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   > equipment > features > DIVER tests appeared in DIVER May 2004

John Bantin has been a full-time professional diving writer and underwater photographer since 1990. He makes around 300 dives each year testing diving equipment.

Tried and truly tested...
  • Mares Proton Ice reg
  • Scubapro S600/MK25 Classic reg
  • Icom IC-M31 VHF radio
  • DUI TLS 350 dry suit
  • Explorer 7630 case
  • Delta P VR2 computer
  • Apollo Bio Vest


  • Chilled but not frozen

    IT DOESN'T OFTEN HAPPEN, BUT WHEN IT DOES, I GO PREPARED. What? Me, diving in cold fresh water? It can be as cold in the water at Stoney Cove in winter as almost anywhere in the world. So what's my choice of regulator under these dire conditions? For a February trip to this Midland Mecca for divers, I took a Mares Proton Ice with a coldwater kit fitted.
         I hadn't left the shore before the regulator on the other side of my tank H-valve started playing up, gushing and roaring like a burst pipe. I won't mention the brand. The Proton Ice, however, behaved impeccably.
         So why did I choose that regulator and that model? The Proton Ice comes with the V32 first stage, which is a direct descendent of the MR22 supplied with the Mares Abyss and the Mares Ruby. It has merely been pared of excess metal and hence weight.
         It has six ports, four medium-pressure and one over-sized to accommodate the wide-bore hose of the second stage. The high-pressure ports are sensibly angled away from the route of the other ports so that hp transmitters and hp hoses are not squeezed by others.
         It has Mares' patented "Dynamic Flow Control", which minimises pressure drop and with it temperature drop during the inhalation phase of breathing. The valve also has a spherical core seal system which avoids abnormal wear.
         Ever concerned that I have the best experience, Justin from distributor Blandford Sub-Aqua kindly fitted an optional coldwater kit, too. This ensures that the works of the diaphragm regulator stay dry and the diaphragm itself stays lubricated and flexible, reducing the chance of malfunction because of icing.
         The Proton Ice second stage is made of metal, including the mesh grid at the front, but is otherwise similar to the standard Proton. The even newer Proton Metal has a traditional shiny finish rather than the rather avant garde frosted look of the top-of-the-range coldwater model.
         I imagine there will be some hairy-arsed members of the diving public who would rather be seen dead than using a regulator finished in pale blue and misted metal!
         So what's special about metal? Divers started having trouble with free-flows in freezing conditions only once regulators had been developed to provide today's massive flow-rates, and makers advanced to lightweight plastic construction.
         The coldest water is usually warmer than 0°C (it's very hard to swim in ice). But the air supplied by your regulator can be very cold indeed, because that's what happens when a gas is depressurised, just as your tank gets hot when it's pumped.
         Start off your air supply at, say, 4°C, a temperature common in freshwater sites in winter, and it can become very cold as the pressure drops from more than 200 to 8-15 bar at the first stage, depending on your depth.
         Any water in or around the first stage could turn to ice crystals, which can jam the mechanism.
         There is another temperature drop at the second stage, and this very cold air can be warmed up only by the water surrounding it. Metal conducts heat better than plastic, and although there may not be much heat in the water but there is a lot more than there is in the air passing through the regulator.
         The metal parts of the regulator serve to conduct this heat to warm up the air. The Proton Ice has heat-exchangers on the hose, too, but I think this is more to ape the fashion of other manufacturers who add heat-exchangers where their second stages are made of non-heat-conductive thermoplastic.
         Mares goes further by directing the main supply of air away from the works of the second stage by means of the venturi bypass tube or VAD (Vortex Assisted Design).
         I have found this design very effective in avoiding exponential free-flows, and the designers at Mares don't think it necessary to furnish their regulators with venturi ± switches or breathing-resistance adjustment knobs. You just stick them in your mouth and breathe. All the clever stuff was done when it made the regulators.
         I did everything wrong when I tried the Proton Ice. I left my tank in my car overnight so that it was well-chilled. I took some heavy breaths from it while standing at the shore before diving - a surefire way to introduce ice into the main body of the second stage and affect the demand-valve mechanism. It didn't.
         I cannot guarantee that a Mares Proton Ice will not freeze up on you, given even more extreme circumstances, but if you buy one and it happens, please let me know.
    The Mares Proton Ice (£385) with optional Coldwater kit costs £435.

