Drysuit #2 leaks - and so it continues . . .

[RogerPollock]

So, on Friday I go and pick up my new (left-over-demo) Palm Sidewinder drysuit, found, luckily, in the warehouse by the Palm rep up in Maine, which they shipped to the retailer down here. I go immediately to Chebaco lake, don the thing, and hurl myself in the water, giving the sole bystander at the boat landing, an environmental police officer, cause to raise his eyebrows and think me totally off my gourd.

No leaks. I’m bone dry. Phew.

I go on Saturday back to Chebaco to practice rolling (so, I don’t blow rolls at the Greenland session the following day and look like a boob– which happens nonetheless, thank you very much). I’m wet when I’m done, but I figure (optimistically) it’s perspiration.

Following the Greenland session, I’m sopping wet in the crotch, and my entire right arm. Like, I can wring water out of my undergarment. Oh, sure, I bet that’s sweat, too. Right? Sure. Definitely.

Back to the bathtub I go.

Twice. To be sure.

Leaks.

Essentially right in the same spots.

I guess I’m blowing the seams in the things - in two rolling sessions. I talked to the rep again, and though she can’t believe it - I guess there’s potentially a whole manufactured lot of these things with weak seams out there, ticking time bombs that Palm ought to hope they sold to paddlers unlikely to perform maneuvers more lively than the very occasional bow rudder.

Jeesh. So, now I’m back to waiting – with a leaky suit - for the cargo container with the ’05 suites to come in sometime who knows when – December/January.

I mean, is it me? I’ve looked closely, and there’s nothing particularly abrasive lurking in my armpit. I don’t have Brillo pads glued to my hips. Shouldn’t a suit marketed to kayakers – including whitewater kayakers – be able to withstand a couple rolling sessions?

Oh, woe is me . . .

One more shot for Palm and I’m buying a fricking Kokatak.

[rick stoehrer]

...and as it happens, i have a stikine canyon by palm that i love and has performed very well with no leaks or problems whatsoever and is holding up to my rather abusive ways without complaint or incident.

could be the zipper - pulled to the stops both ways? leaking in and down the assembly?

try the tub again....and if that doesn't bear anything out, try the lake again and just float there and see if you can pinpoint the problem. palm is distributed by MTI out of weymouth and i can't beieve that they would lose a sale to ko...koka....that k company where they have seemingly finally entered into this market (i don't remember seeing a palm drysuit around here before last winter)

good luck!

[Suz]

Roger,

Try the suit again in the water and this time make sure that your sleeves are pulled up past the latex wrist seals. Sometimes you can get a bit of cloth that is just inside the seal and it will wick up the water and create a wet arm.

The suit that you bought is a different suit than the one that Rick bought. You have the one with the zippers that are not YKK metal tooth zips. I believe they are plastic and are not of the same quality.

Do you think that it leaked through the relief zip rather than along the seams? That seems likely to me.

I have a feeling that the suit is more than adequate for a light duty suit. Perhaps for the average touring kayaker who doesn't get out more than once a month in the winter if they are lucky. Probably not the suit for someone who is going to spend the day in surf or rolling. All depends on what you want to do with it.

Give the rep a chance to work it out, especially if you can use the suit while you wait for the replacement.

Suzanne

[jeffcasey]

Hi Roger -

Many sympathies. I have no advice about repair vs return, but I will urge you to maintain high standards. There is no reason that you can't stay absolutely dry.

Myself, I'll put up with leaky hatches, but the drysuit must stay dry inside. Since I'm a lousy roller, I usually swim when I surf, so I've gotten a fair amount of use. I also like to play the ham at training sessions, which means that I fall out of my boat (and do everything possible to impede my rescue) a few dozen times each spring. I've never had a whisper of a leak, despite being repeatedly and clumsily dragged across back decks while thrashing unreasonably -- a tough workout for a drysuit.

This is one place to insist on performance. Don't let them talk you into accepting anything less.

