What's the problem?

[mwhities]

Last weekend I was in the pool and TRIED to suck my 100cf to 500psi to check my buoyancy. No luck, wind, boss lady, and darkness interrupted that.

Fast forward to yesterday. I donned my full 3mm suit and my BP/W with my 100cf tank at 1200psi. I figured with the increase in exposure suit that I might have a little bit harder time getting down. I floated to the center of the pool and released the air out of my wing. Ohh! I slowly started descending! Yay, so I made it to the bottom and all is well.

I come up a foot or so and try to stay neutral and trimmed out. Not to much of a problem so it seemed. Getting impatient waiting for the air to get down to 500psi, I start swimming around and around the pool. Trying to get these last few pounds out of the tank. Finally I hit 500-600psi. I make sure I have no more air in my wing and I get down to the bottom and try to trim. My legs, which last weekend (with a full tank) would float down, now they are floating up. Is that because all te air is going to the back of the tank since the valve, closest to my head, is heavier than the back? I really had to keep swimming around to keep my feet from going up.

Down to about 400-500psi, I opted to get my 3mm hood on. With that on, I went to the bottom again and made sure there was no more air in my wing. Laid on the bottom with no problems. leaving my wing completely deflated, I was able to swim to the surface with no problem. I assume that's good. I'm not to over weighted. (I think I couldn't do that without an exposure suit. I'll need to try again.) With the exposure suit, I could almost float at the surface with minimal finning effort. I was going to add my one glove to the test but, I figured that it wouldn't make to much of a difference with the buoyancy. Next weekend I will give it a shot.

I got down to about 300psi and called the dive. I again deflated my wing and slowly started heading up the slope from the deep end to the shallow end. On the way up, I made sure to release any air that might have built up during the ascent. Once at the surface, I removed the empty tank and added the full one.

With the new tank on my back, I floated out to the middle of the pool again and dropped easily to the bottom again. Frank and I were playing around with all the different kicks and trying to trim and get our buoyancy down. Maybe I'm doing it wrong and shouldn't be doing it but, whenever I try to do a back kick, my legs tend to go "up" which make me go up. Very weird but, I am backing up!! Is it because I'm not doing it right or and am I just an up riser? I think I got the frog kick right, again, maybe I shouldn't be doing these. I can't help it.

One thing I did notice is that I can't really tell if my legs (feet/fins) are "up" (think 90 degree bend at the knee). I know it sounds stupid but, I really can't tell. Ohh and how does one stay in one spot? Or do you actually do it? I notice when I'm trimmed (I think I am.) and neutral (kinda) that I move forward. I know if I relax my legs and they fall, I get pushed forward. In this small pool, I end up on the side of the wall. Is there a way to stay in one spot or is that just not going to happen?

Otherwise, Frank and I pretty much just played around with trim and buoyancy. He has pretty good trim even though he's in a jacket style bcd. I can't tell at all if I can get into it. I signaled him to watch and for whatever reason, I couldn't seem to do it. :| Then other times, I felt like I was almost perfect.

I did notice with the empty tank or full, in the BP/W, that the amount of air in your lungs (very little even) makes a world of difference. I was playing once I was neutral (I say neutral.) and exhaled fully. I felt like a rock heading down and just before I hit the bottom, I filled my lungs up and I stopped and then started ascending. All with just my lungs. I've never experienced that with my bcd. I then started playing around with it and when trying to get full breathes in, I'd really start floating up, then exhale fully and I'd go back down. (Thinking of fully exhaling and inhaling to get good gas exchange.) What are some pointers you may have to help me on that so I don't shot up or fall like a rock. I did take short inhale/exhales and with no problem stay semi neutral. I just don't want to get to much CO2 build up. (It's not that bad, the shorter breaths, I was just always told to do deep long inhales and exhales.)

I guess that's enough for now. I'll probably think of a few more things that I did and forgot to mention. thanks again in advance for any recommendations and if you've read this far, Bless your little eyes and THANkS!.

