BTV (hands free) dry tips and techniques please

[joham34]

Hello everybody.
I have been doing spearfishing since 1991. Without being taught I use Frensel quite successfully but recently, a friend of mine told me about hands free . Since 6 months I have tried very hard in and out of the water. I am a doctor myself -not an ENT- but still can understand some things from a medical point of view.
From what I have understood so far, it appears that some people have a direct innervation flow to the tensor veli palatini (the muscle that opens the Eustachian tube) and others only indirect. The latter can only contract the muscle indirectly, by performing more complex maneuvers like yawning or swallowing. Now, in this second category maybe there are people who have direct innervation to the tensor veli palatini bun dont know how and others (possibly the majority) who dont. It is a matter of how everyone of us is made. Me for example, I can contract a small ear muscle called tensor tympani and hear roar but unfortunately it doesnt help.
Now about clicking soungs it is not very simple . I can contract (after training) my soft palate and hear a lot of clicks which are caused (I am almost absolutely sure) from the release of the apposition of the soft palate with the posterior wall of the pharynx. I can do these clicks in the water but no equalization at all. The click from the E tube opening is slightly different although difference can be subtle. Also, from what I have read in medical aricles, the levator palatini muscle opens only the opening of the E tube and presumably a click could only mean that only a portion of the tube opens, not of use at all
Also, for me at least, the roaring ? (it is a low frequency sound) can be caused independently or during a yawning. In both cases my tensor tympani contracts although during yawning I equalize.
What I have managed so far is to equalize in the water but far from satisfactorily : I contract my soft palate up and back, push my jaw forward and down , tongue is either back or at the front of the mouth and basically do the first part of a swallowing . The last one is the critical . Momentarily, my E tube opens for a moment and some air flows in but this air is not enough to equalize completely at a depth. I have to do the manouver many times to fully equalize and then to proceed deeper. The swallowing manouver though cannot be repeated immediately, it takes several seconds before it can be repeated again. It would take an aeon to dive e.g down to 15 meters so it is useless. My progress is really slow and I start getting dissappointed. Many friends of mine who equalize hands free successfully tell me they "click" their E tube every 1 second or so. So I assume that they do it in a completely different way than I do.
For all those of you who can equalize hands free, please:
If someone has passed through the same steps as me, please tell me what to do next.
I do a lot of out of the water training but cannot be sure , havent found a way to check if my E tube really opens or not. The manouver of trying to suck out of the ear air doesnt help me. Is there any other way?
Also please, give every detail that could help the unfortunate us : How frequently you can do it , how much air flows in, if you perform a partial swallowing or not, If the Adams apple moves up or down etc
Me (and definitely many others) waiting forward to your advices
Happy new year and safe dives!

 

[growingupninja]

I think I have the 'direct' control. I have been able to EQ that way since I was a child. It almost never fails me no matter how congested I am. I can use it to over 50M.

My jaw and Adam's apple do not move when I do it. 'Clicking' is very easy but it is slightly harder to hold them open continuously. I did learn to uncouple my esophagus and soft palate from each other, needed to be done to eq mask past RV, and initially it was difficult to open e-tubes while soft palate was open but while throat was closed, but with practice I could do it.

Since you are a doctor perhaps you can tell me, isn't it also dependent on the size of the etube? For instance somebody with excellent voluntary control and large etubes would have a very easy time with eq. But I meet divers who can voluntarily open the muscle but have problems with actually getting it to work in the water.

