beginner question about weight

Please register or login

Welcome to ScubaBoard, the world's largest scuba diving community. Registration is not required to read the forums, but we encourage you to join. Joining has its benefits and enables you to participate in the discussions.

Benefits of registering include

  • Ability to post and comment on topics and discussions.
  • A Free photo gallery to share your dive photos with the world.
  • You can make this box go away

Joining is quick and easy. Log in or Register now!

Thanks to the OP for this question. I'm new, diving a 7mm and a single aluminum, and am consistently bottom heavy. The top half of my body floats up all the time. Really annoying. I'm not sure how to change my body position or kit to correct this. I've tried pulling my arms in, moving my legs in, etc., but I can't get it working. So I'm thinking to attach weight to my top cam band, but that's unditchable, of course.
 
You need to realize that being able to sink at the beginning of the dive, doesn't mean that your weighted correctly.
You are heavier at the beginning because of the weight of the compressed gas you're carrying. The only right way to make sure the weighting is correct, is to check with almost empty tanks, when you are lightest. At that point you should still be able to sink. Dive safe. Have fun.


gr. Ron
 
Since you are here in this forum already, you have a fantastic "somewhat local" instructor out there (bob sherwood) amongst others that can work AMAZING magic with regards to your 'trim'. you should hop into a primer with him :)

We can yapper away here for hours but in the end, but a hands on with someone who grok's center of buoyancy/center of gravity and can actually 'see' what your kit looks like, will do a much better job :wink:

without seeing a picture of you in your kit, we can't really give much input. You are reporting the opposite of most divers in an AL80, most people actually have to move the tank down down down to not feel head heavy. is there a chance you have a lot of gas in your wing and are holding that bubble in the top of your wing to offset the head heavy feeling?

someplace to start...

end of dive with low psi in tank, do a weight check. when are perfectly neutral, with basically ALL of the gas out of your wing, and 400psi in your tank, in 10' of water, hold still. stop sculling, no hands moving and see what sinks and what floats. Holding still is hard, have a buddy to watch and see what you are doing.

do you have a weight belt, if so how much weight is on it? what fins are you using?
are you tall or short? what is your body habitus?

again, a picture speaks a thousand works. video as well... take a picture of you standing in your gear from the front, side, and back.

trim pockets on cam straps tucked in really close to tank are much much much better than just clipping off a weeblewobble weight on the back... you want everything tucked in close to your center of gravity both top to bottom and side to side. the further things are from center, the more effect they will have on your trim.




Thanks to the OP for this question. I'm new, diving a 7mm and a single aluminum, and am consistently bottom heavy. The top half of my body floats up all the time. Really annoying. I'm not sure how to change my body position or kit to correct this. I've tried pulling my arms in, moving my legs in, etc., but I can't get it working. So I'm thinking to attach weight to my top cam band, but that's unditchable, of course.
 
https://www.shearwater.com/products/swift/
http://cavediveflorida.com/Rum_House.htm

Back
Top Bottom