  • Blandford Sub-Aqua 01923 801572, www.blandfordsubaqua.co.uk


    + Has all the features of a regulator for use in cold water
    - None come to mind

  • Isn't this where we came in?
    Remember, remember, the fifth of November. I remember 5 November 1983. It was my first trip to dive in a flooded slate quarry in Leicestershire.
         I went to try out my shiny new rubber Viking drysuit. Until that day I had always dived in limpid, clear, blue water. What a daunting prospect that Stoney Cove's grey lake made.
         My regulator was a Spirosub. It had all the outward design appeal of a tin of baccy - Three Nuns on the end of a hose.
         It didn't give me much air, but I never expected much. However, what it also didn't do was go into an uncontrollable free-flow because it froze. Those days were yet to come.
         During the next decade, the folks at Stoney Cove would regularly see divers disappearing in a cloud of bubbles before climbing out mouthing curses about their kit.
         Before that, regulators had given air-flows that were puny enough to make those trying to breathe from them feel like asthmatics. So manufacturers addressed the problem and increased their regulator performance to something approaching today's acceptably high levels.
         However, at about the same time, they also adopted lightweight technopolymers in the construction of second stages. This meant less weight on the mouthpiece and far more diver comfort. Great for the majority of divers who spent their time in the Caribbean, Red Sea or Indian Ocean, but not so good for that small minority, worldwide, who spent their weekends diving in cold, fresh water.
         Delivery of vast quantities of depressurised air in conditions close to freezing was asking for trouble. Many of us got that trouble, because the technopolymers used had a low coefficient of conduction. In an attempt to warm the air, some manufacturers tried adding bits of metal as heat sinks.
         Bring back the baccy tin! That never froze. There is no substitute for metal in coldwater designs, as many regulator manufacturers have now realised.
         Some have abandoned plastic in the quest for safe low-temperature use. It's a classic solution to a modern problem.
         The Scubapro S600/MK25 regulator is close to the acme of that manufacturer's achievements. It can deliver exceedingly high quantities of air with a low work-of-breathing (see www.divernet.com/equipment/0503divertests. shtml#mk25).
         Recent modifications to the first stage have been designed to further reduce the problem of icing. Now Scubapro has gone all the way - all the way back to where we came in because, reminiscent of the old classic Scubapro MkV and MkX, the new Scubapro S600/MK25 Classic has a chrome-plated brass front to its second stage!
    The Scubapro S600/MK25 Classic costs £399.

  • Scubapro UK 01256 812636, scubapro.co.uk

    + More metal, less icing
    - None come to mind

  • Wet-resistant, over and out
    What distinguishes us from animals is our ability to exchange information in an abstract way. You never see a monkey reading a newspaper. Some animals can learn from others by observation. So can we, and during our lives certain images stay in our mind, especially of other people making the mistakes we hope never to make ourselves.
         I remember watching the boat-handler of an inflatable picking up divers one night in the Red Sea. He had a VHF radio on a lanyard around his neck. It was dark. Each time he leaned over the side to pull in some kit, the radio dangled in the water. He never understood why it had stopped working.
         I often see people with similar radios in soft plastic waterproof containers. These often work, but I have also seen those same bags with almost as much water in them as there is outside. Why doesn't someone come up with a radio suitable for use in a small wet boat?
         The Icom IC-M31 is water-resistant. It is said to have been tested at 1m for 30 minutes. That should do it. Reception gets rather poor if you go any deeper, anyway!
         It comes with a rechargeable 5W ni-cad but you can always insert six standard AA battery cells in a special chassis if you are stuck for somewhere to charge it.
         There is a convenient stand for use in boats that have space to fit it, and this doubles as a charging-connector when used with the appropriate transformer.
         The IC-M31 has a nice big illuminated LCD and easily operated buttons. You can pre-programme up to 70 channels and it has dual watch, so that you can know what's happening on Channel 16, and tri-watch, so you can be alerted to any signal being received on both 16 and another call channel while using a third.
         Reverting to channel 16 (the emergency and calling channel) is easy. It has its own button and you can programme a specific call channel if a different one is used in the area where you are located. Tag-scanning does exactly that. It
         scans round several channels in sequence looking for signals.
         Thanks to modern digital technology, the volume and squelch controls (which filter out unwanted background noise) can be adjusted easily, if you read the instructions.
         Everyone who goes out in a small boat should know how to use a VHF radio, even if he or she has no operator's licence.
         In an emergency you might be the only able-bodied person, so you should know how to turn it on and use Channel 16. You should know how to use the Press-to-Speak button and understand that you will not be able to hear any replies unless you release it after speaking.
         Say clearly: "Mayday. Mayday. (M'aidez!)... This is (the vessel's name)...We are (its position)... It is (a brief description of the vessel)... We are (your predicament)." Release the button and await an answer. Press it to call again. Release it to listen. Every radio should have these waterproofed instructions attached.
         Having a unit that will withstand the water sloshing about in the bottom of a small boat can only add to safety and a possible happy outcome. It should not, however, be dropped. And I don't know if anyone unfamiliar with this type of radio would understand how to use the squelch control.
         Other than during emergencies, you need a licence to operate a marine VHF radio. Close to the coast of Britain and many other countries, mobile phones make a very good alternative - and everyone knows how to use them.
    The Icom IC-M31 VHF radio transceiver costs £149.

