August 1999

John Bantin has been a full-time professional diving writer and underwater photographer since 1990. He makes around 300 dives each year testing diving equipment.

The BC's in the post

• The BC's in the post - Seaway Mercur BC
• Handier than an oil barrel - C-Kit PFP25 Sport lift bag
• Easy dressing - Membrane Dry Suit
• There's bags of space - Mares Jumbo Backpack bag
• Lenses that offer a clearer view - Lens service by SDS
• A reel that does its job - McMahon MRC100

When we tested German manufacturer Seaway's drysuit, as it launched on to the British market, we called it "the BMW of drysuits". The Seaway Mercur BC is another premium-quality product but instead of costing a premium price in a dive store, it is sold for much less by direct mail.
Like a BMW, it looks like a fairly regular design at first glance, but a closer examination reveals subtle differences and very high quality, such as the 1000 denier Cordura and neatly stitched piping. The pocket areas are of an even tougher 1200 denier "ballistic" cloth.
Based around a neat hard backplate with twin cambands for the tank, this BC has an adjustable, elasticated cummerbund secured by 5cm webbing and a fastex buckle. The shoulder straps pass through stainless-steel anchor points where they meet the jacket and run behind the padding of the backplate to two more adjustment points. There's a small zip-pocket on the cummerbund for car keys, credit cards etc.
The shoulder straps fit high up under the arms like those on a rucksack. This accommodates the Schwarzeneggers and Partons of this world, endowed with large chests. I hasten to add that the straps can be adjusted to fit skinnier frames like mine too. A 12.5cm cross-chest strap takes care of any tendency for the straps to slip off the shoulders.
Inner surfaces are covered in smooth neoprene, so there is no pilling or "bobbling" on the nylon outer surface of the dive suit. The neck roll is padded to stop chafing - particularly useful when used with a lightweight wetsuit. Six large stainless-steel D-rings and two easily accessed side pockets with big YKK zips complete the picture.
In the water it proved easy to inject air with a neat, anatomically designed direct-feed mechanism with a rubbery surface.
Dumping air was instantly achieved by pulling on the corrugated hose which operated the integral dump valve, or on the toggle threaded through the right shoulder, which controlled a dump valve on the left shoulder. Both dump valves were optimally placed and there was no tendency for air to get trapped either side. If you are inverted you can use a dump valve at the lower back. This is operated by a toggle attached to a long lanyard.
The toggle on the upper dump seemed to be buoyant, which meant it wrapped itself around the nearby D-ring. However, the toggle on the lower dump seemed to be heavier, which made it retreat out of easy reach when inverted. If it were my BC I would simply have changed them over, but it wasn't, so I persevered by pulling on the corrugated hose. It's a small point which could easily be rectified once purchased.
My wife used the Mercur throughout a two-week live-aboard dive trip. Despite all the adjustments possible she still found that it felt as if it were riding up - although as an observer I could see no sign of this. It was probably the psychological effect of the rucksack-style shoulder straps.
At the surface with the BC fully inflated she did not appear to be as high out of the water as some other standard BCs allow, but this presented no problems. The Mercur certainly gave enough surface buoyancy for any experienced diver.
The example we tested came with an optional security pack. This included: a weighted late-deployment surface marker buoy, together with around 5m of plaited nylon line and a small karabiner which stows away in its own purpose-built pocket; a special knife, clipped in place by means of a sheath with a fastex connector; and a metal shaker stick for attracting your buddy's attention, which stows, tethered by a lanyard, in one of the main pockets.
The Seaway Mercur is a high-quality item which belies its direct-mail price of £249 including p&p. The security pack costs an additional £48.

Seaway Direct 0800 0748016

PLUS	MINUS
+ High-quality German product + Low price + Thoughtful extras + Suits chesty people	- Direct mail only

Handier than an oil barrel
C-Kit brought out what it thought was the ultimate design for a 100kg lifting bag. Everybody liked it but few needed to lift 100kg and it was expensive - especially when you consider that I once lifted and moved a 600kg concrete mooring block using nothing more complex than two dozen upturned plastic 25 litre oil containers and some lengths of rope. [All right MacGyver - Ed]
But swimming around with a 25 litre plastic oil container is not very convenient, especially if you are likely to be a spontaneous lifter! The new C-Kit PFP 25 Sport lifting bag (for loads of 25kg) stows neatly inside the pocket of your BC, forgotten until the day you stumble on that important item of treasure.
It fits inside its own sleeve, which measures 25 x 10cm. The D-ring of the lifting strop is easily accessed together with the length of 25mm webbing and karabiner supplied, so the balloon can be attached to its load before you let the cat out of the bag.
Slackening the draw-string at the other end of this sleeve deploys the bag and the sleeve stops being a container and becomes a funnel for filling the bag. The lifting strops pass right over the bag, which is teardrop-shaped. This means you can safely lift objects lighter than the full load capacity without the lift accelerating out of control on the way up, exploding through the surface, losing its air and hurtling back down to greet you.
Quite a lot of air escaped from the sleeve/funnel during filling and the load was left quite deep below the inflated bag once it was at the surface. So you still need a fair bit of strength and dexterity to get the treasure safely into the boat.
This product has been made with the idea of keeping the cost low but I wish that the designer had included the price of a dump valve. It can be quite embarrassing to attach a lifting bag to an object and then find it was heavier than you antici-pated. Getting the air out of a fully inflated lifting bag under water is not that easy, so a dump valve would be worth the extra couple of quid!
The PFP 25 Sport costs £34.50. A 50kg version costs £39.50.