 

[joham34]

I am an eye doctor, not ENT. Yet is seams resonable to assume that a wide E tube makes things easier. The problem to get it in to work in the water though, at least in my opinion, is not due to the narrowness of the tube (it would cause problem out of the water too) but to two other factors: 1) To the fact that in the water we are usually head down and so the air is pushed to the lungs and 2) in every case I try to equalize after a pressure gradient is developed , namely if the ear drum is already pushed , the equalization is more difficult. Many people in various fora describe that. So out of the water, the pressure difference between middle ear and nasopharynx (where the opening of the tube is), is minimal and the equalization easy but in the water, if one does not equalize continuously, the pressure difference increases and it makes things more difficult.
I cannot understand why did you practice to open you E tube with closed throat. I think that in the depth, the air outside of the middle ear should have the pressure of the more compressed lungs to be able to enter and equalize the middle ear that has the lower pressure of the last equalization. So it should be necessary to have an open throat. Or do you mean that you have to close it exactly at the moment when you open your E tube (so the pressure of the nasopharnyx has already the lung pressure because the throat was open up to that moment)? In general do you close your throat when do BTV? And what about the soft palate ? Can you do it both with open and closed mouth? And how frequently can you do the click? Every how many meters do you equalize and is one click enough for each depth you do it or do you need more than one click because not much air is entering? Is there any way to describe what movement does open your E tube ?
Many questions, yes but things common to us that appear easy e.g walking, are very difficult to analyze in detail
Thanks in advance

 

[growingupninja]

I am an eye doctor, not ENT. Yet is seams resonable to assume that a wide E tube makes things easier. The problem to get it in to work in the water though, at least in my opinion, is not due to the narrowness of the tube (it would cause problem out of the water too) but to two other factors: 1) To the fact that in the water we are usually head down and so the air is pushed to the lungs and 2) in every case I try to equalize after a pressure gradient is developed , namely if the ear drum is already pushed , the equalization is more difficult. Many people in various fora describe that. So out of the water, the pressure difference between middle ear and nasopharynx (where the opening of the tube is), is minimal and the equalization easy but in the water, if one does not equalize continuously, the pressure difference increases and it makes things more difficult.
I cannot understand why did you practice to open you E tube with closed throat. I think that in the depth, the air outside of the middle ear should have the pressure of the more compressed lungs to be able to enter and equalize the middle ear that has the lower pressure of the last equalization. So it should be necessary to have an open throat. Or do you mean that you have to close it exactly at the moment when you open your E tube (so the pressure of the nasopharnyx has already the lung pressure because the throat was open up to that moment)? In general do you close your throat when do BTV? And what about the soft palate ? Can you do it both with open and closed mouth? And how frequently can you do the click? Every how many meters do you equalize and is one click enough for each depth you do it or do you need more than one click because not much air is entering? Is there any way to describe what movement does open your E tube ?
Many questions, yes but things common to us that appear easy e.g walking, are very difficult to analyze in detail
Thanks in advance

I learned to separate the soft palate and throat incidentally because I thought it was something I needed to do for deeper EQ, specifically mouthfill, it isn't really although it does make it possible to EQ mask when very deep, past RV. All the divers I have ever met who have very easy and natural BTV seem to have difficulty with other techniques because all instruction and research is geared towards divers who do not have natural BTV.

I have to keep my throat closed when diving past RV (depends on my mask but usually 40M+). Like those who practice conventional deep EQ, I cannot BTV if there is no air in my mouth. So, at a certain depth I need a throat lock to keep air in my head from escaping into my lungs which are negatively pressurized. I had never trained to keep my throat closed, and I think this is case with most divers who have natural, easy BTV--as they near the depth where EQ would be otherwise difficult, by opening the throat and E-tube, they can push a bit with the lungs (like a 'pinch and blow' but without needing to pinch) and easily gain many more meters, so I initially was the in the habit of opening my throat, e-tubes, and soft-palate all at the same time, as you would expect. I have also heard of very advanced divers with natural BTV who were unable to separate the etube from the throat lock.

Over the last year I have trained to maintain my throat lock but open my e-tube since in theory it would make my deepest EQ more comfortable--take less tounge pressure to EQ since they tube is already wide open. Mostly it is practice, I have very little opportunity to practice dives 50+M.

