kafkaland
Contributor
I was curious about the buoyancy characteristics of my light wetsuit, a 3/2 Ripcurl, which I bought originally for surfing, not diving. So I took it into my exercise pool today. At the surface, it was +6.5lb just to get it sinking (inside a neutral mesh bag, all air bubbles carefully expelled), at 5ft (the bottom of the pool - it's that shallow) it stayed down even with just 6lb. And that was absolutely reproducible. With 6lb it would either float or sink, depending on where in the water column I put it. So it looks like a 0.5lb swing when going from 1 ATA to 1.15 ATA. Extrapolating from this I get a loss of 1.8lb at 33ft., or 2.5lb at 66ft. Is this normal for a thin wetsuit, or has this something to do with it being meant for surfing, not diving? I don't have enough diving experience yet to ascribe my increased difficulties with buoyancy control in shallow water when I'm wearing that suit just to the suit, or to perhaps other factors that may have been in play.
For comparison, my shorty was +2lb, pretty much no matter the depth. And I with just fins and mask, was +1. I could sink even without any weight, but had to exhale really hard. With 1lb, it felt very natural. With these numbers I can start to figure out what my weights ought to be, which should be useful further down the road.
Any thoughts?
For comparison, my shorty was +2lb, pretty much no matter the depth. And I with just fins and mask, was +1. I could sink even without any weight, but had to exhale really hard. With 1lb, it felt very natural. With these numbers I can start to figure out what my weights ought to be, which should be useful further down the road.
Any thoughts?
