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Bill, i remember this discussion and it's about as useless for me now as it was before. I really don't need to be told how to dive in cold water since i have been doing it for 10 years. But anyway you seem to have your shit together and that's fine and you share some good information but the tone of the email implies that i don't know what I'm doing. Have you had a look at the Typhoon electrical undergarment? The electronics and pads is sealed so it works even if the suit floods. It's used by UK navy divers and have also been tested by the Swedish navy. I have not used it and have not researched it enough to recommend it for others yet but it sure is worth a look. If it is reliable and works as good as reported by users i can't see why it wouldn't increase safety in cold water as long as you don't extend deco. I always get cold on deco to some degree and that effects decompression. If i can avoid getting cold with a heater that is a good thing and also makes the dive more comfortable. If it fails I'm back to the same situation as not having a heater as i don't plan to extend my deco time much. If the suit floods I'm in serious trouble with or with out heater. But at least with the Typhoon heater it will still work even if the suit is flooded and that should give me some valuable time on deco. I have had suit floods in 2C water and it's not pleasant. It's impossible to do a longer deco then perhaps 10 min, then you have to bolt to the surface. Now the only safe way of diving i cold water would be to limit deco to the time you can spend in a flooded suit on deco. But that is silly! I do deco times of up to 1.5h and if the suit floods i am fucking dead no matter if a use a heater or not. My point now and my point 2 years ago when we had this discussion is that don't use a heater to extend the deco times if you want to be safe. Use it to get a safer decompression and a more comfortable dive. Now if you are prepared to take risks you can use the heater to extend your deco beyond what you could endure without one. But that is really dangerous as I'm sure there is a lot greater chance the heater fails then the suit floods. But for some people that option may be justified. I´m not saying i´m one of them. Best, Ingemar -----Ursprungligt meddelande----- Från: Bill Bott [mailto:aquadart@ix*.ne*.co*] Skickat: den 10 maj 2000 02:18 Till: Ingemar Lundgren; Trimixjoe@ao*.co*; cavers@cavers.com Ämne: Re: SV: Electric Underwear..... Formerly: Cold water risk This same subject came up a year and a half ago on the tech list (Sept 98). What follows is my reply to the subject then. As my experience continues to grow so does my certainty that electric underwear is an ill advised idea at best! On Sept. 7, 1998 I wrote: I have been following this thread for days now watching for some sign that someone has even a remote idea what cold water technical diving is. It is sad that the best advice came from a diver that by his own admission is a "sport diver (no decompression)". For those of you that are not aware, most of my technical diving is in the Great Lakes with bottom temps around 38f. My bottom times range from 20 or 25 minutes to over 90 minutes. Deco times range from 0 to nearly 2 hours. And average run times for my Great Lakes dives are about 90 minutes with some longer and some shorter depending on the dive objective. The best way to stay warm with a flooded suit is not to dive cold water. Heaters, chemical or electric, are unreliable at best. It does not matter what you wear under a dry suit if it floods in cold water you are going to get cold!!! Good undergarments will help a lot but they will not prevent the stinging cold from running across every part of your body as the water seeps in from even a pin hole. I know I have been there. Several thin layers of Thinsulite or wool are MUCH better than one thicker layer. Polartec is also a choice. Again the thinner the better. Garments that use Mylar or Titanium thread or foil will still work by reflecting your body heat back even when wet. However, Mylar and Titanium will be of little use if they are not warn close to the skin. If they are the second of third layer they become nearly useless if the layers under them get wet. These are the only materials that will get the job done when wet. However, even the best layering and the best materials will not keep you warm. Again, YOU WILL GET COLD!!! It just becomes a matter of how cold. I have tried chemical heater packs in the past. The best ones are the liquid filled silicone bladders. However, they have a little quark about them. The colder they are the less heat they put out. Mind you they last longer when cold but who cares when you are BTU deprived. The other problem with them is they are hard to activate inside a suit. That problem becomes even greater when you and your hands are numb. Imagine, if you will, trying to find a dime under two layers of clothing when you can't fell the tips of you fingers. You