When I start a dive I click about once on every kick cycle, it is nearly unconscious, and I do it less as I get deeper because it isn't necessary. Like I said, I can hold the etubes open continuously but 'clicking' requires less attention so I mostly do that. I am not in the habit of riding my ears at all but if I have air in my lungs/mouth I can BTV after the pressure gradient has developed. Sometimes after diving all day in a hood and cold water, a tube will get sticky and nothing will open it (including pinch and blow + BTV) but then ten minutes later it spontaneously opens and is fine for many more hours. It is also very difficult for me not to BTV when I feel any sort of pressure change... I suppose an analogy would be if a puff of air is blown into your eye, it would be very difficult for you to keep from blinking. If you did not have the ability to blink then perhaps it would be different, but once you know how it impossible to keep from blinking. This is I think why it seems to be common for very advanced divers with natural BTV to be unable to use mouthfill. And yes, I can open/close soft palate or etube with mouth open or closed, it doesn't matter, I don't remember that being difficult to learn.

There is no way to describe the movement that opens the etube. If I am very still and I watch myself do it in the mirror I can see a very small twitch under my jaw on either side of my windpipe, and if I really try to push intensely to open them my adam's apple will move up a little bit. I think this is what divers are doing when they say they learned to be BTV or frenzel by swallowing. Swallowing for me does not activate the muscle that opens the etube but yawning does. Swallowing does seem to put more pressure on the throat, which combined with a voluntarily open etube might aid in EQ but I don't find it necessary when diving.

 

[joham34]

I learned to separate the soft palate and throat incidentally because I thought it was something I needed to do for deeper EQ, specifically mouthfill, it isn't really although it does make it possible to EQ mask when very deep, past RV. All the divers I have ever met who have very easy and natural BTV seem to have difficulty with other techniques because all instruction and research is geared towards divers who do not have natural BTV.

I have to keep my throat closed when diving past RV (depends on my mask but usually 40M+). Like those who practice conventional deep EQ, I cannot BTV if there is no air in my mouth. So, at a certain depth I need a throat lock to keep air in my head from escaping into my lungs which are negatively pressurized. I had never trained to keep my throat closed, and I think this is case with most divers who have natural, easy BTV--as they near the depth where EQ would be otherwise difficult, by opening the throat and E-tube, they can push a bit with the lungs (like a 'pinch and blow' but without needing to pinch) and easily gain many more meters, so I initially was the in the habit of opening my throat, e-tubes, and soft-palate all at the same time, as you would expect. I have also heard of very advanced divers with natural BTV who were unable to separate the etube from the throat lock.

Over the last year I have trained to maintain my throat lock but open my e-tube since in theory it would make my deepest EQ more comfortable--take less tounge pressure to EQ since they tube is already wide open. Mostly it is practice, I have very little opportunity to practice dives 50+M.

When I start a dive I click about once on every kick cycle, it is nearly unconscious, and I do it less as I get deeper because it isn't necessary. Like I said, I can hold the etubes open continuously but 'clicking' requires less attention so I mostly do that. I am not in the habit of riding my ears at all but if I have air in my lungs/mouth I can BTV after the pressure gradient has developed. Sometimes after diving all day in a hood and cold water, a tube will get sticky and nothing will open it (including pinch and blow + BTV) but then ten minutes later it spontaneously opens and is fine for many more hours. It is also very difficult for me not to BTV when I feel any sort of pressure change... I suppose an analogy would be if a puff of air is blown into your eye, it would be very difficult for you to keep from blinking. If you did not have the ability to blink then perhaps it would be different, but once you know how it impossible to keep from blinking. This is I think why it seems to be common for very advanced divers with natural BTV to be unable to use mouthfill. And yes, I can open/close soft palate or etube with mouth open or closed, it doesn't matter, I don't remember that being difficult to learn.

There is no way to describe the movement that opens the etube. If I am very still and I watch myself do it in the mirror I can see a very small twitch under my jaw on either side of my windpipe, and if I really try to push intensely to open them my adam's apple will move up a little bit. I think this is what divers are doing when they say they learned to be BTV or frenzel by swallowing. Swallowing for me does not activate the muscle that opens the etube but yawning does. Swallowing does seem to put more pressure on the throat, which combined with a voluntarily open etube might aid in EQ but I don't find it necessary when diving.

