MacDive Forums

Dear MacDive developer,

Weights (both total and distribution/trim) are so important to perfecting buoyancy that I thought it would be really helpful to be able to have the following data fields for dive details please. This way, we could always look back at previous dives and immediately be able to tell what weights to use for a particular dive in the future.

1) own body weight: since people's bodies don't stay at the same weight throughout their life, the weights they need to use change too.
...or even ....
2) a "weights details" tab: dedicated to logging the finer aspects of weighting. a) body weight b) total added weight c) specification of how much weight in belt, BCD pocket, BCD trim pocket, ankle weights, tank weights, etc. d) water type (yes this is already present in "Site" tab, but it's important for weights, e) suit type (yes, it's part of "Gear" tab, but again, it would be great to see this as part of the "weights" tab also

So far I've just been writing these things down in the notes section, but because this is such an important part of perfecting buoyancy (especially for the first 50 dives of a new diver) I thought making it more visual / organized in the dive information would tremendously help as a future reference to immediately getting the perfect weighting down right.

Hi there,

Some interesting ideas. This requires quite a few changes both internally and to the user interface, so I can't do anything for you immediately. Primarily because I'm about to release a fairly major update, and this kind of change would require pushing that back for some time.

However, I like the idea, and it would probably be quite beneficial to a few people. Let me put this on the backburner for now and address it once I've gotten the next update finalised.

This thread is a bit old but I thought I'd chime in.

I really like the way the software I use for budgeting my finances, YNAB (You Need A Budget), handles this.

It would basically work like a split cost. I throw $106 worth of stuff in my Amazon shopping cart.

I tell it I spent $106, and that it's split into multiple categories.
For the Household Goods category, I tell it I spent $95 for the light bulbs, bed sheets, etc.
It then says "you have $11 unassigned"
I then assign the remaining $11 to Pet Stuff, for the toy my dog will destroy in 5 minutes.


Total weight is what really matters with diving, but the details are definitely helpful- and you're essentially budgeting it to different areas (BCD, weight belt, back of tank, ankles, etc). I would love to see something like this incorporated into Mac-Dive.

Everybody loves pictures right? These may help explain.

Amazon Example


Dive weight example



Edit
I also wanted to add that what's nice about this method of doing it is that it can be as simple or complex as the user wants. Simply put in 30lbs for the weight field? Fine. Want to be more detailed? Fill in 30lbs and then hit a little assign icon or something, and budget out where weight was distributed however you like.

I have a related suggestion that may work well with the detailed weight topic.

That is to have buoyancy characteristics available for tanks and gear, and then when you put in your weights in the 'general' tab, MacDive could automatically add up some aspects of your kit's buoyancy to give you an 'effective weight' estimate. This would not help for trim as the other suggestions on the page, but would make it much easier for folks switching between standard and compact AL tanks, and especially steel tanks, adding pony bottles (with regs), and different wetsuit thicknesses.

e.g. -8 lbs (lead) entered by user, plus gear selected is 3mm wetsuit (+3 lbs), and Compact AL tank (-0 lbs since it's neutral when empty) = effective weight of -5 lbs

As opposed to -0 lbs (lead), no wetsuit, and HP Steel tank (-4 lbs) = -4.

Currently these two dives look drastically differently weighted (8 lbs lead vs. 0 lbs), but they are almost identical as far as buoyancy goes. Effective weight (especially as a column on the main list of dives) would help differentiate between weight changes due to your kit and weight changes due to a diver being able to dive with less total negative buoyancy.

(Side note: I realize there is already a way to add weight to a piece of gear, but I assumed this was for planning your luggage weight allotments, and not for buoyancy in water.)

I know that this is an old thread but I would also like to see this added to the log. It is an important bit of info. Thanks