Nomad Weight Plate

Has anyone had a chance to try or give me your take on the new Dive rite Nomad Weight Plate. Before I spend the cash Id like to get idea if its worth it from some vetran sidemount divers
as weight placement is really a pain with the nomad for me AsIm just getting started in sidemount

Buy it, I designed something very similar for myself and asked dive rite if they could make one or would offer it. They declined at that time so I built my own, which you can see online at TDS months ago. I love it. Hell you can even add a soft v-weight and add even more weight....

If your in cold water, this is a very comfortable way to carry weight.

Edit: I want to point out, I am not accusing anyone of stealing or anything. Dive Rite didn't copy anything it's just a similar idea. They have great products, of which I own many. I'm sure it is high quality, and in fact I might buy one too. Don't hesitate.

Never felt the need for it personally.

Normally use 104's that are heavy enough to not need any extra weight. Diving 95s I will put a 4 pound weight on my waiststrap. Al 80's and I would put some weight on the camstraps on the bottom of the tanks.

Well I have ordered it should be here in a few days.I do need the extra weight with the 95s and plan to take the nomad when I travel which is AL80s most the time.and once the weather brakes on the Greatlakes ill be sidemounting the wrecks
which will be drysuit and heavy thermals.also doe anyone use the X8 130s for sidemount?

divewelder:

Has anyone had a chance to try or give me your take on the new Dive rite Nomad Weight Plate. Before I spend the cash Id like to get idea if its worth it from some vetran sidemount divers
as weight placement is really a pain with the nomad for me AsIm just getting started in sidemount

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I certainly wouldn't call myself a veteran sidemount diver, but I don't really see a need for the weight pack unless you will be diving with thick thermal protection. Most of the people I have seen diving NOMAD's in Florida (including myself) dive with two pound weights up on the shoulder straps. Of course I am diving in 68* water in the springs. Even the people I see diving Drysuits use about the same shoulder weight. Of course they are not wearing as thick of thermal protection underneath as one would need for much cooler water temps.

wjefferis:

I certainly wouldn't call myself a veteran sidemount diver, but I don't really see a need for the weight pack unless you will be diving with thick thermal protection. Most of the people I have seen diving NOMAD's in Florida (including myself) dive with two pound weights up on the shoulder straps. Of course I am diving in 68* water in the springs. Even the people I see diving Drysuits use about the same shoulder weight. Of course they are not wearing as thick of thermal protection underneath as one would need for much cooler water temps.

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I'm diving nomad in 34-41 degree water in Minnesota, with aluminum 80's and 22lbs of lead. 18lbs is in my custom pack, like what the OP asked about and the rest is on my waist strap under the nomad shoulder strap attachment point.

I experimented with weight on a standard piece of webbing attached view sex buts to the top and bottom holes in the nomad, but the results were less than optimum.

Consequently, I bought the weight plate. I played in the quarry today seeing how sidemount went in really cold water with the plate. I had my heavy DUI undergarment with a vest on top. Normally, I have 2 pounds of weight on each shoulder strap and that works great in terms of trim in N FL with a dry suit and lightweight underwear.

For today's 39 degree tempts, I started with 5 pounds with 2500 psi in X7-100s, but I had to dump everything and put a squeeze in the suit to even get close to neutral. The heavy weight undies are ptretty floaty compared to what I wear in FL. I added two 4 pound weights, along with the original 3 pound weight and a 2 pound weight in the pockets on the weight plate and that worked very well overall with enough weight to loft the insulation as well as hold a safety stop with 500 psi on each tank.

Trim wise, I started with the weight plate it in the middle holes on the Nomad but trim was less than wonderful with a distinctly feet low tendency. For the second and third dives, I moved the plate to the top hole and trim was great.

One annoying thing about the plate is that the holes in the weight plate are about 1 hole diameter too long, putting a bit of a bend in the plate and pressing on each screw. Be sure to tighten them both down a lot as the pressure and the bend tends to defeat their otherwise self locking traits and when the top one comes loose, things get interesting in terms of trim. I see a hole punch and a couple new grommets coming in the very near future.

Overall, the plate worked well and removing and replacing the tanks went very smoothly as did swinging them forward both individually and together with only very slight head down trim issues. All in all it was very smooth and required far less adjustment than I anticipated.

I saw a blurb from Lamar stating that the holes were intentionally a little further spaced due to the weight plate bending when weights were installed. I think it was on the DiveRite website description of the new weight system. I'm considering it myself,as well. good luck!

SCUBA Diving Equipment for Technical, Wreck and Cave Diving: Dive Rite, Inc - Product Catalog - Nomad Weight Plate
this is it...

I heard that explanation/warning at the shop and it made sense at the time. And it continued to do so until I actually took the plate out of the bag and installed it.

From the DR site:

"The grommets of the plate measure at 11.5-inches center-to-center, giving an extra 0.5-inch of spacing as compared to the grommets of the Nomad backplate. This allows the plate to align once it is filled with weight as the extra length is absorbed as the plate 'thickens'."

The problem is that the weight plate is constructed just like the butt plate - nylon on each side of a hard but semi-flexible inner core. The pockets are sewn on the upper layer of fabric and as such there is nothing to "thicken" and no lenght is "absorbed".

What DR desribes would make sense if the pockets were sewn on a single piece of fabric where that fabric would have to run around one side of the weights when the pockets are filled, but that is clearly not the case. That approach would also be problematic as the degree of "thickening" would vary with the amount and type of weight used and the end result would not be as stable as the weights in the plate would have some fore and aft movement.

That was exactly the problem I had with my DIY attempt and the "build it like the buttplate" approach DR used works much better. However I can't help feeling like the 11.5" hole centers were part of a earlier single piece of fabric prototype and were carried forward into the current design, perhaps in error and not noticed until they had a gazillion units in stock.

In any event, the effect is the same - the weight in the plate tries to flatten it and the grommets on each end push outward on the screws on each end due to the extra .5" lenght, creating stresses that just don't need to be there.