Tips for buoyancy control

[Schwob]

Convex mirror works well for instant feedback

 

[scrane]

Go back to the pool, and adjust your BCD to a point where when you breathe in you go up, and when you exhale you go down. Inflate your BCD with quick, short spurts of air.
Take off your fins so you can't unconsciously adjust your depth mechanically.
In open water, when descending from the surface, as you approach the bottom feed air to your BCD to achieve a soft landing. Quick spurts.
In open water be conscious of your feet. Are you kicking? If so, ask yourself why. If you are kicking to maintain depth your BCD air needs adjustment. The air you feed through your BCD will be more than made up for by the air and energy you save by not fighting physics.
Appreciate the water for what it provides: a truly three dimensional experience. Not only can you fly, you can fly without effort.
In my opinion, adjusting and maintaining neutral buoyancy is the secret of diving.

 

[Octopusprime]

Hello everyone !

As a newbie (I did my certification dives last week-end), I read a fair amount of posts and articles on buoyancy and its importance. So I called the dive shop and spent time in the pool this week to practice. I am planning to do the same every week until I leave for Cozumel at the end of July.

I am wondering if there are exercises I can do to improve my buoyancy control. I came up with few things by myself in the pool, but was curious to see if more experienced divers and instructors here can give me few exercices or tips.

Thanks very much in advance.

(P.S : sorry for my broken English).

First I want to congratulate you for wanting to have good skills. Buoyancy will make your dive so much more fun. There are 2 main things to work on in the pool.

First is the hover. You proberbly did it in your certification class. However they proberbly had you do it vertical. Practice it horizontally in a diving position.

Second while in the hover get about 2ft off the bottom of the pool. Close your eyes and try to maintain the hover. If something touches the bottom of the pool you will know what is your lowest point. Start with 10 seconds and see how long you can make it.

Use your other senses when diving to notice depth changes. Are your ears equalizing in open water does the water temp changes. These are good ways to know you are chafing depth.

 

[seaseadee]

Agreed. A good instructor can help you. If you try and do it yourself, you don 't know what you don't know, you can't see yourself, and you can easily end up missing the important points and reinforcing some bad habits.

A genuine question with no intent to troll: How does someone know their instructor is good or not without taking the class with them? It's a catch 22 for someone who knows not what they don't know. My own experience with a PADI instructor was that I had barely adequate instruction. I can't count how many times I have been slightly bent in my first 75 dives because my instructor placed zero emphasis on proper weighting and trim. I have had to teach myself this (and I'm still not there yet). The trouble is that I could have gotten seriously hurt in the process. I placed too much weight on PADI producing an instructor that would give me the tools to enjoy this sport safely. Instead I got the bare minimum. Mea Culpa.

 

[Seaweed Doc]

A genuine question with no intent to troll: How does someone know their instructor is good or not without taking the class with them? It's a catch 22 for someone who knows not what they don't know. My own experience with a PADI instructor was that I had barely adequate instruction. I can't count how many times I have been slightly bent in my first 75 dives because my instructor placed zero emphasis on proper weighting and trim. I have had to teach myself this (and I'm still not there yet). The trouble is that I could have gotten seriously hurt in the process. I placed too much weight on PADI producing an instructor that would give me the tools to enjoy this sport safely. Instead I got the bare minimum. Mea Culpa.

Do instructors in your area work with divemasters on the openwater checkout dives? If so, I'd ask to talk to a couple of divemasters privately about which instructor they'd recommend. They probably won't trash a bad one, but they may recommend one or two good (or at least decent) ones.

Out of curiosity myself, how do you think your buoyancy (and trim?) issues caused you to get slightly bent? Did you ascend out of control routinely? Or ended up far deeper than you intended to? Honestly curious, as I want to know how to advise student divers better.

 

[rongoodman]

More to the point, how do you define "slightly bent", and how do you know you suffered from such a thing too many times to count?

 

[Trace Malinowski]

I teach in the 1000 Islands about 2.5 hours from Montreal. I think most here would agree my buoyancy control is pretty good. I can teach you to coach yourself.

 

[CWK]

I practice buoyancy control during my safety stop at the end of every dive. I try not to move either hands or feet for the entire safety stop.

 

[seaseadee]

Do instructors in your area work with divemasters on the openwater checkout dives? If so, I'd ask to talk to a couple of divemasters privately about which instructor they'd recommend. They probably won't trash a bad one, but they may recommend one or two good (or at least decent) ones.

Out of curiosity myself, how do you think your buoyancy (and trim?) issues caused you to get slightly bent? Did you ascend out of control routinely? Or ended up far deeper than you intended to? Honestly curious, as I want to know how to advise student divers better.

The one time that was the most obvious to me was when I had a dark round splotches on my skin. That was caused by me riding my NDL up from a 100’ Dive on a local wreck that had some significant current on it. At no point was I given any guidance that this was a bad idea. I found out after the fact reading a thread on this board.
The other times were less obvious. These were not strenuous dives but I would be significantly exhausted after these dives. Those were usually caused by my not being able to control my ascent rate and not being able to hold a safety stop. I’m still having trouble with this in a thick wetsuit. With boardshorts and a vest I have zero issues. So yet another thing that should be covered. How to not only adjust your weighting for different thicknesses of wetsuit but understanding how wetsuit crush affects your bouyancy on ascent.

 

[seaseadee]

More to the point, how do you define "slightly bent", and how do you know you suffered from such a thing too many times to count?

I’ve has one case of the skin bends. Yes , self diagnosed and it went away after a day or two. The other times I could directly correlate me losing control on ascent (sometimes multiple times in the same dive) and feeling like I was in a car accident for the rest of the day. I know you’re probably headed to “you’re not a doctor and you’re probably diagnosing muscle fatigue as the bends”. I’m sure you’re right and My only response is I know my body. When I have it together and ascend slowly I come out of a dive feeling fine and I carry on with my day. When I don’t I feel like crap and have to lay down for the rest of the day.