How do you get better, when you're always following a group leader

[Diving Dubai]

Why do you still have air in your bcd at the safety stop?

For me personally:

I'm slightly over during a normal stop because:

I want to be able to hold a stop in a stressful situation (more buoyant)
I want to be able to hold a stop with a gas volume below normal end pressure ("fumes")
I want to be able to still make a descent in case of a "threat" boat etc"

The amount of weight (or not) depend on the dive, and location. On vacation I might be assisting a diver in trouble or dodgy tenders. At home, potential to have low back gas and empty pony and trying to eek out as much of a stop as possible if say I've been hit by a serious down current etc.

Always a trade off as not wishing to carry so much weight that a normal SS becomes a pita having to excessively concentrate.

 

[BlueTrin]

Why do you still have air in your bcd at the safety stop?

It’s not directly related to your comment but I found out this weekend that I need to be slightly overweighted because I often have a bit of trapped air in my drysuit when I ascend: if I do a weight check from the surface with the valve open, my drysuit is much more squeezed than when I would ascend.

Is the correct way to weight check with a drysuit to get a bit of air out by only sitting down then closing the valve so you can weight check with a bit of air inside ?

 

[AJ]

Is the correct way to weight check with a drysuit to get a bit of air out by only sitting down then closing the valve so you can weight check with a bit of air inside ?

You're supposed to be able to do the stop with a minimal amount of gas in your tanks at the end of a dive. Would you want to sit down in such a situation or be able to hold that stop keeping normal position? I know I would want the last. A litle too much (enphasis on a litle) weight is not bad if it helps you to do the stop safe. It's better than shooting to the surface unplanned.

 

[Scratch_Monkey]

A bit late but I am/was in a similar boat.... what I did when I was learning, getting experience was this:

• Went diving when I could
• Would re-read my PADI manual on the plane down to my dive trips
• Would re-read my dive computer instruction manual on the plane down to my dive trip
• Would practice my buoyancy and air control on each dive. Specifically didn't try to do photography, just focused on practicing my skills and enjoying the dive.
• Eventually purchased my own gear. At home, I would practice putting stuff on, taking it off, setting up my "kit" (i.e. where my houses would route), etc... hard to do without a tank, though
• Watched lots of YouTube videos on setting up gear, cleaning gear, storing gear, routing hoses, etc.... (I know you learn this in training but you don't remember if you don't practice and you can't practice without your own gear).
• Read lots of advice on Scubaboard, posted some questions, too.
• Kept traveling to dive each year and kept focusing on skills. Pay attention and experiment with your weight, with your kicks, your overall movement, and be conscious of your air consumption. Whenever I dive, I look at other divers and see who seems comfortable in the water and look for people who aren't. And then maybe learn what you could do better from the good divers and what to avoid from the not-so-good divers.
• I'm just over 100 dives in but only this year starting using a GoPro (and I still have mixed feelings about it but that's a different topic altogether). I am still paying attention to my skills each dive in an effort to improve.

My wife recently got certified and that's really helped with my fundamentals because she has forced me to really think back to the challenges I had as a new diver. I specifically call out photography and the GoPro because, on dry land, I am an avid photographer. But I didn't want to try underwater photography or video until I got my basic skills under control.

I hope this helps. We've probably all been on your journey.