Got soaked in rental drysuit

[Dogbowl]

Last night, my husband and I tried on our first ever drysuits as part of the PADI drysuit course. They were rental DUI flex extremes. The shop has a vast fleet of rental drysuits and they all looked to be in pretty good condition, so I don't really doubt their quality or maintenance (rightly or wrongly so).

When we got dressed and went into the pool for our confined water dive, we started to get wet immediately. We could feel the water streaming in. We told our instructor but he thought we were just not used to the feeling and didn't think our suits were actually being flooded. We didn't know any better as it was our first time so we continued with the dive. After the pool dive, and when we removed the suits, we were both soaked to the core and water could be poured out of our suits. Another couple in our class didn't get soaked like us, wet from sweat probably, but not soaked.

Now, my question is: what could have caused this? Other than a puncture hole in the suit material, what else could have caused so much water to enter? My instructor thinks that we didn't zip it all the way to the very last zipper tooth. Could that be it? What else? We just want to know so we can make sure we fix it for next time.

This was a very disappointing start into drysuits. Now I'm not sure if I even want to finish the course. I'm afraid to do the open water dives because if we get flooded again, we wouldn't be able to complete them. The water will be pretty cold.

 

[Brandon]

Zipper or the seals not being donned properly are the two most likely culprits. In a drysuit course, the instructor should have taught you how to check both.

 

[undrwater]

I'm somewhat surprised that you have to ask here. It sounds like the problem was with your instruction, not the suit.

Perhaps look for a different instructor?

 

[kelemvor]

Have to agree, identifying the leak and its cause should have been part of the course. It was part of mine. Maybe another instructor is in order.

To answer your question, it could have come from a partly unzipped zipper or a small hole. It doesn't take a huge gash to get soaked on a dive. I had probably a quarter inch tear in the material surrounding the zipper on my suit and I ended up with enough water inside to fill my feet above the ankles. I didn't even get to start the dive, it took just a few minutes clipping on tanks at the surface. It might even be possible to get that much water pretty quickly from improperly donned wrist/neck seals. I've never had the latter problem, but apparently it doesn't take much to let in a lot of water.

 

[Dogbowl]

Thanks a lot for everyone's help and advice.

 

[Jim Lapenta]

Other things that can cause a drysuit flood are poorly fitting or torn seals.

How much classroom time did you spend on checking fit, seals, zipper, and other possible leak sources before going to the pool?

How much time did they spend on fitting you in the suits and checking to make sure the seals were ok?

You are fortunate in that you have a shop with a large drysuit rental fleet. In my area most of the shops may have a couple that are outfitted with zip seals for rental use. Most of the time though the course is taught when you buy your suit.
That has its pros and cons.
Pros are:
You know the suit fits.
You know it's new and has a warranty (most times unless you buy a used one)
You know that all the seals and zipper are good (unless you tear a seal or a seam got missed)
You know where the suit has been.
It's your suit so you know you will be diving it for a while. You might get a different rental every time with enough differences to make it hard to nail down your skills.
Cons:
Initial expense

That's pretty much it unless the suit is a lemon from the mfg.

As for feeling the suit flood that is a serious concern. Not so much that the suit flooded in the pool but that the instructor ignored your concerns and did not check to see if you were actually having a suit flood. That's irresponsible and I would not blame you for not going back to finish the class. Might even ask for your money back.

Know that the big failure here was not you and perhaps not even the suit. Even if it was something other than the zipper not being fully closed (my guess is this is likely. If you're not familiar with them and did not have your buddy check it. The instructor should have on the first time in it when you were going to get in the water). The failure here was your employee (the instructor) ignoring your concern. He is your employee you know. You hired him to teach you a drysuit class. He blew off your concern.

What would you do if your babysitter ignored your instructions to feed your child at a certain time?

 

[fmerkel]

I think I would ask for a refund. That would be a really clear message that the instructor was lackluster with basic instruction.

Dry suits are weird. Actually pretty much everything in scuba is weird. When you first try just about anything out or on a new divers will not have a clue what it should feel like or what to expect. That's something that comes with time and experience. There are few short cuts there.

 

[Dogbowl]

The reason why I chose this shop to do this course was because they had a large fleet of rental drysuits. It is 1.5 hours' drive away in good traffic, so definitely not my LDS. I have to admit we were half an hour late to the class due to traffic, so we were short on time due to our fault. I think we were fitted properly at the shop, checking wrist and neck seals properly. I don't think the problem was with the seals. I think when we got to the pool, that's when our zipper didn't get checked for proper closure, and that's how we got soaked (based on everyone's opinion, this seems the most likely).

I understand everyone's comments about the instructor's shortcomings. I get it and agree with it. It's just that I am highly averse to any type of complaining, especially if I like the instructor on a personal level. But after careful thought, we decided to call the shop and let them know our feelings in a respectful way. They have agreed to return a portion of the course costs should we decide not to finish the course with them. I think that's the course we'll take. I "could" argue for a full refund, but I don't think I want to go down that road.

It's a shame, cause this experience has caused me serious doubts about ever signing up for another drysuit course again, or ever using a drysuit at all. Living in Canada, it would be nice to be able to dive here once in a while, instead of having to fly somewhere warm all the time. Spending CAD$2,000 - $4,000 (approx.) for a drysuit just to see if we'll like drysuit diving just makes no sense at all, unless I win the lottery. Just can't justify it.

 

[The Laconic]

Happened to me in my drysuit course, too. The seal just wasn't trimmed right for my neck. (And I can't blame the dive shop at all, because they didn't have enough in my size, and an instructor graciously lent me her own.)

The solution is to buy your own drysuit, which is probably what you were going to do anyway.

 

[Dogbowl]

The solution is to buy your own drysuit, which is probably what you were going to do anyway.

IF we ever bought drysuits, it would be a DUI or Santi. Those cost CAD$4,000 each, times 2 for both of us, plus tax = just under CAD10K. So, NO, we were not going to buy our own drysuits "anyway", cause we're not made of money and spending that much "just to see if we like it" doesn't make sense.

Now, as I said before, if I win the lottery, 10K would just be chump change and maybe we would.