What should a tall and skinny beginner do?

[JackZwykle]

The horrible weather is one of the reasons I'm not going to dive locally much. The other reason is, there's nothing interesting to see around here. I fell in love with diving because of reefs, all the little critters in there, and big critters like sharks and dolphins. Here we just have maybe 5 dive sites total, with uninteresting average sized gray fish if you're very lucky, and small sunken boats. So I have no reason to invest into anything that would help me dive locally. And buying a drysuit for tropical diving is way too much.

Let me give you my 5 cents.

1. I'm not convinced Lithuania is so bad, maybe for a beginner, but you won't always be a beginner . Talk to local guys, check quarries, check further around (you have amazing diving relatively close in Poland).

2. Drysuit is not an overkill in any terms other than cost and it's subjective. I dive a lot in Canaries and Gozo which we keep going back to and always happy to have a drysuit with us. With time you're going to spend longer and deeper as you progress and 24C water is not that warm. And drysuit cannot be too hot - it's actually much colder than a wetsuit if you don't take any undies. It's just a watertight bag, with ZERO thermal protection, the protection comes from whatever you put on under the suit - giving you much better control over insulation levels you want and making you much more comfortable and safe (!) as you progress.

Not to overdo it, but drysuit has two safety aspects wetsuit doesn't - when you're warm you're improving the degassing to normative levels and push the DCS risk further away, and it can serve as emergency bouyancy source (for whatever reason).

Anyway, apologies for boring you, in the end the drysuit boils down to cost and affordability.

 

[ColoDale]

That might be a good idea, kayaking is very popular here. I'm not sure if there are any specialized stores just for that, but I might be able to find something in general sport stores.

How is your experience with this setup? I've read that it's generally not a great idea to use wetsuits made for other water sports because they compress under water and lose their thermal insulation. How does it compare to an ill-fitting but proper full size scuba wetsuit in terms of warmth?

The kayaking pants have held up as well as any other stretch neoprene that I own. I don't feel they have compressed any more than neoprene that is dedicated for scuba. I find the kayaking pants to be as warm as any scuba neoprene. I would prefer this to ill fitting full size wetsuits for tightness or being too loose and having water able to enter more freely. The kayaking pants I have are very comfortable. The brand marking on it is Supreme.
My issue with full wetsuits is crotch to neck (height). Yours seems to be waist versus height.
As an exercise, you might also look at farmer john style scuba wetsuits. A few do have adjustable shoulder straps and you can wear a jacket or dedicated second piece over it. Maybe mix and match those. These styles are not as popular now but just an idea.

The thing about wetsuits and the kayak gear is that you should to try them on first. If you do it via a shipped order then I would only deal with reputable dealers in case you need to send it back. You might have (better) luck with sporting goods stores in person.

 

[FreqFlier]

Check out this austrian wetsuit manufacturer. Very good quality, somewhat weird sizing (tall and skinny...)

Neoprenanzug & Wetsuit Hersteller

Camaro Watersports ist Ihr Onlineshop für Neoprenanzüge & Wetsuits. ➤ Hier klicken & mehr über den Hersteller Camaro erfahren!

www.camaro-watersports.com

 

[pauliunas]

I dunno, the sizing doesn't look weird to me, looks pretty standard

Let me give you my 5 cents.

1. I'm not convinced Lithuania is so bad, maybe for a beginner, but you won't always be a beginner . Talk to local guys, check quarries, check further around (you have amazing diving relatively close in Poland).

2. Drysuit is not an overkill in any terms other than cost and it's subjective. I dive a lot in Canaries and Gozo which we keep going back to and always happy to have a drysuit with us. With time you're going to spend longer and deeper as you progress and 24C water is not that warm. And drysuit cannot be too hot - it's actually much colder than a wetsuit if you don't take any undies. It's just a watertight bag, with ZERO thermal protection, the protection comes from whatever you put on under the suit - giving you much better control over insulation levels you want and making you much more comfortable and safe (!) as you progress.

Not to overdo it, but drysuit has two safety aspects wetsuit doesn't - when you're warm you're improving the degassing to normative levels and push the DCS risk further away, and it can serve as emergency bouyancy source (for whatever reason).

Anyway, apologies for boring you, in the end the drysuit boils down to cost and affordability.

Poland does look interesting, but we don't have a proper highway or a train line in that direction so it takes pretty much a full day of driving forward and another day to drive back. At that point I would prefer to fly there by plane, and if I'm flying, I might as well fly somewhere warmer. In Lithuania, there's only 2 diving centers that I know of, they have one dive site each. I've already been to one of them, I might check the other one later since it's 3 hours away from me. Either way, there's really not much to see unless you have a full-time buddy and you're both confident enough to dive without extra company. I might consider that in the future, but I would say I'm way too early in my diving career to be thinking about it. I only feel confident diving with a dive master, and I've already checked the two diving centers, they don't really do any organized groups other than diving in the lakes they're based on, during weekends.

Yes, I do think I might decide to get a drysuit someday, but it's way too much of an investment for me right now, and I still need to practice my boyancy a lot so I don't even want to think about adding another air pocket to manage.

 

[CT-Rich]

Check out the Austrian wetsuit maker Camaro. I have bought one or two suits from them. They are relatively inexpensive compared to a Henderson. I suspect that you you are on the young side and are going to grow and fill out a little more. The quality was pretty good. I haven't bought from them in about ten years. Exchange rates will probably have an impact on price.

Diving

www.camaro-watersports.com

 

[pauliunas]

Yeah I'm still young, but also I've been trying to gain weight for 10 years, unsuccessfully, so I don't think that's gonna change soon Camaro was recommended two replies above, but their size chart didn't really impress me. There is no exchange rate, by the way, since we use euros both in Austria and Lithuania.

I messaged Elios, and they're saying a 3mm custom suit would be 300-400EUR depending on material. So far that's the best option I have, but I still have to decide if I want to spend that much money on my first wetsuit. If not, I might have to cobble something together from two different size neoprene garments

 

[Eric Sedletzky]

Try Elios Sub in Italy.
maker of custom suits. many varieties in style and materials

 

[Celt]

Yeah I'm still young, but also I've been trying to gain weight for 10 years, unsuccessfully, so I don't think that's gonna change soon Camaro was recommended two replies above, but their size chart didn't really impress me. There is no exchange rate, by the way, since we use euros both in Austria and Lithuania.

I messaged Elios, and they're saying a 3mm custom suit would be 300-400EUR depending on material. So far that's the best option I have, but I still have to decide if I want to spend that much money on my first wetsuit. If not, I might have to cobble something together from two different size neoprene garments

Elios will alter an off the rack suit, I believe they call it made to fit,. The most important part of a wetsuit is the fit, a good quality decathlon suit, which is built from soft stretchy Yamamoto in a size small might do but it will be short in legs and arms and as expensive as a made to measure from Elios
In the photo is my Elios mtm. and my zone3 aspire decathlon. Both fit perfectly but the zone3 is more expensive.