Down in Portland Harbour again a couple of weekends ago, for a
midwinter 'quick dip just to keep from drying out' dive day.

Pulling on my rig for the first dive (wreck: The Spaniard) it occurs to me
that I have forgotten to re-attach my drysuit hose after my last Egypt
trip.  And the change to compatible nipples between BC and drysuit
inflators is still on my 'to do' list...

No problem, max depth is only 12-15m or so, and Rich donates a squirt off
his hose to take off the squeeze when we get on the wreck.  Not exactly one
from the standard technique manual, but it works OK.  :-)

Another freighter foundered against the harbour wall, there is a lot more
bulk to the wreck than I was expecting.  The sturdy bow section still
stands well proud, and several tiny feathery nudibranchs cling to the iron
ribcage straggling out across the silt.  A friendly Lumpsucker entertains
us on our safety stop.  Water temp 7 degrees, visibility a credible 4
metres.

Second dive, (wreck: The Landing Craft), I give my homemade backplate
http://www.huwporter.com/scuba/hplate.html it's first sea trial.  It works
perfectly during descent and bottom time, and after a couple of center-of-
gravity and shutdown drills I forget about it completely and just enjoy the
dive.

After half an hour, I pop up a blob with cold, numb fingers.  My new plate
is a smidgin lighter than my old one, and as we start to ascend, I find
myself a touch underweighted, fumbling with those numb fingers to dump
suit, dump wing and wind in the spool at the same time.  Nothing goes
horribly wrong, barring a couple of brief line tangles and a bit of
downward swimming to hold the safety stop, but it just isn't nearly as rule
#6 as one would like to aspire to!

Which leads to the question:

A little bit of task loading, thick gloves and cold fingers, and my spool
technique goes all to pot.  To the extent that I was - in retrospect - not
in a good position to assist my buddy if he had required it.  I'm even
tempted to go back to a reel for DSMB use, but <cough>DIR</cough> has been
right about so many things, I want to give this one the benefit of the
doubt.

So, for those on the list that use spools, has anyone got any technique
tips, or is it just a question of practice, practice, practice?

Cheers,
Huw
--
http://www.huwporter.com