Weight Integrated or Not?

[ChasingRichard]

I have done both and weight intergrated is the best for me. I just jump up on the boat with everything on me and sit down in my seat and strap it onto another tank. My daughter under 100lbs does the same thing and would never go back to a weight belt.

 

[Curly]

...but it is VERY heavy when fully weighted, which makes it more than a cumbersome. It can be difficult to put on with the weights in when there is no bench/tailgate/rock to sit on. I've though about lessening the amount of integrated weight and getting a soft weight belt to compensate.

And WHO takes off a weight-integrated BC and hands it up to someone on the boat?!?!? That's bad manners, let along dangerous.

 

[Northeastwrecks]

When diving singles in cold water, I wear a weight harness. I like the shoulder straps.

When diving singles in warm water, I can get by with a BP&W and no weight.

 

[rds4640]

One thing that I don't see mentioned is if you need to take your BC/BP off while at depth and wearing a drysuit. I have used both WI and weight belt and find WI much more comfortable and convienent. BUT, I personaly wear a weight belt. I do this because if I need to take my rig off underwater i don't have to have a grip-o-death on my BP. With a WB I am weighted enough to make myself neutral. If I still had my Ranger I would wear some weight in the BC and some on a belt as it is better distributed that way.

 

[SA-Diver]

Used to dive weight integrated but have changed back to a belt.
I dive warm water (Indian Ocean) most of the time with 3mm wetsuit and only use 4 pounds.
We dive off RIB's and hand our weightbelts to the boat crew on the surface before we hand them the rest of our gear and exit.
WB makes this easier.

 

[ivansie]

I did my discover scuba, OW and first few dives with a weight belt. Later after more dives and research switched to weight integrated, I have an Oceanic Probe bcd and I really like the weight integrated system it has, easy to load and to remove. plus it has the added security of the clip on handle besides the velcro.

I have no problems getting back into the boat (most of my dives are boat dives) I just pull both weight pouches and pass them or throw them on the platform and thats it... change the tank and put them back in. They are really easy to put back in since the pouches has a certain countour to it that makes it glide easy into the opening.

Another advantage is that since you use soft weights I always grab some from the boat and dont have to be carrying weight around like most people with weight belts.

There are also 2 non ditchable weight pockets where you can put a couple of pounds for trimming.

For my recreatinal diving it works very well.

bye
Ivan