[Brian Nystrom]

To find exactly where it's leaking from you need to insert snug fitting "plugs" in the seals (bottles, balloons, etc.) and blow some air into it, then submerge it, squeeze and look for bubbles.

In addition to the undergarment sleeve problem that Suze mentioned, some people also experience wrist leaks due to having protruding tendons that create channels for water. This can be minimized by using a relaxed grip and straight wrists, which are good form anyway.

As for the wet crotch, did you get really scared at the Greeland Day? ;-)

Seriously, it's quite possible that the leak is higher up in the suit and the water is simply running down to where you found the wet spot. If it's near your left hip, I would suspect that the leak is at the end of the main zipper. Are you sure that you're pulling it completely closed? There should be no gap between the zipper slider and the end stop.

[christopherG]

Roger, what about trying wax on the zippers? NESC sells a special lubricant designed exactly for this purpose. If these zips of yours are not as good as the full-metal ones, perhaps wax will improve the seal?

I also believe the wrist gasket sealing, as mentioned by Suzanne and Brian, may be one of your problems: it happens to me quite a lot -- the shape of my wrist is quite different now to how it used to be, with tendons that were once flush, now standing proud in a huge "trench", post-surgery (if you follow?)

If none of these suggestions works for you, how about simply re-proofing the suit? They do need it, once in a while, and I never see anyone on this list make reference to that, for some reason...(anyone?) Nikwax is available at REI as a spray or as an addition-to-final-rinse in the washing machine.

Does this help, at all? (By the way, at session's end, at Walden, I too was soaking wet underneath, despite wearing a borrowed tuiliq on top of my drysuit!)

[Dee Hall]

#1 - I discovered the hard way that that both zippers must be pulled to the very end to seal. Unless I have just waxed them, I have difficulty getting the entry zipper the last 1/4" closed.

#2 - Having clothing or hair caught in the latex seals, wrist or neck. This could include not having shaved if your beard goes that low. (Not something I have experienced, for the record.)

#3 - When I do a C-C roll, sometimes a small amount of water leaks in the neck seal. My neck seal is very comfy without having trimmed it. I guess I have a small neck. A roll with less hip snap (screw-sweep) does not cause this problem.

#4 - There have been a couple of times when I have been hanging upside down that I felt water dribbling onto my neck. At first I thought that I had a leak, but then I realized that it was sweat running downhill. At least one of those times was a rescue practice. Not much activity there.

I hope this helps. I agree with Brian that another test is probably worth the effort.

[Dave]

Godfrey old man!

The Nikwax and other products for Goretex are actually just to make the water bead up on the outside of the garment and do not actually (supposedly) effect the actual waterproofness of the fabric. Nikwax is a DWR... Durable Water Repellent.

A DWR is important to maintain on a goretex garment because without it water will not bead up, it will soak into the OUTSIDE layer and stop the breathability aspect of your waterproof-breathable garment.

If the DWR is not working on a garment you will probably get wet inside the suit but it is actually your own sweat that you are getting wet from since you are effectively now in a non-breathable suit.

DWR failure led to my one experience (hiking) with winter hypothermia! My friend's DWR was in need of refreshing and he got soaked from within and went to the planet of the shivering loop loops... very scary stuff though all turned out well.

I find the Nikwax spray on works better than the wash in stuff. Also tumbling in a warm dryer and ironing can bring some of the DWR back. Nothing I have ever done really brings the DWR properties back to like new, it seems you need to apply quite often once the factory DWR wears off.

This is from Nikwax-usa.com

DURABLE WATER REPELLENCY (DWR)

All waterproof breathable fabrics used for outdoor clothing are treated with a surface water repellent agent in the textile mill before being made up into garments. This is normally a fluorocarbon (Teflon, Scotchguard etc.). This treatment is necessary to keep water from soaking into the outer fabric and making it look and feel wet, “wetting out”. While the membranes like Gortex® will keep water from soaking through the fabric, they will not make it “bead up” on the outer fabric that the membrane is laminated to. When treated with treatments that make water bead up and roll off, garments are said to have durable water repellency (DWR). DWR can wear out and garments can begin to “wet out” or feel waterlogged. Nikwax TX-Direct in a wash in or spray on version is a treatment that restores the DWR to garments without using environmentally dangerous solvents or propellants.

