In my garage there was a drysuit. It hung in the loft space for many years, originally belonged to my son who long since left home (and had no use for it).
Given my penchant of the last few years for paddle boarding, I thought it would be good to put it to some use so I could get some "on the water" time in standard British weather (aka WET).
Side note: Yes I acknowledge that it is entirely odd to consider not wanting to get wet while pursuing a paddlesport such as paddleboarding.
I have no problem getting wet, it doesn't worry me. It is a pain however when I'm time limited if I have to stop and get dried and changed before the drive home.
So it's two different time scenarios when time is limited:
Drive to river, get changed, engage in activity, get dry, get changed, drive home.
Drive to river, throw on drysuit, engage in activity, take off drysuit, drive home.
It doesn't look much difference in text form but the reality is the drysuit gives me anything up to 1/2 an hour extra time on the water.
I actually don't much like drysuits, they're too bulky and restrictive but if it means the difference between paddling and not paddling I'll happily wear one. Theyr'e also a good option when it gets colder.
Anyway, I got it out of the garage, put it on and noticed the latex socks had failed where they had been hanging for many years. They failed on the fold line as you can see here.
What to do then? Drysuits are expensive, this particular one is a good few (maybe 15) years old but other than the socks it seemed in good condition. It actually had little use. So the possibility of breathing new life into it seemed attractive.
You can see the full detail in my longform (40 min) video and the steps taken in my shortform (4 min) video that are both at the bottom of this post. If you want to go there now just click this link
I guess it's kind of obligatory to put some sort of disclaimer so here we go: This is not an instruction list (because I'm not a professional drysuit repairer). It's a list of the steps I took to repair mine and it worked for me.
If you want to take the same steps that's your choice and your risk.
Off to google and search "replacement drysuit socks". This delivered me the www.stormsure.com website and sure enough they sell a replacement sock kit. Just before I committed to ordering I thought I'd try to figure how easy a job it was so I watched their video:
Seems easy enough right? Stormsure's video deals with neck seals not socks but I figured it's the same difference. Subsequently I found it didn't deal with some important detail, more of that later.
Ok, order placed, £21.94 spent (including shipping) and wait for the delivery.
A day or so later the package arrived and in it was:
A pair of latex socks, a tube of Stormoprene adhesive, a glue spreader and pair of disposable gloves. I threw the gloves away because I have nitrile work gloves which I thought would be better but other than that the kit contains everything needed, sort of..... We'll come to that shortly.
Ok, having watched the Stormsure video you can see the guy "tears" the existing seal off the drysuit but I found that really didn't give a good result because it left lots of tiny bits of torn rubber on the suit.
Back to YouTube for more searching and I found this video from Annapolis Performance Sailing which had some more info. Unfortunately APS closed up at some point so their website is gone but the videos remain.
In the video at about 2:30 the guy talks of cutting the existing sock off at the end of the trouser leg and gluing the new sock over the remains but that also wasn't going to work for me because parts of the existing sock were coming unbonded.
However, at around 3:30 he also mentions using heat if you need to take off the whole sock but he doesn't give any more detail (except suggesting looking it up on the now defunct website).
Hmmmm, back to google and I can't remember how I structured the question but I found a website somewhere that basically said use a hairdryer or heat gun to soften the glue.
So I tentatively went at it with the heat gun and it worked!!! Not much heat was needed, it wasn't too hot to touch but the glue softened and the sock peeled of perfectly. The only thing I found to be careful of is that the warm glue is very tacky and both the sock and the trouser leg easily stuck to themselves and everything else.
I should note at this point that I carried out all the steps with the drysuit turned inside out. The socks are also attached inside out so that on completion everything is turned right side out.
Step 1:
So step 1 of the whole process is remove the old sock/s or seal/s (here's a downloadable checklist linked below)
Great, ready to fit the new sock!.
In the APS video above and also in this one from Dry Suit Projects I noticed the use of a former to hold the trouser leg tautly in shape while the sock is fitted. It also shows another critical point for socks which is to mark the correct orientation of the sock (you don't want your drysuit feet pointing backwards..)
So I thought I'd better get a former ready. I couldn't find anything in either the house or garage that was the right size and in the APS video he shows a kind of coiled piece of plastic sheet / tube.
At Screwfix I found a WC pan connector that I thought I could cut about and modify to fit. If you watch my longform video (link at bottom of page) you'll see this didn't didn't go so well so here's a picture of what I bought but I won't bother with the detail as it wasn't very satisfactory (although I did get it to work)
And it ended up like this
One piece of split pipe inside the other, then the roll of tape inside them and the bits of pipe pushed in between the pipe and the tape to pack it a bit tighter.
If you're thinking of making your own, remember it needs to be able to be removed through the drysuit leg when you finish gluing the new sock on.
Ready to go then.
Step 2: (because step 1 is removing the old sock)
Insert the chosen former and make sure it fits tight enough to not be moving about.
The inner end needs to go past the end of the glue line by about 14" or 5mm minimum.
The outer end needs to stick out of the leg by at least the width of the glue line plus 1/4" or 5mm.
Either end can go further but we have to remember we're limited by the length of the sock and again we need to be able to remove it after we've glued the sock on
Step 3:
Fit the new sock, first important thing is to get the orientation correct so that the foot of the sock points in the right direction (like the same as your feet). Also don't forget that the sock needs to be inside out (like the drysuit).
Fit the sock on without glue, lining the top of the sock up with the top of the glue line.
Check again that the former is still a bit further into the leg than the top of the glue line.
Feel or look for the ridge where the trouser leg is under the sock and tape round tightly below and up to this point.
Something like this.
I put two rows of tape around to avoid getting glue on the main sock when brushing it onto the cuff.
Then roll the top (cuff) of the sock down over the tape to reveal the glue line on the trouser leg.
Make sure the two are butted tight up to each other
Step 4
Now we have step 4 which I don't have any pictures of (possibly because I completely forgot to do it on the second leg of my drysuit and I didn't film the first attempt).
Make sure the two surfaces that are to be glued are clean (I did that) and then lightly sand the surfaces to give them a bit of a key for the glue (I didn't do that).
Step 5:
At this point I applied the first coat of glue. Using the Stormoprene glue that I got with the kit, the instructions say apply a thin layer of glue to each of the surfaces to be glued, so that's what I did. Then leave it to touch dry (3-4 minutes) so I also did that.
Check the instructions on your glue!!!!!!!
Note the use of protective gloves and also a sheet of silicon baking paper on my table to protect it if I get a bit haphazard.
Step 6:
Once the first coat is dry, another coat goes on.
Step 7:
And when it's touch dry I roll the cuff of the sock back up to put the glued surfaces together.
Step 8:
At this point I added a step that isn't listed on the Stormoprene glue but it does appear on some of the videos using other glues. I taped over the glued areas and left it to "cure". Mainly because I had to go out for the day....
Step 9:
Later that day I stripped off all the tape and checked that the sock was fully bonded to the trouser leg.
Step 10:
Satisfied that it was all good I took the former out, turned the drysuit right side out and that was it done so to celebrate I went and dangled my feet in the river and contemplated the excellence of the completed task. Well in reality I just counted myself lucky that the second leg stuck ok given that I forgot step 4.
There you have it then, here's the links to my videos:
This is the 40 minute long one that shows most of the steps in detail:
And here's a shorter version with just the steps in (4 minutes)
If you want the checklist I made for myself so I wouldn't forget any of the steps if I did it again, it's linked here:
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