Drysuit undergarment advice

[Jake]

Hi all-

My girlfriend and I will be traveling to Norway to do some diving soon. We've been told to expect water temperatures as low as 38F and possibly as high as about 48F.

The dry suits will be provided for us, but we will be bringing our own undergarments. I need help selecting something for my girlfriend.

Some info about her: she's petite, but is ok in her Bare 7mm wetsuit down to around 55. We did a dive on the Yukon in San Diego recently with water temps below that, and she was quickly chilled through.

We don't really want to buy a super thick undergarment as she's unlikely to use it much for California diving. So, we'll need to layer.

Given that, I'm looking for suggestions on items which would layer well with at least one standard dry suit undergarment, whatever that piece might be. Or, avoiding standard undergarments altogether would work too.

It's been a long time since I bought my dry suit insulation so I'm a little lost on fill densities and the like.

Thanks in advance!

 

[Lorenzoid]

Those temps are what ~400 g/m2 undergarments are for. I dive in 60-70F water with 200 g/m2 undergarments. That's Thinsulate, by the way. I don't know equivalents of other materials.

 

[elgoog]

I use the 400gm DUI Thinsulate diving in Monterey/Carmel all year round layered with a SmartWool base layer. Water temps in the last 12mo have been 48-55F here and my dives now average 90min. I've also comfortably dived this exact same insulation in 70F for a >1hr dive and was totally fine (I used a thinner hood and wet gloves on this dive).
Honestly, I think the closer you get to 40F, you need to start thinking of adding a Thinsulate vest in addition to 400g undies. Obviously, this depends on how long your dives are going to be - do you know this information? 45min to an hour will most likely be OK with just with the 400 but if you're getting closer to 90min, it won't be enough.

 

[tbone1004]

honestly? talk to the local tech community and beg and plead to borrow a heated vest for her...

 

[Gareth J]

My partner and I did the Silfra crack among other dives a few years back.

We spent a few months getting ready, trying and testing kit and various configurations.
We where intending long dives for photographic purposes. All our dives where around the hour mark.

We used dry gloves, with good thermal liners.
I wore a base layer followed by a forth element tech vest, and forth element arctics. Forth element hot socks with forth element arctic socks over the top. My suit was a whites fusion.
We both had heated vests, which we both set on low power on entering the water.

We took our own clothing, suits, gloves, and heated vests. Plus a ton of photographic kit. Scuba kit was provided locally by our dive company. The guide only got in the water for one dive - to guide us to the site. Even then he left us to it and got out early. He new we where going to be a long time and new he would get cold.

We did
'the garden' - a sea dive along a pier, the warm up dive
'barney crack' - an inland fissure with a salt water feed, very small with a halo cline.
'silfra' - three times, although this was for photographic reasons.
'Pingvallavatn' - which was probably visually the most spectacular.

It should also be noted we where there in August - and still had every variation of weather from snow to sunshine.

photos are here
St Ives Sub Aqua Forum - Iceland Aug 2015

 

[TrimixToo]

Nothing beats heat for comfort. Nothing. (Did I say "nothing"?)

However if you will incur deco obligations you have to wear enough to let you make a safe (not perfectly comfortable) exit.

 

[Gareth J]

I think the deepest dive we did was 20m. None of the diving was particularly difficult, it was the environment that was the issue. We are both well used to cold water diving, diving in the UK all year round.
However, the water was colder in Iceland, and this was ultimately the issue that we had to address. We where also both aware that we would be static or at least slow moving, setting up photos.
The biggest problem I had was issues with the dome port and condensation/fogging. I found the best solution was to put the lens in a bucket of water as soon as I arrived on site whilst we sorted kit and changed and ready.

 

[buddhasummer]

I'm skinny, anything less than 50 and I turn on the heat. I wear Xerotherm base layer and full heated BZ400. I also wear Kubi dry gloves.

 

[Lorenzoid]

I'm skinny, anything less than 50 and I turn on the heat. I wear Xerotherm base layer and full heated BZ400.

Wow. How long are your dives? The heated BZ400 with just a regular, say, wool, baselayer leaves you too cold?

 

[buddhasummer]

Most of my dives are in 70-80 min range. I've tried so many combinations and under 50 without electricity I'm cold. A weight gain regime would have been cheaper and probably more effective but alas my metabolism prevents weight gain. My weight has not changed since I was a teenager and that was a long long time ago.