| Ah, the familiar trials and tribulations of the newly dry-gloved . . .
I bought the Viking ring system, which I now really love and will put on the new dry suit, too, but the learning curve had some interesting peaks and valleys. I got the rings installed on the suit with no problems, feeling immensely clever, until I, too, realized that I had oriented them incorrectly, and than unless I was willing to remove my hands and sew them on backwards, it simply wouldn't do.
Then I carefully installed the gloves on their rings according to the smudged photographs on the mimeographed instructions, and looked at the final assembly and thought, "This can't work; if any of the woven liner is exposed to the water, the water will just wick into the glove!." Checked the photographs, and it looked just like them, so I went diving, and in fact, I was right -- flooded gloves. Took the gloves out and redid them and tested them in our hot tub (memo to all: flooding gloves with hot water beats flooding them with cold water all hollow) and they still leaked.
Scratching head. Decided gloves without woven/bonded liners might be the answer. Went and bought what were essentially dishwashing gloves. Dry one dive. Checked after second dive, leaks were in the gloves themselves. Memo to self: The upward curve of durability and the downward curve of dexterity when plotting against thickness intersect somewhere.
In the end, I found a compromise glove, installed it correctly, and now I only have to twist my hands a little out of the normally achievable anatomic range in order to get the rings locked properly.
It was all worth it. |