hello everyone at DB. i am looking to buy a speargun and start freediving, and i already have a thread started on the site about that, so i have a pretty good idea of gear such as mask, snorkel, fins etc. but heres what im getting at. i want to get started in scuba, but i have no idea what to buy as far as a bc, or tanks or anything like that. i live in westfield, ma (pretty much the middle of nowhere) and southwick, ma (one town over) offers a scuba expierence type thing every friday night. you pay $20 and you can go try scuba for 2 hrs. i did it in 5th grade once, and i loved it, and i want to do it again this friday. so, anyways, what gear would i need and how much would it cost about? i am on about a $400 budget, and my parents can probably pay $100-$200 more, and they will be paying for lessons. so total budget for gear is around $500. any information would be very helpful.
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new to scuba, need help for gear.
- Thread starterHypersquid1
- Start date
Thread Status: Hello
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It can take a long time to get an up-to-date response or contact with relevant users.
for now, with your currenting funding situation, I would choose one hobby (Freediving OR Scuba) and devote your total funding in that direction instead of going cheap on both. remember scuba equipment is Life-Support equipment. don;t cheap out!
if I could do it all over again I would have bought a Back Plate & Wing set up first, instead of going with the jacket style. a really good deal is currently available @:
http://www.deepseasupply.com/page12.html (Hogarthian harness is all you need and $50 less)
Favorite Regulator brands being Apeks, US Divers/Aqualung, and Scuba Pro.
your freediving fins will not be adequate for scuba (yes yes some people get away with it, but they are typically silt machines too)
remember there is LOTS of cheap budget crap out there in the scuba industry. do your homework before you buy!
if I could do it all over again I would have bought a Back Plate & Wing set up first, instead of going with the jacket style. a really good deal is currently available @:
http://www.deepseasupply.com/page12.html (Hogarthian harness is all you need and $50 less)
Favorite Regulator brands being Apeks, US Divers/Aqualung, and Scuba Pro.
your freediving fins will not be adequate for scuba (yes yes some people get away with it, but they are typically silt machines too)
remember there is LOTS of cheap budget crap out there in the scuba industry. do your homework before you buy!
I'm with Amphibious on this. If you think spearfishing is expensive, don't even look at the price of BCDs and regulators!!
I can tell you right now that if $500 is your budget forget it.
I started scuba diving when I was 14 and it took me two years of part time work to buy my first scuba set-up. Much of that was second hand and all of it was upgraded as soon as I had a better job. Taking the course is going to cost some cash and a basic C-card is just that. You'll want/need to take at least a few other courses beyond that.
There are deals to be had on older scuba gear if you checkout Ebay, but until you take the class you won't know what they are. For a decent set-up new, of the good stuff like Amphibous mentioned, your looking at $1300-$2000 to start with. In your area a drysuit would be a very good idea. I actually went with a used drysuit early on since I only had to worry about the neck and wrist seals fitting me and I got quite a bit of growing room out of it.
Of course drysuits are much fancier, and more expensive, than the one I bought all those years ago. Still, I got at least 4 years growth out of it when I need it most.
I would say that with your current budget you could eith be a VERY well equipped freediver or a scuba diver who needs to rent every time they go diving. When I sold off my scuba gear I instantly had cash for all kinds of fancy fins that I wouldn't have bought other wise. For what I wouls spend on one day's worht of trimix diving I can now fund an entire year of freediving/spearfishing trips.
Seriously, if you want to go the scuba route I would buy some good mask, snorkel and fins (NOT split fins) and then take as many courses as you can with the rest of your cash. Rent everything else while your growing and see where it takes you. For me I went out to California when I was 17 and became a scuba intructor- turned 18 just a week shy of course completion.:t That gave me a job to work my way through college with and have done it part/fulltime ever since.
Still, If I could do it over I would have just started out freediving and used the huge amounts of cash that I spent on gear, gas fills, courses, ect. on a bunch of really cool trips instead- I bet I could have circled the globe a couple of times by now.
Jon
I started scuba diving when I was 14 and it took me two years of part time work to buy my first scuba set-up. Much of that was second hand and all of it was upgraded as soon as I had a better job. Taking the course is going to cost some cash and a basic C-card is just that. You'll want/need to take at least a few other courses beyond that.
There are deals to be had on older scuba gear if you checkout Ebay, but until you take the class you won't know what they are. For a decent set-up new, of the good stuff like Amphibous mentioned, your looking at $1300-$2000 to start with. In your area a drysuit would be a very good idea. I actually went with a used drysuit early on since I only had to worry about the neck and wrist seals fitting me and I got quite a bit of growing room out of it.
Of course drysuits are much fancier, and more expensive, than the one I bought all those years ago. Still, I got at least 4 years growth out of it when I need it most.I would say that with your current budget you could eith be a VERY well equipped freediver or a scuba diver who needs to rent every time they go diving. When I sold off my scuba gear I instantly had cash for all kinds of fancy fins that I wouldn't have bought other wise. For what I wouls spend on one day's worht of trimix diving I can now fund an entire year of freediving/spearfishing trips.
Seriously, if you want to go the scuba route I would buy some good mask, snorkel and fins (NOT split fins) and then take as many courses as you can with the rest of your cash. Rent everything else while your growing and see where it takes you. For me I went out to California when I was 17 and became a scuba intructor- turned 18 just a week shy of course completion.:t That gave me a job to work my way through college with and have done it part/fulltime ever since.
Still, If I could do it over I would have just started out freediving and used the huge amounts of cash that I spent on gear, gas fills, courses, ect. on a bunch of really cool trips instead- I bet I could have circled the globe a couple of times by now.
Jon
ok ok im not going to go scuba now. but my parents would pay for the lessons, it would be up to me to buy the equipment. they actually would probably want me to do scuba rather than freedive and spearfish, but i really really want to spearfish and freedive. ok forget this forum, scuba is on hold for now.
You can also join a club or something or rent scuba equipment for the odd dive you do. Once you really get into it you can start buying the scuba stuff. And you will already have all the soft gear that you bought for spearfishing.