SCUBA Log Book

[Gaston]

Tell the truth. How many of my fellow divers keep an accurate not embellished Log Book? Further, how many divers don't keep a Log Book at all? Just wondering.

[donna5]

We do. It is just like a souvenir.

[Hilary]

I keep an accurate log book, why would I lie? My log book is for me to keep track of my dives, my exposure protection, my air consumption, what I saw, etc. I know a couple of guys who have well over 2000 dives who now just keeps a list of where/when they dive, and only does detailed logs of new places.

[Gaston]

My sincere apologies. I am not challenging diver's honesty about their Log Books. I am asking to be honest about actually keeping a Log Book.

[cruzegirl]

Well I keep an accurate log book filled in after each dive..... And do an internet dive log too....But I'm also a newbie and had it drilled into me how important it is...... I hope I never lose that desire...... :)

[w&k]

I quit logging after my first 100 dives.

 

DH still does his, but it's getting to be a simple listing of site, depth & time.

 

I have to hand it to the organized people that actually keep track of their dives.

 

On the other hand, for ~ 300 dives I had the same set of equipment, so there wasn't much for me to keep track of.

 

Wendy

[bruce-r]

I keep a fairly detailed log book, but I think I am in the minority. I make my own pages and sometimes I even print a photo or two from the dive on the page.

 

I dive warm water in a wet suit, and both cold saltwater and fresh water in a drysuit. I have my own 80cuft steel tanks, I use different tanks when I fly to dive, such as Aluminum 80's, steel 95's and steel 120's. All these factors affect the amount of weight I need on a dive. I keep track of that.

 

I recently we on a liveaboard trip in California. Several of us had our log books out during the trip to keep current. One guy had logged every one of 1300+ dives.

[Capt_BJ]

I still log 'em - certified in '73

 

Usually just 1 line - time of day/type of dive/ water temp/air temp/max depth/time down/air used/rig/weight/site comment, incl would I use the tour again if applic.

 

Handy ref for the next time and to ensure I get the right weight

[NM_Eman]

I always log dives. Good info as in Bruce-r's message, but them I'm an instructor and the "be a good example" habits die hard. One of the instructors I did my IDT with was logging in the 5000s.:D

[Woodsmaster]

In my early diving, we did not keep dive logs.

 

Since I resumed diving and began taking my children, we all have dive logs and keep them accurately. They provide us information on exposure suits, weigh requirements, air consumption, dive shop stamps where we go on vacation, computer data, fish ID, sights, and depths.

 

They help us with memories and also provide data if we ever have a dive emergency on a week long dive trip. Contain DAN numbers, Emergency information, emergency contacts, BCBS data, and a few other items including C Card storage.

[sea-jay]

Although I have less than 30 dives at this time, I keep my log up to date. I also have all the photos I take on any particular dive saved to a CD and keep them with a copy of the log sheets. I think the log is extremely helpful if you don't dive that much and need refreshers as to weights, history of air consumption at varying depths, etc. One thing not normally listed on a dive log sheet, which I add, is my personal body weight. I found out this does affect the weights you need to maintain proper boyancy control. I have fluctuated as much as 40lbs over the last three or four years.

[starsjohn]

I have only 54 dives but log each one. Last month, in the French Polynesian islands, we used steel 90's, Al 80's, composite steel and Al, and a couple of larger sizes of tanks, so I needed some reference to set bouyancy weights. I always did a bouyancy check at the surface, so I could log in a figure.

 

I also log a reference to my digital picture files so I can locate quickly the photos for a particular dive.

 

John

[budaman]

Used to but misplaced my log during a move and never replaced it. Decided to start a new one during our trip to Grand cayman last week since we would be diving the entire week. Used Ocean Frontiers and after each dive, the divemaster would come around and get depth and time readings etc. At the end of the week, they gave us a computer printout with all the info for the entire week.....great stuff and a very good outfit.

 

Mike

 

http://www.homepage.mac.com/csealove/

[cruzegirl]

Mike,

Have you ever used the online dive log? It's great too.... It calculates your tbt for you.... I get so messed up trying to count minutes then into hours... ah..... very cool.....

Any photos of the diving yet?

http://www.diverecord.com/Welcome.asp

[Sailfish]

I'm guilty - I stopped at around 100 dives and that was many years ago! I never referred to my log book when I did, and no one ever asks me for it - never have EVER! I do, however, take pictures, and will indicate dive sites and details in my scrap book. But that's about it.

 

I also never bothed to get AOW certified either - most DM's tell me "I've been there, done that", so why bother!

[Sailfish]

I'm guilty - I stopped at around 100 dives and that was many years ago! I never referred to my log book when I did, and no one ever asks me for it - never have EVER! I do, however, take pictures, and will indicate dive sites and details in my scrap book. But that's about it.