 

[TSandM]

Going up with the back kick is a common problem! We call it the "shrimp dance" (I think Rick Inman may have coined that.) It's usually because your fin tips are pointed upward, so you're pulling the water forward and down -- Therefore, you go backward and UP. Getting your fins truly horizontal stops it, but getting this right takes a lot of us a fair amount of practice, and some feedback from buddies is very helpful.

Staying still is hard. It requires that you be perfectly balanced, so that you can sit in the water without any movement of your fins. If you are feet heavy or feet light, you will have to move your fins to maintain your trim, and that drives you forward. The first key is to assume truly correct posture, with the back a little arched and the knees up. What works best for me is to think about getting as LONG as I can -- arms out in front, legs stretched back. Thinking about "arching my back" didn't work. It made me pull my shoulders up. But getting "long" gets the right posture.

Once your body is really where it should be, if you still can't float quietly, you may need to move some weight. I don't know how much you are carrying, if any, with the exposure protection you're using, but if you're head-heavy, you can move weight to a belt, and if you're feet-heavy, you can move it to the cambands using weight pockets.

Congratulations on finding the breath control of buoyancy. This is the fine-tuning mechanism that allows you to be much more precise with your position in the water.

 

[mwhities]

Well, if it's called the "shrimp dance", I was shrimp dancing my (__Y__) off. I'll work on getting them horizontal, after I look at a few more videos. When you say horizontal, I'm thinking making the fins flat, inline with the bottom of the pool but, I think you mean a different way. (That's why I'm going to look at more videos to see if I catch it.)

I am a little feet heavy. If I sit there and try to trim and stop moving my feet, they will slowly start moving down. I tried the arched back and it seems to help out a little. I know I should try to get "long" but, I feel if I do that, my feet will for sure sink. It's just hard to tell if my feet are up in the right position. Maybe Frank will get his camera housing soon and we can start filming. As of right now, granted it all will change once I hit salt water but, I'm not currently using any weights at all. I love that feeling.

I may try a small weight (ankle weight) on my valve to see if that helps any. I did do what was recommended to my by a friend on here. She said to move my wing down on my back plate and see if that will help me keep my feet up. It seemed to work a little, as they didn't seem to sink as fast.

Found it? Yes, I did that but, I still have a lot more work to do on it. I know it will take some time and a lot of practice but, I know I'll eventually get it.

Ahh, something else I remembered, I love the feeling of not feeling the harness or back plate. Underwater, I can barely feel that it's there. Quite a good feeling compared to my bcd. I know I need to adjust it some more. Seems l;ike everytime I wear it, I readjust and it loosens up again. My waist strap has almost wrapped around me about half way. (I'm leaving it all on until I get it dialed in.)

After the dive, Frank and I let our tanks and my BP/W and his bcd float. He grabbed his tank (one cam band) and shook it side to side and noticed the "swaying" motion of the tank to bcd. I floated my BP/W to him and told him to do it. He said it was because of the extra cam band... I smiled and said I know. I'm going to try to get him in a BP/W soon. Hopefully I can.

Thanks,

Michael

 

[TSandM]

No, I do mean flat surface of the fin horizontal. Then, when you extend and pull forward, you are pulling water horizontally instead of pulling it down.

Regarding being "long", that doesn't include your legs! If you are wearing Jets and extend your knees, you have a negative object at the end of a VERY long lever arm, which will tend to tilt you feet down. That's one of the reasons for the bent knee position (the other being that it keeps your fins up away from the bottom). Varying the amount of bend in the knee changes the length of the lever arm and can change your angle in the water all by itself.

A good article on balance in the water is here, and if you're interested in some nice demonstrations of how body position affects trim, they're available on the Essentials DVD sold by 5thD-x.

 

[mwhities]

Uhm, I'll need to look into it more. I'm still not catching on. :|

Yeah, I am aware of the legs, mine are big already, they like to sink. Still working on the bent knee thing too. Arch + long + bent knees = (hopefully) good trim,

As soon as I get some extra cash, I'll see about getting that video.

Thanks,

Michael