Is overweighting of OW students a violation of standards?

[Eric Sedletzky]

Just out of curiosity, and because it has been a long time now, I pulled out my original circa 1990 PADI open water work book to look up a few things that seem to be hot button topics as of late. I went to the section about proper weighting. They say proper weighting is when at the surface before the dive you should be able to float with no air in your BC at eye level, then when you exhale you should slowly be able to sink feet first. Upon returning to the surface after the dive you should be able to easily float on the surface with no air in your BC. They went on further to say that some people may choose to add a little air to the BC at the surface to make things a little more comfortable.
I personally use a slightly different approach with weighting. I choose the empty BC at 15 foot stop rule as determining exact proper weighting (no more no less weight than absolutely needed) but none the less, at least PADI's description is better than some of the horrors I here about these days with gross overweighting. My instructor used the rule in the PADI book, and instead of piling more weight on a student who he knew was properly (PADI) weighted he would instruct them to exhale and use their arms in a palm up position to reverse stroke themselves down to where they could either get enough pressure on the suit to sink, or have them flip over and kick down head first, which was covered on how to perform in the 'skin diving' portion of the class. He also stressed "no elevator diving".
If the rules haven't changed from then to now wouldn't that mean that any PADI instructor who purposely and grossly overweights students to keep them on the bottom to to perform skills in an effort to make "his" life easier is in violation and should be reported?

 

[ajduplessis]

I would not use the word violation, the word "crime" is a better desciption IMHO.

 

[Doc]

...If the rules haven't changed from then to now wouldn't that mean that any PADI instructor who purposely and grossly overweights students to keep them on the bottom to to perform skills in an effort to make "his" life easier is in violation and should be reported?

[Lawyering hat on] The two very specific conditions you set to meet that criteria are quite subjective.[/Lawyering hat off]

purposely, grossly, for the ease of instruction

Are we PADI trolling? I'm no stranger to bashing her, myself.

Counsel for the defense presented by the Devils Advocate (google it)...

Other than the imponderables you present, any amount of weight that you stuff in somebody's pockets that makes them sink during their skills dives is likely, in comparison, to be vastly overweighted if and when that noob diver has their epiphany. Not many students get epiphed during certification process.

Your honor, observe that this weighting model was only done with students that had brand new wetsuits (how many might that be?) and were well fed specimens, and were (imagine this), over breathing a bit.

It isn't uncommon for many divers to shed 6 to 12 pounds of lead once they buy themselves a clue or take some kind of Peak Performance Buoyancy type of class.

So.... If with whatever lead weight they have stuffed in their shorts, will the full inflation of their BC make them float like a dead carp?

Yes? They'll float? Case dismissed, with prejudice.

The dissenting opinion....

Every time I see or hear about a first dive experience that included a 2mil wetsuit and 36# of lead (which has been more than once, no joke) that usually begin with the instructor pushing the student off the boat with his foot....

I don't think about "standards violations", I just talk to the noob and find words to say, "May I fix you?"

Dumb assed instructors will do what they do, PADI, SSI, BSAC, NAUI, CMAS, everybody is allowed to take part.

 

[NAM001]

I have never understood that either. As i see it the eye level thing is a way of determining a starting point that should be close to being correct. The idea of overweighting to keep students on a platform may very well work for platform work however if you have any air in hte bladder would it not be bettter to fully vent and stay hard on the platform than pile on lead. I have watched instructors do the lay on the bottom of the pool and inflate till your breathing controls depth but that does not prevent over weighting either, it just demonstrates what neutral feels like. Personally i think there is no other way to determine the correct weight than to be neut at safety stop with no air in the bcd. That should be a process done at a 20 ft platform at the end of the training dive. Or the student should be monitored for when the bladder is empty and note the psi in the tank. Calcualtion can be done from there. The process should then be discussed with the student as to how that relates to 500 psi at 20 ft adn no bladder lift. I know it is a hard thing to do when you have several students. But correct buoyancy is so critical to not only pleasure of the dive but proper execution of a safe dive. you cant trim till you get the buoyancy right. Face it there is not much that is in the OW class bare minimum standards to precclude getting weighted correctly. Yes it does depend on the instructor as to how good the calss is. Many train far beyond teh absolute bare minimum requirements of the class. To be told that bouyancy will be worked out in the AOW class should not be comforting or acceptable by any student. Or instructor for that matter.

