Looking for dry suit advise and suggestions

[danieldale]

jaeckert- I'm also looking to purchase my first Drysuit. I did my course in a Fusion Bullet
and it seemed to preform well enough (nothing to compare to). I also have to watch fitting I'm 6'3" 200 lbs.(seem to be inbetween sizes) had my sites on a bullet but now looking very seriosly at the Bare SB. The only thing I would like to know is-with this new fabric "how long to dry"? nowone seems to know. good luck and keep us posted.

 

[Paco II]

The one piece of advice I can pass along, which was given to me before I bought my first drysuit late last year and has been mentioned here already, was try on as many different types of suits as you can. Trilam, crushed neo, Fusion style suit, latex neck seal, neoprene neck seal, attached socks, attached boots, etc. What I ended buying, and feeling the most comfortable in, was not what I had in mind when I first started the search.

 

[TSandM]

I'm surprised that you had trouble with an unstable bubble in the Fusion. One of the things I love about my suit is that the stretch of the outer skin really distributes the gas fairly evenly within it (although I can still park a little here and there for best balance). If you had a big, unstable bubble, I would worry that your weighting wasn't correct.

I'm with James -- I've had my Fusion for around three years now, and I have been extremely happy with it. Using the Lycra skin and X-shorts for pockets (which I will admit is a bit of a PITA) has made the suit quick-drying and easy to travel with. It's been AMAZINGLY durable -- up until this week, I had about 450 dives on the suit and had had only two tiny pinhole leaks, both of which were easily patched with Gorilla tape. (I fell off a boat this week and had one of the bolts on my doubles rip a big hole in the suit -- I really can't blame the suit for that!)

My backup suit, for when mine is getting seals changed, is my husband's suit, which is a size larger than mine, and I've had no problems whatsoever with bubble instability or any other issues when diving that suit.

I have found the skin on the Fusion leads to pretty good streamlining, compared with other laminate dry suits. (I base that on speeds when using similar scooters on the same speed setting.)

I have to admit, though, that the Bare SB is intriguing -- a stretchy suit that you can put pockets on would be very cool!