Which equalization technique do you use MOST OFTEN?

Which equalization technique do you use most often?

  • Valsalva

    Votes: 90 67.7%
  • Toynbee

    Votes: 7 5.3%
  • Lowry

    Votes: 4 3.0%
  • Edmonds

    Votes: 2 1.5%
  • Frenzel

    Votes: 6 4.5%
  • VTO

    Votes: 13 9.8%
  • other (please explain below)

    Votes: 11 8.3%

  • Total voters
    133

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knotical

perpetual student
Scuba Instructor
Messages
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Location
Ka'u
# of dives
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If you don’t remember the names, the following descriptions of techniques are extracted from: http://www.diversalertnetwork.org/medical/articles/download/DiversGuidetoEars.pdf

Valsalva Maneuver
This is the method most divers learn: Pinch your nostrils (or close them against your mask skirt) and blow through your nose. The resulting overpressure in your throat usually forces air up your Eustachian tubes.
< But the Valsalva maneuver has three problems: It does not activate muscles which open the Eustachian tubes, so it may not work if the tubes are already locked by a pressure differential. It's all too easy to blow hard enough to damage something. And blowing against a blocked nose raises your internal fluid pressure, including the fluid pressure in your inner ear, which may rupture your "round windows." So don't blow too hard, and don't maintain pressure for more than five seconds. >

Toynbee Maneuver
With your nostrils pinched or blocked against your mask skirt, swallow. Swallowing pulls open your Eustachian tubes while the movement of your tongue, with your nose closed, Compresses air against them.

Lowry Technique
A combination of Valsalva and Toynbee: while closing your nostrils, blow and swallow at the same time.

Edmonds Technique
While tensing the soft palate (the soft tissue at the back of the roof of your mouth)
and throat muscles and pushing the jaw forward and down, do a Valsalva maneuver.

Frenzel Maneuver
Close your nostrils, and close the back of your throat as if straining to lift a weight. Then make the sound of the letter "K." This forces the back of your tongue upward, compressing air against the openings of your Eustachian tubes.

VTO (Voluntary Tubal Opening)
Tense the muscles of the soft palate and the throat while pushing the jaw forward and down as if starting to yawn. These muscles pull the Eustachian tubes open. This requires a lot of practice, but some divers can learn to control those muscles and hold their tubes open for continuous equalization.
 
I tend to just swallow without pinching my nose. Maybe I'll try pinching and see if it would help.
 
Glad there's not only me! I get funny looks when I say I can't do the valsalva method and only seem to be able to swallow without doing anything else.
 
Valsalva because it always works for me. Also I use Toynbee, VTO, and anything else, that work. When I dive a lot in a short period of time, equalization is easy and I don't pay attention to what I'm doing, which is the VTO, I think.



Bob
 
Maybe what I do is close to the VTO, though I don't push my jaw forward. I just open my Eustachian tubes somehow--like when yawning, but I don't have to yawn. I just make my ears "crackle". I can hold the "crackle" position at will and do this on land if something really noisey approaches (like a fire truck while I'm walking)--so I don't plug my ears with my fingers looking like a dork. If I'm going down real fast I do occasionally swallow now and then.
 
I'm a valsalva man. It works every time for me.
 
Valsalva for me. Early and often. It just works for me. I can descend as fast as I need to with no issue.
 
https://www.shearwater.com/products/swift/

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