Moving on to Drysuit

[hayleyfish]

ok. So I've taken my OW in Mexico and now I'm home here in the Pacific Northwest. I'm so excited to get back out there. But I'm feeling a lot of anxiety about my Drysuit training. I feel like I have a good starter skill base with my bcd in a wetsuit, but for some reason I'm freaking out a bit about learning in the drysuit. Any advise besides to suck it up and put my big girl pants on?
Thanks!!

 

[Marie13]

What specifically concerns you?

 

[KevinNM]

It's harder than it looks, but it gets better the more you do it.

 

[rongoodman]

It will probably help while you're starting to run as little air in the suit as you need to in order keep it from squeezing you. You won't be able to dump air as quickly as you can from a wing or BC, so you'll have to anticipate more.

 

[hunter991]

Some agencies teach to use the drysuit as your BC, others teach to use the BC as a BC. Personally I use the BC as a BC and try to run the minimum amount of air in the drysuit that I can tolerate. Only add air to the drysuit to alleviate squeeze, or if I get cold. As you are early into learning the dry suit try to keep your feet lower than your head, don't run much air in the suit, and also try to stay near something you can hold onto just in case like a rope or a line until you get the hang of things. I started out in dry suit diving using military thermals and other half steps to proper drysuit thermals. While it is doable, there is a much larger learning curve finding non dive thermals that will work and keep you warm in your conditions. If I could do it over again I would have skipped the non scuba thermals and just went to the correct ones right away. Would have saved a lot of aggravation and shivering.

It isn't that hard, but it is different and there is a learning curve associated with it. Hopefully buy from a shop that can teach you, but more importantly that you can dive the suit with on a regular basis as you will got a lot of education and experience just diving it, with a good mentor.

I am a fan of DUI dry suits, but there are lots of good companies out there.

Brent

 

[kelemvor]

ok. So I've taken my OW in Mexico and now I'm home here in the Pacific Northwest. I'm so excited to get back out there. But I'm feeling a lot of anxiety about my Drysuit training. I feel like I have a good starter skill base with my bcd in a wetsuit, but for some reason I'm freaking out a bit about learning in the drysuit. Any advise besides to suck it up and put my big girl pants on?
Thanks!!

Did you already take drysuit training? For me, the class was key. It was also included with my drysuit purchase at my local dive shop. Even if you've already had a drysuit class, if it's included then do it again to gain more comfort.

 

[Lorenzoid]

My wife and I had our reservations, too. We took a drysuit course. It was very helpful, especially for simply calming our fears. We are NOT finding it easy to master the drysuit. We needed to spend yet another day later with the instructor to do more practice. However, everyone says that eventually you overcome the learning curve, and it becomes nearly as natural as a wetsuit. We surely will not be the only ones in the world who simply can't "get it." I am certain that we, too, will eventually reach the point where it feels natural. My point here is only that it can indeed be a hurdle for some people, but everyone assures us it will all be worthwhile in the end.

 

[hayleyfish]

What specifically concerns you?

I've only dived in 5mm wet suit in tropical water. I am taking a pool class with the dry suit as part of my AOW. I really enjoyed my dives and felt very comfortable. The only issue I had was with weighting. I felt that I didn't have enough opportunity to make sure I was at neutral buoyancy and struggled at first on decent. It seemed hard for me to get below the surface and to go down the first few metres. I also struggled with my hover test, but I believe it's because my weights on my belt were all moved to one side so I kept rolling.
Anyway, I guess I'm just worried that it will be too much all at once. New water temp, COLD, new dry suit buoyancy, new instructor. I think I'm just psyching myself out.

 

[hayleyfish]

It will probably help while you're starting to run as little air in the suit as you need to in order keep it from squeezing you. You won't be able to dump air as quickly as you can from a wing or BC, so you'll have to anticipate more.

thank you for the advice!

 

[hayleyfish]

Some agencies teach to use the drysuit as your BC, others teach to use the BC as a BC. Personally I use the BC as a BC and try to run the minimum amount of air in the drysuit that I can tolerate. Only add air to the drysuit to alleviate squeeze, or if I get cold. As you are early into learning the dry suit try to keep your feet lower than your head, don't run much air in the suit, and also try to stay near something you can hold onto just in case like a rope or a line until you get the hang of things. I started out in dry suit diving using military thermals and other half steps to proper drysuit thermals. While it is doable, there is a much larger learning curve finding non dive thermals that will work and keep you warm in your conditions. If I could do it over again I would have skipped the non scuba thermals and just went to the correct ones right away. Would have saved a lot of aggravation and shivering.

It isn't that hard, but it is different and there is a learning curve associated with it. Hopefully buy from a shop that can teach you, but more importantly that you can dive the suit with on a regular basis as you will got a lot of education and experience just diving it, with a good mentor.

I am a fan of DUI dry suits, but there are lots of good companies out there.

Brent

Thank you Brent. I really appreciate the advice to understand the difference between running the BC as the BC and the drysuit as the BC. That will help me wrap my brain around the difference. Also, the advice about the thermals. I was wondering about that and thinking I should get them asap. Thanks again!