low tech or high tech in cave diving

[Kelly Jessop]

Cave diving has always had a minimalistic attitude with the less you took the better. This also applied to bringing tech into the cave,simplest worked the best,because less chance for failure. I remember how digital and wireless pressure gauges were fought over and generally rejected. What is your feeling since there are more high tech gadgets in diving- are you low tech or high tech person? It is difficult to define high and low tech because that depends on the individual and where you came along.

[FW]

High and low tech are relative terms. Cave diving was the first "tech" diving. As a result cave diving has always been "high tech".

Cave Divers were the first to:
Use Submersible Pressure gauges
Use Buoyancy Compensation Devices
Carry backup regulators
Have dual port manifolds
Regularly do staged decompression
Use mixed gasses (other than the navy)

What you really should be asking is, if we think cave diving is about fancy gadgets or not.

[Kelly Jessop]

". What you really should be asking is if we think cave diving is about fancy gadgets or not.

Not really what I am inquiring about. Do we still hold the standard of minimalism with as low tech as possible,for example using tried and true older technology that has a past history or surviving the rigors of cave diving, or do we feel comfortable with using newer technology as it enters the market and apply it to cave diving even though it may not be beta tested as well. I used the example of the wireless spg because this has been available for quite awhile,but generally this has been rejected in cave diving for the standard spg . There is a discussion ongoing about advancement of tech in cave diving,and the what means is it adopted.

[FW]

Not really what I am inquiring about.

Still a hard question to answer. I still use a brass, analog, SPG, but I also use a CCR, with a "high tech" computer connected to it. I quit using Halogen lights years age, but even those were considered "high tech" when they came out. I was one of the first to use a scooter in a cave (talk about "high tech"), but I didn't stick to Farallon with wet cell lead acid batteries.

[Kelly Jessop]

Still a hard question to answer. .

Very hard. There are so many people that have entered this sport at different times and the level of technology is different for each. I remember when HID lights came out and the tremendous concern about having that much electronics. With halogen your canister leaked you were relatively okay,but with HID when the ballast was in the lid,that could be an issue. But,with LED,many people feel we have returned to low tech with high reliability-go figure.

[Bobby]

The level of technical innovation & the level of reliability do not necessarily correlate. Lights are a good example. LED is newer and more innovative compared to HID or Halogen however it is also more robust. The drivers, depending on design, can also have much more technology and also be can be more robust. Present dive computers are the same, IMO, they are more reliable and have a lot more innovation.

Wireless spg's on the other hand have possible communication & reliability issues & that is the reason, IMO, that they are not so common in cave or technical diving. As a group, I agree with Forrest, that we tend to adopt new technology sooner and usually first however if it does not prove to be reliable then it usually doesn't gain popularity.

There will always be the few that hold on to old technology well past its time however I believe the majority use the new when it proves that it is functional and reliable.

[FW]

The level of technical innovation & the level of reliability do not necessarily correlate. Lights are a good example. LED is newer and more innovative compared to HID or Halogen however it is also more robust. The drivers, depending on design, can also have much more technology and also be can be more robust. Present dive computers are the same, IMO, they are more reliable and have a lot more innovation.

Wireless spg's on the other hand have possible communication & reliability issues & that is the reason, IMO, that they are not so common in cave or technical diving. As a group, I agree with Forrest, that we tend to adopt new technology sooner and usually first however if it does not prove to be reliable then it usually doesn't gain popularity.

There will always be the few that hold on to old technology well past its time however I believe the majority use the new when it proves that it is functional and reliable.

Well said Bobby.

[SlowDiver]

There will always be the few that hold on to old technology well past its time .

There is one diver that I dove with and to this day he does not use a isolator for his doubles. I won't mention his name but he use to dive with Sheck Exley all the time and I think Kelly knows who I'm talking about.


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[MORGAN]

Being an old fart backwoods Vermonter I'm naturally suspicious of high tech gadgets, and prefer the tried and true low tech approach to most things. On the other hand, I'm a critical care nurse at a university medical center. So at home I'm low tech, and at work I'm high tech.

Cave diving, I incline toward the simple and minimalistic, but I love my Petrel and my LED lights. The point to me is not whether something is high or low tech, but whether it is reliable, durable, easy to use, does what I need it to do, and is reasonably affordable. I also prefer things that have a minimum of extra special features - simpler is better.

So I guess I'll agree with Ben Franklin: "Be not the first by whom the new is tried, nor yet the last to lay the old aside."

Mike

[Squirrel Girl]

No, no, Kelly and Forrest, it's an *exceedingly* hard question. The reason I say that is because there are things that are "high tech" yet simplistic and I think that is what we tend to want in cave diving.

As I've talked with non-cave divers about some of the ways a person can wind up dying while cave diving, they come up with all sorts of fancy things, "With modern technology you could...." For instance, put flashing lights on guidelines, etc. Well, I'm all for high end LED cave lights. But there's a level of complication of the dive that makes something like that worse. What if you're relying on the light and the battery dies? How much time to do you use from your gas suppy deploying them. Do they trash the cave when lost? I think the question is, "do they solve more or bigger problems than they introduce?" A rebreather is a prime example. For some dives, they do, and for some they don't. But if you're a rebreather diver, it pays to dive the easy ones to gain experience/familiarity/muscle memory with your unit.

So I voted that I am "high tech" but it's a poll whose options are not very meaningful to me.