During the SSI Open Water Diver course we introduce the concept of working out Surface Breathing Rates or SBR’s. The amount of gas a diver consumes either at work or rest per minute at surface pressure.
Also referred to as Surface Consumption Rates (SCR) & Surface Air Consumption (SAC) Rates, but not always pertaining to Air; what about all Nitrox divers? Working them out is an extremely important part of dive planning & helping Open Water Divers meet the SSI philosophy of diver’s independence from their Instructor.
Often we see these workings finished off in Bar, which unless diving with exactly the same size tank every dive, isn’t much good to you at all. For example, if someone shows up for their Deep Diver Specialty Course & shows you their SSI DiveLog shows they have a SBR of 1 Bar/minute, it will make have a great impact on your planned dives if they learned to dive on an 8litre or a 15litre tank!
We always teach our new Instructors, when working with Open Water students always remember to multiply the SBR in Bar by the volume of the tanks used. Even if using average depths, this will give the students a better understanding of dive planning when you’re not around leading to those confident, comfortable & safe divers we all love as our buddy’s.