steel buoyancy

[rstofer]

Yes, I float easily at the beginning and end of the dive even when the BC is nowhere near fully inflated. In fact, I barely sink at the beginning of a dive indicating I'm at least very close to exact weighting. This is obviously due to the 7 mil farmer john. I swim horizontally always: in fact, I need an effort to not swim horizontally. Hovering is a piece of cake. At the surface when my BCD is totally inflated (to the point that air escapes the the quick dump) my unit will sink. It may have been years before I noticed this negative buoyancy had I not been practising the unit removal prior to the DM course. At our first pool session (weight belt only) the unit was of course very buoyant when BC inflated at the surface and I did the skill, so demonstrating it for students in a pool will not be a problem. But it won't work in the ocean with my current configuration with all that BC weight. Who else has 20+ pounds in the BC and a steel tank and has this problem?

Let's just concede that you are properly weighted. The numbers aren't all that different than mine.

What you aren't is 'balanced'. You need to get some of that weight out of the integrated pockets and onto a weight belt or harness,

Find out how much lift your BC can provide, subtract the -10.5# for the tank (HP 100) and a couple of pounds for the regulator. What's left is the maximum amount of lead the rig will support when fully inflated. I wouldn't use all of it; perhaps I would use about 5# less.

The rest of the weight would go in a harness or on a belt. Actually, I wouldn't use integrated weights at all and I would probably use a BP/W with a 5# SS backplate but that's a different discussion.

Richard