Weightbelts, why does everyone hate them so much?

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After reading 5 pages of responses I'm surprised no one mentioned that it messes with your trim. For me, a weight belt made me too feet heavy. Switching to integrated weight pockets on a BCD partly fixed the bad trim. Switching to a BP/wing with the weight on the tank straps split between the upper and lower bands finally got my trim dialed in. When I was diving cold water in a 7 mm wetsuit I used integrated weight pockets on the waist band of my BP which didn't upset the trim too much.
 
I think the trim thing depends on the person. For me, the integrated BC and the weight belt place the weights at the same level torso.
 
We often hear that weight belts will fall off, slip down, hurt the low back and need to be adjusted at depth if diving with a thick wetsuit.

A few people have mentioned elastic rubber belts which address many of these valid complaints.

Wearing 25 or 35 lbs of lead on any belt may not be comfortable. However, many people find a "freedive type" belt very comfortable for a moderate amount of lead - maybe 16 lbs or so.


I have been looking at getting one of your rubber weight belts to use with my drysuit. Have you had any problems with the holes stretching out or ripping from repeated buckling and unbuckling.
 
I have looking at getting one of your rubber weight belts to use with my drysuit. Have you had any problems with the holes stretching out or ripping from repeated buckling and unbuckling.

Thanks for asking!. I know that we have a lot of customers who use them with dry suits. The elastic belts are robust and unexpected failure is very unlikely.

However, as you can imagine, the belt will eventually wear out and need to be replaced. It is advisable that a diver keep an eye on the hole which is most commonly used on their belt, because this is the point that is subject to the most stress. A quick check once a day should be sufficient to confirm that the belt still looks good.

If/when the belt hole shows signs of degradation, the belt should be replaced. The belt should last several years, but longevity depends on a lot of factors including, how often it is used, how much weight (or tension is applied to the belt) etc.

Wetsuits, fins, hoses, masks, gloves - anything with soft parts is doing to experience degradation and will eventually wear out.

In short, the MAKO belts are quite robust and should last years of hard use.

 
After reading 5 pages of responses I'm surprised no one mentioned that it messes with your trim. For me, a weight belt made me too feet heavy. Switching to integrated weight pockets on a BCD partly fixed the bad trim. Switching to a BP/wing with the weight on the tank straps split between the upper and lower bands finally got my trim dialed in. When I was diving cold water in a 7 mm wetsuit I used integrated weight pockets on the waist band of my BP which didn't upset the trim too much.
Ah, there we are, the “T” word.
I was wondering when it would finally show up.
 
+1 weight belt so some, 5-10 lb., stays on me. I use a belt with pockets so any weights can be used or swapped. Though a rubber belt has been an interest. A belt/harness also means you are setup to be moderately buoyant skin diver should you need/want to be.

Trim with a weigh belt requires more planning. It may mean no weight goes in the integrated, but only further up (BP/W, trim pockets, shoulders). Which means you need more options for lead higher, which is lacking in some gear.
The sale/instruction chain gets a bit convoluted:
- Here's your integrated BC; but it works best with extra gear.
- You likely need some tank trim pockets, as the BC ones aren't high enough.
- You likely need a belt/harness, for the R/R confined water drill or if you ever need to.
- Now you likely really need options of weight higher on the BC.
- So those integrated pockets are just for the lead left near your mid point.
Not wrong. But convoluted. And a BC with no pockets significantly higher than the hips gets hard to explain. Absent the no bioprene, no wetsuit, 2-4 lb. total ballast for the AL80 scenario.

Trim in the BP/W realm with a weight belt on the body may require an aluminum or thin/cut plate and lead attached to the plate or strap near the shoulders to balance out the belt. Diving a heavy SS plate and throwing up your hands that you have no ballast to spare is to miss a key bit of the facts.

I'm not pushing BP/W. But you need to distribute weight and some on you has advantages, or may even be crucial to pass confined water. How you do that with BC X is an exercise for the reader or 'novice diver completely new to all of this'.

