4th of July 2021 Get Together

[surflung]

4th of July 2021 - Three Generations Diving Vintage
- It's become an annual tradition for our family to get together on the 4th of July and if possible we go Scuba diving with a bunch of my Vintage Diving Equipment. Color coordinated diving outfits can sometimes be achieved. Here are a few pics from this year's get together...






- The youngest diver was 3 years old. The oldest was 67 (me). I have to say it has been worth the effort to find and fix up small tanks for these little guys. With simple, light weight gear, they don't get scared and they seem to take to diving like little fish!

[broxton coalition]

i hope those kids know how lucky they are!!!!
great pic's,
BC

[Linda]

Very cool. Where was this?

[h2operations]

What a great posting, thank you. Are those tanks ones you repurpose and posted about before ?

[surflung]

Jul 7, 2021 14:51:18 GMT -8 Linda said:

Very cool. Where was this?

We're in Central Minnesota, Lake Victoria. Formerly a green lake, the last 10 years it has had exceptional visibility in Spring and Fall (Sometimes 20-30 feet). Usually by July it gets "Dog Days" green algae but this year we've been in a drought and the viz has stayed pretty good so far. In these pictures we're diving next to a dock and a lot of swimmers have stirred up the silt so that viz doesn't look so good.

Jul 7, 2021 16:42:58 GMT -8 h2operations said:

What a great posting, thank you. Are those tanks ones you repurpose and posted about before ?

The two littlest are using one former 18 cf CO2 Fire Extinguisher tank and one original U.S.Diver Vigo 18 tank. These two are lightweight and nearly neutral in the water... Not scary for little kids. The oldest is wearing an original Nemrod 27 cf tank at 2250 psi... I bought that one back in 1971 and used it for taking my girlfriend diving... Also not scary. The second oldest is wearing an XS Scuba 27 cf tank I bought in 2012. The XS is a modern 3400 psi steel tank... Way too heavy. This is the first time I let one of the kids use it and he sunk like a rock. I have a couple more of the little re-purposed 18 cf tanks and I think I'll go back to them for the little kids.

Here's a copy of the US Divers 1961 catalog (courtesy VDH) that advertised the Vigo 18 tank and regulator. I found that the original strap harness is useless... The tank flops all over the place. So, I modified contour back packs to fit little kids. Simply re-positioned the straps. In the smallest one, the waist strap is position in the same slot as the tank strap. These back pacs held the tanks in position and are far more comfortable. This, I think, also is a factor in making them less scary for little divers.