Can't stay afloat

[ReddAntt]

I have been following the board for a little and did a few dives myself however this question is more about my brother. He sinks like a rock and getting him into diving doesn't change that fact. He just started to get his open water cert. and is doing his pool sessions and this is where his problem showed, he has done all his skills great so far ad he is comfortable underwater but he has a problem staying on the surface. I know don't we all wish it was easy to stay down and our bodies wanted to go under but he can't stay up. He had on a jacket style BC, a shorty 3mm wetsuit, 5mm boots, and all the rest of the standard equipment with no weights and no air in the BC and sank. It took to the point of having the BC to being 3/4 of the way full of air to bring himself to eye level on the water. Has anyone had this problem before or how would you fix this?
Sorry for misspells or anything else.

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[Herb-alaska]

I have been following the board for a little and did a few dives myself however this question is more about my brother. He sinks like a rock and getting him into diving doesn't change that fact. He just started to get his open water cert. and is doing his pool sessions and this is where his problem showed, he has done all his skills great so far ad he is comfortable underwater but he has a problem staying on the surface. I know don't we all wish it was easy to stay down and our bodies wanted to go under but he can't stay up. He had on a jacket style BC, a shorty 3mm wetsuit, 5mm boots, and all the rest of the standard equipment with no weights and no air in the BC and sank. It took to the point of having the BC to being 3/4 of the way full of air to bring himself to eye level on the water. Has anyone had this problem before or how would you fix this?
Sorry for misspells or anything else.

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if the BCD would not float him above his eyes he is overweighted or the bladder of the BCD is under sized. If he is in anything other than a AL tank then put him in an al 80 and get a larger bladder BCD. there is not a person that I can think of that is so negative alone that a 50 lb bcd bladder would not float them high.

 

[ReddAntt]

He can float with the help of the BC but it has to be 3/4 of the way full of air and he only has an extra 2.5 lbs of weight just to have weight

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[rivers]

thicker wetsuit?

 

[sphyrnidus]

Some people do not need a lot of weight. And a bigger blader in the BCD is a good plan.

 

[Timmyjoe]

Also you might want to check the BCD he was using to make sure it's not half full of water. On my first pool session in my OW classes, the previous user of my BCD did not drain it and being a newbie I just put it on and couldn't figure out why it didn't float me so well. After our pool session we cleaned up the gear and found a couple gallons of water in my BCD.

 

[Imla]

He can float with the help of the BC but it has to be 3/4 of the way full of air and he only has an extra 2.5 lbs of weight just to have weight

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Why does he have the extra 2,5 pounds??

 

[ReddAntt]

He does plan on getting a 7mm wetsuit soon because the lakes are still cold here and I thought that should help a bit, this pool session he is going to be using his own gear including the BC and I know for a fact it has no water in the bladder and hopefully it helps as well, lmla he has the 2.5 pounds as his weights and that is it. My concern is that with so much air in the BC would that be a problem at depth at stay neutral and is there a greater risk of an uncontrolled assent with that much gas trying to expand on the way up?

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[Redshift]

But if he sinks so easily why would he have extra 2.5 pounds?!

 

[ReddAntt]

It is just so he has weight on the belt, he can sink without any weigh at all but then that creates an unsafe dive.

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