Northwest Dive Club

My co-worker is a meg diver and has gotten me very interested in CCR, I know I cannot afford it till probably next Xmas or later.
My main choices for CCR's are
Meg, JJ's, rEvo, and Sf2. I want opinions and also other. Ccrs also, I want to find the right one.

didn't you just get your first drysuit?

Big money for the CCR + more $$ for training (lots of training) + experience (lots more than you have) + anal compulsive attitude about meticulous gear care.
Methinks you are getting way ahead of yourself.

Ok

Some people know they want to go CCR early on, and that is fine as long as they are very attentive to detail types, don't mind spending a bit of extra time with gear and understand what they are getting themselves into. I can think of a handful of folks on this board who went this route and are still happily diving their CCR's, in fact they are probably diving their CCR's more than a lot of folks who made the switch once they were 'experienced'.

You will need at minimum Advanced Nitrox to take a Megalodon or Pathfinder class, this is so you have at least a basic understanding of o2 mixes > 40%. First class is Mod 1, which gets you air diluent. Generally speaking I encourage folks to take Rescue as well as soon as they can after basic.

There are a lot of units out there, and each of us will likely tell you 'our choice is best' mostly cause we invested a lot of time and money into it and are still justifying it to ourselves

Personally I dive Megalodon and Pathfinder, and love them both. I won't recommend one over the other for someone unless I've sat down and chatted and learned what direction a person wants to take their diving. My regulators, BCD, weighting loop and lungs are same for both units, i just swap out the rebreather part (canister/head). I don't dive CCR to go particularly deep, I dive it because I shoot video and want the duration without having to carry doubles, lack of bubbles, warmth, small size (compared to doubles). The pathfinder is currently quite adequate for all my diving (it can to 200' and scrubber duration is ~5hrs). CCR makes sense for most of my dives although I still dive OC for solo work dives.

I do a fair bit of mixed team diving, no one really seems to mind if i'm on OC or CCR, as long as I've given them a quick rundown on what buttons to push if they have to bring me to surface in an emergency. Well, actually they probably like it if I'm on CCR cause I tend to be a bit less whiny.

I've known a few folks that went right from AOW to CCR. Personally, since you need to be able to bail out to OC, you should be comfortable on it first.

I jumped to SCR after about 50 dives. In retrospect, wish I'd gone straight to CCR.

CCR is a whole new ball game, and you'll start at almost zero again when you switch. As previously noted, you'll need to be anal retentive with your gear. I dive my CCR as if its actively trying to kill me, and it has tried a few times. Forget about 20 minutes hoping into your gear for a dive. I'm lucky if I can manage it in an hour. But we're slower than 2 grandma's in a breast milk pumping contest. But thats being careful and meticulous.

Cost is a big deal, and people dont mention the additional costs of scooter (few tec dives can be done fin kicking), heated vests, and big ass batteries to run those vests for 4 hours, and more batteries to run that scooter 4 hours. And additional thermal protection for 4 hour dives. Also add big ass lights. It can get almost a Stygian darkness down there.

To the plus side, you have a gas blending machine on your back, warm air, no bubbles (fish treat you like a big fish), silent diving, can boldly go where few have gone before, and relish in delight when you speak with recreational divers about diving to well over 200 feet and 4 hour dives, and then watching their reactions...

CCR is awesome, I love mine, its all I've dove for 3 years now, and we dive every weekend.

my co-worker is jeff your dive buddy. i also do alot of stuff with randy williams so I caught the tech/CCR bug from those two, to answer Norris i did get a drysuit but its to old and seals look like elephant skin so im gettikng a fusion one that should be here iin the next week hopefully.

Those are both excellent sources of info. Ask them to fill in the blanks.
There are occasional 1-2 day info seminars where the manufacturers talk about them and you can sometimes take them for a spin in a pool. I thought I was going to like one, a lot. I actually did not. It's not a useful tool for the diving I like to do, though Laura's talk of the Pathfinder is pretty appealing. I've got no use for 200' and 4 hours underwater.

verrinne wrote:My co-worker is a meg diver and has gotten me very interested in CCR, I know I cannot afford it till probably next Xmas or later.
My main choices for CCR's are
Meg, JJ's, rEvo, and Sf2. I want opinions and also other. Ccrs also, I want to find the right one.

Megs are local and your coworker already dives one.

Ok thank you all.

I may be selling a couple of Sport Kiss units quite soon as I am looking to upgrade my CCR units. Both are in good condition (we just finished a week of diving in Grand Cayman with them) and excellent machines. The going rate for used Sport Kiss units is pretty reasonable, maybe $1500 for the core unit. The Kiss devices are Manual vs Electronic CCR's, which in my opinion is a more reliable design and much easier to maintain. I've had a great time diving my SK and highly recommend it. I'm likely going to move to a new Kiss Spirit, which is the successor to the Sport.

If you are interested, please let me know and we can discuss price, options, and accessories like Computers and Bottles. I'm not looking to make a bundle, just offset my upgrade cost and hook a new CCR junkie.

Some recent sales comps:
http://www.rebreatherworld.com/showthre ... sport+kiss

ok

Right on man! Whatever path you decide, diving is awesome!

I mainly want to do for college / research, and exploring wrecks, and alot of puget sound

And photography

Most of what you want to do is easily done on OC right now, no additional fancy equipment required.
CCR is bloody expensive, both the initial capital cost, the class, and consumables.
As a nitrox machine the cost is pretty much on par with 32% fills.
Trimix is a bit cheaper, sort of.

You are not likely to be allowed to use a CCR for university sanctioned research.

Used pre-Meg2015 models are fairly inexpensive right now although ISC has only committed to servicing them for the next 2 years.

Ok

Yes, you'll hear from the right tool for dive crew, the you can do that on OC crew, the you're gonna die crew, etc.

Sure, yea, right, sort of.

You really have to seriously think about what type diving you want to do in the future(how deep, how long, and how often).

After that start comparing costs.

A lot of very good info here and on the site if you do a search. I thought about CCR at one time, about the time Jeff was going from OC to CCR, with a short affair with a KISS unit first. I stay plenty warm and have no desire to exceed 90 feet however the warm breathing air and no bubbles really sounded nice. After weighing all of the pros and cons for the type of diving I do I stuck with OC, with the fact that I may go with doubles in the future. I would get in well over 200 dives on OC and then weigh the pros and cons of the type of diving you enjoy the most.
But then again you can always do both!

Yeah I will but I know I won't be too start CCR till sometime in 2017

Sounds like plenty of time to get in a lot of OC dives, and build a baseline.

verrinne wrote:Yeah I will but I know I won't be too start CCR till sometime in 2017

Who knows what will be available 2 yrs from now.

That is true

You need (OC) Adv. nitrox or equivalent to train on a Meg. Other units may or may not require comparable background.

Im going to be taking Randy Williams Tech course