Drove 6 hours to a job and my drysuit zipper locked up on the first dive

Tbh, I thought I was good after checking the zipper lube before I left, but the seal got pinched in the damn thing near Port Angeles. Water started seeping in around my chest on a 40 foot wreck dive, so I called it after 10 minutes and had the tender haul me up. I tried working the zipper with some silicone spray and a wrench, but it was fully bound up. Ended up using my backup wetsuit for the rest of the week, which sucked in those temps. Anyone else had a zipper failure like this and found a better way to prevent it in transit?

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1 Comment

bennett.noah21d ago

Did you keep your undergarments on when you worked the zipper with the wrench, or did you try it stripped down? I've seen guys crack the teeth on a Si-Tech by forcing it with tools while the suit was bunched up, and that makes it way worse than a pinched seal. Also, was the zipper fully closed and flat when you laid it in the car, or did it fold over on itself during the drive? That's usually what gets me, the zipper bending at the chest curve in a gear bag, not the locker itself.