 

[KevinNM]

Watch students starting an OW class during the weight check in the pool. They mostly don't stop finning and their breathing is all messed up because they are stressed. So yeah, they end up overweighted. You would too if you did that.

 

[NAM001]

Yes you are right , the pool session is where that should be delt with so the weighting should be close when going to open water and not be grossly overweighted to keep on the platform and not float away.

Watch students starting an OW class during the weight check in the pool. They mostly don't stop finning and their breathing is all messed up because they are stressed. So yeah, they end up overweighted. You would too if you did that.

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

The only problem with the pool and the the real ocean around here is that the pool is in the 80's and the ocean is about 50. Students would croak in the pool with a 7mm on like what they'll be using in the ocean. So to try and figure out what they need in the pool doesn't match. However, in the pool they could work on what proper buoyancy should be and then transfer that knowledge to the ocean. Any good instructor that teaches a lot of classes and does the checkout dives locally should know within a few Lbs what a student should need, especially if it's rental gear. They should be familiar with what the shop rents.

I read reports time and time again of people diving that get into trouble but make it to the surface, only to sink back down and drown.
If people were weighted at least to what I read in my 1990 nPADI OW book then there should be no way this could happen. They should be able to float on the surface no matter what.
My thinking is they never lose the initial teaching of using 35 or 40 lbs of lead from their first OW experience and realize they only should be using something like 18 to 24 lbs (example).
With any sort of wetsuit on shouldn't a diver be able to float on the surface at the beginning of a dive with no air in the BC and a full tank?
I think so, which may be a little lighter than what PADI suggests, but for the 15'/500psi in tank/no air in BC/ method that I use that's the way it works out for me.
BTW, NAUI now uses what they call "the new 15' method", which isn't new at all but apparently they stumbled upon it and use it as their standard now. This is from the NAUI course director at the Sonoma State University diving program. This method weights you a little lighter than PADI's method. As a result they spend more time on pike and kick down methods to get down instead of feet first descents.

 

[kr2y5]

I think the problem starts with some instructors believing that the safety of the dive is a function of how "orderly" the dive appears from the instructor's perspective. I have done the Manta ray dive in Kona several times with different dive ops. One of these ops was particularly intent on micro-managing all aspects of the dive, starting from stubborn insistence that everyone must dive grossly overweighted, to the nonstop harassment on the part of the dive guide, hovering over us like a helicopter and constantly pestering us with annoying requests to adjust one thing or the other... While from that guide's perspective, the dive must have looked orderly, and he probably believed it was safer this way, in my experience it was not only unpleasant, but also dangerous. Even though I have done this dive a few times before, with different dive ops, I felt MUCH more stressed out this time, more anxious, and completely distracted as a result of the dive guide's actions. The problems he was trying to "control" were basically self-induced. It would seem obvious, but for some folks it just doesn't compute.

 

[Nemrod]

Just out of curiosity, and because it has been a long time now, I pulled out my original circa 1990 PADI open water work book to look up a few things that seem to be hot button topics as of late. I went to the section about proper weighting. They say proper weighting is when at the surface before the dive you should be able to float with no air in your BC at eye level, then when you exhale you should slowly be able to sink feet first. Upon returning to the surface after the dive you should be able to easily float on the surface with no air in your BC. They went on further to say that some people may choose to add a little air to the BC at the surface to make things a little more comfortable.
I personally use a slightly different approach with weighting. I choose the empty BC at 15 foot stop rule as determining exact proper weighting (no more no less weight than absolutely needed) but none the less, at least PADI's description is better than some of the horrors I here about these days with gross overweighting. My instructor used the rule in the PADI book, and instead of piling more weight on a student who he knew was properly (PADI) weighted he would instruct them to exhale and use their arms in a palm up position to reverse stroke themselves down to where they could either get enough pressure on the suit to sink, or have them flip over and kick down head first, which was covered on how to perform in the 'skin diving' portion of the class. He also stressed "no elevator diving".
If the rules haven't changed from then to now wouldn't that mean that any PADI instructor who purposely and grossly overweights students to keep them on the bottom to to perform skills in an effort to make "his" life easier is in violation and should be reported?

