The simplest question about wings

[Thanshin]

I was stupid enough to not ask someone at the last Invasion to let me try a wing for a minute, and now I'd like to buy one before my next trip. (no water to dive where I live, so testing isn't possible).

My one and only problem with buoyancy is spending air to keep horizontal. Everything else I know how to balance, but when I try to stay completely still, being carried along a coral wall by the current, I start rotating until I'm in a standing position.

My workaround was to push against the current a tiny bit. Not enough to significantly change my position but enough that my finning kept me horizontal. The problem was that when doing that, the current moved me backwards and I didn't see the pretty things untill I was past them.


Will a wing solve that one problem and keep me horizontal?

 

[tstormdiver]

A wing *may* help a bit in your problem. I would say most of the problem in your trim is weight placement. You might want to lift your cylinder up a bit (or lower the BC on the cylinder). You might also want to look at moving the weights upwards. It sounds like your weights are placed a little low, making your lower body want to sink.

 

[TSandM]

Horizontal trim is produced by a balance of factors, and the first one is posture. If you tend to flex at the hips and drop your knees, you will tend to rotate feet down. Keeping your head up and your body flat from the shoulders to the knees will help make you more stable.

Beyond posture, it's a matter of balancing the weight of your equipment. If you, for example, are using integrated weights that are all at the bottom of your BC, those weights may be below your center of gravity. That will make you rotate into a feet-down position. The cure for that is to move weight up -- move the tank higher, move weights into trim pockets, or put weight on the cambands or around the tank neck.

What a steel backplate does for folks is move weight up onto the back, and this helps a great many divers be able to be horizontal more easily. If, however, you're like some of our students in OW, who wear very thick neoprene which can make their legs really float, moving weight up isn't helpful. And if you dive with little or no exposure protection and no weights, you will be using an aluminum or Kydex plate, so there may be little or no change in your posture.

Does that help?

 

[CT Sean]

It is possible that a wing will make it easier to be horizontal if you are currently diving with a jacket. However weight location and body position will have a much bigger impact on trim than the gear your wearing.

 

[Thanshin]

A wing *may* help a bit in your problem. I would say most of the problem in your trim is weight placement. You might want to lift your cylinder up a bit (or lower the BC on the cylinder). You might also want to look at moving the weights upwards. It sounds like your weights are placed a little low, making your lower body want to sink.

I've only dived with rented BCs and with all the weight in a belt. If a decent BC with "places to put weights on teh shoulders" could solve my problem, what would be the reason to buy a wing?

What a steel backplate does for folks is move weight up onto the back, and this helps a great many divers be able to be horizontal more easily. If, however, you're like some of our students in OW, who wear very thick neoprene which can make their legs really float, moving weight up isn't helpful. And if you dive with little or no exposure protection and no weights, you will be using an aluminum or Kydex plate, so there may be little or no change in your posture.

Does that help?

It does help greatly to tell me I'm aproaching a complex problem as if it was a simple one.

Maybe just moving weights to my shoulders would solve my problem. I do usually dive in warm waters with shorties, so it's interesting to learn about the backplate options and that there might be no difference between wing and no wing.

It is possible that a wing will make it easier to be horizontal if you are currently diving with a jacket. However weight location and body position will have a much bigger impact on trim than the gear your wearing.

I'll center my search in weight repositioning possibilities and forget about wings for the time being.


Thanks everyone.

 

[CT Sean]

I've only dived with rented BCs and with all the weight in a belt. If a decent BC with "places to put weights on teh shoulders" could solve my problem, what would be the reason to buy a wing?

The main reason for me was simplicity and a BP/W's low profile design. My previous BC was big and bulky and heavy yet very buoyant at the same time. I also like the high level of customization afforded. If I want a bigger or smaller wing I can get one, If I want more or less D-rings I can install them and put them wherever I want.

Having the same weight yet being 6 - 8 lbs more negative than my old BC is a nice side benefit as well.

 

[TSandM]

I think there are a lot of reasons to buy a backplate and wing setup! I like the modularity -- I can put the wing on that matches the kind of diving I am going to do (small and streamlined for warm water, bigger for cold water and steel tanks). I can take the whole setup apart to pack it in a suitcase. I LOVE not having a bunch of "stuff" on the front of my body, and having the whole setup be so simple that I can clip and unclip things easily without having to be able to see them. I like the fact that I need carry NO weight to sink my equipment, because there is no padding to float. And in cold water, I really like having five pounds of my ballast built into my BC, in a place where it really works to help balance me properly.

If you are perfectly happy and comfortable in your current BC, except for the trim issue, it's totally reasonable to just play with weight and tank position, to see if you can solve your issues with what you have.

Except, of course, that if you don't dive a backplate and wing, you are going to die . . .

 

[knowone]

Back inflate wing BCD thing not really much difference


Back plate with wing thing is the correct starting
platform for horizontal diving and also for other things


http://www.google.com.au/url?sa=t&r...o8ieBQ&usg=AFQjCNEHorZ3gxj5F8X6PdkMsKhEiww7iw


DISCLAIMER: Until just now when I had a quick glimpse again, since last year, I had forgotten that above link was associated wth above poster.

Not that there's anything wrong with that?