[laminar]

Hi KPK and Bolts,

Remember that everyone is different when it comes to the shape of the mouth, control over muscles that are rarely used, visualization abilities, etc...

Spending time on the Frenzel is well worth the hours and days you might end up using to finally get it. I'm friends with Eric Fattah and he helped me learn both the Frenzel and the moutfill, but even with his help, I still had to figure out my own way of teaching my throat, mouth, cheeks, tongue and soft palate to work together. For example, I spent at least a week breathing through my mouth and nose in alternating sets to make sure I could feel and control the soft palate. The soft palate is what switches your breath from mouth to nose. Try it with your mouth hanging open and loose and after a while you should feel the clicking sound of the soft palate opening and closing as you change back and forth.

Is packing necessary to know to be able to do the tongue piston? Possibly yes, but I know some people use a squeezing of the cheeks and mouth to equalize their ears. But when you are really deep, I imagine that wouldn't work as well.

Eric has also used the following method to teach packing with the tongue. Try to suck the air out of a large plastic bottle (1L - 2L) by sucking with your mouth and tongue. You really do need to use your tongue to suck the air into your mouth and then push it down into your lungs, otherwise the air just rushes back into the bottle. You also need to close your throat as you gather each mouthfull of air, otherwise the air from your lungs goes back into the bottle. To do the exercise, take a reasonably full breath before you put the bottle to your lips and then try to make the bottle collapse. This is a reasonable simulation of the Frenzel and will also help you pack through a snorkel. When you first try it, don't think so much about what you are doing, just try to suck all that air out of the bottle! Just make sure your lungs are already almost full when you do it so that you know that you aren't just breathing in the air with your diaphragm (although that is pretty difficult). If you have success, try a smaller bottle.

Another thing to think about is the shape of your tongue as it cups the air and sends it back. Also, it can sometimes help to push your lower jaw forward as you gather the mouthfill before pushing it back with the tongue (for packing and equalizing).

I think the safest way to practice frenzel is not at 25m! or on an exhale. Once you can equalize on land with the tongue piston. Try taking a mouth full from the surface and equalizing by holding the pressure constant against your ears (this is a component of the circular equalizing idea that Tylerz came up with recently) until it runs out. I do this on every dive now and I find I can get down to 15m or so on a mouthfill from the surface. If I really concentrate, I can go deeper. If you can equalize even to ten metres from the surface on a single mouthfill, that means that you can easily surpass 25m by gathering more air into your mouth at say 15m.

When I dive now, I sometimes equalize as follows:
1. Mouthfill at surface to 15m, constant tongue pressure
2. Mouthfill at 15m down to 25-40m (small relaxed one, lasts me for my deep recreational dives, constant tongue pressure
3. Mouthfill at 25-30m down to 65m+, constant tongue pressure
(this is one step removed from the circular equalizing method where Vaslava is done in between mouthfills to maintain pressure on the ears)

So what I'm saying is that spending the time to learn how to apply the tongue pressure to an open soft palate is a great way to greatly simplify your equalizing!

Hope that helps!

Pete Scott
Vancouver, BC