Now diving dry
September 25th, 2007 Filed Under Uncategorized
I haven’t been too fond of my Pinnacle Arctic wetsuit and have been on the search for something that will suit me better. I was on the fence as to whether or not to go dry. Having a dry suit certainly makes things more comfortable and convenient for California diving, but cost was an issue for me. Along with the cost of the suit there is the cost of undergarments, regular seal replacements on the suit, and the chance of tearing a seal while on a trip. I found a DUI TLS SE suit on sale at a local dive shop (LDS) near me, so I pulled the trigger.
I initially bought the Pinnacle Temperate fleece undergarment for a Channel Islands live-aboard trip. I went with fleece since they are cheaper so I could kind of see what I like and don’t like in the cheaper stuff and go from there. I also brought some middleweight REI thermal long undies, a fleece shirt and a Primaloft vest to add to the Pinnacle if it wasn’t enough.
The water temps in the Channel Islands were in the mid 60’s and I was OK with the fleece with the middleweight undies. I added the Primaloft vest on one shallower dive where the temps were near 70 deg F, and I got a little warm on that dive. What I didn’t like about the fleece is it is big and bulky. It doesn’t pack very small either.
From reading online reviews and studies about undergarment thermal qualities, I decided to go for a synthetic loft insulator. Thinsulate is used in many undergarments, but in the world of outdoor clothing Thinsulate is kind of old skool stuff. I believe it is used for diving wear because some of the properties that make it less desirable for outdoor wear do not count against it as much for dry suit wear…and may even help it (like how it is heavier than other insulators and doesn’t compress as much). I wanted to go for a higher loft insulator that would compress more than Thinsulate so that when I dump air from the suit I would lose more buoyancy and therefore (hopefully) be able to pack less weight for keeping control between 15 feet and the surface. One property to a higher loft insulator is its insulating properties are more affected by the amount of air in the suit. This can be a positive or a negative depending how you look at it. It is positive in that the undergarment has a wider thermal range over which it works, the drawback is you have to put a little more air in it than a denser insulator to get good insulation.
I got bit by the dry suit bug and made a SCUBA addiction buy of the Dive Rite Primaloft jumpsuit. I then took it to San Diego for diving as well as to Monterey. Water temps were colder. Monterey was its usual 55 deg F. With the Dive Rite suit and thinner leg undies and just the medium weight shirt undie, I was fine. It also packs small and is nice and light. It is basically a sleeping bag that you wear. It is pricey, but that is dry suit diving.
Overall, I like diving dry much more than wet. My wetsuit was too cold for Monterey, and with the dry suit I am fine. On the live-aboard trip I did all but one of the dives. In the past I tended to skip more dives when diving wet…especially the night dives.
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