Thank you for your anwer, very informative
You write : " Swallowing for me does not activate the muscle that opens the etube but yawning does" this piece of information is very important. It means that to achieve a successful BTV at least the way you do, instead of swallowing one has to try to isolate the part of the yawning where the ET opens and replicate exactly that movement. I will try to practice this.
About throat closed and soft palate open, I can do it too without practice, actually I perform a Frensel very reliably, it has always been so, nobody taught me. Yet, for those who want to try, E. Fattahs mouthfill instructions pdf is very helpful.
Thank you for your help. I have to strart yawning now, so I will call my mother in law

 

[joham34]

Hello everybody again ! Merry Christmas and all the best for 2017 . I wish everyone of us, unfortunate guys who cannot do the hands free technique, manage to do it in 2017. Quite discouraged, have not had any progress but do not give up!! Even the try (1,5 year now), gives me joy
BUT!! today I found a video on You tube : that appears very interesting , the only problem is, it is in Italian (and I have no idea of Italian) . The video is about a method "La Compensazione hands free" from Andrea Zuccari . I tried google translate in some of the slides, no much luck but on the final slide he claims (or I think so) that EVERYONE without functional or mechanical eustachian tube problem CAN DO IT !!!
WOW!! HURRAH!!
If anybody with Italian language knowledge can watch the video and give us an abstract or at least some interesting points , please do it for us!! You will have our eternal gratitude!

 

[joham34]

Hi Everybody, happy 2018, wish it brings our wish (BTV) to everyone. I just met a wonderful video from Adam Stern, the best of the kind I have seen so far :
The 2 most important info I got are 1) Stretching the jaw is not of much help (I believe it depends, some people claim it does) and 2) When yawning, it is the raise of the center of the soft palate that does the trick not the raise of it as a whole. This is corroborated by the folowing picture I found, where it is obvious that Tensor Veli Palatini (the muscle that opens eustachian tubes) , raises exactly the center of the palate:
Will everyone of us achieve to control it? I doubt but, at least, I clearly understood what is the movement I should master and where exactly I should focus.
Good luck to everyone !

 

[ishuyi]

Hmmm... I read the BTV document and it seems very confusing. Has anyone had the drills work for them? If so share what worked here.

I learned BTV because did a lot of flying on airplanes when I was a kid and found I could just click my ears.

I don't move any part of my mouth, throat, jaw or anything to open the Eustachian tubes. I have managed to isolate the one set of muscles that do it.

I don't think it is related to swallowing or movement of the jaw at all in terms of opening the tubes voluntarily. Thrusting the jaw forward and down helps in terms of making the air flow less restricted at the opening of the tubes in the back of the throat (I think).

To me, the essential development of the BTV comes from the beginning of a yawn. A yawn combines the jaw lowering/forward thrust and a sense of building pressure in the ears and the "crackling"... Try yawning on purpose a lot and see if you can notice those sensations.

Even if you don't have a crackling sound - perhaps that doesn't happen for everyone - you still should feel a kind of roaring in your ears as you open and hold the tubes open. Holding them open for several seconds, working your way up as long as possible is essential for pure BTV equalizing and of course helpful for any mouthfill or frenzel combos.

A simple way to work on your BTV is to reverse equalize your E-tubes. Pinch your nose, and suck air out of your E-tubes by filling your mouth or using your diaphragm (ask me for a more detailed explanation if you don't follow). My tubes crackle as they depressurize.

Then to bring your E-tubes back to full pressure, start to yawn. Try varying degrees of yawning to get there. Eventually, you want to not yawn at all. Just move the muscles that let air back into the e-tubes.

I have to go now, but I can write about how to practice in the water once you isolate the BTV muscles.

