest it might be slightly more severe with nitrox. I suspect there's no measurable difference.

If you're coming up from dives because you or your buddy are low on air and you are not cose to your NDL, there's no point in you paying extra for nitrox for that type dive.

Air is for tires is certainly true, but it's also for diving. Use the best mix for the dive you're planning, for me diving for fossils at Venice Beach I have no NDL on air. Air is the best mix for the dive, it would be ridiculous to use nitrox.

If you aren't getting cotton mouth, I suspect your mix isn't the reason. Nitrox is just as dry as the air that's pumped into tanks. It goes through the same filters (and then more filters).

The technical diving community did not exist decades ago. While some divers have been making dives that some today call "technical" since the invention of SCUBA, the poor excuse for a term is not yet 20 years old. Nitrox was introduced (outside commercial, military and scientific circles) barely 20 years ago in Key Largo. It was a long time before it was available anywhere other than Ocean Divers. Six years later, it was still not commonplace, although by the late 90s it was easy to find.

Gray, I agree, most captains are very good at what they do.

Oh, BTW, Mike, yes nitrox does make your butt look big.
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#19 Latitude Adjustment

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Posted 22 June 2006 - 06:30 AM

Mike what's your SAC these days? Nitrox can't extend your bottom time if you run out of gas first :)
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#20 Guest_PlatypusMan_*

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Posted 22 June 2006 - 06:38 AM

Oh, BTW, Mike, yes nitrox does make your butt look big.


Oh, crap!... and here I just signed up for the Nitrox option for the Roatan trip....

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#21 Walter

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Posted 22 June 2006 - 07:17 AM


Oh, BTW, Mike, yes nitrox does make your butt look big.


Oh, crap!... and here I just signed up for the Nitrox option for the Roatan trip....

PlatypusMan


Not to worry, it only makes Mike's butt look big.
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#22 Desert_Diver

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Posted 22 June 2006 - 07:18 AM

For me, the added safety is worth a little cost. I'll always go for an appropriate mix when given the option.

I've never detected a difference in how I feel post-dive on air or Nitrox, either. It's the stops that are most important, less so the mix. Champagne in your blood probably isn't the happiest time to enjoy a little bubbly.

#23 PerroneFord

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Posted 22 June 2006 - 07:24 AM

Well,

That's a pretty big assumption on your part that I've never been on a boat charter. Take a GOOD look at that attached picture of me on the FAMI tugs 4 weeks ago out in the Gulf of Mexico.

Yes, it is common for it to take an hour to move sites. However, it is also not uncommon to do a 2 tank dive on the same wreck. I don't really remember hearing about people chartering the Spiegel Grove and being moved to another site for dive 2.

Yes, taking an hour SIT will help you clean up, however, it can also get some people pretty sick depending on conditions. So I'd prefer not to have the captian tell me I need to sit there in the rocking boat for an hour if my profile dictates I don't need it.

Nitrox is good for reducing nitrogen in the body. With all it's manifestations. For shallow diving (less than 100ft) it's a better gas than air.

Thanks for clearing up the issue about the quarry. I didn't realize people were paying such a premium over air. Its not common here so I'm not used to that.

You're comment on ascent profiles, is of couse what I was driving at, but I didn't want to assume that. I was interested in knowing what she was doing. Slowing ascent will absolutely make a diver feel better after a dive, and I wish people would be told that during their diving classes.

In these "studies" where they say there is no difference in feel between diving nitrox and air, I truly wonder what kind of profiles they are doing. If it's the dive to 60ft, stay an hour, come to 15ft, offgas for 3 minutes and hit the boat, I'm sure they won't feel great either way.



Most boat captains have a clue. It doesn't however sound like you have ever been on a dive boat charter.

In many cases it's easy to use up an hour moving from dive site #1 to dive site #2. It's also not going to hurt anyone to sit out an hour to offgas, rest and hydrate (all help with offgassing) especially for 3 tank charters.

Yes, with the proper dive profile you can "clean yourself up" pretty well but slow tissues over multiple dives are continuing to build up.

In any event unless you have your own boat you will be doing what just about every boat captain would like for you to do.

It helps to have done something before you post about it.

Nitrox in a quarry...I think the point was that there isn't much too see and that they probably don't want longer bottom time and the reduced nitrogen is a shallow quarry isn't much as an issue.

Nitrox is good for shorter deco times but no one posting said anything about doing deco.

Nitrox is good for deco, reducing nitrogen levels over multiday, multiple dive days if used on air tables and at shallower depths. So it's useful for certain dive locations and not as useful for others.

Overall it's much more important for divers to manage their ascent profile. Doing this is what makes you feel better after you get out of the water. You stay shallow on Nitrox so you end up automatically with slower ascent profiles in most cases but good technique is what is really needed. Air works fine.

For reducing narcosis sure add helium. Other than as a deco gas Nitrox in my opinion does little that good diving technique on air can't match.