  • Icom UK 01227 741741, www.icomuk.co.uk

    + Stands a dunking
    - You need to know how to use it

  • Zip-a-dee-doo-dah, it saves the day!
    It was a long fast drive through the night across France, but Steve and I shared the chore while our partners slept soundly in the back seats. We finally made it to Porquerolles before breakfast, where we planned to preface our time in France with a dive on the wreck of the Donator.
         We'd had the foresight to rig our gear before we set off. My Inspiration CCR was ready to go and the others needed only to twin up pairs of cylinders before we put on our suits.
         Everything was going swingingly to plan. Then my missus put her fingers through one latex wrist seal of her Hydrotech drysuit, rendering it useless.
         Well, we weren't delayed for long. She's tough, and managed, slightly wet and cold, in an ill-fitting borrowed semi-dry. But how much more convenient it would have been if we'd been using the new DUI suits with instantly replaceable ZipSeals. Why did no-one think of this simple idea before?
         DUI is one of my favourite brands of drysuits. Why? Because they keep me dry, that's why! They are, however, incredibly expensive.
         DUI made its name in the UK with an extremely hard-wearing suit of neoprene that was atmospherically crushed after the suit was made. This tightened up all the stitching and made for an almost indestructible membrane-style suit. However, as these suits are made far away in California, CEO and founder of DUI Dick Long (guess his e-mail address!) found that they could not compete on price with the burgeoning UK-made products.
         An original crushed-neoprene DUI suit will give you little change from two grand. So the company went about providing the original suit design in a range of less costly materials.
         The TLS350 is still a top-price product but is made from a lightweight sandwich of butyl rubber between two layers of hard-wearing nylon cloth. I guess it's aimed at lookers rather than wreckers, though I am assured that the material is incredibly durable.
         The suit has the same long conical wrist and neck seals that can be cut to length to provide a perfect watertight fit. It has the same over-long torso, enabling easy donning through a diagonal-entry front zip concealed and protected behind a covering of nylon material, which itself is closed by a secondary plastic zip.
         The torso has a tuck at the midriff, and internal braces combined with a jock-strap and pinch-clip keeps everything in place. The diagonal cross-chest zip is fitted in such a way that this suit can be self-donned completely, with no outside help needed to close the last couple of inches of zip.
         It's a pity the nylon material is so slippery that it's hard to get a grip on it to pull the legs on easily. I have the usual gripe about black braces being hard to see in the dark recesses of dark suits, especially on a sunny day with deep shadows. Why not make them is some contrasting colour so that we don't get our knickers in a twist?
         The TLS350 has the same Apeks low-profile auto-dump with the DUI logo, perfectly sited at the shoulder, and it has a similarly DUI-branded Apeks-type rotating inflation valve at the centre of the chest.
         It also has that other unique feature of legs finished with sealed neoprene sock-ends. This allows the user to wear tough DUI Rock Boots which will put up with a lot of the challenges to the integrity of drysuit boots along a shoreline.
         On a previous occasion on a liveaboard in a wintry Red Sea, I found that the sock-ends worked as well with ordinary neoprene wetsuit boots of an appropriately large size worn over them.
         The TLS 350 allowed me to swim as easily as if I was in a wetsuit. That's because drysuits with heavier-weight material need to be flexed with every fin-stroke, and that takes energy. Is that why this is the choice of drysuit of the Secret Service agents assigned to protect George Bush when he goes swimming?
         So what of the ZipSeals? I love the instructions that come with the suit, obviously aimed at the American market. After explaining how to fit the neck ZipSeal by turning the suit inside out, they remind the reader to turn the suit right-side-out before diving. You'd have a job closing the dryzip any other way!
         Often copied, DUI drysuits still seem to lead the field when it comes to putting innovative ideas into practice. The ZipSeals are the latest such ideas. Both suit and seal are provided with flexible plastic rings which interlock, not unlike those of a double ZipLok bag, only much heavier. Press them together until they make a distinctive clunk. Naturally, you should check that they are properly interlocked before every dive.
         A problem arose when I tried to remove the ZipSeal at the neck. After much struggling, I remained unable to separate it from the suit. It might as well have been welded on. So much for a quick seal change at Porquerolles. You can't fit a new seal if you can't get the old one off.
         Then I spotted the secret. A macro-photo is needed in the manual to show where it splits. I had no success with my fingernail, as per the instructions, and ended up doing the job with a blunt-ended screwdriver, with the risk of damage had it slipped.
         As it was, I had taken the precaution of asking DUI to send me a spare neck seal just in case, no doubt confirming the idea that journalists are thick when it comes to following manuals. I did, however, remember to turn the suit right-side-out before diving.
         The moment came to put it all back together. DUI suggests soapy water to help lubricate everything. I used Polar Bears Suit Gloop (330ml for £3.95) to lubricate opposing surfaces and soon had the neck seal back where it belonged, crunching it into place. The neck seal is much easier to reinstall than to uninstall, but isn't that always the case?
         In fact the opposite seemed to be true of the wrist seals. To fit them I needed to bend the wrist-ending into an oval shape and fight the ZipSeal into it. It worked in the end.
         DUI also took the opportunity, second time round, of asking if I'd like the ZipGloves too.
         Would I? Brrrr! These fit on instead of the cuff seals to afford a perfect dry-glove effect, with woolly liner glove included. Thankfully they pull off a lot more easily than the neck seal, otherwise I'd still be at Stoney Cove shouting: "Will someone get me out of this?"
         In fact I cheated. I fitted a ZipGlove to one hand, and a ZipSeal to the other. In that wayI could check how both systems worked. My left hand stayed warm and snug while my right enjoyed the dexterity of a neoprene wet glove - until it went numb.
         So back to France, and the observation that had my wife brought with her a DUI suit with ZipSeals rather than the conventionally equipped Hydrotech suit, she might have been better off.
         Unfair to pillory Hydrotech, you might say - it could have happened with any suit with latex wrist seals. But, fittingly, Hydrotech has become the British distributor of DUI suits, so I'm sure the guys there won't mind the mention.
    The DUI TLS 350 with ZipSeals costs around £1500. Zip Gloves cost £117.

