breathing & boyancy

[FFMDiver]

I tend to use my lungs a little when trimming, especially when getting close to the bottom - I hold my exhale just a tad to elevate my head and then fin in a new direction. Of course I always pay a lot of attention to breathing during ascent. I find that this minor habit disruspts my normal breathing pattern and I'm concerned about CO2 problems. Is this an extremely bad habit? Should I strictly rely on my inflator?

 

[schford]

Breathing is an integral part of bouyancy contral imho. Most good divers use breathing to help with boyancy - iuts why switching to a rebreather is so challenging for experienced divers.

 

[partridge]

Schford; I know next to nothing about rebreathers but if you still take the air into your lungs and breathe it out, shoudn't you still be able to control buoyancy with your lungs?

 

[jagfish]

I can't confess to know much about rebreathers either, but I did hear someone explain that when you exhale into a rebreather, it fills some kind of holding bag. So as your lungs deflate, this bag inflates, and the overall air volume that influences boyancy remains fairly constant.

I'm sure someone will chime in and be more descriptive...

JAG

 

[Curt Bowen]

Schford; I know next to nothing about rebreathers but if you still take the air into your lungs and breathe it out, shoudn't you still be able to control buoyancy with your lungs?

Using a rebreather you exhale into a bag that has the same volume as your lungs. Your volume never changes when you exhale and inhale making buoyancy control using a rebreather a little more difficult. But it can be mastered after about 10 dives or so.

 

[murphdivers286]

I tend to use my lungs a little when trimming, especially when getting close to the bottom - I hold my exhale just a tad to elevate my head and then fin in a new direction. Of course I always pay a lot of attention to breathing during ascent. I find that this minor habit disruspts my normal breathing pattern and I'm concerned about CO2 problems. Is this an extremely bad habit? Should I strictly rely on my inflator?

From what I was taught, breathing is used for fine tuning your boyancy. If you have to hold your breath, even for a short time, you may have too much lead. Try dropping a couple of lbs.

I have been working on dropping more lead. I notice the more lead I drop, the less up and down movement I do on the bottom. I also noticed I don't have to hold me breath to make my head come up.

 

[Spectre]

Is this an extremely bad habit? Should I strictly rely on my inflator?

Not at all.

In fact, you should -never- add gas with your inflator to obtain positive buoyancy; only to obtain neutral buoyancy.

 

[FFMDiver]

Hmm I like this one.
Thanks for all other responses as well.

Not at all.

In fact, you should -never- add gas with your inflator to obtain positive buoyancy; only to obtain neutral buoyancy.

 

[RIDIVER501]

Not neccessarily true.

if you have done a proper bouyancy check at the surface. dumping any more led will cause you to be positive.

If you are at depth remember that your exposure suit will compress, thus changing your bouyancy characteristics slightly. (making you more negative)

What are the components of a divers bouyancy system.
1. BCD.
2. Lead
3. Exposure suit, if diving dry the dry suit is used inplace of the BCD at the bottom.
4. your lungs (for fine tuning)

if you are slightly heavy at the bottom,when you have already done a proper bouyancy check. you don;t need to remove lead you need to add another small burst for air or two to your BCD/Drysuit.

delaying an inhalation for a few seconds isn't harmful,
delaying an exhalation with a full breath can be fatal.

 

[Curt Bowen]

Not at all.

In fact, you should -never- add gas with your inflator to obtain positive buoyancy; only to obtain neutral buoyancy.

This is not true, once you become an experienced diver, use your inflator as an assistant to get you started up.

In deep diving I use mine to go up all the time. Its there use it, just watch your ascent rate.