What event made you head toward/away from DIR?

[Chris H]

Agreed, GUE makes it clear that DIR is a building block to be used in all aspects of diving from OW on up to whatever.   The next time I make it to the tropics, if I can get past the bad tasting water, you can bet that I will be wearing my BP/and an appropriate single tank wing.   There won’t be stages and the like, but there will be a long hose and all of the other things I typically have on my harness will be right were they are when I'm in 200ft on a wreck in the Great Lakes.   That is the reason DIR-FUNDAMENTALS is called what it is.  GUE has chosen skills that it believes are essential to being a good diver and makes ''passing" that class a prerequisite to any other GUE courses.   Fundies covers things like buoyancy, control, situational awareness, trim, and bunches of other important things that don't get covered in a "typical" OW setting.   Oh yeah, it also states that you need to have Hs all over your gear. Wait a minute, in our course we were specifically told that the brand doesn’t matter, the fit, function, and overall performance of the equipment are what matters.

[Vtach]

Since my first post on this thread had really litlle to do with original topic..........

Why DIR?

In a nutshell, I was trying to make my own system.  I had already had many years of uneventful diving, penetrating wrecks on single tanks, coming up with 100-200 psi and generally pushing my luck.  Fortunately I realized my luck would run out before long.  I had heard of DIR but I did not like the "stroke" term and didn't like the long hose or continuous webbing.  So I decided to make my own doubles rig with a home made harness with plastic fastex buckles and old Dacor BC hard pack and old cheap seaquest wing along with using my own ideas for equipment placement.  All because I thought it would work better and cheaper than what was already out there.  I had been diving this setup for less than a year with no problems.  Then, I had some equipment issues on a winter dive on the Len-Der.  My upstream second stage failed to deliver air at all at 100+ ft, I couldn't find my backup on a clip in the "PADI triangle", my backup freeflowed at the same depth, I could not reach my valves, broken harness clip......  Everything that could go wrong....did.  Fortunately, we were still using the buddy system and remained calm and I exited the water with fried egg eyes and realizing that this is not going to work.

After that I decided to look a bit more at DIR and try out some of the equipment options.  Tried the long hose, BP and wing and reconfigured my regs for proper hose routing.  Seemed to be pretty comfortable.  Funny though, Chris was teasing me for being "Johnny DIR".  ;D So converted to DIR from an equipment perspective and started to learn more about the fundamentals of DIR along with more diving classes which used DIR philosophy as a base.  Now it's just the way I dive along with the people that I dive with.  I have nothing to prove, no axe to grind, don't collect patches for patches sake, don't slam other divers and just work on perfecting my diving and seeing (and remembering) more cool wrecks as safely as possible.

[Chris H]

That all brings a little tear to my eye :'(   You would have thought Todd had died and gone to heaven when he got his sewing machine for making that harness.   Like Ralphie getting a Daisy Red Rider BB gun.

Then, that fateful winter day when I came to your rescue with my bungeed long hose attached to Poseidon and a pony bottle that was rigid mounted to my single tank.....

It's too bad we're set in our ways and closed minded.

[WIdiver_Paul]

You're right, you can't ignore the technical aspects of DIR. But it needn't be scary. If it wan't for the we wouldn't have smoke detectors, cordless drills, and water filters. But you don't have to be an astronaut to use that stuff, we just made it all part of our normal lives. Useful skills learned in DIR can make most any diver a better diver without being a technical diver. It's funny you pointed out the thread in TDS where a bunch of GUE trained east coast snobs showed their true colors like a bunch of hyenas biting the ass of a tiger cub. Stuff like that is enough to turn anyone away from DIR, TDS, GUE or whomever those people align themselves with. It's that whole "i'm better than you" thing is where DIR has it's greatest weakness. A stroke is only a stoke because 1.) they don't know any better and haven't been shown a better way, and 2.) the person labeling them a stroke is too ignorant and conceited to swallow their vanity and show them how it can be done better and be made fun as well.

[Vtach]

Halleluia!!!   AMEN!!!    Gimme some Kool-Aid brother!!! ;D

I gotta get my sewing machine out again to sew up some velcro on my DIR pockets.

I gotta figure out if it's a DIR sewing machine first..... ;D

[WIdiver_Paul]

/ lol

[matt t.]

Is it black???

[Vtach]

Is it black???
[/quote]

Nope....dang.....I gotta find a Halcyon sewing machine..... ;D

[Chris H]

Is it black???
[/quote]

The sewing machine isn't, but the thread and the smoke coming from that little motor while sewing through harness webbing sure is!

[Chris H]

I'll see if there is a Halcyon sticker at the store tonight.  We can handle that part with ease.