Weight belt - under or over crotch strap?

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johnnyseko

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I'm sure this had been said before, but I cant search all night. Dont want to bring up the ditchable weight discussion again. Is the belt supposed to go under or over the crotch strap? I think I read it depends if you dive wet or dry. My feeling would be I'd hate to lose my belt and having the crotch strap catch it if it slips makes sense to me regardless of diving wet or dry. What are the ideas behind this? Today I dove with the belt over everything and it was not comfortable.
 
Under if you wear a drysuit over if you wear a wetsuit. Since with a drysuit you have a reserve buoyancy device. With a wetsuit ditching may be an option in some situations.
 
johnnyseko:
I'm sure this had been said before, but I cant search all night. Dont want to bring up the ditchable weight discussion again. Is the belt supposed to go under or over the crotch strap? I think I read it depends if you dive wet or dry. My feeling would be I'd hate to lose my belt and having the crotch strap catch it if it slips makes sense to me regardless of diving wet or dry. What are the ideas behind this? Today I dove with the belt over everything and it was not comfortable.

Over; You have a weight belt so you can ditch it if need be.
 
mdb:
Over; You have a weight belt so you can ditch it if need be.

Ditto. You want the belt to ditch freely in an emergency (if it gets hung up on your crotch strap it isn't "quick ditch")
 
Try not to lose your weight belt. A spring loaded buckle will adjust automatically at depth as your wetsuit compresses. There are other versions of self adjusting weight belts. If you are worried about a buckle opening, try threading two buckles onto your weight belt. It takes a split second longer to open it but it will be twice as secure. Just make sure that your buddy is aware of this feature if you choose to use it
 
Under...you can still ditch it if you need to and it takes an extra step if you accidentally pop the buckle. You shouldn't need to ditch it anyway if you are weighted properly.

Not an instructor, dm, or in any other way qualified to make this suggestion. In fact you know what a menace in the water I am!
 
rapidiver:
Ditto. You want the belt to ditch freely in an emergency (if it gets hung up on your crotch strap it isn't "quick ditch")

Back when I used ditchable weight, I had my crotch strap catch a weightbelt from dropping off me when it wasn't supposed to on a couple of occasions.

And if you don't run completely out of air (no available reg on self or buddy to breathe from), there shouldn't be a need to "quick ditch".
 

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