Virgo Glove System

I bought a second spare complete set just to have in case they cease manufacturing. They are that good. The reviewer above is having a real hard time removing. Wish I could help him. Only time I had some difficulty was when I washed the suit with gloves on and locked and they were left for a month.

After having fiddled unsuccessfully with the Antares System for a while, I almost gave up on the idea of diving with dry gloves. However, a recent dive with 5mm gloves in 50-degree water made my hands go numb. So, I looked at all the options again. It took me a while to figure out what system would work with my Hollis DX-300X drysuit without further modification. For instance, the SI TECH website is utterly confusing with a mix of alphabet-soup nomenclature (QCP, QCS) and Ikea-style product names (Släggö, Neva, Virgo, Liana, etc.). So, when I ordered the Virgo system, I wasn't sure whether it would actually work. However, to my surprise, the installation was quick and easy (just don't forget the O-rings, which were in the package but not pre-installed). I completed three dives yesterday, and my hands stayed warm and dry in 53-degree water. Instead of the thin plastic tubes included with the Virgo System, I used the Xerotherm Wrist Warmers to allow for air exchange between the suit and the gloves. Donning and doffing is easy, too. You just need to remember which way to tighten and loosen the locking ring. And, I would recommend testing the glove-and-ring assembly in your bathtub before heading into open water. This way, you'll develop some intuition for what's tight enough to make the system leak-proof. I will now experiment with different glove types sizes, although the 660 PVC glove from DRIS worked perfectly well. Given the low cost of PVC gloves, you can try things out and tailor your optimal configuration in terms of glove size/thickness and glove liner.

For those of us with Si Tech's QCS Oval system installed on their drysuit the Virgo glove system is great. Much more reliable than Antares but with the advantage that the Virgo ring can be easily removed and your wrist seals reinstalled with the much lower profile QCS ring for those times when you don't need dry gloves. Being a Southern California diver for most of the year this is a huge bonus when I'm heading to the Florida caves.

An earlier review commented on how hard they are to unlock...and they are if you don't have your hand in them. So for transport only twist the ring enough to engage the bayonet, whereas when diving make sure the ring clicks into it's final position. As I said, when your dressed in your drysuit they're easy to remove.

The only thing that would make this system better would be if Si Tech made different sized rings for different sized hands. I've got a large but narrow hand so could get away with rings of a smaller diameter.

I've used Si Tech's Glove Lock system successfully for many years and Virgo is a better design on the same theme.

This is one of the worst products I have encountered in over 40 years of scuba diving. They install easily, they lock easily and then . . . you can't get them unlocked. I have two pairs of these that are useless because I can't get them apart. I even emailed SI Tech about the problem and the president of the company admitted that once locked, they take a little effort to get off. That is the understatement of the year. I've used pipe wrenches to try to get them apart and they are still locked tight. Never again!