Pre-heating a wet suit.

[SwimJim]

When Im Ice diving wet I bring five gallons of warm water in an insulated container. I use a hand pump to get the water into my suit. The less you expose of the ice the better off you are. You don't need all five gallons for yourself. However your friends will use it up. Even dry suit divers like the warm water for thier gloves. Works good for unsticking scuba flow regs to.

jim

 

[VanGirl]

Yea..the warm water trick into the gloves was a huge help when I was doing my OW dives up here in the PNW. I was nice 'n toasty in my fleece and dry suit but the hands really suffered over the two days. When I finally figured out how to 'pre-heat' my gloves between dives I appreciated just how cold my hands were before that!
Cheers & happy (warm handed) diving!

 

[DrySuitDave]

Isn't it just alot simpler to buy a quality drysuit?! They last much longer then wetsuits anyway....

 

[diver_paula]

from a woman that dove wet way to many years in the Great Lakes.

Soak your hood between dives! Or try heat packs that you can activate once in the water.

Paula

 

[VanGirl]

Aahhh so simple...yet SO brilliant! Heating the hood too...why didn't I think of that one too.... Duh! I remember those heat packs from when I was a kid....but I haven't seen them around in years. Any Canadians out there who know where I could score some??
Cheers and Happy Diving

 

[Warren_L]

It does not work as well with a semi-dry as the water will pool in your legs and eventually gets very cold.

But it works well with a wetsuit and was a very common practice when I started diving in the early 80's. A regular cofffee ithermos of water per dive is all you need to pack.

One critisim of the practice at the time was the theory that the warm water opened your capillaries and directed more blood closer to the surface with the result that you eventually lost more heat than you conserved. I never thought much of that particular theory.

You can probably minimize that by not using water that is warmer than body temperature.

 

[Scubaroo]

Ditto on the hood heating - TOOOOASTY

 

[devilfish]

What a brilliant idea, sounds so good, too bad it does not work.
A wet suit is not a hot water suit with a constant supply of hot water circulating. Pouring hot water into a wet suit causes perifial vasodialation. As soon as the hot water in the wet suit cools will result vasoconstriction. The cold water in the wet suit will cool the perifial blood pushing it back into the core, and as a result body core temperature will drop much more rapidly causing hypothermia. A diver's body core temperature will crash much faster than just diving in a good fitting wetsuit. The only way this would work if there was a constant flow of warm water circulating through the suit.

 

[DA Aquamaster]

What a brilliant idea, sounds so good, too bad it does not work.
A wet suit is not a hot water suit with a constant supply of hot water circulating. Pouring hot water into a wet suit causes perifial vasodialation. As soon as the hot water in the wet suit cools will result vasoconstriction. The cold water in the wet suit will cool the perifial blood pushing it back into the core, and as a result body core temperature will drop much more rapidly causing hypothermia. A diver's body core temperature will crash much faster than just diving in a good fitting wetsuit. The only way this would work if there was a constant flow of warm water circulating through the suit.

Ah yes...that was the argument 20 years ago as well. Same basic argument as the one against drinking alcohol to make yourself feel warmer by opening the capillaries and getting more blood to the surface. Except of course the alcohol keeps things dialated even when you are cold and overcomes the body's natural defensive reaction to cold.

But as I stated before, I personally don't put much weight in that argument with regard to warm water and wet suits. When the water cools to ambient temp, your skin gets cool, your capillaries constrict and you are really no worse off than you would have been previously if you had just gotten in the water. I also think there is some benefit to rewarming bewteen dives with warm water. It's heat you would not have otherwise gotten.

This is however all observational based on 2 dives a day in 35 degree water way back when. I felt better and functioned better with warm water in the wet suit and had more symptoms of hypothermia without it.

It is sort of academic though for me as I started using a dry suit for winter diving a long time ago. Still, it would make an interesting experimental study.

 

[ew1usnr]

Pouring hot water into a wet suit causes perifial vasodialation. As soon as the hot water in the wet suit cools it will result in vasoconstriction.

So, if you dump cold water in the suit you will avoid perifial vasodialation. And if you stay cold between dives you can maintain a constant state of vasoconstriction.