Just a couple more thoughts about experiences that I've seen:
I had a buddy on his third dive start an uncontrolled feet first ascent at around 50'. Kick as hard as he could towards the bottom all he could do was hold his position. He also was not able to descend because he was trying dump his bcd from the hose as Mempilot referenced. I got to him and had to pull his rear dump (please no jokes
) As he started to descend his composure came back and he was able to remain in control for the rest of the dive. Arriving on the surface he told me how freaked out he was becoming by going feet first and that he hadn't even thought of using his rear dump. The rest of our dives he was fine, because he chose not to put any more gas in his suit than was absolutely needed.
IMHO - BCSean is correct about the dynamic instability of gas in your suit.
When I first learned to dive dry my first exposure was in the pool. I did the somersaults no problem. Then my instructor handed me a 20# weightbelt and told me to take it to the bottom of the pool. I was also told not to hold my breath and fill up my suit with air. Guess what happened. I breached the pool's water like a gray whale.
The next day I did an OW dive with said suit. I was advised to use it as my bc instead of my wing. Well I did and found that air shifted way to much for my liking (dynamic instability) so I went back to using my wing. I dive occasionally in warm water, so it makes sense to me to use my wing as my primary buoyancy device. This way I'm not changing techniques when I go from diving dry to diving wet.
I had a buddy on his third dive start an uncontrolled feet first ascent at around 50'. Kick as hard as he could towards the bottom all he could do was hold his position. He also was not able to descend because he was trying dump his bcd from the hose as Mempilot referenced. I got to him and had to pull his rear dump (please no jokes
) As he started to descend his composure came back and he was able to remain in control for the rest of the dive. Arriving on the surface he told me how freaked out he was becoming by going feet first and that he hadn't even thought of using his rear dump. The rest of our dives he was fine, because he chose not to put any more gas in his suit than was absolutely needed.IMHO - BCSean is correct about the dynamic instability of gas in your suit.
When I first learned to dive dry my first exposure was in the pool. I did the somersaults no problem. Then my instructor handed me a 20# weightbelt and told me to take it to the bottom of the pool. I was also told not to hold my breath and fill up my suit with air. Guess what happened. I breached the pool's water like a gray whale.
The next day I did an OW dive with said suit. I was advised to use it as my bc instead of my wing. Well I did and found that air shifted way to much for my liking (dynamic instability) so I went back to using my wing. I dive occasionally in warm water, so it makes sense to me to use my wing as my primary buoyancy device. This way I'm not changing techniques when I go from diving dry to diving wet.
