You love your new BCD: It’s comfortable; it fits like a glove; and it lets you effortlessly control your position underwater. Now to tie it all together, you must find a home on it for all of your accessories. Whether your BCD has ample pockets, no pockets, plenty of D-rings, or just a few, we can help you find a place for all your gear and still keep you streamlined. First, let’s say…
Your BCD has pockets
Your BCD’s pockets are an ideal place for accessories that you won’t use consistently during a dive. For example, since you’ll generally only reach for your DSMB and reel as you near the end of your dive, you can comfortably leave these in a pocket until then. Keep other accessories in a pocket, including your pocket mask, your slate, or your torch. Unless you’re on a night dive, of course, in which case keep it at the ready. But what if your BCD has small pockets? Or no pockets? Does that mean you have to leave all that gear behind? Well, not if…
Your BCD has D-rings
Again, let’s compartmentalize your accessories: Do you need them to be easily accessible for the duration of your dive? You can clip anything you will not continuously need to the D-rings at the bottom of your BCD. If you’re worried that you won’t be able to grab at those bottom rings, you can invest in coil lanyards so that you can stretch anything you might need right to up to you. For those of you still after the security of a pocket, or turned off by the idea that your stuff will flail freely in the open water, worry not. There are remedies. You can secure your DSMB with a bungee cord or keep it in a mesh pouch, for example.
Free up the rings at the top of your BC for any piece of equipment that you’ll need to be immediately available, such as your whistle, your tank banger or even your torch. Remember that some of your stuff is small enough to share a single D-ring, so you can afford to be stingy with your ring real estate. But wait: You still can’t manage to find space for all your accessories? There are solutions yet…
Accessories for Your Accessories
Do keep in mind that you don’t have to attach everything to your BCD; you can attach some things to yourself. Your compass is happy to live on your wrist, as is your flashlight. If you cannot secure your knife to the side of your BCD or to your power inflator, you can always strap it to your leg. Some slates are even designed to wrap around your forearm, just as some tank bangers can stay tied to your tank.
Now let’s say you’d really like to store all your equipment on your BCD (a BCD with no pockets and few D-rings). How can you make the most of your limited space? Buy some inexpensive accessories for your accessories. Use lanyards to tie things and double-sided clips and carabiners to encourage your gear to share a single ring. If you struggle to find a spot for your alternate second stage, you can get an octopus holder to solve that problem as well.
There you have it. Now you can find somewhere to keep anything you might need on your dive. Remember, you probably don’t need to bring everything with you every time. Yet, if you simply cannot do without all of your gear, you no longer have to. Even if it has no pockets or rings, with our tips you can make the most out of your BCD’s real estate.
By guest author Lorena Espin
