Symbios instructor: learn to dive the Halcyon Symbios

I am an SSI instructor on the Halcyon Symbios, Halcyon's chest-mounted rebreather. If you are looking for a Symbios instructor in the Netherlands, you are in the right place: I teach anywhere in the country, at the location that suits you, on a unit I dive daily and take apart down to the scrubber on my YouTube channel.

Why with me

A rebreather course is only as good as the hours the instructor has on the unit. I own two Symbios units and dive them in the work I earn my living with: filming in wrecks, flooded mines and caves, down to a hundred metres. I am certified up to CCR Cave myself, and that is the way of diving I bring along: team, standard gases, procedures you can do blind.

Literally blind: on DiveJunk there is a video in which I build my Symbios blindfolded. The pressure tests are there too, packing the scrubber, replacing the oxygen sensors and connecting off-board gas. Anyone who takes a course with me has those videos as reference, and knows in advance how I explain things.

What I offer

• Try CCR Diving. The introduction. Half a day of theory and a session in the pool or shallow water, to six metres, on my unit. For anyone with an Open Water Diver card who wants to know whether a rebreather is for them before buying one.
• SSI CCR Diving on the Symbios. The full entry course. You learn to build, check and dive the unit and to handle the failures that matter, to thirty metres without decompression. SSI requires Deep Diving, Enriched Air Nitrox 40 and at least twenty-four logged dives beforehand. Expect seven theory sessions, one confined-water session and six open-water dives.
• Crossover to the Symbios. For divers already certified on another unit who want to switch. The SSI programme is called XR CCR Unit Crossover: you are certified on the Symbios at the highest level you already hold. The requirement is a CCR certification and at least ten rebreather dives in the past twelve months.
• Next: CCR Extended Range. Decompression dives to forty-five metres, with trimix as diluent. For divers with CCR Diving who want to go deeper than the entry level allows.

About the Halcyon Symbios

The Symbios is an electronic closed-circuit rebreather worn on the chest. Three oxygen sensors, one of them the solid-state GreenFlash, a scrubber with a certified duration of 160 minutes, and EN 14143 certification to a hundred metres. With air as diluent the limit is forty metres. Dive-ready with a one-litre cylinder the unit weighs eleven kilos. The difference from a back-mounted unit is immediate: you can see your own unit, you feel the counterlungs breathe, and your back is free for bailout cylinders or a camera.

Since September 2026 the Symbios has been supported by six training agencies, SSI among them. Everything I know and think about the unit is in thereview of the whole Symbios ecosystemand the series around it.

Where and when

Anywhere in the Netherlands, on location. We do the practical part where it suits you and where the water allows: Zeeland, the Oostvoornse Meer, Vinkeveen, or your own familiar site. Theory is done beforehand, online or at your place, so that the days at the water are spent in the water. Dates by arrangement.

What it costs

On request. A half-day Try CCR and a full CCR Diving course with six open-water dives are two different conversations, and it matters whether you already own a Symbios. Tell me what you want and where you stand, and you get a price with nothing hiding behind it.

Frequently asked questions

Do I need my own Symbios?

Not for Try CCR, which you do on my unit. For the courses your own unit is the normal route: you get to know a rebreather by owning it. Talk to me first if you are still undecided about buying; I will tell you honestly where the Symbios excels and where it does not.

I have a different rebreather. Can I switch?

Yes, through the crossover. Your existing level stays, you learn the unit anew. How long that takes depends on how much of the Symbios is new to you: the electronics, the sensor layout and diving on the chest.

I dive open circuit. Is CCR Diving the first step?

If you meet the prerequisites, yes. Deep Diving, Nitrox 40 and twenty-four dives are SSI's requirements. If you are not there yet, Try CCR is the way to feel what you are working towards.

Which agency issues my certification?

SSI. I am an instructor with SSI and PADI; the rebreather courses run through SSI. My own technical and cave training was with a different agency, and that way of diving comes along into the course.

How far do you travel?

All of the Netherlands, and just across the border by arrangement. I work all over the country as an underwater cameraman, so travelling is already part of the job.