Custom Divers

Forged in the UK Deeps

In the early 1990s, the UK technical diving scene was exploding. Divers were pushing deeper into the English Channel, hunting virgin wrecks in conditions that terrified standard equipment. Frustrated by kit that broke, snagged, or failed at depth, a diver named Alex Vassallo decided to build his own. Based in Redhill, Surrey, Custom Divers was born from a refusal to compromise on safety in the most hostile environments.

Custom Divers is a brand “by the few, for the few”—though their equipment is now used by military and commercial teams worldwide. They are famous for their stainless steel hardware and the legendary TDB (Technical Diving Buoyancy) Wing, a system designed to lift twinsets and stage bottles with absolute stability. Their gear is instantly recognisable by its industrial, “bulletproof” aesthetic. It isn’t designed to look pretty in a shop window; it is designed to survive being dragged over the sharp, rusted gunwales of a shipwreck.

For the UK technical community, Custom Divers is the go-to for problem-solving kit. Whether it’s their ratchet reels that can deploy a DSMB from 50 metres without jamming, or their quick-release cylinder bands that make switching tanks a breeze, every product feels like it was engineered by someone who has spent hundreds of hours on decompression stops thinking, “There has to be a better way.”