  • Hydrotech 01455 274106, www.hydrotech.co.uk

    + Incredibly well made
    + Fun to use
    + For those who want the best

    - Incredibly expensive
    - Only for those who can afford the best


  • A suitable case for rough treatment
    You know how it is, waiting for your bags to appear on the luggage belt at Heathrow. Why are mine always last to be unloaded? But after one recent trip I felt I was in luck. My bags were already belting round the carousel when I arrived in the baggage hall.
         I had them on my trolley and was waiting for my partner's last item to appear, when a well-known and irate underwater photographer strode up, took the bags away and put them on his trolley. Why? Because they were his. We happened to have identical taste in suitcases.
         My biggest fear is to arrive at some far-flung diving destination with someone else's cameras. That's because so many underwater photographers these days choose to pack everything in a large black Pelican case. So I welcomed the chance to use a new Explorer case when it was sent to me by Forward Diving.
         The range of Explorer hard equipment cases is similar to the established Pelican line. They come not only in black plastic but in a vibrant Motorway Maintenance orange. I can't see many other people choosing such an outstanding case, so there's less danger of misidentification.
         The Explorer 7630 is almost of the same dimensions as the equivalent Pelican 1650 but about an inch deeper. It has the same robust construction, with a hermetic seal to keep out dust and water; a pressure-relief valve to allow you to prise it open once it's been in the low-pressure environment of an aircraft; the same folding handle down the longest side; and the same wheels.
         The bigger of the two handles at the end, used with the wheels, is spring-loaded, but otherwise it's very simple. There's nothing to tax the brains of US airport security officials, but don't try to help them with it or you'll soon be right back at the end of the line!
         The 7630 comes with or without foam inserts. It was only when I saw that the foam costs £48 extra that I realised I had thrown away about £20 worth when I fitted my camera kit into it.
         But these cases are for people who travel in the front of the plane, travel on business, or have a benefactor like Bernard Eaton to pick up their excess-baggage charges.
         The equivalent Pelican case weighs around 12kg before you start to load it, but although the 7630's spec says it weighs 11kg, it appears to weigh even more than the Pelican. I won't tell you the excess charge I paid on Singapore Airlines just to get to the first plane-change of my journey to the Far East.
         Of course, these charges could be worth paying the day you see your precious camera kit in its bright orange Explorer case fall off the boat. I can't confirm this, but I am told that the case will still float with an all-up weight of nearly 82kg. With a camera housing rigged with two flashguns, I noted that the weight was 25kg. That's a lot at Singapore Airlines' check-in but not so much when the case is bobbing in the South China Sea.
    The Explorer 7630 is undoubtedly tough and capacious but is expensive to buy and use. It has internal dimensions of 765 x 485 x 305mm, comes in black or orange and costs £313 with foam, or £265 without.

