GUE_WhySideMount

GUE Cferece 2010 / Steve / Steve Bgaerts

G eveig everye. My name is Steve Bogaerts and my presentation tonight is on SM diving. I have been diving SM now or over 15 years. In act my rst ever cave dives were made using SM congurati conguration on in sumps in the UK. Since that time I have done most o my cave diving here in Mexico where I have been living ull time or the last 12 years. During that time most o my personal diving when not teaching or guiding has been made in open circuit SM conguration and the majority o those dives have been exploration dives.

G eveig everye. My name is Steve Bogaerts and my presentation tonight is on SM diving. I have been diving SM now or over 15 years. In act my rst ever cave dives were made using SM congurati conguration on in sumps in the UK. Since that time I have done most o my cave diving here in Mexico where I have been living ull time or the last 12 years. During that time most o my personal diving when not teaching or guiding has been made in open circuit SM conguration and the majority o those dives have been exploration dives.

Over the years o exploration a great deal o real world experience, experimentation and trial and error has had a proound impact o my approach to SM equipment, equipment conguration, skills and procedures. As I have gained experience and knowledge exploring in the cave systems o QR my diving has evolved and the diculty o the dives I have been able to undertake has increased.

As the dives have become ever more challenging I have been orced to urther rene my conguration & technique. As my conguration and technique has improved I have been able to undertake still more challenging dives. So in eect these two processes go hand in hand one driving the other so that my diving is a constant learning process and I am continually trying to improve all aspects o it.

In addition to my own personal diving I have learnt a great deal rom teaching other divers SM. The best way to really learn something in depth is to teach it to someone else. To be an eective teacher you really have to understand your subject matter inside out. I I can nd a way to make a skill easy or one o my students then that technique will almost certainly work just as well or me. Oten when I teach a course I eel that I am learning just as much rom my students as they are rom me … ... but let’s try to keep that a secret otherwise my students may start expecting me to pay them!

S hy  I chse t ive i sm cfigurati? I can sum that up in 3 words: Flexibility Saety Comort I will talk more about these aspects o SM later but rst I would like to run through a quick history o SM diving.

Like may f the ivatis i ivig SM as br i the caves a it has bee aru quite a hile. Probably the earliest ever SM dives were made by members o the CDG in the UK who used SM to make sump dives in order to extend exploration in cave systems such as Wookey Hole and Swildon’s Hole in the 1960’s. In act practically all cave diving in the UK was and still is done in SM conguration as this is the only practical way to dive in an environment where oten considerable dry caving has to be undertaken to even get near the sumped section o cave to start the dive.

Most o the SM cave explorers in the UK were dry cavers who learnt to dive to pass airly short shallow sumps that were blocking their exploration o urther dry cave passageway. Coming rom a caving rather than a diving background oten their diving skills were sel taught and to be honest airly rudimentary. Niceties such as buoyancy control, trim and eective propulsion techniques did not seem to be high on their list o priorities.

I imagine it’s pretty hard to do a shufe kick in a pair o Wellington boots! The rst SM rigs were pretty basic. Oten just a waist belt with a couple o tank cam band stitched to it to drop the sm tanks in. The top o the tanks would be at waist height with the body o the tank hanging down alongside the diver’s legs.

Great or crawling along the foor but no so ecient or swimming! In other parts o the world relatively easy access to large water lled caves allowed divers to use BM conguration eectively. For example French cave divers were diving their caves in independent BM doubles - and some still are to this day! They christened SM the ”English System”.

In the 1970’s American cave diver Woody Jasper adapted the “English System” or cave diving in the Floridian aquier. Woody moved the SM tanks higher up the body so that the tops o the tanks were now positioned in the armpits rather than at the waist and added a buoyancy device in the orm o a recreational jacket style BCD. This made it easier attain neutral buoyancy and proper trim so that he could move eectively and eciently in the longer deeper caves he was diving but still retain the fexibility and unctionality o the English system. Over the last 50 years many cave diving explorers around the world have chosen SM conguration as the optimal exploration system and typically built their own SM rigs rom scratch or adapted existing scuba equipment to suit their purpose.

Dive Rite was probably the rst manuacturer to oer an o the shel commercially available SM rig when they introduced the Transpac system in the mid 1990’s that was designed by the owner o DR, cave explorer Lamar Hires. Even 5 years ago it was airly rare to see SM divers at dive sites unless they were explorers but just recently SM has been growing enormously in popularity and has been getting more and more exposure.

Today there are quite a ew manuacturers oering SM systems and more and more divers choosing to dive SM both in the caves and in the open water and SM is no longer just the preserve o cave explorers or even cave divers.

