Hi,
I haven't seen the article but I have trained in
Ragan's sub. It is a basic sub. No thrills. Any
surface boater used to modern power boats would not be
impressed.
As for my experience I also dragged the nose through
mud and piloted through clouds of silt.
Ragan has chosen to remove the VBT out of his sub to
open up the interior. Which means neutral buoyance is
hard to obtain. Before getting in Mark guestimates
your weight and you load or off load internal ballast,
then use the thrusters to maintain depth.
Typical of K-boats with its poor directional stability
and no compass you tend to not go in a straight line.
So if you do stir up the silt you will probably double
back and plow through it. Total black out!
I did get a few drops of water from the hatch seal on
my first dive but a few twists on the hatch clamp took
care of that. Of course I dove in the summer and the
seal was warmer.
I put together a video of the experience. Interlacing
two dives with interior and exterior points of view.
Regards,
Ray
--- "Smyth, Alec" <Alec.Smyth@compuware.com> wrote:
> I'm actually glad to hear that Jon, because I
> thought it was just me. I
> did, however, interpret it a bit differently. I
> think the mishaps
> described just seem an attempt to make things sound
> adventurous and
> throw in some humor. I didn't get the impression
> that unprofessionally
> or danger were implied by those anecdotes. The thing
> is, the whole tone
> of the publication seems rather childish, catering
> to a "pizza and
> babes" readership. Just flipping through the other
> articles, for
> instance, I see a new boat review has been titled
> "Dance Party". I guess
> they liked the boat. Everything seems to be about
> horsepower, what's
> "hot" to buy right now, etc. While I wouldn't pick
> out a magazine like
> that myself, my impression is the author did put
> together an
> entertaining piece. But entertainment was probably
> all he was shooting
> for.
>
> What DOES bug me is the inaccuracy I pointed out
> earlier concerning
> Dale!
>
>
> :)
>
> Alec
>
>
> The contents of this e-mail are intended for the
> named addressee only. It contains information that
> may be confidential. Unless you are the named
> addressee or an authorized designee, you may not
> copy or use it, or disclose it to anyone else. If
> you received it in error please notify us
> immediately and then destroy it.
>
>
> From: owner-personal_submersibles@psubs.org
> [mailto:owner-personal_submersibles@psubs.org] On
> Behalf Of
> jonw@psubs.org
> Sent: Monday, May 05, 2008 1:28 PM
> To: personal_submersibles@psubs.org
> Subject: RE: [PSUBS-MAILIST] PSUBS in Boating
> magazine
>
>
> Perhaps I am too sensitive to these things, but I
> have to say that I'm
> not impressed with this article. In my opinion the
> author didn't convey
> this as a serious experience and the fact that he
> ran into a number of
> issues during his dive I think is unfortunate.
>
>
> You can kind of get a flavor of where the article is
> heading when the
> author leads off with this comment.
>
> "It's beyond cool....now if it only came with
> torpedoes"
>
>
>
> First, the author describes an apparent hatch leak.
>
> Ragan's disembodied voice comes over the radio:
> "What's that sound?"
> "Just a little water," I reply. "No big thing."
> The cold stream hits
> my
> neck and runs down my back. The seat of my jeans
> absorbs it like a
> Depends
> adult undergarment. Water pools around my shoes.
> Apparently the gusher
> isn't going to go away, no matter how long I try to
> ignore it. Before
> I squeezed inside his one-person Kittrege (sic)
> K-250 submarine (named
> for designer George Kittrege (sic)), Ragan warned me
> that on this winter
> day the O-ring would be cold and inflexible.
>
>
>
> Next, the author describes getting hung-up.
>
> I'm just spinning in place. From the muddy 3 foot
> view through the
> porthole between my legs, it's obvious we're not
> moving forward. Then
> I spot the problem. "Uh, it looks like we're hung
> up on something
> down here," I say. "Something metal. Looks like a
> milk crate." To
> work the submarine off, I try to ascend a bit, then
> I try rocking the
> submarine from side to side ever so slightly. But I
> end up either
> still spinning or dragging the crate forward and
> kicking up enough
> silt to muddy the view. Eventually, I abandon all
> hope and radio
> Ragan that I'm blowing the tanks.
>
>
>
> Finally, the author ends the article with this
> exchange, using a
> paragraph heading of "Sub Par".
>
> "You did better than most of my students," Ragan
> says once
> I've forced open the hatch.
>
> "Come on. I couldn't even steer the damn thing."
>
> "It wasn't your fault," he says. "The wind was
> pulling my boat, and
> that
> was too much for the submarine to overcome. Also
> you didn't panic when
> the water was running in."
>
> "Pouring in."
>
> "Whatever. I feel comfortable signing you off.
> Congratulations."
>
> If he's comfortable, then I'm comfortable.
> Drenched, freezing, but
> comfortable. Just get me out of this thing and back
> into a real boat.
>
>
>
> I'm not sure this puts Ragan's business, or small
> recreational subs, in
> their best light. Unfortunately, you never know
> where a reporter or
> editor is going to take a story ahead of time. And
> to be fair, alot of
> times an editor will dictate to a reporter how they
> want the story
> framed.
>
> Just my opinion.
>
> Jon
>
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