| Imported post
Well, Justin, you've been given lots of advice, some of it contradictory. Here's my twopennorth, just to make you even more confused. There are lots of good regs about. Frankly, just about any cold water reg will meet your needs. However, the TX40 you mention is among the best, in my opinion. I have a TX40 as my main reg and another as my octopus. I've used them for 6 years and done somewhere between five and six hundred dives with them and they've been excellent.
As regards drysuits, I definitely prefer a membrane suit to a neoprene (have had both) but a crushed neoprene suit is basically just a more hard-wearing membrane suit, so it's a good choice, in my opinion.
Conventional BC or wing? You'll almost certainly want some kind of wing BC or backplate and harness with wings later on but I personally think a conventional BC is easier to use for an inexperienced diver, so I suggest you buy a good second hand BC (without an inflation bottle) to start with. You can then sell it without too much loss if and when you decide to progress to wings. Hundreds of thousands of divers all over the world are quite happy diving with an ordinary BC, as I was for the first 14 years of my diving life. I love my wing BC (DiveRite Transpac II) but I wouldn't be particularly worried if I had to use an ordinary BC for some reason.
Pony bottle or not? You should definitely get a pony in due course but I presume you will only be diving to relatively shallow depths and under supervision for the time being, so perhaps there is no immediate hurry, if you are short of funds. Whatever you buy, dive as much as you can, within the limits of your training and certification, and get familiar with your kit, then upgrade it when you feel really confident and comfortable in the water. By then, you'll know exactly what you want. If you buy second hand, that needn't mean too much loss.  |