There are probably as many dierent reasons divers choose to dive in SM conguration as there are SM divers and each individual will have their personal reasons or choosing to use SM. As I mentioned earlier fexibility, saety and comort are the 3 main reasons I use SM and I would guess that most SM divers have those reasons pretty high up on their list so let’s look at each o these in more detail.

SM is by ar the most fexible system in all senses o the word. Anywhere there is diving you will nd single cylinders but you may not be able to nd doubles in more remote locations. Transporting single cylinders to and rom the dive site particularly in remote areas or i the entrance is dicult to access is easier than with doubles. Imagine the diculty o having to crawl or climb through a dry cave or hike 5 miles through dense jungle with a set o doubles.

Once in the water the ability to quickly and eciently remove and replace your tanks either one at a time or both together means that you can pass tight or awkward areas easily, opening up parts o the cave or wreck you would not be able to access otherwise. SM equipment is lighter and less bulky to travel with which is certainly an advantage in these days o shrinking airline baggage allowances.

In any BM conguration all your critical lie support equipment is in an exposed location, out o sight, dicult to access and limits potential solutions to ailures. Let me say that again because I think it is a very important point that needs emphasis. BM puts your tank valves, valve hand wheels, regulator frst stages and all the hoses coming rom them in the most exposed position they could possibly be in.

This creates a huge potential or impact damage o these critical components in an OH environment such as a wreck or a cave. It also presents a much greater risk o entanglement. I you do experience a problem you may not immediately be able to identiy what or where the problem is as you can’t see any o this critical equipment either. You may have to work your way blindly through a valve shutdown sequence or have to rely on a team mate to assist you or to clear an entanglement or example. Trying to solve the problem is going to be less ecient and more time consuming and some ailures will be dicult i not impossible to solve.

Breathing rom a ree fowing regulator by eathering the tank valve, switching out rst stages underwater, or breathing directly rom the tank valve itsel, are not practical solutions in BM but can all be done easily and comortably in SM.

Although extremely unlikely catastrophic gas ailures are possible. True gas redundancy is only possible with independent tanks so BM divers equipped with a maniold must either dive as a team or carry a saety bottle to coner sucient saety in the event o a catastrophic ailure. SM divers have true redundancy and are completely sel sucient. In the event o a catastrophic ailure only hal o the gas would be lost and assuming proper gas planning there would be sucient remaining gas to exit saely without having to rely on a team member or saety tanks. When you actually think about it you really have to wonder who thought it was a good idea to put the tanks on the diver’s back in the rst place. The best place or your tank valves and regulator rst stages is in your armpits where they are protected, where you can see them and where you can reach them easily!

For me SM is the most natural diving conguration and is the most comortable and enjoyable to dive. I love to ree dive and the sense o complete reedom in all 3 dimensions is really exhilarating.

Unortunately I don’t have gills so cannot stay down as long as I would wish hence the need or Scuba. Unortunately as soon as you have a steel back plate and set o doubles locking your body rigidly in place you lose a great deal o that reedom. SM returns that sense o reedom as you are able to move your whole body and twist and turn so that diving can become a graceul and fuid dance in a weightless three dimensional world.

Unortunately old injuries also are also catching up with me. For example I have scar tissue in my let shoulder that limits my fexibility and a reconstructed right knee, the result o Rugby injuries in my youth that make certain movements or activities painul or dicult. Cave diving is much saer than Rugby! For me manipulating BM valves is awkward and painul whereas in SM it is no problem at all.

Oten when I am exploring the most dicult and dangerous part o the entire experience is getting both my equipment and me all to the water in one piece. Carrying tanks over uneven trails or climbing down into dicult cave entrances is challenging and potentially dangerous especially because o my knee injury. The last thing you want is to all and seriously injure yoursel in a remote location. Again single SM tanks are easier to deal with than a set o doubles. Once you have your equipment at the dive site being able to gear up actually in the water at the start o the dive and then take everything back o again still in the water while essentially weightless beore climbing out at the end is also oten easier and more comortable than having to make an entry or exit carrying all o your gear including tanks. As we are all aware post dive exertion is one o the biggest contributors to DCS.

Ultimately the more comortable you are the saer you are and the more you will enjoy both the dive and the whole diving experience.

That search or fexibility, saety and comort led me to the invention and development o the Razor SM Harness. As they say: “Necessity is the mother o invention.” I originally designed the Razor Harness or use on Side-mount / No-mount exploration dives in very restricted cave where every piece o extra equipment seems as i it is trying to kill you.

The problem was that in many cases to get to the part o the caves where I was exploring required long penetrations using DPV’s and multiple stages thus increasing my equipment load considerably. But when I got to the area I wanted to explore I needed to be as small and streamlined as possible. I wanted some way to integrate these disparate requirements in one system.

