Buying a Pony

[EllieCee]

I feel its time to add some redundancy to my kit... So am looking at buying a pony setup. I've seen a deal on the loved/hated godive site which is:-

Faber 3L steel cylinder
Apeks DS4 DIN 1st Stage
Apeks Egress 2nd Stage

Its £209 which seems reasonable....

But my questions are:-

Are the DS4 & Egress cold water rated and any good?
Am I best with a 232bar or a 300bar cylinder for this little one?
What about pressure guage? standard or 'button'?

If you have a button one, then if you need to use the pony for real, then am I right to think you wouldn't be able to see the guage so would not know how much air you had left? I'm thinking of mounting it inverted on my cam band, on a nice bracket from Kent Tooling.

Lastly, how much difference to the amount of weight I need to carry will this make?

Thanks!

Ellie

[Ian]

Thats exactly the pony setup I have, I bought from Go-dive. Phoned to check if in stock, paid online, received next day.

DS4 is dry sealed and cold water rated, as is egress. Never had any problem with either. Egress if a fine breathe (if not as good as the XTX200, perfectly adequate). I wear it necklaced and I don't think it's ever freeflowed even though the mouthpieve points up.

I went for 232 bar, 300 is too heavy for my liking and doesn't really contain much more air in practice (hard to get a real 300 bar fill).

I got a SPG for £30 with it, I keep it clipped out the way but in an emergency I can see the guage so I know what I've got left as I ascend - I reckoned the psychological importance (for me personall) outweighed arguments about cost/weight/complexity/extra failure points.

I mount upright on my cam band with a Northern Diver clamp which I think is brilliant. I don't know the Kent Tooling one but they have a pretty good name!

Only thing I would say is that it's very worthwhile replacing the standard reg hose with a miflex one. The extra flexibility will be a REAL boon if you do have to get it into your mouth fast in an emergency!

All in all I'm very happy with my purchase, but that's not to say there aren't other better options...

Ian

[EllieCee]

Well, you having one is probably a good advertisement Ian!

The guy at Kent Tooling said I should get a miflex hose for it too... It seems a good idea

Ellie

[coldhands]

Yeah, I wanted a pony when I was a kid, too. But our garden was too small...

[Dougalsdad01]

I have mine (a 232 bar 3 litre) mounted conventional way up on a Northern Divers clamp (I also have a brand new one in it's packaging for sale if anyone's interested, unused, £45).

I have a button gauge with the following reasoning, on the one occasion my pony has been used it was grabbed by my buddy who had a massive freeflow and went from a full cylinder to 30 bar at 32m before we could turn off her air. That gave her enough time to transfer to my AAS since as that is connected to a full 15 litre cylinder she was much better using my big cylinder than the 3 litre pony. For me it is a 'bale-out' air source to get me to my buddy's AAS or until my buddy can locate my AAS. with just 3 litres there is insufficient air for a regular ascent from 30m with a safety stop, better to get on the AAS. In these circumstances a gauge is of little use and may even get in the way, if either of us really did need to check the pony contents then as part of our pre-dive check we agree signals for 'can you check the pony contents', 'can you check I've turned my pony on' and 'oops, I've forgotten to turn my pony on', actually they are all the same signal. If I was to have a conventional hosed gauge then I'd bungy it to the cylinder where I could reach it and just pull it loose if necessary.

I find I need about 2kg less but I'm trying 3kg less this weekend at Porthkerris. With a 12 or 15 litre cylinder, 3 litre pony, membrane dry-suit and a Greenforce torch or my camera I need just 7kg in fresh water, 9kg in the sea.

I have my pony regulator attached to the right shoulder D-ring with a Lumb-Bros release (best on the market) where I can see it from the corner of my mask and my buddy can easily access it if necessary.

[Sakara Drinker]

EllieCee Wrote:If you have a button one, then if you need to use the pony for real, then am I right to think you wouldn't be able to see the guage so would not know how much air you had left?

If you have no air in your main cylinder then knowing how much is in the pony is irrelevant. You are going to breath it until it runs out or you are at the surface.

I use the button gauges on my stage regs. They give you a good enough indication to know it is full before you start your dive, that's all you need really.

[Bobco]

And all that he said, but set it up as a stage, better by far than a clamp

[air-guzzler]

i agree with Bobco side sling it it will also allow you to balance your weighting as well. Ellie just a word do not take away any weight to compensate for the pony weight there is now need and it also allows you to set your self up exactly the same evry time weather you use the pony or not. HTH

[air-guzzler]

you could also use this set up

[Tom]

Just my two penneth worth, if you are using a clamp, Northern Diver, defo, and I like the thought of a gauge that I can see.[/i]