Thomas M. Heineman wrote: > > Any thoughts on when you need a wet suit vs. a dry suit. Lake Michigan > is now 53 degrees and dropping rapidly. > > I need to buy a wet suit and/or dry suit and am curious what the > guidelines are. > > Any recommendations for brand/type? > > Tom The answer to this is a moving target. It was not so long ago that paddlers ventured out with minimal cold water clothing, wool and rain slickers. All you have to look at are early editions of John Dowd's book and Derek Hutchinson's book to see what I mean (his classic comment back then was who wants to go around smelling like a stinky frogman when he could be all decked out in the clothing of a Gentleman British walker). Then paddlers started wearing 3 mm neoprene in conjunction with paddling jackets and pants. Then dry suits came into vogue. Meanwhile, the scale of when to wear what and the consequences of not doing so has also been a moving target. At one point, the threshold for donning even a wet suit was either 50 degrees or 55 degrees. But that has been upped to a point that some paddling clubs have been known to refuse paddlers not properly cold water clothed when the water temperature was proven to be hovering around 65 degrees, which is acceptable beach swimming temperature water in many parts of the country. What is the clothing situation now and what are the thresholds? What is survivablility at various temperatures or more importantly self-rescueability at various temperatures? All I can answer with is my own personal choices. I start off with the premise that I am in a folding kayak that is not prone to tip and is not for playing around with doing eskimo rolls. I know lots of folding kayakers who start with that premise and rely on it and so don no cold water clothing whatsoever. I think that is wrong and have spoken and written until I am blue in the face telling them so. I advise a modicum of cold water clothing regardless of the type of boat on the proven theory that something can always go wrong. So, even though I am in a folder that is not tippy and can be remounted in seconds without much in the way of paddle float aid, etc. here is what I wear. When water temperatures are around or below 60 and even with the air in the 70s, I put on as a minimum a shorty Polartec Thermal Stretch suit (the material Jack Martin described); this is a one piece suit with short legs and sleeveless but with wide shoulder protection. Over that, if I am feeling the least bit chilly (i.e. air temperture around 70 or less), I add a short sleeve jacket of the same material. As the water temperature starts inching down to the 55 degree mark environs, I switch to a full suit of that same material. (BTW, I wear a Goretex Paddle Jacket over this at these temperatures.) When the water temperature gets to around 50 degrees or so, I put on a vest of the same material over the suit. Below 50 deg. or so, I switch to a coated nylon dry suit, because that is what I have, with a varying amount of insulation under it, about 200 wt. fleece on top and 100 wt. fleece on legs (although I may switch this insulation to the Polartec Thermal Stretch as Jack Martin suggests and which he and I have discussed in the past). At times I may not wear the dry suit and push the Polartec Thermal Stretch suit and vest get-up down below 50 if the air temperatures are high and conditions not windy or tricky but I know that this outfit is risky in this range and would not be too good below 45 degrees water temperature. The rules can't be hard and fast. This is an old discussion but well worth repeating and I hope we knock it around some more. Feather/unfeather discussions are habit and style; cold water clothing is a matter of life. It can't be stressed enough. ralph -- ----------------------------------------------------------------------- Ralph Diaz . . . Folding Kayaker newsletter PO Box 0754, New York, NY 10024 Tel: 212-724-5069; E-mail: rdiaz_at_ix.netcom.com "Where's your sea kayak?"----"It's in the bag." ----------------------------------------------------------------------- *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - All postings copyright the author and not to be reproduced outside PaddleWise without author's permission Submissions: paddlewise_at_lists.intelenet.net Subscriptions: paddlewise-request_at_lists.intelenet.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************Received on Mon Nov 01 1999 - 07:58:02 PST
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