Over the years I have dived just about every Side Mount rig on the market as well as various homemade versions. All o them worked to a degree but none were ideal. Like most Side Mount divers I spent a lot o time making modications to improve the various rigs but was always constrained to a certain extent by the original design and never had a Side Mount harness that I was totally happy with. As my exploration dives became more and more challenging, particularly over the last ew years, I started to run into the limits o both the equipment and the equipment conguration I was using.

Trying to squeeze mysel into ever smaller places was pretty rough on all my gear.

I was getting hung up and stuck quite oten and in act in the year o exploration leading up to the connection between Sistema Sac Actun and Sistema Nohoch Nah Chich I managed to destroy three dierent Side Mount rigs.

To illustrate just how important a streamlined SM rig was or many o these dives even the thickness o my wetsuit could be a problem when diving certain areas. I have several wetsuits that now look more like Teabags with lots o perorations. I was both running out o equipment to dive in and also rustrated by its shortcomings. Around this time I decided to start experimenting with dierent equipment solutions.

I began by making a very simple No Mount harness to go under my Side Mount harness so that when the cave really started to get small I could ditch the comparatively bulky Side Mount rig I was diving and carry on No Mount. The problem was managing all this equipment a long way back in very small cave usually in zero visibility while trying to run a line or survey. I was spending too much time dressing and undressing while underwater a long way back in the cave and not enough exploring. Also trying to make sure that I had all the stu I needed on the right harness at any given moment was a problem and at various times I orgot or lost various pieces o equipment as I changed rom one harness to the other.

For example on one exploration dive having no mounted 20 minutes through very small cave and getting ready to begin my survey I realized that my survey slates were still attached to the Side Mount rig I had let behind me in the cave and were not on my No Mount harness. Additionally oten having passed through a No Mount section o cave the cave would open back up again and then having a Side Mount harness would have been an advantage so that I could swim more eciently. I needed a simpler more fexible system that tted my current, more demanding needs. As nothing like that existed I decided to start rom scratch and design a completely new harness or mysel.

So the development o the Razor Harness began at this point in early 2007. I wanted a harness that was fexible and would meet several dierent needs. It had to unction as both a No Mount and a Side Mount harness and I needed to be able to switch quickly and easily between congurations while underwater. The harness also had to work with multiple stages and with DPV’s and to accommodate a totally separate and removable modular buoyancy system.

Ideally the harness also had to meet the ollowing criteria on my rather extensive wish list as well: Small and light so as to be easy to carry on long treks through the jungle. • Comortable to wear and easy to get on and o on the surace. • A simple design with no stitching, complicated hardware or multiple closure points. • Rugged to stand up to the most challenging dives in the most challenging environments where it was going to take a beating. • Sae and reliable because my lie depended upon its perormance. • As low prole and streamlined as possible to allow me to t in the smallest areas possible. • Easy to use in very challenging conditions. • Easy to adjust. • Easy to repair i and when it does get damaged. •

Over many hours o brainstorming, lots o test diving and various “Eureka” moments in the middle o the night the Razor Harness nally evolved into what you see today.

There were several prototypes along the way but the nal version that I am currently using meets all o my requirements and is by ar the best and most fexible Side Mount / No Mount harness I have used and has made my exploration dives ar more ecient and productive and saer too. I nally have a harness I am 99% happy with and that level o comort is directly translated into the diculty level o the dives I can now undertake that I would have hesitated to do beore. They say imitation is the sincerest orm o fattery and judging by the number o people now copying the RH I guess it works prettz well!

Ater years o experience diving in Side Mount I really thought I knew what I was doing but the last ew years spent experimenting with the Razor Harness have completely redened my approach to, and philosophy o, Side Mount diving. During this evolution I have learned so much and become a much better Side Mount diver along the way and that has been a really enjoyable experience. I have attempted to streamline equipment, skills and procedures as much as possible. Standardizing equipment choice and equipment conguration has allowed me to standardize skill and procedures as well.

The Bogaerthian SM Philosophy is based on a very minimalist approach to SM diving trying to keep everything as simple as possible. The key being “less is more” Each o the components in the overall system is designed to t together seamlessly and work as part o an integrated whole. The Razor Harness is at the heart o this system but is only a part o it and is complemented by all the other equipment choices and conguration decisions.

The philosophy is holistic in approach and is designed rom the inside out so that as additional layers o equipment are added there is no change in the core equipment, equipment placement, procedures or skill sets. I soon realized that i the system worked so well or me then it would work just as well or other divers.

“The proo o the pudding is in the eating.” I started teaching all my Side Mount students in the Razor Harness using my “Bogaerthian Philosopy” and immediately noticed a dramatic improvement in their skills, abilities and comort levels. Their pace o learning accelerated considerably and I was able to ocus much more o the ner points o SM diving.