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#24 Walter

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Posted 22 June 2006 - 09:21 AM

That's a pretty big assumption on your part that I've never been on a boat charter. Take a GOOD look at that attached picture of me on the FAMI tugs 4 weeks ago out in the Gulf of Mexico.


Yes, it looks like he made a bad assumption, but based on your statements on this board, it is safe to assume you haven't been on many. What I don't understand, Perrone, is one minute you'll freely admit to being a beginner and the next you're giving advice to experts, acting like they are the beginners.

Nitrox is good for reducing nitrogen in the body. With all it's manifestations. For shallow diving (less than 100ft) it's a better gas than air.


Deeper than 40 feet and as deep as 150, it's a better choice than air. Shallower than 40, air's just as good and it's usually cheaper.

In these "studies" where they say there is no difference in feel between diving nitrox and air, I truly wonder what kind of profiles they are doing. If it's the dive to 60ft, stay an hour, come to 15ft, offgas for 3 minutes and hit the boat, I'm sure they won't feel great either way.


Read the article yourself.
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#25 PerroneFord

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Posted 22 June 2006 - 09:51 AM

Yes, it looks like he made a bad assumption, but based on your statements on this board, it is safe to assume you haven't been on many. What I don't understand, Perrone, is one minute you'll freely admit to being a beginner and the next you're giving advice to experts, acting like they are the beginners.


Walter, I've been certified for 12 years. Certainly not as long as many here, but I'm no rank beginner either. However, it doesn't take an expert to figure out that if you put less nitrogen into the body, there is less to come out.

#26 BradfordNC

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Posted 22 June 2006 - 10:13 AM

Here's a question. Are you guys paying for nitrox by the tank, or by the cubic foot?


pretty much the only place you'll get nitrox by the cubic foot is cave country.

anywhere else they charge a flat fee to fill a tank.
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#27 PerroneFord

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Posted 22 June 2006 - 10:19 AM

Here's a question. Are you guys paying for nitrox by the tank, or by the cubic foot?


pretty much the only place you'll get nitrox by the cubic foot is cave country.

anywhere else they charge a flat fee to fill a tank.



Darn, that really sux! Retail on nitrox here (and fill express down south) is $.08 cuft. So filling an AL80 here is $6.19 for an ABSOLUTELY empty tank, and usually more like $5.00 if you bring it back with about 500psi in it. Air is $4.00 a fill in the same instance. So for the $1.00 more, I just get nitrox every time.

What are you guys in Dallas, Houston, N. Carolina, and the PNW and Cali paying for Nitrox fills?

#28 Diverbrian

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Posted 22 June 2006 - 11:05 AM

I guess it's harder to find boat captains who actually have a clue. Oh well.

Why wouldn't you use Nitrox in a murky quarry? I don' understand wha visibility has to do with gas choice. Maybe I'm just missing something here.

As for bringing your own, I always bring my own. Why is that more expensive? Do you mean it's actually cheaper to get gas on-site than bring it in yourself?

Here's a question. Are you guys paying for nitrox by the tank, or by the cubic foot?

-P




Perrone,

alot of boat captains will tell you how long you'll stay out of the water...it's a by-product of our sue-happy society

and I wouldn't dive Nitrox in a murky quarry either...the one's here in Texas have at best 5 to 10 vis and not much to see...not to mention that most quarries here don't offer Nitrox so you have to bring all your Nitrox with you which increases the cost


The only times that I have heard of paying for nitrox by the cubic ft. is in Florida with Fill Express or special arrangements with the dive shops (like me who is affiliated with the shop that I fill my tanks at as the only Trimix blender on staff).

Most of us (including me when not filling at my LDS), have to pay by the tank. That means if your tank is at 1500 psi, you are paying the same as the person that ran their tank down to 750 psi.

Why is it cheaper to get fills at the site? Well, not everyone wants to own, store and maintain several tanks when they will be away for the weekend. I know that someone from cave country would think this is funny, but I only own two sets of doubles. That is all that I have any intention of owning along with my other single tanks. Also, the vehicles to carry these tanks to remote locations tend to burn more gasoline than a moderate sized to small car with one or two tanks in the back intending to dive all weekend at the quarry and get fills there or get fills with the local charter op.

Some quarries don't have nitrox fills available. You either top-off/refill with air or bring your own mixes. As well, you would be hard pressed to find anything but air in Michigan's Upper Peninsula (or even the Straits of Mackinac). I am doing a two day charter up there next month (Whitefish Point). All of my mixes will be going up with me. But air top-offs are a measly $4.00 up there. If it weren't for safety considerations, I would be better off getting their top-offs.

As to captains insisting on an hour out of the water, well... many of them do have a clue. You may think that you surface perfectly clean, but do you really want to take that chance? That is standard practice up here. I prefer it to the other extreme that I have heard about with some operators in the keys which is dropping divers in after a half-hour to fourty-five minute S.I. so that the boat can get in more quickly and get the second run done. Which one is more safe and which one wants the most money for the least amount of work?

