Diving with a Dry Suit but with no training

[joyfulsun]

Hi all. Do I need special training to use a dry suit?
I'm a warm water diver with no dry suit experience and will be going to Iceland in 2 weeks time. There is a guided day tour to Silfra which is 3 to 4 degrees C and according to the dive center, with or without dry suit experience, I can do the dive. What do you think?

 

[Divedoggie]

You don't HAVE to take the course, but you absolutely should train and practice in the drysuit before you actually go do a dive.
Buoyancy, weighting, control, fit, etc., are critical issues.

 

[Azza]

At least borrow a drysuit for an evening and go for a dive in a pool with it.

I bought my drysuit after 150 dives in a wetsuit and it was like learning to dive all over again with regard to buoyancy and trim.

 

[NSDiver]

Definetly need to at least try it out first. Diving with a drysuit isn't hard, but it is a lot different than diving with a wetsuit. That being said, it is really worth the trouble to learn to dive with a drysuit.

-Nick

 

[kidspot]

Are you buying a Drysuit or renting while there? If renting they may require the "card" - if you are buying one, I'd recommend using it in your local water first - just use very light undergarments (I've used mine in water up to 84*f comfortably) This is assuming it's a shell type suit. Do a couple of dives with it, keeping things easy. Another thing that made the transition simple for me from wet to dry diving was having very little air in the suit. This makes it closer to wet suit response. The other thing to learn is to dump air early on your ascents - plan ahead as it doesn't exhaust air as fast as your BC does.

Aloha, Tim

 

[joyfulsun]

Thanks for the advice guys but if there is no chance to practice in a dry suit before the dive, can you offer any important 1st timer dry suit tips (aside from prayers) before jumping into the Silfra fissure.

 

[joyfulsun]

Hi Tim,

Thanks for the dry suit tips. No I'm not buying the suit. The package includes all equipment including the dry suit.

 

[TimAZ]

First, I would not recommend using one without training. While most of dry suit diving will seem like second nature after just a few dives, up to that there are great opportunities to hurt yourself. But, if you are going out w/o training, focus on not allowing yourself to become inverted. There is no dump valve near your feet and as you ascend, righting yourself becomes increasingly difficult. You may wish to consider ankle weights or gaiters. Also keeping your dump valve mostly open helps to limit the amount of air in your suit.

 

[Daryl Morse]

Hi all. Do I need special training to use a dry suit?
I'm a warm water diver with no dry suit experience and will be going to Iceland in 2 weeks time. There is a guided day tour to Silfra which is 3 to 4 degrees C and according to the dive center, with or without dry suit experience, I can do the dive. What do you think?

Whether you take a formal training course or not, you'll need to spend time with an experienced drysuit diver in order to be properly prepared for this dive. There is a lot more to diving in 3-4 C water in a drysuit than warm water diving. 3-4 C is extremely cold and requires much more preparation than tropical water.

What kind of drysuit will you be using? What will you be wearing underneath? You'll need an appropriate hood, gloves, possibly also boots (depending on the type of drysuit), and your warm-water fins won't fit with drysuit boots on. You'll also need regs that are designed for cold water. Weighting is also a consideration. You need a lot of weight with a drysuit. Last, but not least, you also need to understand how to properly utilize the inflator and dump valve on the drysuit to avoid squeeze on the way down and an unwanted trip to the surface on the way up.

You should ask lots of questions of the dive center to be sure they aren't "low-balling" you with respect to the equipment and training.

 

[spectrum]

If by "warm water diver" you mean that you don't even have recent experince with heavy neoprene then you should certainly plan to spend some time in training or at least diving with a good mentor.

The whole hood, heavy gloves and dynamic suit bouyancy is a whole new challenge.

Pete