This is absolutely true for the few shops that rent drysuits around here. Unfortunate, but understandable from the shop's perspective.
New Drysuit Diver - Do I Need The Course?
- Thread starter dkatchalov
- Start date
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
This is absolutely true for the few shops that rent drysuits around here. Unfortunate, but understandable from the shop's perspective.
JeffG
Contributor
I can confirm from personal experience that some shops won't rent a dry suit to someone who doesn't have the dry suit specialty card. Since I got certified in a dry suit, I never took the specialty class, and didn't have the card when my dry suit went belly-up on a trip to LA. The shop wouldn't rent me one, but they WOULD rent my husband (who has the card) a lady's small . . . I'm sure it's an insurance issue.
I think your plan of work in the pool and under the pier is perfect. It's not difficult to simulate a feet first ascent -- just go head down in shallow water with the suit a little loose and it will happen.
Even if you take the class, it will still take you a number of dives before your buoyancy and trim control are what they were diving wet. You have to be much more on top of buoyancy changes in a drysuit, because it simply won't vent as fast as a BC.
I think your plan of work in the pool and under the pier is perfect. It's not difficult to simulate a feet first ascent -- just go head down in shallow water with the suit a little loose and it will happen.
Even if you take the class, it will still take you a number of dives before your buoyancy and trim control are what they were diving wet. You have to be much more on top of buoyancy changes in a drysuit, because it simply won't vent as fast as a BC.
If there have been more successful lawsuits against dive shops than tool rental companies, wouldn't it make sense for dive shops to do what they think might protect them from liability?
What it comes down to is the jury decides, after being fooled by the lawyers, who needs to be protected from themselves.
Now, that makes no sense!
Hijack over (hopefully, sorry if it isn't).
Dave C
Sounds reasonable. A even less stringent approach worked for me and others I know.
One suggestion, just so you don't get overconfident, is to test the limits of recoverability from the feet-first uncontrolled ascent by putting in more air and waiting longer to do your somersault maneuver.
Need I say, do it safely?
To do so, try putting more air into both the suit and the bcd and see how complicated things get.
Then try the excess air in only the drysuit, then only the bcd.
See if you can safely create a situation from which you can't recover.
Again, safely: in shallow water, like 15', not holding your breath, etc.
That will demonstrate the differences in the volume handled by the respective exhaust valves and whether there actually is a significant issue there. There may not be one.
For me, using only my drysuit for buoyancy control has significant advantages and no major drawbacks. I'm definitely warmer, venting is hands-free and my drysuit exhaust valve is more than up to the task.
There are divers on both sides of this issue, which mostly comes down to preference in the final analysis, IMHO.
It might be a little early for you to conclude this is a "bad habit" before trying both ways.
Streamlining certainly isn't the issue....
I still don't quite understand why you're taking the drysuit course....
Dave C
Bobbin-along
Guest
Our LDS is different. You buy a dry suit, and never had one before, they do a pool and an open water dive or two open water dives with you. If you want the cert, then they do offer it, but it costs more.
hubert
Registered
- Messages
- 28
- Reaction score
- 0
- # of dives
- 200 - 499
I would recommend taking the class if you can find a good instructor. I suppose I have been extremely lucky so far, but whenever I took a class, I met a nice professional, learned plenty of useful stuff, and felt the money was well spent. This is not to say that there are no crooks/idiots around. Nor that the PADI curriculum is great - it sucks, but then everybody knows it, the instructor first of all. Diving is also about meeting new people and learning from others.
As far a buoyancy goes, the nature of the DS may play a role. A neoprene one, crushed or not,
actually does get compressed at depth, hence loses buoyancy, hence requires a bit of air in the BC if you dont want to look and feel like a balloon by overinflating the DS. A laminate one is different: the ``buoyancy control'' simply means you add a bit of air to keep your volume constant, hence buoyancy constant by Archimede's principle. For whoever can master it, it is the best.
Diving with a wetsuit and a DS is truly two different things. With the WS, I feel I *am* truly in the water. With a DS, I rather feel like I'm flying (even sober, honest) over a bubble of air. It is fun and comfortable, but less ``aquatic'' if you see what I mean. I now tend to do the first dive in a WS, and move to the DS for the second or third dive when the shivering becomes uncontrollable.
Good luck!
Hubert
As far a buoyancy goes, the nature of the DS may play a role. A neoprene one, crushed or not,
actually does get compressed at depth, hence loses buoyancy, hence requires a bit of air in the BC if you dont want to look and feel like a balloon by overinflating the DS. A laminate one is different: the ``buoyancy control'' simply means you add a bit of air to keep your volume constant, hence buoyancy constant by Archimede's principle. For whoever can master it, it is the best.
Diving with a wetsuit and a DS is truly two different things. With the WS, I feel I *am* truly in the water. With a DS, I rather feel like I'm flying (even sober, honest) over a bubble of air. It is fun and comfortable, but less ``aquatic'' if you see what I mean. I now tend to do the first dive in a WS, and move to the DS for the second or third dive when the shivering becomes uncontrollable.
Good luck!
Hubert
I teach the course and here is why PADI's method works ok for a beginner to use the suit..
If you are properly weighed in the beginning of a dive(on surface float with full breath,exhale and sink slowly-with an empty bc) then at depth the air you put into suit to eliminate squeeze should be enough to offset negative bouyancy you get from suit squeeze,especially if a crushed or trilam suit is used. On surfacing you would only have to dump air out of suit to compensate for expanding air and not out of bc also.If you have to add alot of air to bcd at depth ,after compensating for squeeze,its probably because you are using too much weight.
In reality this works pretty good but I admit once you get used to the system it is ok to air some tiny bit of air to bcd too,just remember that you may have to dump some air on ascent.
Bcd's main use with a dry suit for myself is for any additional surface support I may want/need as to inflate suit on surface for support is cumbersome and can be uncomfortable.
Interestingly, even the shops around here that refuse to rent drysuits without DS cert cards will be happy to sell you one, usually with a "drysuit orientation" that involves pointing you towards the pool and saying "have fun."
PADI also believes that two inflators and deflators adds to task loading and in orer to simplify things IF YOU ARE PROPERLY WEIGHTED it's no big deal to use the suit as Oly said. Problem is how many are properly weighted? My instructor went by the party, sorry I mean PADI line, and taught in theory to use the suit. In reality use the bc however. Since I now dive steel doubles almost exclusively when dry the suit takes ofdf the squeeze and bc for control. Although a little fine work to add air when it's friggin cold is not unheard of.
Similar threads