  • Forward Diving Services 01202 677128, www.forwarddiving.co.uk

    + Very robust
    + Big capacity
    + Buoyant

    - Heavy weight penalty
    - Expensive


  • You can't take your eyes off it!
    The casual reader of any British diving magazine might well be led to believe that most scuba-divers go in equipped with trimix and deco gas, weighed down with equipment, and dive to 90m as a matter of routine. This is not true.
         Most dives made today are by people wearing one tank on their back, breathing whichever gas the diving operation chooses to give them, wearing a minimal layer of thermal insulation by way of a suit, and planning their dive on the basis of their ongoing air-consumption.
         Kevin Gurr is one of the minority. He is even one of a minority within that minority. So when he decided that he wanted a computer that met his needs, it was naturally very comprehensive in what it could do, and necessarily complicated in how it did it.
         I think even he was surprised at the number of Delta P VR3 computers he has sold, but then, if everyone who bought a Ferrari needed to drive like Michael Schumacher, we would never see a prancing-horse badge on our roads. All manufacturers of consumer goods know that people want to own good stuff, but not necessarily to use it to the full.
         At up to £1000, the VR3 is an expensive item. Kevin has realised that there is untapped sales potential in that part of the market that wants to use state-of-the-art kit but probably never dives deeper than 50m, so he has introduced the VR2.
         The VR2 has a family likeness to the VR3, but is made of plastic rather than aluminium. Under water, it has a similar display. It runs on a similar single AA battery.
         Like its big brother, the VR2 applies deep-stops, and if you pass a stop depth it allows you one minute to get back down to it. I like the little-man-on-the-line display that indicates the possible range of continuous decompression.
         It's not all rosy. I found its knobbly shape incredibly uncomfortable at times on my wrist, and wondered why it had to be so. It has a set of instructions as difficult to grasp as those of the VR3, and a pair of buttons as frustrating to use. Once mastered, however, it can be configured for open-circuit scuba or closed-circuit rebreather with the option of the "fourth cell" connection. It can be configured for multiple gas switches - but only if you stick to nitrox.
         The VR2 is not intended for use with trimix, which effectively gives it a depth limit. It is limited to the maximum depth its user is prepared to go to while breathing nitrox 21 (air).
         That said, possibly the biggest future market for closed-circuit rebreathers includes those who intend to use air as a diluent and will never go deeper than 50m.
         Once I got it set up the way I wanted it, I expected the VR2 to be a joy to use. However, this proved not to be.
         Why? If I had been diving a wreck, completed my photographic task and then given the VR2 all my attention as I ascended a line, there would have been no problems.
         In the calm still waters of the northern Red Sea, I found that I was able to take in my stride the deepwater stops the computer demanded. Coming up a reef after bottoming out at, say 35m, it seemed quite natural to spend time at, say, 18m as demanded.
         But once I found myself in the more turbulent waters of the Maldives in January, things proved quite different. On nearly every dive, to no more than 30m, I would get back to around 20m, still busy taking photographs, only to suddenly discover that the display was reading "Missed Deco Stop - Use Tables", to which my reaction invariably was: "I don't believe it!"
         I was not diving dangerously. Seeing this information displayed so early on in a dive was rather depressing. I often dived for a further 40 minutes, guided by my alternative computers. The VR2 obviously did not enjoy the hurly-burly of the up and down currents in which I was diving. I was missing those deep-stops and the computer was abandoning me to my fate.
         To avoid this I would have needed to scrutinise the VR2 every minute, but with the requirements of an underwater camera this was unlikely to happen. Had I been relying on the VR2, I might have been left floundering without any knowledge of my deco-status. Other divers back on the boat kept asking me if I had bent my computer again!
         Before anyone writes to say that I was not diving properly, please be aware that big ocean currents have a will of their own when they strike a reef, and it is not always possible to keep within a precise 1m depth-range while being hurtled along. But that is what the VR2 expects you to do.
         I imagine the VR2 will be attractive to many divers who normally do square-profile dives, dive in a very disciplined way and appreciate such complex equipment. They will be the equivalent of Ferrari drivers rather than Ferrari racers.
         So if you want a VR3 but are never going to use trimix, and if ascending a shotline is always the normal final stage in your dive, this could be just the computer for you. If you are a multi-level underwater photographer - forget it!
    The VR2 costs £499 in open-circuit mode and £549 for use with closed-circuit. It can be upgraded from one to the other later if necessary.

