Not serious but a pain

[IndigoBlue]

i know i breath deep and slowly, someone did mention about "skip Breathing" i wasnt sure about that 'cose every book says dont hold your breath. in a few weeks i am off to Tenerife to live so there will be loads of chances to dive, and a lot warmer than the UK, thanks for your advice! hope you dont mind me asking questions, but without questions you never learn

Youre in the UK.

Have you got a drysuit yet? If not, the added warmth will improve your air consumption by half, possibly, if you get one.

Warm water diving is even better yet, but you might find that you need a 3mm wetsuit even then.

 

[Xela-Tess]

I am about to arrange to do a dry suit course, if i can arrange it before i move to Tenerife but to be honest i dont fancy the cold to much, but i am going to give it a go!

 

[DivemasterSteve]

hope you dont mind me asking questions, but without questions you never learn

thats what this site is for, please ask all the questions you want to and i bet you will get plenty of answers to your questions. thats how we all learn.

steve

 

[String]

my problem is that i seem to go through a tank quicker than any one else, how do i reduce my consumption, (i know Breath less!) is it better to breathe deeper but slower or shallower but quicker, hope you understand what i mean.

Dive more often !

 

[pipedope]

For water over your head.

 

[DiveSurgeon]

All very good advice on here. The best thing to do is dive more. This will sound stupid but I also found 3 simple tricks to be useful early on......

Breathe slowly and regularly. OK that's easy to say. But we all do it every night for 8 hours or so. Find a place in the water column where you can safely close your eyes for a few seconds....it will calm you....you breathe evenly....you are feeling sleepy....sleepy.....LOL. Get the sense of what that feels like and train yourself to breathe like that. A guy in our group 2 years ago used less air than anyone else, and he was more out of shape....but he was into a lot of mind control/breathing excercises, so it seems to work.

Loosen up on the mouthpiece. It is meant to hold the regulator in your mouth, but a deathgrip with gritted teeth isn't needed. By doing this, you may relax a bit more.

Take it easy on the finning. Unless you are going against a current, I have almost never found constant motion along a reef to make for good diving. Some of the best dives I had were just slowly tooling around a group ot two of coral heads. It is amazing what you can see when you give it a chance. Less finning means less CO2 production in the tissues...hence less stimulation to breathe more often.


Joe

 

[Tekk Diver]

Inhale for 3 seconds. Exhale for 5 seconds...this will reduce CO2 build-up.

 

[mogwai]

It will come in time, i am new to this as well but have got my air consumption down big time. But that is because i have had 27 dives since the end of september. The more you do it the more comfortable you get. Can feel myself getting nice and loose and relaxed in the water, don't tense up and get comfortable with your bouyancy and you will be amazed at the difference in air use. I have been. Keeping nice and relaxed has worked wonders for my air use. Have got up to 54 mins out of a cylinder, even in conditions that were damn cold. Time in the water is the thing that seems to make the difference. As in life experience is everything.

 

[Conor]

There can be a bit of bravado about air consumption...where everyone starts comparing guages after a dive. Personally, my advice would be not to worry about it too much at this stage (you can always get a bigger cylinder). Focus on increasing your comfort, Getting your buoyancy/trim sorted out and getting comfortable with the whole underwater world and the new kit.

As your experience increases it will improve (you will be more relaxed and conserve more energy/air)....if at the point you feel totally at ease with the rest of your diving your air consumption is shortening dives then actively work at improving it, otherwise add it to list of skills you want to gradually improve (its not like they give you money back for air you don't use ).

I would say that worrying about air consumptin too much and too early can actually make things worse. When I learned to dive my consumption was crap, then I got my own regs and it was on a par with the guides I was diving with, then I took a break for 6 months and for a few days it was back to the start again. So the other advice would be dive much and often.

Hope this helps

Conor

 

[Diver0001]

some advice please. i have just started Diving (wish i had taken it up 20 years ago!) and did my ow and aow back to back ok some people dont agree with this, but two weeks of diving was fantastic. my problem is that i seem to go through a tank quicker than any one else, how do i reduce my consumption, (i know Breath less!) is it better to breathe deeper but slower or shallower but quicker, hope you understand what i mean.

You could use a bigger tank for the time-being. Eventually it will go down all by itself.

R..