Getting proper training or all levels o diving is extremely important. The more advanced the level the more important it becomes. Finding a knowledgeable experienced SM Instructor will be a huge advantage or the diver wishing to progress in a sae, ecient manner Being a good Side Mount diver requires a great deal more thought and attention than just hanging two tanks o o the side o your body. SM diving is not the same as stage diving or monkey diving although many people mistakenly believe that it is.

A poorly congured setup will make everything much harder. Choosing the right equipment and then having it congured correctly is hal the battle in becoming comortable as soon as possible in SM. But equipment is only hal the battle. When you completely change your equipment conguration rom Back Mount to Side Mount a lot o other things are going to change as well and a whole new skill set is going to have to be learned and practiced. However learning exactly what those skills are and how to perorm them correctly is critical as practice makes permanent and only perect practice makes perect!

Beore advanced Side Mount skills can be learned basic ones have to be mastered and beore entering a more challenging environment those basic skills need to be rock solid and comort levels high. For this reason complete SM training should be modular. The courses I have designed have 3 main levels o training. The Level 1 Basic Side Mount Course teaches the skills and procedures necessary to dive saely in Side Mount conguration. It is essentially “Fundamentals” or SM. Any new equipment conguration takes some time to master and this should be done in a low stress sae environment so the intent is not to dive in very small areas.

The Level 2 Advanced Side Mount Course builds on the skills and procedures learnt in the Level 1 course as well as adding additional skills with the intent to train divers to be comortable and sae diving in small areas which increases the environmental hazards and psychological stress levels considerably. The Level 3 Exploration Side Mount/No Mount Course provides the diver with the tools to be able to explore eectively and saely in the most extreme environments one will encounter in diving. There are also a number o complimentary specialty courses that can be taken in Side Mount conguration such as Stage/Multi Stage, DPV and Survey.

As we have already seen SM is a very fexible conguration and it lends itsel to Team diving just as eectively as BM under the same conditions. Ideally team members should all be diving compatible equipment, congured in the same way. Each diver is thereore amiliar with other team member’s setup and skills and procedures can be standardized to simpliy and streamline protocols and emergency procedures. With this in mind it is preerable i all team members dive in a standardized SM conguration. To simply dive planning the same volume SM tanks and standardised gas mixes should be used.

However dives with mixed teams o both SM and BM divers can be done eectively and saely with a little extra planning. In order to simpliy and acilitate gas sharing procedures all team members including SM divers should be equipped with a long hose to donate to an out o gas diver no matter what conguration they are diving. Team gas management should be implemented based on the smallest volume o gas carried by any o the team members either in any o the single SM tanks or in hal o the BM doubles. Reserve volumes in each and every SM tank should always be sucient to get any other team member saely back to the exit in the event o a catastrophic gas ailure at the point o maximum penetration.

Usually the optimal team size or diving in BM cave is 3, this will oten be the case or SM dives as well when they are conducted in similar areas o the cave that are relatively large in size. As the cave gets smaller there is a need to reevaluate the optimal team size in terms o saety, eciency and practicality. In true SM cave a team o 3 divers will in many instances be too many. The conditions encountered will make eective communication between three divers dicult or even impossible and this will lead to problems in and o itsel. In the event o a problem or emergency it may prove to be inecient or impossible to provide any assistance to a team member.

In reality too many divers in close proximity to one another in very small cave, oten working in zero visibility conditions while having to remove and replace equipment to pass multiple restrictions, can create additional hazards while doing nothing to enhance saety. Team members that cannot see you, the cave passage or the guideline cannot help you i you do have a problem. Even i they are aware o a problem the inabillity to provide eective assistance does nothing to enhance your saety and their presence may well make the dive less sae or all. Both the ideal equipment conguration and the ideal team size should be considered careully beore every dive. It should be based on the actual environment the dive will be conducted in and the prevailing conditions at the time o the dive. Sometimes the ideal team size will be 3, sometimes 2 and or some dives 1 is the best number. For many o my exploration dives the ideal team size was 1.

Getting properly trained is not just a saety issue but also an important conservation issue. SM has the potential to spread impact into previously inaccessible areas o the cave or wreck. It is critical that your skills and knowledge are matched to the environment you are diving to minimize any impact you may have. The more challenging the dive the better both your equipment conguration and skills must be.

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SM is here to stay and I really see it getting more and more popular.

•

There will be more SM specic equipment available.

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Equipment conguration is going to become ar more standardized as are skills sets and procedures.

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SM rebreather systems are going to become more common.

For my part I have a bunch o new SM stu I am working on and I am very excited to take the “Bogaerthian SM system” to the next level.

So go out and give SM a try … but be warned once you go SM you may never go back! In closing I would like to say whatever equipment conguration you choose to dive in ... BE SAFE! Enjoy your diving and please cave sotly

Thak yu!