Correct Weighting...

[Erik Il Rosso]

During the last 4 months I lost about 16 kgs and passed from 116 Kg to 100 Kg and I am still dropping in weight...

This simply means the it is time for a serious weight check next saturday...

At the end of the dive, once the safety stop is finished, I will empty the tank up to 50 bars and I will start to remove leads until I will be neutral at - 5/6 metres...

This should be the right way to have a near perfect weighting, right ???

My question is, when I will do this check I will be probably calm and relaxed and with a correct breathing pattern but what is going to happen if I should encounter a problem while underwater and start to breath with an irregular breathing pattern ???

I know that we should always be in control of the situation, I know that we should "Stop, Breath And Think" but not more than 3 weeks ago I had a problem and I had a hell of a time trying to mantain depth...

Should I find the correct weighting and then add 1 or 2 Kgs to my weight belt ???

Waiting for your comments...

Ciao Erik Il Rosso

 

[herman]

There are 2 basic opinions on the "proper" weighting. One is to adjust your weight for no air in your BC at your safety stop depth (the one you have above). The other has you get neutral at the surface. This will require that you have a small amount of air in your BC at your safety stop depth. I prefer this one for a couple of reasons. First, it gives you the option of removing a little air at your safety stop depth if you need a little more negative buoyancy for some reason. In addition, its easier to do because you don't have to yoyo up and down to add/remove weight to get the correct amount.

 

[Vayu]

Weight to be neutral at 50 bar or less. If you are worried about control, you can add more weight to compensate or practice more.

 

[dbulmer]

Erik
You asked:-
"My question is, when I will do this check I will be probably calm and relaxed and with a correct breathing pattern but what is going to happen if I should encounter a problem while underwater and start to breath with an irregular breathing pattern ??? "

Calm and relaxed is the state you will normally want to be in while diving. If you have a problem and your breathing is erratic then incorrect weighting isn't going to help.

Correct weighting on the other hand gives you better overall buoyancy control and reduces the risk that your breathing pattern might impact your bouyancy while dealing with a problem. ie the closer you are to neutral buoyancy the easier it becomes to resolve a problem ie less stress/anxiety therefore less risk that erratic breathing affects your buoyancy. If you are overweighted, you have more air/gas to control and you have a less direct means of controlling it. Buoyancy control via the lungs is a very direct way of controlling your bouyancy as opposed to dumping air from a BC or drysuit.

 

[TSandM]

One of the things you train for is to be able to cope with being stressed without losing your buoyancy control, which means controlling your breathing. This is learnable -- when I started, anything you asked me to do underwater made me lose buoyancy control, but today, that's improved immensely.

A point about weighting that I learned the hard way this week, though -- If you weight yourself to be neutral in shallow water at 500 psi, then if you shoot a bag and do an ascent while winding up the spool, the tension you put on the line to keep it taut will cork you. Therefore, it is good to weight yourself very slightly negative under those conditions if you carry and may need to deploy an SMB.

 

[spectrum]

Neutral at 15 feet or bobbing at eye level are the common balance points. Since it's best to make a nice slow final ascent and you can't control stuff such as surge I tend to prefer the bobbing route, I thnk it goes a pound or 2 more and should not make a significant difference during the dive.

Pete

 

[Erik Il Rosso]

One of the things you train for is to be able to cope with being stressed without losing your buoyancy control, which means controlling your breathing. This is learnable -- when I started, anything you asked me to do underwater made me lose buoyancy control, but today, that's improved immensely.

A point about weighting that I learned the hard way this week, though -- If you weight yourself to be neutral in shallow water at 500 psi, then if you shoot a bag and do an ascent while winding up the spool, the tension you put on the line to keep it taut will cork you. Therefore, it is good to weight yourself very slightly negative under those conditions if you carry and may need to deploy an SMB.

I carry and sometimes need to deploy an SMB thefore I think that tomorrow I will tend to be slightly negative during my weight check...

Another thing, if I will ever decide to cross the ocean to dive in the USA I need to know where you are, I simply would like to dive with you and your friends...

If you and your husband should ever decide to visit and dive Italy you will be my guest !!!

Ciao Erik Il Rosso

 

[TSandM]

We're up in the northwest corner of the country, in the Seattle area. If you ever make a trip to the US, this is a wonderful area to visit, for diving and for other outdoor activities (there ARE other outdoor activities, right?)

I haven't had the opportunity to visit Italy at all yet, but someday.