Weighting for horizontal trim

[fugly]

Check out your local diving for demos from halycon or dive rite , etc... Try a bp/w and see if it makes a difference.

With a drysuit you'll have to manage that bubble and maybe help with the trim.

 

[Dive the World]

I put 2 pounds on my tank band and that fixed it.

Now I dive wings, back-plate takes care of the weight distribution.

 

[spectrum]

Slmason.72,

What are you using for cylinders? Rental AL80s? Catalina and Luxfur at the 2 likely brands. Catalina will be somewhat tail heavy. I have one of each and it's noticeable when I use them back to back. If you righted even quicker with bent knees it suggest the excess weight is in your midsection, not the feet. The thick bottom of a Catalina is becoming a prime suspect.

Other considerations:

Are you wearing full 6mm booties? If you are using warm water "short boots" this is an opportunity.

If you have access to ankle weights and have a good sense of humor string 2 together and wear the pair around your neck like a dog collar for about 3 pounds of your weight. it should provide a noticeable tip to the see-saw. Probably not a permanent fix but a good indicator.

Bending knees and extending arms are all good postures at times but you should be able to just extend your legs and have your arms at your side and hang there for openers.

As your cylinder depletes it will have an influence on your trim. If you are doing better in one stage of the dive than another this may be a clue. Things like extending arms or even shimmying the weight belt up can also be part of your game plan.

How big is your mask? I assume it's not a fishbowl.

Please keep us all posted,
Pete

 

[Aqua-Andy]

Wow, heads up, knees bent, arms out front, suck in your stomach, stand on one foot and spin around. That sounds like a lot of work. When I was diving my old Avid and ranger BCs I just attached a 3lb ankle weight around the tank valve, that got my trim weight up high enough to keep trim. Once I moved to a BP/W I was in trim without the ankle weight around the neck. But enough of that talk, I don't want to turn this into one of those threads.

 

[ADeadlierSnake]

Regardless of whether its the answer people want to hear, I honestly think a bp/w could be a huge help if you are struggling with being foot heavy. Using a nice stainless steel backplate will give you weight on the torso, and provide you with awesome stability. I would highly recommend trying one out if at all possible. However take it for a few dives. I know I wasnt a fan on my first dive with one. In fact I hated it. Now I cant imagine diving anything else though.

 

[Patrick Sadowski]

I Dive and love my aqualung dimension i3, but am having a hell of a time finding neutral horizontal trim. With a 3 mil wetsuit, 3 mil vest and hood and 3 mil shorts, I use 8 lbs in fresh water, 4-6 in salt with a shorty... I keep all of this weight in the trim pockets, have the tank shoved up so far I cant get my head all the way back and still can't keep from going feet down when neutral... Mind you, I have no trouble maintaining neutral, even at the end of the dive, but I'd like to get my trim set horizontally. I have about 30 dives under my belt and have even done a PPb course hoping to fix this... The instructor ended up just shaking his head. I do have a very low body fat percentage and am somewhat muscular. I sink like a stone and cannot float (think swimming not diving) at all in fresh water without very actively paddling or kicking. I can snorkel in salt water without a flotation device, but only horizontally... If I go vertical, I have to kick to stay up...

I have heard of something called a trim leveler but the website is dead... Is there a way to move the weight further up my back? While typing this, I just had an idea... Since I have the tank shoved so far up, I might have room for another tank band near the shoulder of the tank, I could strap a couple of small weight pockets up there and try to get my cent of gravity to shift even more... I'd really like to get my tank back down a few inches as I'm not fond of the dimple starting to develop in my skull, yet am not willing to give up and hang vertical all of the time.

Any thoughts or suggestions? Anyone else have this problem?

 

[Patrick Sadowski]

Try using a lighter fin. The Seawing Nova's (not Gorilla version) float. Try these and see how it goes.

 

[ZzzKing]

Either the OP has worked out his trim by now or he has moved on to another hobby. This thread is 6 years old.

 

[Andrei Astra]

All my problems with the heavy feet were solved, when I switched to the drysuit.