Solo with no BCD?

[northcave]

I'm in the Isle of Scilly, UK and I normally solo dive with a drysuit and a BCD. Solo I never go below 10m. It's just my personal self imposed limit.

Anyway, my BCD has developed a leak and I wont use it until repairs or replaced. In the mean time, would anyone here with more experience than me consider diving with just their drysuit and frame and no BCD? I mean I know of some people that use the BCD as their buoyancy device anyway and leave they jacket empty.

If I stick to my self imposed limit of 10m what are your thoughts on this?

 

[Pareto]

Hello

I personally dive solo only with two independent ways to create buoyancy. When I dive in wetsuit is at least a lift bag or the big closed buoy with it.

To use the drysuit for buoyancy I have given up again. I have as little air as necessary, so I have much better trim and stability under water.

Personally, I would not go into the water without BCD, see no reason why to do without it. If your BCD is defective I would recommend you to rent one until you have repaired or replaced as soon as possible.

Greetings from Switzerland
Pareto

 

[hedonist222]

Your BCD is you aid to remain neutrally buoyant as you ascend.
Are you neutrally buoyant in the event that you are without BCD and need to jettison your weights?

 

[diver00011]

You want redundancy when diving solo. Don't let yourself grow complacent.

 

[Wibble]

Given the conditions in the Scillies and with a 10m/33' floor, you’d need to mitigate the loss of a buoyancy source with other measures such as ditchable weights or a SMB which you could pull yourself up on (preferably self inflating) should things go wrong (or you’ve found too many scallops).

If your weighting is OK then no reason not to do this. Let’s be honest, thirty+ years ago this would have been common.

 

[lowviz]

If I stick to my self imposed limit of 10m what are your thoughts on this?

As a true solo diver (to you), our thoughts on this should be meaningless.

If you haven't yet arrived at what is an acceptable risk to you (with ABSOLUTELY NO outside info) then you are a work in progress.

If you have to ask, then you already know the answer. Keep pushing, you'll get there. ..

 

[GJC]

If your drysuit tears or neck seal rips and floods your drysuit, can you swim to the surface and swim on the surface comfortably?

Do you have a lift bag or smb you can float with?

 

[Gandalf-the-Diver]

24 yrs ago, a friend invited me to go diving with him. We had drysuits, back harnesses for the tanks and a weight belt. You wanted to go up, you pointed up and swam. Down, you pointed down and swam. There was no bcd. I did three dives that day; long before I did any training.

 

[Pareto]

Hello all

A few years ago you still dived J Valves, had no SPG and went much deeper than 40m (130Feet) with air.I think today there is no reason to do without a BCD, unless you dive a setup that is designed exactly for this.
If a piece of equipment is defective it should be replaced or repaired. However, I think it is negligent to just leave it out and hope that it will be fine (especially on solo dives).

Greetings
Petar

 

[Celt]

You can dive safely without a bcd if you’re setup to do it. A heavy neoprene drysuit with built in buoyancy and ditchable weights, you need to be buoyant on the surface in a flooded suit,