Trimming a hood?

[icechip]

Has anybody trimmed, or felt the need to trim back the face opening on the hood of their suit (or any hood) for that matter? I took my new BARE 7mm Semi-Dry out for its first dive the other day and noticed with the attached hood that it was tough getting my mask to decently seal. I usually just opt for a 2mm beanie, but it is kind of early in the Maine season for that. I don't think I have a big pumpkin head or anything, but I found the face opening of the BARE suit with hood wicked small. So I am thinking about maybe trimming it back some...

 

[Silty Sam]

Did you try putting the mask on then running your finger around the lip of the hood so it's over the facemark?

 

[icechip]

Yes I did but whenever I moved my head the opening tended to loosen the seal on my mask.

 

[Silty Sam]

Figured you did. I've cut a hood to allow my full-face mask to seal on my skin. It gets ugly quickly if not careful. And cutting a seam allows rips to happen easier.

 

[johndiver999]

A lot of hoods are designed to have the face edge or opening extra small and then trimmed to fit. They are designed so that you can carefully trim away a portion of the edge. Often it is the area on the side of the face. As long as your cuts are with a sharp scissor, you don't leave any cuts (or locations for a rip or tear to spread from) AND you do not cut back where a seam (or sewn edge) is located, you should have no issues in opening up the face a little.

I would suggest caution and maybe may a few modest trims and test the results before removing more rubber.

For example, you can see on this particular hood there are no seams except at the center of the chin. You have a lot of real estate to safely trim back.

 

[icechip]

Great! Thank you for the input, guys!

 

[Brett Hatch]

I recently received a hood that I purchased online. The hood fit my head, but the face hole was incredibly, ridiculously small. When not wearing a mask, it went from just between my eyebrows at the top, crossed over my eyes' irises to about my cheekbone, and covered my bottom lip. There was just no frickin' way to dive the thing.

I donned the hood and held a mask in place over it. Had a friend trace the mask with a red Sharpie pen, which is barely visible on the black hood. The tracing was approx 1 inch from the hole. Used sharp EMT shears to trim it back a quarter inch at a time, donned the mask and hood, and repeated until I had a good fit. In the end, I stopped right on the Sharpie marks in some places, and just short of them in others. The marks are still barely visible if you know they are there, and seem to be fading with time. Fit is perfect.