Drysuit squeeze and feet over head

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After two and a half seasons with my drysuit (been diving wet for 16 years) I can’t seem to get comfortable with drysuit squeeze. I don’t know if it’s just me not liking the feeling around my chest cavity or if I’m doing something wrong.

When I descend (typically doing dives in the 100’-130’ range) I try and put only the bare minimum amount of air in my suit to reduce squeeze. Once hitting my bottom depth I will even out with my wing. This will leave me not enjoying the feeing on my lungs from the suit squeeze. I’m an asthmatic and this instantly makes my mind think of the onset of an attack. Side note, I haven’t had an asthma attack in 7-8 years and I haven’t used an inhaler either. So by this I know it’s not a lung issue. Plus when I dive wet or without any protection I don’t have these issues.

So if I try to be comfortable on the descent and add enough air to remove the squeeze I can feel the bubble move through out the suit when I do my dive. I’m diving the north East wrecks and tend to be poking my head and body in holes to look for critters and what not. I do find my self feet above head while searching around since most wrecks here are wire dragged or really old and flattened out. This obviously makes my feet super buoyant. Thus making me need to reset position and even out the gas in the suit. Is this normal, is this much air normal, do people just deal with suit squeeze while diving and not add much air.

I’ve tried diving with minimal air in the suit and enough air in the suit and they each pose their own problems. What do people do??? Is wreck drysuit diving different from cave drysuit diving. Does each have there own trick? If I’m going to start doing longer dives during deco training, I need to figure the squeeze out. Ugh!!

CKK,

Have you taken a dry-suit course.

All of the concerns you have addressed will be answered during your course instruction.

I dive dry suit full time, I was once told, ''as well as diving a dry suit right, wearing the right dry suit is just as important.

Rather than telling you what I do, or what you should do, I'll just say,

A course with the ''right'' instructor will solve all your problems.

Rose.
 
I will bow down to the DIR diving god you must be but maybe you should think about this.

This takes 15-30 seconds and greatly helps with mobility. It’s very smooth and quick and moves the bubble around the entire suit.

Where did I learn this little trick; from a very well respected GUE instructor while brushing up on some teaching strategies to assist students with mobility issues.

So maybe before you are such an ass, you either say nothing at all or give it a try. I was attempting to provide feedback to help a diver with a specific question.

What was the purpose of your post?
Apologies - my bad. You are right. I misread it and thought you were telling him to do a somersault or something weird with full gear on.
 
Do you do a suit stretch on the surface before descending?

Try this. Once you get in the water put your regulator in your face hole and tilt head down. Then add lots of air so your feet get floaty and it really lofts your undergarments and helps get them placed correctly. The start rolling head up but keep your left shoulder down so all the air moves up your chest and back into your right arm. The finally left your left arm and vent the extra air.

This helps quite a bit with mobility and may position the undergarments on your chest so that as you descend the squeeze is more even. I know it will help your mobility...

Yup, the suit stretch is common here too, including for GUE Instructors.
 
Based on my personal experience and that of several of my dive buddies, a Fusion suit greatly reduced floaty feet and eliminated the use of ankle weights
 
So does enough dives in a reasonably fitting suit of other styles, But the compression does seem to help. My one try dive in a fusion wasn’t bad at all, once I got in the water. IIRC getting in and out of the suit wasn’t great.
 
Whatever you do stay away from ankle weights
 
I had the same issue with my feet. For me it's the "design" of my suit where the feet area has a lot more room compared to the upper leg area. If the upper area squeezes then it's actually difficult for the air to migrate. I actually moved to using my drysuit for bouyancy and the problem has vanished as my suit has enough air for it to flow around which makes dumping it very easy . I've also got a better feeling for how much air I need in the suit now .
 
https://www.shearwater.com/products/teric/

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