Echo Sounder/Fish Finder

[samdive]

Can anyone recommend a good one? I'd like to get one for Saltfree

So far I've only seen one in action - the one they had in Menorca last summer (lowrance x125) - you can see it in this video
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o-z6cQB-f6g&feature=PlayList&p=B7FE11B11DA4E379&playnext=1&playnext_from=PL&index=20]YouTube - Constant Weight Finnish record 94 meters[/ame]

 

[cdavis]

I assume all you want to see is the diver(s). You don't need a super expensive unit for that, but you do need sufficient power. The depth ranges quoted by most manufacturers are pretty optimistic. I can't offer any specific advise on which unit, sorry. If you can't get a seller to guarantee sufficient performance at the depths you need, a decent guestimate would be less than half what the unit is supposed to do. Also, the extremely cheap units are usually crap, like anything else. Get a short list and I'll try to get some more specific info.

Connor

 

[laminar]

Sam,

Give Will T an email about the one used at VB. It was fairly reliable up to about 80-90m - divers with small lung volumes would disappear for a bit at the bottom.

I think it is a Lowrance, as well.

Pete

 

[samdive]

thanks folks - I'll ask Will. We had a cheap one at Saltfree but it was worse than useless - so I'm ready to spend some money, but want to spend it on the right bit of kit....

 

[apneaboy]

Ha ha.

So far I've only seen one in action - the one they had in Menorca last summer (lowrance x125) - you can see it in this video

I was watching the video and then realised I was the deep safety on that

I thought you meant you were taking the videos out there

He was a top Freediver and went on to go deeper cleaner.

The video doesn't do the unit any justice atall, it was a tremendous bit of safety equipment. Francois had a brilliant safety set up out there. I could recommend that unit.

We have one for Dorothea too (not that particular unit), i can get details for you and let you lend it to see if you like it Sam.

 

[apneaboy]

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NlntfbqzQrk]YouTube - Using sonar as a safety device in freediving[/ame]

 

[azapa]

like Pete says. At this years VB Will's worked fine to about 75m, from there you would loose the divers. On the worst days, bad viz and lots of particle, you would loose the skinniest divers at about 50m. Eric with his FRC dives was hard to see

I was in charge of safety at that event, and early on we realized and decided that Sonar was a luxury and not a primary safety tool. We safetied every dive as though there was no sonar. The rule was safety A would dive to 2 x viz on that day. In the mornings as all was being set up, the safeties would warm up with some pull-downs, we would note where we would loose visual with the safeties hands. Say on that day it would be 15m, the limit for safety A would then be 30M.

On diving safety A would arrive and signal up with a big "OK" when in visual, and B would relay this to the surface. The "OK" should then arrive about 50 seconds before anounced dive time (50M depth). We would use this information to decide if we should pull the CB system or not. Not having gloves on (nice warm water) made the "OK" relaying very easy.

Happy to share more info if needed.