Dave - who is hoping to some day find time to kayak with y'all again!

[Dee Hall]

I believe that Sir Godfrey was referring to zipper wax which lubricates the zipper so that it is easy to zip up (and down). It does not seem impossible to me that a sticky zipper might not be sealing correctly.

[Dave]

That too but I was referring to this:

>If none of these suggestions works for you, how about simply re->proofing the suit? They do need it, once in a while, and I never >see anyone on this list make reference to that, for some reason...

>(anyone?) Nikwax is available at REI as a spray or as an addition->to-final-rinse in the washing machine.

[gyork]

My old palm drysuit has developed leaks/weeps. After performing the seal and inflate technique that wizard Brian suggests above, and identifying point(s) of entry, any utility of applying this product INSIDE the suit to effect a cure, complete or partial?

[Jim Snyder]

Gary, I might try a product like this on a raincoat but I wouldn't trust it on a drysuit. If the points of entry are small I would consider trying Aquaseal, you've really got nothing to lose. Alternatively I would try Outdoor New England. They've done good work for me at reasonable prices.

[Joseph Berkovitz]

, I use Aquaseal on the inside of a suit for pinpoint leaks and it works perfectly. That product you showed above is a water repellent, not a watertight sealant. It won’t create a water barrier that stays sealed under water and air pressure. 

For small leaks I turn the suit inside out, mask around the leak (on the inside) with tape and apply a generous layer of aqua seal on the leak, then when the seal becomes firmer but still tacky I remove the tape. This leaves a clean square of flexible aqua seal over the leak. 

for non pinpoint leaks I would apply a patch from a dry suit or goretex repair kit on top of the aquaseal before it dries. 

NRS and Kokatat sell kits including both patches and little Awuaseal tubes. 

[gyork]

Thanks, boys, for the useful advice. Yes, I have used aquaseal in the past with some success. Perhaps, after identifying any small leaks, I will try thinning the warmed aquaseal (currently in my freezer!) with toluene, if I can secure some, and apply it more like wallpaper paste (consistency).

[EEL]

Gary:

Perhaps it is time to consider the possibility, perish the thought, that your dry suit has done yeoman duty and has reached the point where it needs to be replaced.

Gear becomes beloved companions after many journeys together that we are loathed to replace, but sometimes you just need to say good bye.  Especially gear whose job it is to protect you.

I read somewhere that even Goretex takes the position their fabric should not be expected to last for more than 200 full days of use.

Ed Lawson

Who will never get rid of the Svea 123

[gyork]

3 hours ago, EEL said:

..... it needs to be replaced.

Well, yes, Ed. That time has come and gone, as I sprung for a new Kokatat on sale at the KTP paddlers event 3 (or4?) years ago.

Hard to drive the Maine mindset out of my head, don't you know, where it ain't right to just throw sumpin away just 'cuz it don't work no more. If you can see a way to fix it, by gorry you just don't dump 'er! Now, mind you, you might not git to it straight away, and no harm just lookin' at it in the yahd, as a reminder that you're fixin' to fix it, just might not be too soon, 'cuz you got all them other things sitting in the yahd too that need fixing. Never know when you might havest a spare paht from machine X to fix gadget Y!

As for the old Palm drysuit, maybe I will throw away just some of it, taking the upper and fashioning a dry top out of it with Susie's help.  

 

[mhabich]

Mebbe you could patch the tractor seat with the bottoms, and use one leg to store your tomato stakes. Or could just make a scarecrow out of it. 

[EEL]

Or, and very "Mainey", follow the lead of those recycling blown out sails and old fishing gear into items to sell to those "from away" and create items from used paddle clothing, etc.

Ed Lawson