Pete

I recently wrote an article on hands free and I cited what you said here because your method of learning to BTV through first reverse equalizing the etubes has worked for me. I'm sharing my article here in case anyone might be interested? I got most of my ideas for it from people like you on these forums who have shared your personal experience with others.

https://therapystop.wordpress.com/hands-free-equalization-for-the-beginner-and-the-curious/

 

[growingupninja]

I have never heard of using reverse eq to learn BTV, but I could see it being helpful. Did you find that starting to isolate the muscles with negative pressure in the ears was a good way to work up to opening the tubes while applying positive pressure with throat muscles?

Sent from my SM-G930T using Tapatalk

 

[ishuyi]

I have never heard of using reverse eq to learn BTV, but I could see it being helpful. Did you find that starting to isolate the muscles with negative pressure in the ears was a good way to work up to opening the tubes while applying positive pressure with throat muscles?

Sent from my SM-G930T using Tapatalk

Your comment is very insightful to me. Because I have not tried emptying my lungs first, creating the negative pressure using reverse eq, and then applying positive pressure with a throat lock, followed by performing the hands free.

So far, I have always performed this procedure without the throat lock. But I just gave it a try... This modified version of this exercise is even more accurate of reality during a dive. And it will help you practice the hands free while holding the throat lock. (Which I currently can't perform.)

If it is as you said in your other posts that many hands free divers have difficulty doing the maneuver with a throat lock, it could potentially be a reason why some hands free divers say there is a depth limit to their hands free, before they have to switch to another method that is easier to perform with a throat lock.

 

[growingupninja]

Your comment is very insightful to me. Because I have not tried emptying my lungs first, creating the negative pressure using reverse eq, and then applying positive pressure with a throat lock, followed by performing the hands free.

So far, I have always performed this procedure without the throat lock. But I just gave it a try... This modified version of this exercise is even more accurate of reality during a dive. And it will help you practice the hands free while holding the throat lock. (Which I currently can't perform.)

If it is as you said in your other posts that many hands free divers have difficulty doing the maneuver with a throat lock, it could potentially be a reason why some hands free divers say there is a depth limit to their hands free, before they have to switch to another method that is easier to perform with a throat lock.

Good blog post. I would add though that many of the handsfree divers I know dive to their max depths entirely handsfree, and deeper than your forum survey, myself included, but of those I think nearly all had it easily since childhood. They do not all go deeper by switching to frenzel.

Initially a few years ago when I had been stuck at 57M I had been experimenting with a regular mouthfill Frenzel to get one last eq at the bottom, but then Kirk told me that Mandy had always been able to set her world records entirely handsfree and that switching to Frenzel at the end didnt get her anything. So I abandoned trying to switch to traditional frenzel at the bottom and focused on refining my existing eq... and that has worked fine.

If you train dry you will need to use negative pressure drills to train throat lock and to get used to the staggering pressure differentials between the mouth and lungs that you experience at below RV.

Sent from my SM-G930T using Tapatalk

 

[ishuyi]

Good blog post. I would add though that many of the handsfree divers I know dive to their max depths entirely handsfree, and deeper than your forum survey, myself included, but of those I think nearly all had it easily since childhood. They do not all go deeper by switching to frenzel.

Initially a few years ago when I had been stuck at 57M I had been experimenting with a regular mouthfill Frenzel to get one last eq at the bottom, but then Kirk told me that Mandy had always been able to set her world records entirely handsfree and that switching to Frenzel at the end didnt get her anything. So I abandoned trying to switch to traditional frenzel at the bottom and focused on refining my existing eq... and that has worked fine.

If you train dry you will need to use negative pressure drills to train throat lock and to get used to the staggering pressure differentials between the mouth and lungs that you experience at below RV.

Sent from my SM-G930T using Tapatalk

Lance, thank you so much for your affirmation and for sharing your personal experiences with me. I will be working on improving my glottis control and fine tuning my hands free technique!