Today, Kevin, Rob and I went to Millbrook in Haymarket, VA, to try some new gears. Kevin made some configuration adjustments to his new backplate and wing from DSS; Rob had new twins LP108; and I was trying a new Dive-Rite AL backplate and dual classic wing.


It was my first dive with a backplate and two cylinders. Since I don’t have a set of twin cylinders, I used an independent double tank mount with two AL80. I used two separate Oceanic transmitter linked to my Atom 2.0 computer and practiced gas management. I also practiced buoyancy with the new wing and managed to stay level without difficulty during the dive and on the safety stop. The only problem was to keep the weight belt on my hips as I needed 20+ lb of lead to get me down with the AL80s and thick (and warm) undergarment in my drysuit... Once at 30 ft deep on the platform, we adjusted the belt and swam without problem. We followed a guideline and visited a small plane. It was in pretty bad shape. After a few more minutes, Kevin and I got separated from Rob (bad viz) and we had to ascend at the surface to get back together.


We did one dive of 45 minutes. The water temperature was about 38F at the deepest (87ft) and viz 30 ft. Although the water was almost as cold as in Bainbridge back in January, it felt much warmer to me. I think I figured out how to properly suit up under my drysuit for cold water diving and manage to keep my fingers warm by having a good glove seal to prevent water from coming into the gloves.