NotWal said...

There are a couple of errors here. They were officially debunked by Mythbusters so they are the purest truth.

1) Rum. It doesn't make you warm it just makes feel good. When you are cold your bod shuts down your peripheral circulation. This serves to keep your core temp up and your vital organs (like your brain) functioning. Alcahol dilates your blood vessels allowing nice warm blood to get to your arms and toes and fingers making you feel nice and toasty while pouring your body heat away. Your core temp drops faster with alcahol and you die sooner than otherwise.

2) Pissing in your wetsuit does much the same thing. You're pissing away your body heat.

One of the symptoms of hypothermia is stupidity. If the weather is cold and you feel unusually (unusual for you) stupid then go and warm up.

Killjoy...but true...

sboardcrazy said...

Too many choices! We've heard about the titatium vests ,anyone used one of the hotvests?
http://www.hotsuits.com.au/
Id like somefeedback to help make a choice.A female pespective would be great as men generally have a hotter metabolism than us so we may still notice the cold using a product that a man finds great.

Wait till menopause hits since my missus got it she's now the bestest bed warmer and swims all thru the winter

Instead of pissing away your body heat!! Take a few literes of hot water with you from the tap at home, in some form of insulated container, come in every half hour or so and tip some down the neck of your wetsuit. Loads more warmth and possibly more hygenic!!

Rub two boy scouts together.

mineral1 said...

sboardcrazy said...

Too many choices! We've heard about the titatium vests ,anyone used one of the hotvests?
http://www.hotsuits.com.au/
Id like somefeedback to help make a choice.A female pespective would be great as men generally have a hotter metabolism than us so we may still notice the cold using a product that a man finds great.

PM Windwarrior (Kev), see what he can do for you re a blast shield. This will suit you down to the ground. The girls/ladies from Speed Divas over here (now amalgamated with another team) all used blast shields.

What is a blast shield?

To keep warm 15 years ago, we would wear woollen gloves underneath a pair of dishwashing gloves. - Not fashionable, but worked.

KR

They go mental for these drysuits in the States, when I was living there for over 2 years all the kiting/windsurfing shops carry them. I never tried one (I suffered through winter with 3mm wetsuit gloves and socks and a 4:3 Steamer so things like hands and feet went numb a bit).

www.powerkiteshop.com/accessories/oceanrodeopyropro.htm

D

Move to QLD.

Yesterday I went out for my first winter sail in years, encouraged by all these good ideas on keeping warm, and I found I didn't feel as cold as I expected so they must work.
The temp was 15 degrees and the wind 25 knots.
I wore my well fitting full length 3mm wetsuit to the beach and wore a fleecy top and a coat over it to keep warm while I was rigging. Rash vest under the wetsuit, reef shoes, NP flotation vest over the wettie (my body felt really cosy so I think that was important.) I sailed for an hour to an hour and a half - spent quite a bit of time in the water - and stopped when my legs began to cramp during waterstarting.
Had a hot coffee when I returned to the beach, put my fleecy top over the wettie and flotation vest, derigged quickly and threw everything in the back of the vehicle, put on the heater in the car, changed out of my wetsuit and rashie in the car and put on warm dry clothes. Kept sipping hot coffee everytime I felt a bit cold. I found I didn't feel any colder when I got home than I often do in the summer.

I agree with sboardcrazy - my arms were the coldest, but it wasn't a problem.
Guess I won't be needing a heated kidney belt or anything fancy.
A long sleeved titanium rashie might be lovely though.

I stayed warm! Probably looked a dill but who cares! Few factors..
1 - it was 16 degrees & sunny with only 15kts versus 12 degrees with wind coming off the snow & 30kts
2 - Im sailing somewhere else where the wind is heaps more consistent & it is shallow enough so if you do stuff up its only knee to thigh deep so you can beachstart..Mind you a bit of a worry as you hit the bottom occasionally but it is soft.
I wore my new ****ty steamer with a borrowed 2 sizes too big metallite shirt under it + my short summer wetsuit over that + buoyancy vest + helmet + gloves & booties..Bit restrictive but wow I was warm! I wore the undershirt driving down & got into the steamer 10 mins early.Much more fun.. Ive now got my old decent steamer altered so that will help too. Bring on the wind!!

Warm up before you go in, sail for 30-40 mins and then cup in for a cup of tea. I brought over my 5,3 wet suit from the uk ( wore it all summer once) so its only my hands and feet that get cold. I went out on saturday and i thought my feet were going to freeze so i put my booties on, now im not a great fan of boots but this was called for, just open up your footstraps a little to accmomodate the extra room and away you go. Hats of course are a great idea, most of your body heat is lost from there. Another tip that i got from a proffesional diver was to pour warm water in your suit, that combined with your body heat while your sailing keeps you warm.

sboardcrazy, Im guessing Canton????????
No Belmont caravan park in front of Squids Ink..I'm generally the only sailboarder .The rest are kiters because its so shallow.I was starting to think westerlies weren't worth the effort but here they are actually pretty consistent!I'm a bit worried how Ill go in if I hit at speed but its more a problem in a NW as you are pushed onshore more.WNW or W isnt as much of a problem.Im getting soft though..no need to waterstart! Mind you its great for getting used to the new board & new sail, harness line position etc..

Not sure if anyone has already suggested this but I just discovered if you rub Deep Heat or Dencorub on your feet it sure helps keep them toastie! It might work on the rest of the body, taking particular care of course to avoid the area between the waist and the hips!

Bender suggested putting your wetsuit in a nappy bucket full of hot water on the way to sailing. Especially if its been overnight in your trailer from the day before!

I had a Twine shower set-up on my previous vehicle. With the vehicle on a fast idle, the vehicle's coolant runs through a heat exchanger and a pump pumps fresh water from a source through to a hand-held shower. Nothing better than a hot shower up the bush, or even a bath if ther'e a river close by.
I had a 50 litre bladder in the car, and I remember thawing out after a particularly cold sail at Rye once by sticking the showerhead down the back of the wettie with the engine idling until feeling returned about 49 litres later.

Get yourself a 5 litre water container (or bigger if you want). Fill it with hot water and wrap it in a towel. The water will stay warm for 8 hours. The more water you have the longer it stays warm.

You can also wrap you wetsuit around the hot water and warm your suit.

When you finish wash down with hot water then dry off with a warm towel.

Be careful if you use neat hot water and wash down less than an hour or two later. It will be uncomfortably hot.

You can pour the hot water down your wettie but I find it's best to strip off the wettie then give yourself a proper allover sploosh. You can dry off with your nice warm towel before the wind chill cools you down.