Is it normal to not need ANY weight?

[jmasin]

In the end, the answer on your question is yes, it is absolutely normal that you sink in the pool without having any weights.

The amount of weights you need depends on many different things such as the density of salt/fresh water, your bodymass, volume of your equipment, experience, and so on.

Most of the things are personal, and it might be that you don't need any weights, especially in the pool.

Yep!

Like everyone said, do a weight check to get the right amount of weight, but if the right amount is none, that's ok too! One less thing you have to strap on!

I normally use none in the pool, ~4 in fresh with a 3mm and ~8 in salt with a 3mm.

 

[Herk_Man]

Not being a smart aleck here but whether it is normal or not, what would you do different if it were abnormal? Add weight anyway? Just a couple of follow on thoughts though. If you use a wetsuit you are going to get more buoyant. If you swim in salt water you are going to be more buoyant.

And if you dive with your current config, you have no ditchable weight so an emergency ascent is going to rely completely on your ability to swim up and inflating your BCD if it has not failed. So from a safety standpoint, if you sink that quickly with no weight, if you went out of air and could not inflate your BCD orally, then you are going to have to doff your gear and swim up. Might be a good idea to have a pony or, dare I say it, a Spare Air.

 

[Indian Valley Scuba]

No ditchable weight is not a bad thing. Proper weighting is key, and if you need no additional weight, more power to you. I doubt you will have difficulty swimming up. We could play the "what if" game all day long, but if you have no weights to ditch, you are hardly overweighted. Good for you.

 

[senseiern]

I needed 16 lbs Saturday for a pool dive...no suit. I weigh 250+...most of which is fat that I am shedding from eating properly and exercising more.

I read where anxiety will alter your weight needs as well. Anxiety causes you to hold oxygen, making you positively bouyant.

 

[Indian Valley Scuba]

I needed 16 lbs Saturday for a pool dive...no suit. I weigh 250+...most of which is fat that I am shedding from eating properly and exercising more.

I read where anxiety will alter your weight needs as well. Anxiety causes you to hold oxygen, making you positively bouyant.

A little clarification here....Anxiety tends to cause you to not exhale fully, so you are keeping air in your lungs, which of course adds to your positive buoyancy. Unless you are packing your own secret stash of oxygen, I doubt you are holding any!

 

[SkimFisher]

Not being a smart aleck here but whether it is normal or not, what would you do different if it were abnormal? Add weight anyway? Just a couple of follow on thoughts though. If you use a wetsuit you are going to get more buoyant. If you swim in salt water you are going to be more buoyant.

And if you dive with your current config, you have no ditchable weight so an emergency ascent is going to rely completely on your ability to swim up and inflating your BCD if it has not failed. So from a safety standpoint, if you sink that quickly with no weight, if you went out of air and could not inflate your BCD orally, then you are going to have to doff your gear and swim up. Might be a good idea to have a pony or, dare I say it, a Spare Air.

Why? There's no reason you should ever be OOA. Even then, that's what buddies are for. I think the key to "safety" is: don't run out of air.

To answer the OP - I dive a 5 mil with hood and steel 98's (7lbs neg full, neutral empty). I wear 3lbs of non-ditchable lead for trim purposes only - meaning I don't need it, but it keeps me perfectly horizontal in the water - which is what I want.

Even with an AL80 I only wear 6lbs and that is mostly to account for the swing in buoyancy as the 80 empties. We are part of a lucky few that don't have to load up on lead. Some of my dive buddies aren't so luck and I'm happy to not be them.

Dive with a good buddy and you can cut out most of the "what-if's".

 

[Herk_Man]

Umm, you're right. But guess what, people do. And sometimes even the smart ones do. And diving with that mentality that "it won't happen to me" is a sure fire way to "make it happen to you."

There is nothing wrong, in a forum such as this, to think through situations and apply the "what if" factor to them. Even things that are not completely relevant can spur creative insite.

Your patent rejection of a spoken thought is not welcome.

 

[BCscubadive]

naturally a diver will sink to the bottom, because the tank and all your equipment weights enough to slowly brign you down, but also there is not enough air in your body to keelp you afloat with all your equipment, consider checking out your BCD or other low pressure floation device

 

[SkimFisher]

Umm, you're right. But guess what, people do. And sometimes even the smart ones do. And diving with that mentality that "it won't happen to me" is a sure fire way to "make it happen to you."

There is nothing wrong, in a forum such as this, to think through situations and apply the "what if" factor to them. Even things that are not completely relevant can spur creative insite.

Your patent rejection of a spoken thought is not welcome.

...and here I thought I was being friendly.

I'm not saying you can't ever suffer some type of gear failure that might result in you losing all your gas. But that's not really the classic OOA scenario, is it? It's certainly not the scenario that I'm talking about. A "smart" diver that goes OOA out of his own inattentiveness does not fall into that category, does he?

Are there freak accidents? Sure. But a freak accident is one you can't plan for. Otherwise we'd all be slinging 80's for dives in 40' of water. So when people start throwing all these crazy scenarios out there it gets a bit ridiculous. Why not just carry along a spare BC while you're at it? In that case why don't I just ditch all my lead and bring along my toolbox as ballast?

As for my mentality - you're drawing your own conclusions and I'm not going to even get into it.

I tell you what, better yet - just click on the link in my sig. That should explain it all.

 

[Herk_Man]

Friendly? You highlighted a section of my post and started your rebuttal with, "Why? There's no reason you should ever be OOA."

And there is nothing conceptually incorrect about it except that depending on how negative the OP is, he may still be able to swim up with his gear on.

You probably need to get in the habit of reading your posts from the point of view of the intended recipient before you click the "Post" button.