Pinnacle 7mm ,merino wool wet suits

[ivakdiver]

Has anyone had any experience with this suit? Would appreciate any feedback pro/con

 

[SOFDiver]

Marino wool suits are great, I have a 7mm and hooded vest. There is one issue with these items. If the suit is wet and you strip it off between dives the wool gets cold, you can never warm it back up with your body heat, so your second and subsequent dives will be cold. I have quit using the 7mm except when I can leave the suit on between dives, and once on I never remove the hooded vest. I love the merino hooded vest (an old Pinacle item), but there are better options for a 7mm suit.

 

[wjeiii]

I have been using 0ne for 3 years sometimes for multipul dives in Lake Michigan, as good as any I have owned.

 

[al248005]

I have an older 5 mil version and love it. I dove it regularly during the winters here in Ohio before I got my drysuit. If you are looking at the older version beware they had issues with the sizes. I.E two larges might not have the exact same sizes. Another good feature about the older black with gray shoulder merino suits is that they had the merino all the way through the entire suit where as the new ones I don't think they do

 

[Dr. Lecter]

The old Merino-Elastirprene suits are excellent, with full coverage of the interior in the merino wool material creating great insulation in a thin suit (my 7mm ME suit was a hell of a lot warmer than even a properly fitted 7mm farmer john, and my 3mm ME suit worked great in water most people liked a 5mm or 7mm for). They also ran a little small: I'm a large in a Pinnacle M-E suit, but a Medium-Tall in their current version of the same suit (Tempo).

The new ones, marketed as the Tempo, are not fully merino lined but instead have a lot of the interior covered in a similarly blue but not wool lining material that sucks. The new model's zippers are also crappy plastic instead of the heavy duty YKK marine brass used on the old ME version. I'll try not to dwell on the fabulous new color scheme that replaced the great black/charcoal coloring on the ME series. Basically, the only thing they improved about the suit was the match between the size chart and their suits' actual sizing.

As far as I can tell, Pinnacle built a reputation on quality based in large part on the merino lining, and then tried to make $$$ by charging the same prices for poorly designed 'upgraded' suits that weren't as fully wool lined as before. Buy and love the old ones if you can find them, but avoid the new ones like the plague they are.

 

[dumpsterDiver]

I have a Pinnacle.. Terrible quality on the stitching. .Zeagle was selling them for a while, They acknowledged that the thread that was used was defective, but I never sent it in for replacement. Kinda wish I did. The threads just fray terribly like nothing I have seen before. I do not mean the threads or stiching ppull out or run... the threading itself just frays.... I wouldn't spend a lot for one of their suits. They never sis a recall on them as far as I know.

 

[Dr. Lecter]

DD, which Pinnacle?

 

[dumpsterDiver]

DD, which Pinnacle?

A wool lined 5/7 mm one piece suit...It has a very good, heavy metal zipper..

 

[Dive_Gypsy]

I had the older 7MM Merino and I loved it. It was warm, easy to don and comfortable. After a year and a half of near daily diving (not counting short holidays) it started to fall apart. Stitching will almost always fail over time which is why I am interested in looking at the sealed stitches on the new BARE line.

 

[ivakdiver]

Thank you for the information about these suits.