How crackpot is this?

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divad

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I have a Dacor dry suit that is way too big in the hips. I was thinking of folding over and gluing the lateral seams, but now am thinking about Velcro-ing them. Am I trying to fix a problem that doesn't exist?
 
123Scuba.com:
Hmmm... Would the Velcro be strong enough to hold when you add air to the suit? I have heard of divers wrapping velcro straps around arms/legs.






I've never used a dry suit so I know almost nothing about dry suit dynamics, but I don't think a small bubble of air would exert much pressure. Is this wrong?
 
Suits can move a fair amount of air, especially if the diver is still getting used to the feel of a suit and over inflating. The waist strap on your BC may naturally cinch up the extra space your talking about. Have you tried that? Drysuits can be finicky, especially when you start trying to stick stuff to them. :D
 
Finicky eh? I'm more likely to under-inflate.
 
123Scuba.com:
Well, I guess that's my nice way of putting it. :D







Does that mean "yes it's a crackpot scheme" or just "pretty crackpot?"
 
Well there are a couple of things to take into consideration.

When you get into a dry suit you are going to squat down and try to force out as much air as you can. This should causes the bagginess to suck up next to your skin. If its not huge this shouldn't cause much of any issue.

Using the dry suit in the water there are two methods that are taught. One school of thought teaches using the drysuit for managing squeeze and buoyancy. That is you add enough air to manage the squeeze you feel and to maintain neutral buoyancy. The other teaches adding just enough air to keep the squeeze off and use your BC for bouyancy control as normal.

IMHO if you are adding more air than required to just keep the squeeze off this air can move around the suit and make trim and bouyancy control difficult. I think having extra room in the legs is going to make this worse because a feet up ascent can happen in a drysuit and you won't be able to dump any air.

If its so big that its not managable IMHO you need a different suit or a professional modification of that suit.

Good luck, diving dry is great!
 
https://www.shearwater.com/products/perdix-ai/

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