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Half a drysuit is not a drysuit?

cougarmeat

cougarmeat

Paddler
Joined
Sep 17, 2012
Messages
1,210
Location
Bend OR USA
Opened this tread instead of hijacking a post in Trip Reports, there was mention of wearing a drysuit open to the waist until "it was needed". But my experience is, tipping over has always been a surprise. And if the weather turns dicy enough that I'd need to put the top half on - by top half, I'm talking about a one piece drysuit, not a two piece top and bottom - it's hard enough for me to do that on solid ground. So gyrations, when solo, in the kayak are challenging.

I have the luxury/dilemma of choosing between drysuit or neoprene. If I'm paddling with someone, in not a lot of open water, I'd most likely go for neoprene. But if solo, or long-ish open water time, I'd pick the drysuit. But if I'm going to wear it, I'm going to wear it - all of it.

Is this being overly "fussy". Is paddling with your drysuit open/off to the waist, only to be closed up when sufficient white caps appear, a common practice?
 
Yes, an open dry suit would be of limited value when paddling. Perhaps keep you drier if there w s some spray. But definitely would be very wet in a swim. I don't paddle with an open dry suit.
 
What you wear inside your fully zipped drysuit may be a factor of allowing/ preventing hypo/hyperthermia to arise if prolonged over exertion or a lengthy swim were the case.
I was once lightly clothed under my drysuit during a summer training course on rescues. I was in the water a long time, (I thought ) but in reality it was somewhere around 15 minutes, or less. Damn I was cold!
It's difficult to know how to dress.
The best prevention of having an incident is knowledge of the conditions and the environment around you combined with skill and experience. This creates intuitive wisdom which can also be another aspect of your safety.
May everyone land safely.
 
I have never paddled with an open dry suit, but I'm willing to give it a try. However, my drysuits fit me so snuggly I don't think it would even be possible to get my head inside the neck gasket while I'm seated in my kayak. What I think "might" work is putting the suit on but not zipping up all the way. (I have a front zip GMER, not a back zip suit.) It probably wouldn't take me 10 or 15 seconds to pull the zipper all the way down, so I don't think that it would pose a huge risk to my safety, though I might have to pop my skirt off of the combing momentarily in order to make sure the zipper is completely seated. What I gain is significant, however, because airflow around my chest is going to have the biggest cooling effect. I'm definitely game to give this technique a try.

As for getting flipped unexpectedly, I'm usually very aware when conditions are building that might flip me. For example, while paddling WW, I never put on my nose plugs unless I see a rapid coming that looks significant or I'm planning to attempt some challenge move. Otherwise, I don't bother with nose plugs. Sure, the consequences of being wrong are insignificant, but I can't even remember the last time I was wrong. (Queue a flip w/o nose plugs!)

As we discussed in the drysuit thread, sea kayakers are constantly trying to thread the needle between dressing for immersion and dressing for a hot workout. It's not an easy problem to solve, especially if you're paddling solo.
 
Has anybody here used one of those tubing 'neck rings' which hold the neck gasket open?

https://rescuesource.com/shop/drysuit-wetsuit-care/neck-ring/

neck ring.jpg
 
jamonte said:
It probably wouldn't take me 10 or 15 seconds to pull the zipper all the way down, so I don't think that it would pose a huge risk to my safety, though I might have to pop my skirt off of the combing momentarily in order to make sure the zipper is completely seated.
Click to expand...

This is when not wearing a foam-type PFD?
 
I wear a front zip PFD (Kokatat Outfit Tour). I'm pretty sure all I'd have to do is unzip the PFD for a second, pull down the dry suit zipper, then re-zip the PFD. I don't think that would be too difficult or risky. The main question I have is whether I'd be able to get the dry suit zipper all the way down without popping my skirt off the combing. But all of this is conjecture... I'll have to try it on the water to see if it works for me.

As for those neck rings, I tried one twenty years ago and did not find it to be very useful. Latex gaskets are so damn stretchy that they minimize any sort of air gap created by the ring. That was my experience, anyway. If anyone out there has had a better experience using a ring, I'd like to hear about it.
 
this is what i am looking at for next winter, it's all about being able to open/close on the water:

my 10 year old NRS's seamtape is disintergrateing, but it should hang on for one more winter...
 
Dermot, thanks for posting that video! That is by far the most workable solution I've seen to the overheating problem faced by sea kayakers wearing dry suits. A horse collar zipper would provide so much ventilation right where you need it most... every paddle stroke would move a little air around your upper torso to remove heat and water vapor before it builds up and soaks your insulating layers. Plus, you can zip it up without removing your skirt or PFD. I am really impressed with this design!

I do agree that Stohlquist doesn't have the best rep re: dry suit quality, but their PFDs and other paddle clothing seem to hold up fairly well. I guess what I'd really love to see is for Kokatat to make a Gore-Tex drysuit specifically for sea kayakers with this sort of horse-collar zipper. So far, they seem focused on marrying bibs and dry tops or creating a dry suit (the Idol) that splits into a dry top and dry pants, but neither of these designs does anything to address the problem of overheating.
 
I guess that to me this seems insanely risky. If you capsize suddenly, without having the opportunity to zip up, you're not only gonna be cold--you're also gonna have a harder time staying afloat, given that the legs of the suit are going to flood with water, pull you down against the pfd, and make it almost impossible to swim.

I get the problem --I live in TN and often have to be too warm while paddling in order to dress for immersion in winter. But water inside drysuits isn't funny.
 
Freya Hoffmeister routinely "cheats" in this fashion ... under all manner of conditions in her current sequential multiday segments circumnavigating North America. And she is not dead yet. She is an animal, however, with the agility and fitness needed to make recoveries.
 
Astoriadave said:
Freya Hoffmeister routinely "cheats" in this fashion ... under all manner of conditions in her current sequential multiday segments circumnavigating North America. And she is not dead yet. She is an animal, however, with the agility and fitness needed to make recoveries.
Click to expand...
Dave-
Can you give details?
I thought Freya was sponsored by Kokatat, so wondering how she half-wears her drysuit.
 
A few thoughts:
1) very unlikely to capsize on a calm day, haveing the horesshoe zip open should make for a much more pleasurable day on a good day
2) the "standby" mode does offer vastly better protection than an open chest zip on my current suit
3) it looks very easy to button up if there's weather or sea state change, and that's unlikely to happen faster than i could close up the horseshoe zipper
4) i'm a bit concerned with Stolquist's one year warenttee -vs- past street rep
 
Astoriadave said:
Never have seen a photo. Not sure if she strips it to her waist, running her upper body up through the chest zip or not. Awkward reentry, in any case.
Click to expand...
Yes, that's just what she does. And she usually has her PFD on the deck. An amazing paddler and person, but not one to emulate in safety matters.
 
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