Zeagle Express Tech (44lb) - bit of advice por favor: too floppy with a single??

[roydude]

Howdy all!

Finally got my Zeagle Express Tech (44lb) in the pool last night. After 12 years of diving, this is my first wing and I have to say I'm blown away by the difference between this and any 'standard' bcd's I've tried! With minimal adjustments my trim's perfect (actually it seems to be harder not to have perfect trim with a wing, I think I could fall asleep down there and still be perfectly horizontal!) and, finally, no 'standard bcd' clutter - wooop!!

(The crotch strap I put on it is very comfortable too, but I must remember to undo it before giant stride-ing into the pool with the wing fully inflated :shocked2:!)

I love it love it love it and frankly feel like a born-again diver with it!

Here's the part I'm really not sure of.
I got the 44lb bladder because ...

a. 24lb isn't going to be enough with my drysuit diving,
b. it was very cheap and
c. At some point I want to start twinset / stage cylinder diving (I can just change the backplate to alu and hey presto I'm all set).​

I took it off underwater (for the practice) and noticed that, even with a little air in it, the wing flaps around a lot with the single cylinder I have on it. It does have some bungees holding it down a bit, but I was wanting to squeeze it down a bit further without doing anything horribly unsafe. I was thinking I could pass the bungees through the gromet holes in the bp a bit more to tighten them, or add another bungee to each side etc...

Any ideas on this (I'm not wanting a discussion on 'drag' - I'm not worried about the drag really, just the snag potential and general messy 'floppyness' of it all)?

 

[GrumpyOldGuy]

I think a 44lb wing is too big for a single, regardless of the plate. At that amount of lift, its most likely designed wide enough to be used for doubles or singles. Once size fits all is seldom optimal.

I have an Express Tech with a 35lb wing and it does not taco. I think its about the biggest I would want on a single even in a dry suit.

I would pull the bungees tighter and see it that helps. Also you may wan to put some tri-glides on the bottom of the shoulder straps right before they become the waist belt. If not, there is a tendency to keep tightening up the belt and having the rig ride up despite the crotch strap since the straps are not anchored like in a traditional BP.

 

[Jim Lapenta]

Short answer is the wing is too big for single tank diving. I started with a 24lb and moved up to the 35lb lift as the 24 was just not enough for a heavy steel 95, stage, can light, and weight with a 5 mil. Would have been fine with an al 80 but I prefer steel tanks.
The 44 is just too big for single tanks unless you need to offset lots of weight. It sounds like you went for a wing to do double duty at some point. Problem is that often does not work out either way. It's too much for a single and frankly, with 44 lbs of lift, not enough for many doubles set ups.
other than maybe al80's or lp72's. You could also use it with what I call baby doubles - twin 40's or 50's.
If you really want to properly set things up sell the 44 and buy the 30 or 35. Use it until you are ready to.transition to doubles and buy the al plate, a hog harness, and a wing with the proper lift for your tanks.
I went through the one.harness one plate and just switch em up. Lasted about three dive outings. Too much of a PIA. Ended up ordering a proper set up for.doubles within a month and never looked back. I now have 5 plate and wing setups plus the express tech.
Sent from my DROID X2 using Tapatalk

 

[Shftrdog]

It is to big for a single, you can try the bungies but I would look into getting a second smaller wing for a single tank.

 

[aquaregia]

With the 44# I had a massive taco effect and the SP hose routing caused pinching in the bladder at the top. End result was a very difficult to vent system.

 

[Capt.Gene]

The dimensions of the bag itself really are not much different than the smaller bladders Z offers.
The bungy's length allow the bag to inflate to the rated lift.
If you shorten the length of the bungy the bladder won't fully inflate. It might solve the problem if you feel there is one.

 

[bj139]

Aren't all wings a bit floppy underwater? I bought a Zeagle 44lb donut wing 2 years ago and used to agonize that it was too big, that I should have gotten a 32lb wing. There have been many times since when on a long surface swim I was glad I had a little more lift. I think this is like guys arguing about the size of other things they have. Only in the wing case smaller seems to be better. The only problem is going too small will not work at all. You don't want to be on the bottom all alone, unable to get up, do you? IMHO, just use what you have.

On Monday I was hanging from an SMB, watching some tech divers below me and could see some taco of their wings around their double tanks. I thought, "how unsightly". But, they seemed to be doing fine. And they were.

 

[GrumpyOldGuy]

Aren't all wings a bit floppy underwater? I bought a Zeagle 44lb donut wing 2 years ago and used to agonize that it was too big, that I should have gotten a 32lb wing. There have been many times since when on a long surface swim I was glad I had a little more lift. I think this is like guys arguing about the size of other things they have. Only in the wing case smaller seems to be better. The only problem is going too small will not work at all. You don't want to be on the bottom all alone, unable to get up, do you? IMHO, just use what you have.

On Monday I was hanging from an SMB, watching some tech divers below me and could see some taco of their wings around their double tanks. I thought, "how unsightly". But, they seemed to be doing fine. And they were.

Why would you need the extra lift on the surface? If you are diving dry, you add a little extra air to the d/s. If you diving thick neoprene, you have a ton of lift on the surface anyway. If you are diving thin neoprene, you have something like 10-14 llbs of ballast. In all these cases, 44lbs with a single tank of overkill.

The theory about a proper sized wing being easier to dive is the air you have in a small wing will move less as you make small trim changes. Its like driving a tanker truck 1/2 full, it is more dangerous than driving a tanker truck completely full, simply because there is more of a shift of weight when you break or swerve.

 

[bj139]

On a surface swim on my back it gets a little more of me out of the water, so reduces drag.

I agree that having the exact buoyancy and exact weighting makes diving a joy. I don't think a 44lb wing is dangerous.
Most of my dives are with a drysuit so I only have about 2 breaths of air in my wing until halfway then I let it all out and use the drysuit for buoyancy. Moving the air in the drysuit enables me to control trim. In the summer, I dove wet for a while and experienced trim differences due to air moving in the wing. I used these to control trim as well. In Bermuda, I used this wing with a 3mm suit and was hanging upside down above the reef, motionless. It worked fine. I have also used this with AL80 doubles where it probably had a little more lift than needed but it worked fine.

My drysuit has more buoyancy than I need but I still use it. It has more drag than a tight drysuit but I have to able to get into and out of it. It is just an exposure suit and BC in one. My point is, don't sweat the small stuff. IMHO, an extra 10lbs of lift in a wing is small stuff. But I have never used a 32lb lift wing so I may be full of it.

 

[The Chairman]

I think a 44lb wing is too big for a single

Short answer is the wing is too big for single tank diving.

It is to big for a single, you can try the bungies but I would look into getting a second smaller wing for a single tank.

O rly??? I've been diving that wing since I got my prototype Express Tech. It works just fine and the bungees keep it tamed just fine! Although it started life as a lowly backmounted BCD, I have used it mostly for side mounting now and found that you can tighten up those bungees a LOT without reducing the effectiveness of the bladder. It's my current plan to revert it back to backmount since I have recently adopted the Hollis SMS100 as my standard side mount BC rig.

But then, what do I know?