Maintaining Your Gear
Maintaining your gear is one of the most beneficial thing you can do to ensure it lasts as long as possible. Every piece of equipment has its own best practice of care. In this post we will be going over some of the basic strategies for keeping certain broad categories of gear in top condition.
A good rule for all equipment at a minimum is to give it a good fresh water rinse after a day of diving. Saltwater destroys everything over time. Rinsing or putting your gear in a fresh water basin at the end of the day extends everything the life of every piece of gear.
Maintaining Spearguns
Spearguns at a minimum need a good fresh water rinse like all other gear. It is very important to make sure the trigger mechanism is thoroughly washed out. This is extra important for metal trigger mechanisms. Most trigger mechanisms function with springs, which are thinner and more prone to rust than the rest of the mechanism. Once the springs break, you will need to get a replacement, or possibly replace the entire trigger mechanism.
Wooden spearguns can require additional maintenance to ensure top performance and longevity. Every year or so you should take your bands off your wooden spearguns and lightly sand any rough parts of the speargun. After lightly sanding the speargun, you should apply a few coats of teak oil to the speargun. This helps prevent warping by preventing water intrusion.
Wetsuit Maintenance
Wetsuits need some extra maintenance attention if you want them to last. High quality freediving wetsuits are open cell to keep you warmer. The downside to open cell wetsuits is that the neoprene is in direct contact with your skin, so as you dive all your sweat and skin cells start to clog the pores of the neoprene. This wears down the suit and causes it to insulate less well over time. The solution to this is to clean the wetsuit thoroughly with Wetsuit Shampoo. Wetsuits are made of neoprene, which is a type of rubber. Because they're made of rubber, you will need to use specialized cleaners or they will fall apart. A de-greasing soap will degrade the neoprene, effectively eating away at the rubber. By using Wetsuit shampoo you are able to effectively clean your wetsuit and extend its life.
You should also allow your wetsuit to dry with the open cell out first and then make sure to turn the suit back out again to allow it to completely dry. This is especially important at the end of certain dive seasons. Open cell suits will hold water if you do not allow them to dry and they can become moldy. For any small tear, you can easily repair the suit with Wetsuit Glue.
Masks
Masks need to be washed and dried like all other dive equipment. Use fresh water and allow them to dry before storing them. When you first get your mask you will likely need to break it in by burning the lenses to prevent the mask from fogging up. Every year or so, you may need to do this process over again. Oily substances, like sunscreen can get on the lens of a mask and cause it to fog up.
Maintaining Rigging
Rigging is one of the important and tedious thing to maintain that a lot of divers skip over. Double and triple checking rigging and good maintenance are the keys to landing big fish and little fish alike. Gear failures can turn a good day of diving into an early boat ride back if you don’t have your equipment ready to dive. This goes from having your shooting line in order, spare spear shafts rigged up, and having your bands in good working order.