Best Method for Achieving Trim

[Lorenzoid]

Yes, GUE is a training agency (and more). GUE will set you straight (pun intended), though any decent instructor with a tech-ish mindset, regardless of agency affiliation, should be able to do the same. Check out gue.com. If you take GUE Fundamentals, you could continue your tech training with GUE. Even if you end up continuing your training with a different agency, GUE Fundamentals can provide a great foundation.

 

[Storker]

My (perhaps not so) humble opinion: In a drysuit, don't sweat minor imbalances. Don't try too hard to fix them with gear, try first to fix them with your position in the water. Your trim is so much dependent on your trim (yes, I'm not joking!) since a slightly head-up trim will move air from your feet to your torso, and a slightly feet-up trim will move air from you torso to your feet. So, any trim imbalance will exacerbate ever so slightly, and counteracting that trim imbalance will automatically fix (parts of) your problem.

 

[MichaelMc]

I have a few 1 pound ingots, from old exercise weights, that I added bolt snaps to, with cave line, and taped with gorilla tape. On my harness straps I have a few extra inner tube sections. I can clip these to one inner tube section and tuck the weight under one or two more, much like a D ring and bands for backup lights. That way I can move them mid dive if I did not get my trim right. For the very highest attachment, I have a small loop of cave line by the slot in the plate. Or I can tuck them into my ditchable weight pocket on the harness belt, or into an adjustable pocket on my weight belt. So I have 2-4 pounds of tucked in clip weights I can move most of the length of my torso during the dive. They are not uber secure that way, but are only 1 pound each and not a big deal safety wise if lost. If you get dialed you can replace them with weights in pockets or on your plate.

I also tape and zip tied some ingots to the spine channel or shoulder areas of my backplate once I found what placement worked well.

You can get 1 pound ingots, $3, lead wire, as well as low melt lead free alloys, $14, if you want to get more creative, from rotometals.com/low-melt-fusible-alloys. Though I have not gotten any from them yet.

I have one plate/harness for pool, in a 3mm full, and one for ocean, in a 10mm farmer john and beaver tail. Reconfiguring was too much of a pain, and interrupted the slow process of finding what worked.

 

[RyanT]

I actually have only ever dove with a backplate/wing setup as that was the only BC I ever purchased.

Great, so that's one thing out of the way on your way to tech diving. The next issue is what kind of tank have you been diving? If you go from an AL80, to a steel tank, you may find that the tank(s) will trim quite differently. Also with doubles, the bands and manifold often causes the rig to trim differently from a single tank. Again, of course this will largely depend on the particular type of tanks you move to.

For example, I started out with a set of HP 100s and I found that I had to fiddle with the band placement a bit to get the tanks to trim well for me. I then moved to a set of HP 80s that I now dive as my regular rig. These tanks are so short that there is no room for moving the bands up or down, but they also happen to trim perfectly for me as is. The advice that others have given of working with a mentor is a good one.

 

[PfcAJ]

I have a few 1 pound ingots, from old exercise weights, that I added bolt snaps to, with cave line, and taped with gorilla tape. On my harness straps I have a few extra inner tube sections. I can clip these to one inner tube section and tuck the weight under one or two more, much like a D ring and bands for backup lights. That way I can move them mid dive if I did not get my trim right. For the very highest attachment, I have a small loop of cave line by the slot in the plate. Or I can tuck them into my ditchable weight pocket on the harness belt, or into an adjustable pocket on my weight belt. So I have 2-4 pounds of tucked in clip weights I can move most of the length of my torso during the dive. They are not uber secure that way, but are only 1 pound each and not a big deal safety wise if lost. If you get dialed you can replace them with weights in pockets or on your plate.

I also tape and zip tied some ingots to the spine channel or shoulder areas of my backplate once I found what placement worked well.

You can get 1 pound ingots, $3, lead wire, as well as low melt lead free alloys, $14, if you want to get more creative, from rotometals.com/low-melt-fusible-alloys. Though I have not gotten any from them yet.

I have one plate/harness for pool, in a 3mm full, and one for ocean, in a 10mm farmer john and beaver tail. Reconfiguring was too much of a pain, and interrupted the slow process of finding what worked.

Everything about this is ridiculous. Clipping 1lb weights to innertubes and moving them around mid dive? Come on guys. For real?

April fools right?

 

[AliM]

Yes, GUE is a training agency (and more). GUE will set you straight (pun intended), though any decent instructor with a tech-ish mindset, regardless of agency affiliation, should be able to do the same. Check out gue.com. If you take GUE Fundamentals, you could continue your tech training with GUE. Even if you end up continuing your training with a different agency, GUE Fundamentals can provide a great foundation.