Well, I was told in another thread I should report roto tilling and kneeling on the bottom? To who?

Same here, I see an instructor with his/her students and his/herself overweighted and exactly to who would this be reported? And, unlike this forum, unless I see someone doing something that is truly likely to endanger their life or is grossly damaging an environment, I try to keep my nose out of their business.

I weight, ideally, old time way, no air in my BC, slightly negative once my suit (if any is compressed) and slightly buoyant at the end of the dive (500ish psi). And yes I can hold a safety stop. And, I count my camera as part of my ballast. But I would rather error on the side of being slightly negative and pop a bubble in my air bag than fight being positive throughout a dive.

N

 

[boulderjohn]

The PADI instructional standards clearly call for students to be properly weighted while diving. In the OW checkout dives, the standards call for them to check and adjust weighting on every dive, with the theory that by the fourth dive they should have it pretty well dialed it. It can be argued that if students are certified without being properly weighted, then the instructor did indeed violate standards.
Here's the problem.

Here's why overweighting happens, IMO.

A number of years ago I changed my instructional strategy for OW classes. I stopped teaching skills to students kneeling on the bottom and started teaching all skills to students who are neutrally buoyant and in horizontal trim. I found that students taught that way learned skills more quickly and looked like real divers by the time they were done with the confined water sessions. After several years of this, I convened a group of like-minded instructors, and we wrote an article about this that PADI accepted for publication in its professional journal. They wanted pictures of skills being done this way, and I posed for them.

When we had the photographic session, I went into the water dressed as I normally would for instruction. That included being a little overweighted, something I always do as an instructor so that I can deal more effectively with student problems. We wanted to do comparison shots showing what was wrong with doing the skills on the knees and why it was better do do them in horizontal trim. I did the shots in horizontal trim first, and then posed for the shots on the knees, something I had not done in years. I couldn't do them on the knees. Every time I tried to do a skill, I would bob up to the surface and lose my balance. In order to pose for those pictures, I had to DOUBLE the amount of lead I was carrying.

So, the standards do call for students to be properly weighted, but if they are properly weighted, you cannot teach them the skills while they are on their knees. For that, you need to have them firmly planted on the bottom, and so they need to be overweighted. In contrast, if you are teaching them in horizontal trim, students have much more difficulty if they are overweighted, so they should be pretty close to properly weighted.

PADI has now said it prefers that students be taught as we explained it in our article, but it does not require it, I am sorry to say. I imagine the overwhelming majority of instructors are still doing it on the knees, and to do that, they simply have to have the students overweighted. I recently did the OW dives for a student who had purposely done his pool sessions in a 7mm suit so he would know his weighting for the OW dives. His pool instructor, who still teaches on the knees, had determined that he needed 22 pounds, and the student insisted on that weight when we started. By the 4th OW dive, I had him down to 10 pounds, and he was delighted with how much easier diving was for him.

---------- Post added August 1st, 2015 at 03:43 PM ----------

Well, I was told in another thread I should report roto tilling and kneeling on the bottom? To who?

Same here, I see an instructor with his/her students and his/herself overweighted and exactly to who would this be reported?

If you see an instructor conducting a class in a way that is harmful to the environment (your point in the other thread), or if you see an instructor violating any other standards, send the instructor's name along with other details (date, location, etc.) to qa@padi.com. For what you describe, pictures would be nice.

BTW, PADI is not the world's only training agency, and pretty much all of them still teach students overweighted and on the knees. I am doing what I can to stamp it out, and I hope everyone does his or her part.