International Training is the parent organization of Technical Diving International and Scuba Diving International. They offer both the SDI and TDI versions for their Sidemount Diver course. Both courses are similar. Both courses use the same learning materials (which we also wrote). What's the difference between them?
In general Sidemount is more task loading for a diver as the pressure in each tank needs to be balanced in order to have enough gas for an out of air diver and to be balanced on each side.
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If you're not ready to try diving locally, but want to support your local dive shop, you can complete eLearning and coursework near home, then complete your training dives while traveling. Contact your local PADI Dive Center to ask about a referral.
While I still haven’t perfected this art, I am proud that after 20 Sidemount divers I can call myself a Sidemount Diver. It is the most comfortable way of diving!
Despite the gear choice the entry level tech diver will be taught to streamline their equipment to prevent dangling items and drag. This ensures a maximized profile for efficient propulsion and awareness.
Sidemount cylinder mounting was developed for cave diving. They have been more popular in technical diving ever since. They are able to seperate the dual cylinders and mount them on either end of the diver's body. While this prevents the diver from breathing from one cylinder in case of a failure of the regulator, it allows them to have easier access to the valves. Sidemount diving provides a diver with a more horizontal profile but a smaller vertical one.
Sidemount can provide a number of benefits for any diver, but is especially well suited for cave diving. (It was, after all, cave divers who invented sidemount.) Among these benefits:
If you will not be using sidemount during your cave diver training, what you should be looking at is our CDS Basics Orientation course.
Although I'm still learning, Sidemount diving is something I feel confident in. I have done 20 Sidemount dives and I can proudly say I'm a Sidemount diver.
The very general definition of technical diving is to be exposed to a ceiling that does not allow a diver to ascend to the surface at any moment of the dive. This might be due to a real ceiling, in terms of a cave or a wreck, or a virtual ceiling created by a decompression obligation. In this case, by exceeding the NDL’s, mandatory decompression stops have to be performed on ascent in order to avoid any case of decompression sickness. In most cases this requires the use of special equipment, e.g. Twinsets or Sidemount, special gas mixes and of course additional training to be able to perform those stops accurately on ascent to optimize off-gassing of Nitrogen.
The Sidemount diving setup differs from that used for backmount diving.
Technical diving was something that I never had an interest in at first. I remember laughing at the Tec divers and wondering why anyone would need more equipment. I love the feeling you get when you are close to nature. Tom had a reputation for being an inspirational teacher. It seemed to me that I should at least try.
Continue your Tec Sidemount Diver training and you'll be able to learn additional skills for tec diving in sidemount.
- Increased Bottom Time A Closed Circuit diver is not concerned with running out of gas because they are only limited by decompression. This can also be reduced by selecting an oxygen partial pressure that provides the diver with virtually limitless bottom times in 60 feet or less of water.