need to find the dime then bend it or snap it to activate it. Good luck. What will happen is you will loose sight of what you need to do to get your deco done as quickly as possible. You start poking at the area you think the dime might be. All the while wasting valuable time. The other type of chemical heat pack is activated when it is exposed to air. These work well for hikers and others on dry land. But in a dry suit they are about as useless as tits on a bull. First they must be activated before you enter the water. They are stored in air tight packets that once inside a dry suit can not be opened by a diver in the water. I'll pay to watch you try though <g> So you open this thing stick it inside the dry suit then gear up. The whole time this thing is cooking away. Then as you enter the water the increased PPO2 puts this packet into over drive. Unless you use Argon for suit inflation. In which case the damn thing stops working altogether. Either way the minute these thing get wet they stop working. Don't bother with these either!!! As for electric britches... What Zambeckian moron came up with that idea. Oh I remember. That was the idea that spawned the phrase Zambeckian Moron. Nice work Greg. Folks I have been involved in electronics for 22 years and I can tell you from a great deal of first hand experience that electricity and water do NOT mix. Just when you need your electric pants the most they quit working. Worse yet they might start to heat something you don't want heated!!! So what do you do!!! As with most things in diving experience will be your best teacher. You will get wet a few times. Find YOUR limit with shorter dives first. Once you know how long you can be cold you will know how long your dives can be. Things that can help are to eat properly before a dive. It is incredible how much your body can take when properly nourished. I once lost over 7 pounds on a 20 minute ice dive. I haven't been in a wet suit since!!! Carbs are the best fuel for cold water diving. Pasta the night before and whole grain pancakes for breakfast are my first choice. Fats and sugars are a poor source of fuel and should be avoided. If you do get wet you will need plenty of the best fuel you can get to keep from succumbing to hypothermia. If you do get cold keep moving even if only slightly. That does not mean swim around as fast as you can. It means move your extremities SLOWLY. Your hands and feet are the first things that will lose the blood supply if not used. If your body starts to shunt blood from these areas they will not off gas and a nasty case of bends is the likely result. Neurological damage is possible, I have personally seen it happen. If you must hold on to something while on deco switch hands OFTEN!!! If you can use a "jon line" and free up your hands. Keep every part of your body you can in GENTLE but CONTINUOS motion. This will help to keep blood flowing to the extremities. If you start to feel sleepy you may wish to consider getting somewhere dry, QUICKLY!!! Sever hypothermia can cause loss of consciousness. So unless you have learned to breathe water, your bends may be easier to treat than a drowning. I feel that death puts a damper on the fun!!!. At 12:01 PM 5/9/00 +0200, Ingemar Lundgren wrote: >Do you know how much it will cost approximately? Sounds like the same >approach Typhoon in UK is using for a similar product. Is DUI making it >under license from Typhoon maybe? > >The Typhoon electrical costs about $1550 in Sweden so it's really expensive. >Does anyone know how much the Typhoon costs in the UK? > >-----Ursprungligt meddelande----- >Från: Trimixjoe@ao*.co* [mailto:Trimixjoe@ao*.co*] >Skickat: den 9 maj 2000 00:41 >Till: cavers@cavers.com >Kopia: techdiver@aq*.co*; Gagdive@ao*.co*; EANX@ao*.co*; >lakeexplorer@ya*.co*; doppler@te*.co* >Ämne: Electric Underwear..... > > >Hello All, >Just wanted to bring up a new piece of dive equipment that is soon to be >offered to the diving community. This weekend I got the first chance to test >out a new underwear that is electrically heated! It is being marketed >through >DUI and I have to say it has some great possibilities. It is the same >material as a skin but has 5 heating elements. 2 heaters on calf's , 2 >heaters on the forearms and one large heating element near the lower back. >The 5 heating elements are attached to a brain box that regulates the 5 >elements individually (which is programmable). From the box it has a wet >connection to the dry suit, on the drysuit there is an external wet >connection that goes to a battery hook up. On the drysuit there is an on off >turn switch which is nice. I took it for a test dive in 50 degree water and >it was quite comfortable and warm. There is a lot more about the suit >function and specs that this e-mail doesn't cover which may be best >described >by the DUI rep. I just wanted to say it will make these very long deco's a >piece of cake! > >Joe Rojas Bill (aquadart) Bott
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