G&H Diving Services 0181 751 3771

PLUS	MINUS
+ Easy to attach to load + Value for money	- No dump valve - Leaves load deep below bag at surface

Easy dressing
ONCE When I was being shown around a fancy computerised drysuit factory, I disappointed the owner by saying that our readers would not care if the suits were made by his granny in an attic armed with a pair of scissors and a pot of glue - it was the quality of the final product that counted.
The GUL factory in Cornwall is as high-tech and as modern as they come, but the same rationale applies when it comes to testing its suits.
Some lightweight suits on the market have all the resilience of a plastic mac - good for one downpour and that's about it! The Membrane Drysuit from GUL is several degrees better. I found it perfect for the northern Red Sea in April and it didn't use up much of my baggage allowance. I suggest that it would be a good choice for someone who needs a drysuit only occasionally and doesn't get involved in nasty rusty metal in home waters too often.
It is well made from a mixture of nylon and PVC, neatly stitched and reinforced with Cordura at the knees and polyester at the seat. It has comfortable neoprene-lined rubber boots, a fitted adjustable elasticated waist, an inflation valve properly mounted on a rubber gasket at the centre of the chest with a comfort pad on the inside, and a conical neck seal which is neatly bonded to the suit.
The same can be said for the heavy-duty cross-shoulder zip.
I was especially impressed too by the fact that the inside of the suit was lined with a light-coloured material. This meant that I could see where I was putting my feet when I got dressed and didn't get tangled up in the internal braces. Even if I had, these were detachable by fastex buckles, so getting dressed was without the characteristic complicated drama that drysuit donning so often entails.
In the water my arms stayed dry, thanks to conical latex wrist seals which were protected by nylon cuffs. A cosy undersuit (not supplied by GUL) kept me warm and snug.
The only fly in the ointment was the cuff dump. Cuff dumps are a pet hate of mine. Anyone who has to work under water will know that these cheap devices will lose air just when you don't want them to. I believe there is no substitute for a properly placed constant-volume automatic dump valve. Cuff dumps are a false economy.
Available in a range of stock sizes, price £426.

GUL International 01208 72382

PLUS	MINUS
+ Light-coloured lining for easy dressing + Hard-wearing lightweight suit	- Unreliable cuff dump

There's bags of space
The Mares Jumbo Backpack bag is big. It measures 48 x 35 x 72cm and has a capacity of 105 litres. There are side compartments which will take two pairs of fins, and two large front pockets can be used to segregate items such as spares and your logbook from the rest of your kit.
It has carrying handles on both the top and sides and there are rucksack-style straps concealed at the back.
It does not weigh much on its own because it is made from quite a lightweight material. Once fully loaded - and it can take the kit of two divers - it becomes quite heavy, but built-in wheels come to the rescue.
As I checked in for the outward journey, I wondered how it would fare with the loving care meted out by the baggage-handlers at Gatwick and Hurghada airports. I was relieved to find that it appeared on the luggage belt in one piece.
Sadly, the jetty at the Hilton Resort was to have the final say.
While wheeling the fully loaded bag towards the boat on Day One of my trip, I failed to notice that one of its wheel axles had given up the fight and collapsed, letting that corner of the bag drag on the ground. I lost the wheel and not a little fabric too.
I was left with the prospect of returning the bag to the supplier with a note of apology.
It might be half the price of some similar bags on the market but I fear that that's because it might last less than half as long.
It certainly didn't prove itself to be one of Mares' better-quality products.
The Mares Jumbo Backpack costs £87.

Blandford Sub-Aqua 01923 801572

PLUS	MINUS
	- Not very hard-wearing

Lenses that offer a clearer view
When Arthur Balderson found that he no longer had a job as a mining-engineer in the 1980s he got on his bike and started up a dive shop, SDS Watersports, in Sheffield.
When we needed an optical mask for Norman Tebbit, that scourge of the miners during the '80s strikes, it seemed suitably perverse to go to Arthur for the goods.
The service was quick and without hitches and the mask duly arrived with perfectly fitted lenses which allowed Lord Tebbit to see the details of his computer as well as the wildlife under water.
The mask was a new low-volume design from Mares, called the Opera. Lord Tebbit didn't encounter a single problem with adjusting the strap, mask leaks, mask squeeze or mask-clearing (once he had mastered the art of the latter) and became adept at spotting the most camouflaged species of animal life under water.
The Mares Opera mask costs £36. Having standard reading lenses fitted costs £50.

Blandford Sub-Aqua 01923 801572 (for mask)

SDS Watersports 01142 488688 (for lenses)

PLUS	MINUS
+ Good service	- Can't lend prescription lens mask to friends!

A reel that does its job
I have owned a McMahon SMB reel for years but it is unfashionably large, although I must say that it never jams and neither does the line "bird's nest". However, McMahon has been making a similar-style compact reel for some time now and at long last - following many requests - I managed to get my hands on one for testing.
The MRC 100 is made of a mixture of ABS polypropylene and nylon with stainless-steel fittings. It has a large spring-loaded ratchet on its 75mm diameter drum and carries 50m of line. This was deployed without drama and without snagging or catching any fingers. The line runs through a sliding guide which makes sure it piles up neatly on the drum when the time comes to wind it in. It is a good product and its longer-serving bigger brother has proved that there are no hidden defects with its design.
Price £45.

Tandem Trading 01249 651893

PLUS	MINUS
+ Compact design	- None apparent

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Appeared in DIVER - August 1999

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