Clearing the ears "no hands"

[John C. Ratliff]

I've got an exercise for you to clear your ears hands-free. Go to the local pool after a swim meet, or better a water ballet meet. Use your current gear and techniques to dive to the bottom, and look around. You are looking for lost nose clips from the divers or swim team members or performers. Now, remember that they have been in a chlorine environment for an extended time, and are therefore clean, so remove your mask and put on the nose clip. Then replace the mask, and again dive to the bottom, this time blowing gently into the mask as you descend. You will find the equalizing, still using the Valsalvo maneuver, easy and hands-free. I use it experimenting with my Hammerhead swimming device while using the dolphin kick. If you cannot equalize your mask, abort and loosen the nose clip.

This technique for hands-free equalizing is as old as skin diving itself, but has been mostly lost to current generations. It was employed by Hans and Lotte Hass in the very early days of skin diving, early 1950s. If you get Hass' book, We Came From The Sea, or Diving to Adventure, you can see both Hans and Lotte using this technique with both free diving and the special rebreather Hans developed, and under oval masks. The photography was with the Rolleimarin housing which I believe Hans also had a hand in developing, and is quite good.

SeaRat

 

[Dan]

Then you have problem defogging / clearing your foggy / flooded mask.

 

[John C. Ratliff]

Nope, you can still blow into the mask to clear it; that's why I said that if you cannot equalize the mask, the clip is too tight. The nose clip technique can be used with any mask, even low volume masks as current nose clips are well designed, and hug the nose.

SeaRat

 

[lamarpaulski]

How many people out of 10 can routinely clear their ears without pinching the nose (by hand or by a noseclip)? I once made a CGI image of a British 1960's frogman with a rebreather with a fullface mask with a big circular window, and someone ticked me off for omitting his noseclip.

I can clear my ears routinely "no hands" by wrinkling my nose using two small muscles called "nasalis" or "compressor naris".

Nasalis muscle - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I dont know what theyre called but I swallow and clear hands free BUT at times i need to pinch nose.

 

[John C. Ratliff]

Here's Lotte Hass demonstrating hands-free clearing in the 1950s:

You can see the nose clips in a few of the scenes, but they took them off for the surface shots.

And here you can see Hans Hass and Lotte Hass using these techniques.

Please remember, this was prior to Cousteau and the Aqualung.

SeaRat

 

[TMHeimer]

Nope, you can still blow into the mask to clear it; that's why I said that if you cannot equalize the mask, the clip is too tight. The nose clip technique can be used with any mask, even low volume masks as current nose clips are well designed, and hug the nose.

SeaRat

Yeah. I have never had the clip(s) too tight. Because it HURTS. I also have never consciously equalised my mask. I only nose clip to scratch my nose UW. John C.--Won't question what you say re Hans/Hass as it seems to make sense to me.

 

[John C. Ratliff]

There is one other technique that was used in the early days, and that is a nose block. One mask, the Swimaster Wide View, used that technique. It was a small piece of foam neoprene placed inside the mask, just below the nose, which could be used to block the nose when blowing through the mask to clear the ears. This still required pushing up against the bottom of the mask though.

It worked for the early oval masks too, which didn't need the neoprene piece; simply push up on the bottom of the mask and the skirt would block the nose, allowing clearing. Some people used the thumb and second knuckle of the firs finger to complete the nose block through the skirt. This was before we had the nose grips built into these masks. This is so you can understand how divers of old (Dumas, Cousteau, Taillez, Lloyd Bridges, etc.) were able to clear their ears without pinching their nose. Below are two photos of me using a USD Champion mask in a 1971 research dive. In the second photo I'm equilizing, but not no-hands. Note it does not have nose grips.

SeaRat

 

[Sbiriguda]

Very nice thread, really
I bump it in case others want to read it
The following are very good hints, among other useful things you said in this thread

 

[Sbiriguda]

It's easy.
As soon as you feel any slight pressure just thrust your lower jaw forward and yawn with your mouth closed. It will open the eustacian (sp) tubes just like when you ascend or descend from altitude in a car.

It's not really a full hard yawn like when your tired, it's more like a half yawn with lower jaw thrusted forward. You leave your mouth closed around the reg. If you can't hold the reg in with lip power then just hold it in with a few fingers while you equalize without breaking the seal and letting water in.
I am sitting on the couch now practicing it and analyzing exactly what I do. I also notice that the back of my tongue goes down and forward which would be the same movement made when you swallow. This combo makes my ears pop open with a crackling sound so that means the eustachian tube is being opened.
I also notice that I flex my facial muscles around my ears to pull the ears back. I tried it without doing this and it does't work as well so this must be part of it.

 

[Sbiriguda]

I've got an exercise for you to clear your ears hands-free. Go to the local pool after a swim meet, or better a water ballet meet. Use your current gear and techniques to dive to the bottom, and look around. You are looking for lost nose clips from the divers or swim team members or performers. Now, remember that they have been in a chlorine environment for an extended time, and are therefore clean, so remove your mask and put on the nose clip. Then replace the mask, and again dive to the bottom, this time blowing gently into the mask as you descend. You will find the equalizing, still using the Valsalvo maneuver, easy and hands-free.
SeaRat