Diving equipment
The fundamental piece of diving equipment used by divers is theSCUBA breathing equipment.
Equipment worn by SCUBA divers
- Aqualung consisting of the diving cylinder and diving regulator
- Buoyancy Compensator, Buoyancy Control Device, BCD or BC
- Compass for underwater navigation
- Dive Computer to avoid decompression sickness
- Diving Suit such as a dry suit, a wet suit or a skin
- Diving regulator including first stage, demand valve and contents guage
- Knife to cut ropes and nets
- Mask allows the diver to see clearly underwater.
- Rebreather an alternative to an Aqualung
- Weighting system
- A nylon web 2" wide that holds the weights (some belts can be filled with lead pellets as weights.) and features a quick release buckle. Belts come in many color with yellow or black being the most popular.
- Weights - used to offset positive buoyancy.
- Lead is the most common material used
- 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5 pound blocks with holes to thread the weight belt through
- Many modern BCD's have weight pockets with quick release buckles
Surface Detection Aids
The purposes of this class of equipment are to:
- allow the boat cover to find you on the surface after a dive
- prevent the diver being run over by boats on the ascent
- mark the diver's position during a drift dive or while doing deco
- help lifeboats and helicopters to locate the diver
Surface Detection Aids (with cheapest/most effective towards the top) includes:
- Surface Marker Buoy or Decompression Buoy (Delayed SMBs)
- Red or yellow collapsible flag - high visibility, robust, bungeed to cylinder
- Torch - rechargeable are generally best
- Whistle - cheap, will only be heard by people far from engine noise
- Strobe - needs long lasting batteries
- High pressure whistle - expensive but they are effective
- Orange water die - for helicopters
- Compact Disk - makes a good, safe mirror of sunlight or searchlights
- Red flares - for helicopters and lifeboats
- EPIRB (Electronic Position Indicating Radio Beacon)