Some days are harder than others

[Lorenzoid]

I am envious of that frog kick. I've been practicing for a year and a half and don't have that kind of precision yet.

 

[stuartv]

Epilogue:

Thank you to all of you who posted helpful suggestions here.

I got in a pool on Saturday to work things out.

I put the tank bands back up right at the shoulder break.

I left off all ballast, so I was only using my 6 # SS BP.

I did experiment with me in just my drysuit to see how buoyant I am. I had only thick socks, thin shorts, and a short sleeve rash guard on underneath. 10 # of ballast and an exhale would not sink me, but 12 # and an exhale (holding my breath out) would. I guess that's really just a side note.

By the time I finished with my pool work, I had about 300psi left in my tanks (only started with about 900) and found that I could still descend from the surface. So, obviously, the 8 # of bolt-on weight I was using in the quarry 3 weeks ago was way too much. It will be interesting to see if I end up needing to put on a belt with weight when I dive dry/doubles again, but with warm undies on.

I loosened the shoulder straps on my harness by about 2".

My first thing to sort out, once I got in the water was that I had enough weight, using only my BP. Clearly, I did.

Next, I found that I was still tipping to head down badly. I moved my BP from the lower position on the tanks to the higher position (thus moving the tanks about 1" or so towards my feet). That did not make very much difference. My new-to-me Halcyon (Explorer 55) wing only has one pair of holes, so there is no way to move it up towards my head. Just for the sake of "make a change, any change, and see what happens" I unfastened my waist belt and took the crotch strap off, then refastened the waist belt. That actually seemed to make the biggest improvement in my trim, for some reason, but I was still tipping head down. So, finally gave up on the Halcyon wing and switched back to my OMS 60. And I loosened up the crotch strap about 2 inches. And I went back to the tanks being through the top holes on the BP and through the middle holes on the OMS wing (which has 3 sets of holes for up/down adjustment). With that setup, my trim was finally restored.

Once I could hold proper trim, I tried doing valve drills and could do them, in my dry suit, with no problems at all. I did it twice, just to make sure.

One "trick" that I think also helped was that I noticed it seemed like suit squeeze made my suit sleeves bind on my arms and restrict me from extending them all the way. So, I got vertical, to get the air up into my sleeves, extended my arms up as high as I could, and then went back to horizontal. That definitely seemed to help with my reach to the valves

So, I think I'm all "good" now. I got a bunch of weight off my rig. I can hold decent trim with virtually no finning (I think - I actually got my buddy to video me during my second valve drill, but I haven't been able to watch it yet), and I can reach all my valves now, fairly easily. Woohoo! Bring on the next training weekend!

Thanks again to all of you that offered help!

 

[decompression]

Excellent...you've learned to manage the bubble, stay trimmed and perform skills. Next step, add failures and repeat. A trick I use in the pool to eliminate finning while working on buoyancy/trim is to remove their fins, then there's no cheating at all. Well done.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[stuartv]

Excellent...you've learned to manage the bubble, stay trimmed and perform skills. Next step, add failures and repeat. A trick I use in the pool to eliminate finning while working on buoyancy/trim is to remove their fins, then there's no cheating at all. Well done.

Thanks!

We've worked on failures almost since the beginning of my tech training. So far, the only trouble I've had with that has been trouble reaching my valves in my dry suit. In my wetsuit, I've handled all failures correctly, so far. In my dry suit, I've sometimes been able to reach the required valve and handled it correctly. Other times, my intentions have been correct, I just haven't been able to perform because I couldn't reach.

Now, I think I'll be able to reach.

 

[decompression]

Keep it up.....practice failures without changing bouyancy, no mask, while on deco, while reeling in line........lots of fun ahead.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[KevinNM]

One "trick" that I think also helped was that I noticed it seemed like suit squeeze made my suit sleeves bind on my arms and restrict me from extending them all the way. So, I got vertical, to get the air up into my sleeves, extended my arms up as high as I could, and then went back to horizontal. That definitely seemed to help with my reach to the valves

A suggestion I got a few weeks ago while not passing fundamentals with doubles (like everyone else in the class...) was to hold your arms up as you walk down the stairs into the water. This pulls the extra suit material up your torso instead of having it all uselessly at your waist. Then over inflate a bit and wiggle around while flat or a bit heads-down in the water at the surface to get the suit to settle and reduce the base layer binding. Then open the valve back up before you descend.

 

[stuartv]

A suggestion I got a few weeks ago while not passing fundamentals with doubles (like everyone else in the class...).

Oh, man! That's a bummer! Thanks for sharing the tip!