BTW, nitrox up here averages 10-15 dollars per tank (assume an AL80) for a fill. Air averages 4-10 dollars per tank. To fill my doubles at the shop, I am paying roughly $35.00 a crack for nitrox. If I am mixing, they generally charge less for the fill as I am doing most of the work and the tanks are twenty percent or more filled with He before I get to filling them with nitrox.
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#29 PerroneFord

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Posted 22 June 2006 - 12:01 PM

WOW! I really had no idea people paid that much for Nitrox. No wonder I see all these threads on here about diving air. Hard to believe that we acutally pay LESS in Florida for somethnig! :)

I don't think it's strange to only have 2 sets of doubles. Lots of people down here don't have too many. I'll probably end up with 4. Two sets of AL80s, a set of 108s, and a set of 130s. Hopefully I'll retire then all when I go CCR.

I also hear you about the car. I have a nice SUV that stays parked while I drive the Subaru everywhere. I am bummed I had to ditch the Honda convertible to have room for my doubles! That thing got 35+ MPG on the highway.

I doubt people surface perfectly clean. And I am not above saying that you might well be safer to stay on the boat an hour before heading back down. My only contention is the boat captain DEMANDING it. I've seen some folks look pretty green on the boat, and after their relatively benign profiles, they really could get back in the water. Not sure I want Captain Hook, telling me I have to stay on the rocking chair while I relase my stomach contents just so I can satisfy his "protective nature".

Dude, why do you have to pay so much for nitrox? When I fill my own tanks, I'm paying about $.04 cuft or less. I can fill my doubles for less than $5. In fact, my entire gas bill for the spring was less than $20 with the dozen or more dives I did.

-P



Most of us (including me when not filling at my LDS), have to pay by the tank. That means if your tank is at 1500 psi, you are paying the same as the person that ran their tank down to 750 psi.

Why is it cheaper to get fills at the site? Well, not everyone wants to own, store and maintain several tanks when they will be away for the weekend. I know that someone from cave country would think this is funny, but I only own two sets of doubles. That is all that I have any intention of owning along with my other single tanks. Also, the vehicles to carry these tanks to remote locations tend to burn more gasoline than a moderate sized to small car with one or two tanks in the back intending to dive all weekend at the quarry and get fills there or get fills with the local charter op.

Some quarries don't have nitrox fills available. You either top-off/refill with air or bring your own mixes. As well, you would be hard pressed to find anything but air in Michigan's Upper Peninsula (or even the Straits of Mackinac). I am doing a two day charter up there next month (Whitefish Point). All of my mixes will be going up with me. But air top-offs are a measly $4.00 up there. If it weren't for safety considerations, I would be better off getting their top-offs.

As to captains insisting on an hour out of the water, well... many of them do have a clue. You may think that you surface perfectly clean, but do you really want to take that chance? That is standard practice up here. I prefer it to the other extreme that I have heard about with some operators in the keys which is dropping divers in after a half-hour to fourty-five minute S.I. so that the boat can get in more quickly and get the second run done. Which one is more safe and which one wants the most money for the least amount of work?

BTW, nitrox up here averages 10-15 dollars per tank (assume an AL80) for a fill. Air averages 4-10 dollars per tank. To fill my doubles at the shop, I am paying roughly $35.00 a crack for nitrox. If I am mixing, they generally charge less for the fill as I am doing most of the work and the tanks are twenty percent or more filled with He before I get to filling them with nitrox.



#30 Latitude Adjustment

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Posted 22 June 2006 - 12:21 PM

WOW! I really had no idea people paid that much for Nitrox. No wonder I see all these threads on here about diving air. Hard to believe that we acutally pay LESS in Florida for somethnig! :cool2:

I also hear you about the car. I have a nice SUV that stays parked while I drive the Subaru everywhere. I am bummed I had to ditch the Honda convertible to have room for my doubles! That thing got 35+ MPG on the highway.

I doubt people surface perfectly clean. And I am not above saying that you might well be safer to stay on the boat an hour before heading back down. My only contention is the boat captain DEMANDING it. I've seen some folks look pretty green on the boat, and after their relatively benign profiles, they really could get back in the water. Not sure I want Captain Hook, telling me I have to stay on the rocking chair while I relase my stomach contents just so I can satisfy his "protective nature".

Dude, why do you have to pay so much for nitrox? When I fill my own tanks, I'm paying about $.04 cuft or less. I can fill my doubles for less than $5. In fact, my entire gas bill for the spring was less than $20 with the dozen or more dives I did.

-P



One way to get the Captain to change his mind is to release your stomach contents on the bridge or over the DM's equipment :)

Nitrox is at least $10 here in Jersey too which is why if I'm visiting my daughter I'll top off my tanks at Lloyd Bailey's before heading home.
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