Nomad LT 10lbs limit

In looking at the Nomad LT I noticed that it has the following disclaimer:


Now, does this imply that if you normally need 12 lbs or more of weight to become neutrally buoyant that this wing will not work? Or did they really mean to say that once you find how much weight it takes to become neutrally buoyant, that you then have 10lbs of buffer for trim, accessories, etc?

Reason I ask is because my wife may now want a sidemount rig after seeing me dive with the Hollis SMS 50 that I own, but she normally dives with around 14lbs of weight with her current setup. She has tried my SMS 50, but only in the pool so far. The Nomad LT is currently around $100 less than buying another SMS 50.

Let me add that this would be for diving with Aluminum 80s, 3-5mm wet suite, and purely open water.

Thanks,

Paul

Because of the lift capacity they do not recommend any more then 10 additional lbs. (on tanks or harness) because it will not keep you afloat at the surface. With 3-5mm wetsuit diving, 2 Alum 80's, you shouldn't need more then that in worst case scenario.

Thanks for the reply, but apparently I'm having an issue with my reading comprehension because that still doesn't clear it up for me. I believe it's the use of "additional" in both your reply and in DiveRite's disclaimer. I guess I want to read that to mean "in addition to the weight you would use to make yourself neutrally buoyant". So as an example if I would normally need 8 lbs of lead when using a wetsuit to become neutrally buoyant then I still have an additional 10lbs of weight that I could add for fixing trim or other buoyancy issues. Not that I now would only have 2lbs available for fixing trim, etc...

Wayne at DiveSeekers:

Because of the lift capacity they do not recommend any more then 10 additional lbs. (on tanks or harness) because it will not keep you afloat at the surface. With 3-5mm wetsuit diving, 2 Alum 80's, you shouldn't need more then that in worst case scenario.

Click to expand...

Please explain this response. For example, my wife's 5mm Henderson jump suit (size 8) Requires 10 lb of lead to make it neutral at the surface. An aluminum 80 with valve and regs requires about 2 lp to be neutral when almost empty. Additionally, her inherent buoyancy in salt water requires about 4 lb to make her body mass neutral. How does that work against the Nomad LT recommended limit of 10 pounds?

The BC is rated for 22 Lbs lift. This means that at no point during the dive can she be more than 22Lbs negative, for any combination of reasons (weight of gas, wetsuit compression) because the BC will not have enough lift to make her neutral.

They recommend not being more than 10 Lbs negative because that would leave less than 12 Lbs of lift to float her on the surface, which may or may not be enough, depending on how much "altitude" she likes.

The worst case would be a really thick wetsuit and large tanks, however you would really need to do the calculations yourself, once you know the buoyancy characteristics of the tanks and the suit.

In any case, I wouldn't use non-ditchable weight, but would opt for a weight harness, so if she's ever on the surface and needs to be more buoyant, it's easy, not impossible. I was never fond of bolt-on or channel weights.

From my reading, they're not talking about the total amount of lead she carries, but how negative she can become.

flots.