ETA: the freedivers have crotch straps on some of their weight belts to prevent them going to their chest as they descend. Could be an option for those with more curve to the hips, maybe. https://www.makospearguns.com/Weight-Belt-Crotch-Strap-p/mwbcs.htm
 
I didn't see any other women responding, so ... I don't like a weight belt because the weight sits on top of my hips and is uncomfortable. Granted, it's been a few years and I don't need so much lead to sink now, so it might not be a big deal anymore. I dive a Zeagle Zena with the pouches that have handles, and I love being able to hand the pouches up to the boat when I'm getting out of the water.

^ this. I learned on a weight belt and jacket BCD. I have a relatively narrow waist (especially at depth) but large hips and no matter how much I readjust or tighten the belt, it always ended up shifting to get stuck under my BCD and crushing my ribs, banging down just at my hips and leaving bruises, and rotating everywhere in between so my weights never stayed in the same place and I was constantly trying to adjust for the difference in my center of mass. After my advanced class I could barely walk for a day because of how the damn thing behaved during the long dives. I'm sure my need for weight has decreased over time but I don't want that experience ever again.

After reading 5 pages of responses I'm surprised no one mentioned that it messes with your trim. For me, a weight belt made me too feet heavy. Switching to integrated weight pockets on a BCD partly fixed the bad trim. Switching to a BP/wing with the weight on the tank straps split between the upper and lower bands finally got my trim dialed in. When I was diving cold water in a 7 mm wetsuit I used integrated weight pockets on the waist band of my BP which didn't upset the trim too much.

Agreed. In cold with a 7mm I do the same, plus an extra little weight in a trim pocket if I'm diving aluminum and not steel. Weight belts always shift around on me. Switching to integrated pockets that don't move made the most enjoyable dive in my life in terms of how it felt.

My set-up is a BPW and integrated pockets that let me ditch the weight if needed. The pockets are easy to remove when you want them out, very difficult if you don't. I find it a lot easier to adjust weight with a pocket than a belt where you have to deal with webbing and often triglides keeping the weights in place. I am still able to get out of my BCD without zooming up, so to me more ease of adjusting weight plus no more bruises and back pain is a no brainer. If I ever need a drysuit for a dive, I'll get bigger pockets and ankle weights. No way in heck am I putting 30lbs of weight on a belt like my coworkers do when 10 lbs make it painful to walk the next day.
 
Making sure you’re not diving overweighted has a lot to do with it too. If a person has never properly dialed in their weighting I could see how the thought of wearing a massive weightbelt could be a little off putting. It might not have to be as big as some might suspect.
IMO, overweighting is probably the single biggest problem affecting the majority of divers getting out of OW. Even through AOW, rescue, and even PPB, divers can continue on grossly overweighted. Even in PPB, it can just mean that divers learned to elevator dive better and have learned to use their BC with better skill, it doesn’t necessarily mean they learned to shed the proper amount of weight. Unfortunately much of the knowledge of proper weighting has somehow slipped away out of general basic curriculum and many instructors are teaching what they were taught; load up their students with weight to keep them down. This gets carried on and on and finally becomes the norm.
This problem would be the very first thing that would need to be resolved before deciding where to place weights and how much.
 
I have looking at getting one of your rubber weight belts to use with my drysuit. Have you had any problems with the holes stretching out or ripping from repeated buckling and unbuckling.
A solid belt with a metal cam buckle solves that. You used to be able to buy belt off a roll by the foot at the occasional LDS , but I haven't had to replace mine in 15 years or more so I haven't been looking.

I absolutely hated nylon belts when I started diving, and can't imagine why anyone would want to schlepp a 70#+ rig, or mess with soft weights, or weights in front or sitting farther off the center of rotation, but to each their own. My rubber belt never slips, and the weight sits out of the way right in the small of my back for diving and right over my hips for moving around above water. The weights are by far the least obtrusive or fiddly part of my gear.
 
https://www.shearwater.com/products/perdix-ai/

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