I just spoke to Karim over the phone about the class. Hopefully I can work a schedule somehow to just attend the fundamentals course as an add-on to all my other training. It seems like the type of course that blends with my personality (highly rigorous and methodical).

Great, so that's one thing out of the way on your way to tech diving. The next issue is what kind of tank have you been diving? If you go from an AL80, to a steel tank, you may find that the tank(s) will trim quite differently. Also with doubles, the bands and manifold often causes the rig to trim differently from a single tank. Again, of course this will largely depend on the particular type of tanks you move to.

For example, I started out with a set of HP 100s and I found that I had to fiddle with the band placement a bit to get the tanks to trim well for me. I then moved to a set of HP 80s that I now dive as my regular rig. These tanks are so short that there is no room for moving the bands up or down, but they also happen to trim perfectly for me as is. The advice that others have given of working with a mentor is a good one.

I only recently purchased my own tank (HP100), but have never dove with it. In the past, I just used whatever was available in rentals. Obviously I need to have my rig dialed properly (mostly) so that when I go traveling and don't bring my own tank, I should still trim reasonably so with whatever the rental tank is.

 

[MichaelMc]

Everything about this is ridiculous. Clipping 1lb weights to innertubesnand moving them around mid dive? Come on guys. For real?

April fools right?

I mostly dive Monterey two hours from home. The iteration loop for getting my ocean trim right is get in the ocean, past the surf, with an estimated trim, based on notes, and see how it works. I do that on dives with others, on dives that are not about me getting my trim right, and gear that varies by dive. I could either say, well I need more forward, lets try something like that next time. Or, I could have a way of estimating how much and how far forward, and fix the trim for this dive, during the dive. I choose the second. It has trade offs, my straps are more cluttered. We did three altitude dives at Tahoe where I was unsure how much suit expansion at altitude and new tanks would change trim. I moved two pounds from my waist ditchable pockets to my chest during the first dive, while swimming around with everyone else. During that and a second dive I checked buoyancy by ditching weights until I was neutral with empty BC at a 8' safety just off the bottom, and incidentally still in trim. After two hard bottom dives my trim was redialed for the wall dive. Maybe you can estimate trim better or faster.

 

[sunnyboy]

I used to fuss and fiddle trying to achieve good trim. Eventually with more dives I discovered trim is as much about comfort in the water in your gear than the gear itself. Once I "know" what good trim feels like, I find that I can stay in good trim even when my gear configuration changes significantly. In other words, it's practice, practice, practice - ideally with the same gear & weights.

The essentials IMO are to be properly weighted, with the weight distributed as evenly as possible close to your waist. This holds whether diving a BCD with pouches or a backplate & wing with either a weight harness or weights clipped to the backplate or attached to the tank bands.

The worst thing for holding trim is to be overweighted, especially with a dry suit. Then you have a larger bubble of air (in wing or drysuit) that must be managed and can change or move around quickly because it's large. This really throws off your trim. Being overweighted is a great way to make a very frustrated diver.

 

[PfcAJ]

I mostly dive Monterey two hours from home. The iteration loop for getting my ocean trim right is get in the ocean, past the surf, with an estimated trim, based on notes, and see how it works. I do that on dives with others, on dives that are not about me getting my trim right, and gear that varies by dive. I could either say, well I need more forward, lets try something like that next time. Or, I could have a way of estimating how much and how far forward, and fix the trim for this dive, during the dive. I choose the second. It has trade offs, my straps are more cluttered. We did three altitude dives at Tahoe where I was unsure how much suit expansion at altitude and new tanks would change trim. I moved two pounds from my waist ditchable pockets to my chest during the first dive, while swimming around with everyone else. During that and a second dive I checked buoyancy by ditching weights until I was neutral with empty BC at a 8' safety just off the bottom, and incidentally still in trim. After two hard bottom dives my trim was redialed for the wall dive. Maybe you can estimate trim better or faster.

And this is the type of thing I wrote about earlier. Too caught up fiddling with gear. Expansion of tanks messing with your trim? Of all the things I've hear that's somethin' else.

You're supposed to dive the gear, not the other way around.

 

[MichaelMc]

And this is the type of thing I wrote about earlier. Too caught up fiddling with gear. Expansion of tanks messing with your trim? Of all the things I've hear that's somethin' else.

You're supposed to dive the gear, not the other way around.

Expansion of the wetsuit going from sea level to 6,000', a very thick farmer john/beaver tail, that I love, with 20mm on my core and 10mm on arm/legs, so not a trivial issue. Plus a series of two new different tanks.

I'm supposed to set up on land the things I can control to my best advantage, because the ocean may add enough new uncontrolled stuff for me to worry about.