Dry Suits

[VR78]

Much as I like other Apeks products, there are literally over ten other drysuit brands that I would consider before Apeks. The Fusion KVR1 is a niche product, and a very narrow niche too.

 

[AfterDark]

Been diving dry in New England for more than 40 years both ocean and ice diving. My 1st suit was a Poseidon Unisuit followed by many others all were thick neoprene. My current suit is a Pinnacle Black Ice 4mm crushed neoprene, front entry zipper. IMO using a suit with insulating proprieties of its own is the way to go north of Long Island.

I've been tempted by the White / Aqualung Fusion, a beautiful suit but warmth is depended on the undergarment. Also when a neoprene suit gets a leak, what you have is a lose fitting wetsuit; the cold will take longer to feel and as a side bonus if the suit isn't flooded you have the option of dumping your weights and getting some buoyancy from the suit if the need arise. There is a reason you don't see divers south of Long Island using neoprene dry suits much, they are too warm for those places, the same reason I don't use mine year round. I'm sure there are exceptions caves can have some very cold water.

 

[Compressor]

IMO using a suit with insulating proprieties of its own is the way to go north of Long Island.

Interesting observation AfterDark: I have a few friends that dive with a drysuit and when the water goes below 65 or so the won't dive a second dive because they say they are cold. All of them are diving trilam suits.

I think drysuits are like other dive equipment; one set is not enough. Perhaps one needs a set for different purpose.

 

[AfterDark]

Interesting observation AfterDark: I have a few friends that dive with a drysuit and when the water goes below 65 or so the won't dive a second dive because they say they are cold. All of them are diving trilam suits.

I think drysuits are like other dive equipment; one set is not enough. Perhaps one needs a set for different purpose.

Thank you
65F? When the water goes below 65F I'm still diving wet. I hit dry suit temp around 55F. At 55F I may use just my wicking bottom and top with a sweat shirt over the wicking top, the suit does the rest of the insulating. I have a real drysuit undergarment but it hasn't been cold enough since I bought it to use it. Sweat pants sweat shirts and wicking garments have been enough.

I think a traveling diver that wanted to dive dry would be better served by a trilam suit, but a year round northeast diver would IMO be better off with a neoprene dry suit. The second suit at least in my case is a wet suit, actually a few wet suits depending on water temps. Right now @70F I'm using 3m framer john pants, 2mhooded vest (sleeveless) and a 7m step in jacket. Another month or so I'll change to the 7M farmer john pants, lose the vest until Nov. from Dec.on I'm usually in the drysuit, sooner if the air is cold. Although I like getting wet when I dive, I'd rather get out of the water into 35F air in a drysuit than a wetsuit!

 

[Compressor]

Thank you
65F? When the water goes below 65F I'm still diving wet. I hit dry suit temp around 55F. At 55F I may use just my wicking bottom and top with a sweat shirt over the wicking top, the suit does the rest of the insulating. I have a real drysuit undergarment but it hasn't been cold enough since I bought it to use it. Sweat pants sweat shirts and wicking garments have been enough.

I think a traveling diver that wanted to dive dry would be better served by a trilam suit, but a year round northeast diver would IMO be better off with a neoprene dry suit. The second suit at least in my case is a wet suit, actually a few wet suits depending on water temps. Right now @70F I'm using 3m framer john pants, 2mhooded vest (sleeveless) and a 7m step in jacket. Another month or so I'll change to the 7M farmer john pants, lose the vest until Nov. from Dec.on I'm usually in the drysuit, sooner if the air is cold. Although I like getting wet when I dive, I'd rather get out of the water into 35F air in a drysuit than a wetsuit!

Yes 65. It was not a typo.

 

[Storker]

Interesting observation AfterDark: I have a few friends that dive with a drysuit and when the water goes below 65 or so the won't dive a second dive because they say they are cold. All of them are diving trilam suits.

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If this is correct, it isn't the suit. It's the undergarments. If your friends are cold after a dive in 18C water, I'd guess they don't don an undersuit at all.

I think drysuits are like other dive equipment; one set is not enough. Perhaps one needs a set for different purpose.

And how should those drysuits be different?

 

[Patoux01]

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If this is correct, it isn't the suit. It's the undergarments. If your friends are cold after a dive in 18C water, I'd guess they don't don an undersuit at all.

Also depends on the duration, which people often don't mention. I'm starting to think there's a hidden universal dive-length that everybody (but me) knows, which I think is somewhere around the 40 minutes mark, and sometimes drops below 30 minutes when people start discussing how warm and toasty they are in cold water with their wetsuits.

@compressor , if they had proper undergarment, it's very unlikely that they would be cold.

And how should those drysuits be different?

I could see a different suit for warm water diving and cold water. A "winter" suit made for the thick undergarment is going to feel baggy if you use almost nothing underneath, eg just a xerotherm layer. Not saying it's not usable, simply not as nice to use as a second drysuit made for thinner undergarment.

