WVMike:
As a new drysuit diver I have a few questions and or comments.
1. If you had to remove and replace your tanks underwater would you disconnect the drysuit hose first?
I usually remove it last if removing the BC in the water but it is a personal choice. On most dry suits the inflator assembly can be roatated to accomodate a left or right hose routing and that may have some impact on your choice.
For the most part if the BC or BP/wing is just going off and then right back on, I won't disconnect the hose at all. If I am removing the BC or BP/wing on the surface, I disconnect the inflator hose last to allow me to double check the suit is properly inflated before disconnecting.
2. I where a medium bc, which is a little loose with no suit and 3 mil diving. With my 7 mil neoprene drysuit it is on the boarder line of being two tight. Does anyone have to use two BCs?
I use the same XL sized backplate and harness when switching between a 7mm one piece semi dry and a dry suit. I can get by with the same harness adjustment for both, but it just rides a bit higher with the dry suit and requires a little lenghtening of the crotch strap. So I will make some harness adjustments when switching for the season.
I have also used a back inflate BC in the past and could dive it with both a wet suit and semi dry but some shoulder strap and waist strap adjustment was needed.
My spouse on the other hand dives a conventional jacket style BC. A medium is a little small for her drysuit and a large is a little large for her wet suit, so she owns two. In my opinion valve access is better with a back inflate BC or a BP/wing.
3. Fins, same as above, with a size 11 foot I where XL fins, and these are very tight and do not fit well over drysuit boots. Do you need two pair of fins? I quess I need to look at XXL fins?
A lot depends on the specific dry suit boot and on the strap. My XL jet fins caused my size 10 1/2 EEE feet to cramp in dry suit boots so I switched to a pair of Mares Plana Avanti fins. Mares fins have very large and wide foot pockets as do Aqualung blades and both make good choices for dry suit use I don't think XXl fins are required and I suspect a set of XL fins from Mares may do the trick as they have about the widest foot pockets in the industry.
Recently though I added spring straps to my Jet Fins and had no problems at all with cramping during a vehicle recovery where I spent 2 1/2 hours in 40 degree water during 2 back to back dives. So I have concluded much of the original cramping issue was due to strap adjustment issues rather than the foot pocket itself. In my opinion, the self adjusting nature of a spring strap gives you a better feeling of fin security without the risk or need to over tighten the strap.
The nature of the fin strap also tends to keep it in place on the heel with none of the feeling that the strap is slipping off the heel that can occur with a conventional strap.
