Posted by R Bear on March 08, 2001 at 07:48:40:
In Reply to: 1 more thing posted by MSdeepdiver on March 07, 2001 at 22:04:45:
Your personal buoyancy...
Go to a pool or a fresh water lake. Take a scuba tank your mask and fins and a bucket of one pound weights. Odds are that when you breath out you will be negative, but when you take a gigantic breath you will be positive. Pick up one pound weights until you are neutral. This is your personal buoyancy with a full lung in fresh water. Stand on a scale later with the same mask fins and one pound weights. Multiply your scale weight by 1.6 and divide by 62.4 to know how much extra weight you need to be neutral in salt water with a full lung. If you need a nearly full lung to be neutral then you will need to measure your lung volume and subtract that buoyancy. It would be easier if you found that you actually needed a weight or two while breathing normally off of the tank. Aftre all, unless you free dive then it is you breathing-normally-buoyancy that you want to measure.
Wet suit buoyancy...
Same trick as above. The difference is that your personal buoyancy will not change as you go up and down in the water. The most important depth to know the buoyancy charateristics of the wetsuit is at 15 feet.
I gave my valid Email address in this post. Feel free to use it.
Ron