The rest of us just make sure to take a leak just before zipping up. Unless you've overdosed on coffee or overdone the hydration thing, holding it for an hour or so shouldn't be too hard. And for normal single tank diving, an hour run time is usually enough for most. More than that, and either your fingers are getting cold, you're becoming low on gas since most people use a bit more gas when diving dry or your buddy wants to surface due to the same reasons.

Yeah, that worked for me during my OW cert dives. I really had to take a leak just before the dive, and just after the dive... rather lucky that we were diving from shore I guess, no waiting on the boat holding it.
On a single s80, my dives last around 1 hour too, on a 15l tank (which is more the norm here around), that means I'd get somewhere around 90 minutes. Plenty of time to really think about "damn I gotta piss real bad, but that's definitely the worst reason to cut my buddy's dive short" (although I'll admit, I have no buddy).

The hassle of the p-valve is really overdone IMO. To this day, my biggest issues with it:
1) I pissed myself . Happened only once though.
2) I still have to figure out a way to remove the drysuit "in public", without making it obvious that your best buddy is attached to the suit. This is because everytime I get out of the water, there's about 5 kids running at me to ask questions .

So while I can see people not wanting to use them, I don't think it's really that big a deal to have it, you don't have to use it, but I think most people end up finding they use them all the time.

 

[Compressor]

And how should those drysuits be different?

Answered by Patoux01. I'm not advocating it; it was a thought.

@compressor , if they had proper undergarment, it's very unlikely that they would be cold.

Agree; that's not what I would do. Some are really focused on trim and are terrified to change equipment as that may screw up trim.

I could see a different suit for warm water diving and cold water. A "winter" suit made for the thick undergarment is going to feel baggy if you use almost nothing underneath, eg just a xerotherm layer. Not saying it's not usable, simply not as nice to use as a second drysuit made for thinner undergarment.

Good Points.

All in all our equipment is a tool to use when diving. We need the right tools.

 

[Compressor]

The hassle of the p-valve is really overdone IMO. To this day, my biggest issues with it:
1) I pissed myself . Happened only once though.
2) I still have to figure out a way to remove the drysuit "in public", without making it obvious that your best buddy is attached to the suit. This is because everytime I get out of the water, there's about 5 kids running at me to ask questions .

I think that is hilarious on how you phrased it. Thanks for making me laugh for 10 minutes.

 

[Berry Ke]

Yes 65. It was not a typo.

I think there's something quite wrong if this number 65 (18.3celcius?) is right. Here in The Netherlands I typically do 2 or 3 50-60m dives in water 16c-18c. Like today the water was 18c at surface, around 16c at 10m depth and around 9c at 20m depth. Usually if we go to 20m we stay there like 10m/15m and only when I dive with double 7mm wetsuit/overshorts, the rest we dive with single 7mm wetsuit/no under/over-garment. When the surface temp is below 16c I dive everything with double 7mm.

Also depends on the duration, which people often don't mention. I'm starting to think there's a hidden universal dive-length that everybody (but me) knows, which I think is somewhere around the 40 minutes mark, and sometimes drops below 30 minutes when people start discussing how warm and toasty they are in cold water with their wetsuits.

@compressor , if they had proper undergarment, it's very unlikely that they would be cold.


I could see a different suit for warm water diving and cold water. A "winter" suit made for the thick undergarment is going to feel baggy if you use almost nothing underneath, eg just a xerotherm layer. Not saying it's not usable, simply not as nice to use as a second drysuit made for thinner undergarment.



Yeah, that worked for me during my OW cert dives. I really had to take a leak just before the dive, and just after the dive... rather lucky that we were diving from shore I guess, no waiting on the boat holding it.
On a single s80, my dives last around 1 hour too, on a 15l tank (which is more the norm here around), that means I'd get somewhere around 90 minutes. Plenty of time to really think about "damn I gotta piss real bad, but that's definitely the worst reason to cut my buddy's dive short" (although I'll admit, I have no buddy).

The hassle of the p-valve is really overdone IMO. To this day, my biggest issues with it:
1) I pissed myself . Happened only once though.
2) I still have to figure out a way to remove the drysuit "in public", without making it obvious that your best buddy is attached to the suit. This is because everytime I get out of the water, there's about 5 kids running at me to ask questions .

So while I can see people not wanting to use them, I don't think it's really that big a deal to have it, you don't have to use it, but I think most people end up finding they use them all the time.

Single s80 is like 11L, right? Until now I've been diving with 10L single only and me and my girlfriend dive around 50/60m if we don't go to deep (>12m) with a single 10L and we make sure to come out of the water with at least 50bar (start with 200). Usually my girlfriend has around 10/20bar more left than me. We did exactly 25dives now and I've always been thinking the that our SAC would drop a lot over time/experience but now I'm not sure anymore..
Can you tell a little bit about your SAC? How long did you last with a 10L/11L tank when you started diving? And did you (guys) see your diving time extend over time with the same amount of gas? Is 25 dives enough to have reached your maximum or is this something that improves after 50-100dives? Some friends of mine dives around 90m with a 12L tank. (start 200bar, end 50bar)