  • Delta P Technology 01202 624478, www.vr3.co.uk

    + Easy to understand in the water
    + Multi-mix nitrox, open or closed-circuit options

    - Complicated to set up
    - Almost impossible to understand at first, before diving
    - Why the knobbly shape?
    - Dumps you if you are not precise with deep-stops


  • Bring out the gimp
    Apollo Bio Seals are bands of extremely stretchy, rubbery material that a diver can wear at neck and wrists as an interface between skin and the latex or neoprene of a drysuit's seals. The idea is to form a more effective barrier to water than might be obtained simply with seals and bare skin. The neck seal also stops that rash that some of us get from a drysuit seal.
         Apollo has realised that there are other applications for the remarkable hi-tech material from which Bio Seals are made, said to be elastic to the order of something like 1500%.
         Yes, you read that right! It's very stretchy.
         If you were titillated by the sight of me wearing a set of Bio Seals in these pages last year, you're in for a treat! Pulp Fiction fans will be delighted. The company sent me a fetching little black rubber polo-necked vest, and it was probably no coincidence that it arrived in time for the Christmas party season.
         Talk about "one size fits all", this little vest easily fitted me and all the other members of my family (in turn). The Apollo Bio Vest looks as if it's made of rubber, but it's not. Bring out the gimp!
         So what's the idea when it comes to diving? Well, you know how often a diver can arrive at a desirable destination only to find that the water is a bit cooler than was anticipated. It happened to me in Papua New Guinea.
         On the north side of the mainland, it was like diving in a bath, whereas on the southern side, the Great Barrier Reef side, it was like diving in a bath that some teenager had soaked in all morning and finally abandoned just as hypothermia set in.
         I've routinely packed lightweight garments like those from ChillCheater or Fourth Element to wear under a wetsuit that proved too cold, and they make a difference. Apollo is looking at that function too, to add insulation around the torso.
         The Bio Vest is very easy to put on because it stretches so much. There seems little danger of it tearing because, though soft and stretchy, it's also extremely tough. Depending on how much you stretch it (which depends on how much you fill it) this little vest can be very insulating indeed.
         In my case, it was stretched thin across my chest and tended to ride up, leaving me with a bare midriff under my suit. Very fashionable among modern young women, but in my case it's not so good.
         If you're heavily built, forget it. You'll end up with what looks like a very small rubber bra and it really won't look very nice at all!
         However, the stretchiness of the Bio Vest allowed me to pull it down over my abdomen, and its strange non-sticky adhesiveness (if that makes any sense) kept it there. All I had to do then was brave the comments from other divers as I climbed into my semi-dry.
         The Bio Vest proved extremely comfortable. It didn't seem to add much to my overall warmth under water because of the exposed armpit area, but after climbing back aboard the Red Sea's mv Excel in a wintry wind, its hydrophobic properties stopped me being chilled by evaporation when I climbed out of my suit.
         Back in the privacy of my cabin, I found that the Bio Vest had become part of me. It felt as if it was glued on. I peeled it off like a layer of indestructible Jell-O and found I was perfectly dry underneath. I wished I'd had a pair of Bio Shorts to go with it but these are not yet available and might need an extra degree of bravery.
         So while my enthusiasm for the Bio Vest's thermal insulating properties is restricted, the comfort level is high. I can say no more without prejudicing my standing within the diving community.
         Suffice to say, if you are man or girl enough to wear one, you'll enjoy it!
    The Apollo Bio Vest costs £125.

  • CJ Evans International 01202680533

    + Keeps parts warm when other parts are wet
    - Underwater insulation properties limited
    - Few men may be man enough to be seen wearing it



  • straight down the line
     

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