Drysuit burping.

[Bishop]

I was doing a deepish dive (100ft) in my drysuit for the first time and when I was hanging out on the ascent line at 20 ft I noticed I had an inordinate amount of air in my suit. That makes sense when one adds air at depth to ward off the squeeze. But I was having a hard time getting the excess air out of the suit so I could remain neutral. I had the release valve turned all the way down but it still wouldn't vent. I had to stick my arm up and open the wrist seal to let some air out. Is this common?

 

[Soggy]

Where is your dump valve located? Make sure that it is the highest (i.e. closest to the surface) point. You may need to roll around to get the air pocket to that point also.

What kind of valve is it? I had some air trapping problems with my Scubapro drysuit. My new Bare with Sitech valves doesn't have this problem. Hell, I can burp it without even opening a seal before the dive!

 

[metridium]

Turned down clockwise or counterclockwise?

Still in either case, unless your valve was physically blocked, you should have still been able to depress the button to manually vent gas.

 

[Bishop]

The valve is on the left shoulder and I didn't use the push button. My mistake.