position of the tank

[lavachickie]

What do you guys think?

*Amy smacks herself in the forehead.*

Thank you for posting this! It's a tangent, but it NEVER occured to me to look on YouTube for things like skills training videos. DUH. I looked up how to put on a dry suit, but never thought about basic skills references being there.

I checked out the vid you had referenced, and along the side popped up tons of great videos, including incredibly detailed and particular vids on skills trainings for divemasters which illustrate all basics skills in crystal clear detail. Awesome! As I posted in a previous thread, my instruction was lacking in rigor (understatement!), and findings these is a great way for me to brush up before the upcoming big day!

If any other noobs are out there reading, and you likewise want some detailed run through of skills, check out things like this one, part of a series:

YouTube - PADI Divemaster skills circuit Part 2

Or search for "PADI divemaster skills".

Woo hoo can't wait to get home and watch some more!

 

[Mr Carcharodon]

Would that the tank position not be the same even in a shorter tank? It would be high up from the butt but the distance from the head would be the same no???

No to get trimmed out horizontally you would want your center of gravity more or less over your lungs. So the tank would move down a bit and probably help with your problem of your head hitting the tank valve.

A HP80 is about 6 inches shorter than an aluminum 80 so you should be able to move the valve down your back about 3 inches. That should leave your trim unchanged. Of course along the lines of the original post please do not move the tank down so far that you cannot reach the valve.

 

[lavachickie]

As with most things in the PADI world, it is a good starting point, not necessarily the law.

You start with some basic hard rules to get you by until, as I like to say, you know the rules well enough to know when to break them.

That applies in any learning environment that builds skills, often skills which on the surface seem simple but underneath have a very complex set of options, variables, and possible outcomes. If you threw the entire full equation at the beginner they'd have a brain annurism.

 

[Bogie]

I have been experimenting to get my trim right. The first rule is you don't want to bang the back of your head on your 1st stage regulator so your tank can't bee too high. I have been shifting my tank lower on my body and higher on my body just to see what happens. The ideal trim position is horizontal. Some times I like my head down a bit for looking under rocks and I will temporarily shift it forward by grabbing the bottom of tank and pulling it towards my head to give me a head down position. Other times I don't want to be perfectly horizontal and want to see more what is out front so I might shift it a bit lower so my head rides a bit higher than horizontal. Of coarse if you have your trim perfectly horizontally adjusted you can make these adjustments by fin movements, using your breathing, or mild body shifts etc.. It is fun just to experiment with my gear. Being subtle with adjustments is key. Gentle mild adjustments. Just have fun and don't worry about perfection. I watched the YouTube videos watching people with perfect buoyancy, in clear calm water, hands held together, frog kicks, and doing helicopter turns. I've not seen this done in Monterey with huge surges, poor visibility, wave action, shallow water, in the middle of a dense kelp forest, going at a good pace. I am becoming more aware of the subtleties of diving the more I dive. I love learning and it is always an adventure.