 

I also never bothed to get AOW certified either - most DM's tell me "I've been there, done that", so why bother!

 

Don't you find that the vast majority of divers still logging in their dives are newly certified or those who dive infrequently - one DM remarked on this while in Bonaire - made sense. Probably doesn't hold true for EVERYONE - hate those blanket statements But this seems to be what I have observed.

[budaman]

Didn't know anything like that existed......computers are amazing things.

 

Pics aren't ready yet....paying for being off last week this week, 12+ hrs a day the rest of the week. Got them back from developers but haven't had time to organize them and get them on the site. They don't seem to be as good as when we were on the cruise.....Connie took the pics and I think she was more concerned with my well being because we were diving in conditions I wasn't used to and was a little uncomfortable with. Got rid of a few more demons this trip.....like going under quickly rather than bobbing on the surface wanting to get that last breath and how I would react to encountering a shark....they are so graceful and pretty, you're more in awe than scared.

 

Mike

 

www.homepage.mac.com/csealove/

[10X]

I keep a log book but it's not very detailed. I track information that will be most useful to me and that is mainly concerned with equipment. I have three wetsuits, 7mm full one-piece, 3mm full one-piece, and a 3mm shorty. I personally own a steel tank, but have dived with AL80, and large steel. Since I never know what kind of tank I'll get on a vacation dive, I track all of the combinations so I know what weight to ask for depending on what wetsuit and what tank I'm using.

 

I also track anything unusual that occurred during the dive, like the time I put weight in only one pocket of my BCD and tried going to 80 feet at half weight.

[bruce-r]

Don't you find that the vast majority of divers still logging in their dives are newly certified or those who dive infrequently - one DM remarked on this while in Bonaire - made sense. Probably doesn't hold true for EVERYONE - hate those blanket statements But this seems to be what I have observed.

You are right, it doesn't hold for everyone, but as generalizations go, it is probably not far off the mark. I also think that people that do only one kind of diving, especially warm water caribbean diving, are less likely to keep a log book over the long run. People that dive in widely varying environments with different weight and exposure protection requirements are more likely to keep a log.

 

Now that I think about it, mine is just as much a scrapbook as it is a log of dive data. Plus it has pockets for important stuff like C-cards, dive computer instruction cards, extra dive computer batteries, and fish ID cards.

[DiveCruiser]

I kept a detailed book untill I passed my 1000 dive!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I take pitures now

 

Bob

[techdiver]

Still log mine, usually just place, run time and depth for cruise dives. Deco dives get more detail, since they all follow the plan your dive - dive your plan guidelines. I'm starting to really like this diving off cruise ships. No doubles, drysuits and stage bottles.

[JanR]

I think that it all comes down to what a diver believes the log book is supposed to be. I would imagine that this definition changes with more experience and may become unnecessary in most instances with a great amount of dive experience.

 

I think that the progression is much the following:

 

1. The "Wow, look at what I did" phase. During your BOW your log book represents the information that your instructor told you to include and then you look down and find out that there is still a bunch of white space so we fill this up with incredibly helpful entries such as "This is sooo COOL." "Wonderful Dive" "Never thought it would be this wonderful." , etc.

 

2. The "Need to get serious about what I'm doing." phase. Once you start to do more and more dives in different environments and different equipment, you find yourself detailing everything that you did, wore and used. This is probably close to what the diving institutions invisioned the logs to be...chronicling all of those changes and lessons learned so that you can reference on later dives. Mostly this seems to be mostly warmth and bouyancy related..."wore this in salt water at 79 degrees, need 2 more pounds of weight." "wore this in 72 degree fresh water, need to 2 pounds less and it was really COLD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

 

Now I find myself somewhere between #1 and #2, so the following is pure subjection, but I'd imagine that as divers rely more and more on their experience, the need to chronicle their equipment/environment data is less important and tend to only enter information for dives in areas/conditions they haven't dove before. The rest of the dive information is simply putting another "notch in their log" so that they have evidence of going from dive #234 to #235. After their xx'nth dive, the relevancy of dive #1021 to #1022 really doesn't matter and the log stays in the bookshelf at home.

 

For me, I simply see the above as a hypothesis which I am very much wanting to prove/disprove....hmmm, would I really care about #1022???? :)

 

For what it's worth,

 

Jan

[szdiver]

I guess I am still in the newbie stages - with only 138 logged dives. I don't suppose I will ever get to that stage where I won't be excited and want to remember where I dived last and what I saw. I also like to look back at which wrecks I have dived at different islands. So for now, I take my log book with me on whatever cruise I go on. Everyone is unique in that respect. Happy diving....