Contact Info:
Phone: (617) 277-2216
Fax: (617) 738-5521
Address: 213 Boylston st. Brookline, MA, 02445
HRS. Mon-Fri 10:7 Sat 10:6 Sun closed
brookline@ecdivers.com
News & Events
First Aid, CPR, and O2 Course in March
This course will certify you to perform First aid for aquatic injuries as well as administer cpr and oxygen safely.
Aqualung Test Day
Come test out all kinds of new aqualung products, then come to the store for some great deals on gear packages.
ONE DAY ONLY!
Trip Pictures
Come take a look at some of our pictures from previous trips
Make Your Own Mask And Fins Day
Join us April 18th and make a mask and set of fins with us
$50 off your first gear purchase when you sign up for OW pool and classroom training.
*only valid for purchases of $150 or greater
How To Have Better Buoyancy
(the myth of neutral buoyancy)
As most of you know, there are three types of buoyancy. Positive, neutral and negative. We experience all three during the course of any dive we do. When we hop in the water with air in our BC so we can float, that is positive. When we let all the air out of our BC and exhale to sink... that's negative. And then there is the elusive neutral buoyancy. this is what we want to maintain during the majority of our dive. Neutral buoyancy is when an object in a liquid neither floats nor sinks... it just sits there. So to use less energy and be in more control during a dive we want to be neutral.
There are 3 adjustments we make to control our buoyancy. First, most divers will naturally be positively buoyant. between the buoyancy of a wetsuit, gloves, boots, hood, and body fat... (yes fat floats) a diver is generally pretty buoyant. So, we need weights. Divers carry lead weight, usually between 4 to 30 pounds depending on situation, to sink themselves underwater. The next way we control our buoyancy is to counter act the weights with our BC or buoyancy compensator. This device is no more or less a bag with a hose. We put air into the bag to achieve positive buoyancy and remove air to to allow the weights to pull us underwater and dive. The last piece of the buoyancy triangle is the one most people have trouble controlling... it is your breathing. When you inhale it's like putting air into to BC. It will make you rise. When you exhale it is like taking air out which will cause you to sink. Now this is what brings me to the sub heading of this article "the MYTH of neutral buoyancy". If the golden rule of scuba is to NEVER HOLD YOUR BREATH! How are you supposed to really get neutral? YOU CAN'T! Cause somewhere in your breathing cycle will be neutral. Breath in and get positive, breath out and get negative.
Now this may be better than stupid neutral buoyancy any way. If you have the right amount of air in your BC so empty lungs mean sink and full lungs mean float, you will have WAY more control over your body. Swimming up to a big rock? Just breath a little deeper to begin to rise over the rock without having to kick up. Want to sink back to the bottom? Now a long exhale will lower you gently back down.
Your breathing is a key component to buoyancy control that requires practice to master. Work with your breathing and find out what your body is gonna do before it does. If you exhale, what is you body going to do? How bout if you take a big inhale? Let your understanding of buoyancy let you take control of yourself in the water.
Get out there and get some practice,
Alex (ECD Staff)
©East Coast Divers 2010