Replacing the Boots on my Dry Suit

I had the next and wrist seals replaced on my Aedura drysuit recently (have just realised its 9 years old!) but when I tried it I still got wet … the reason became very apparent when I took the suit off – holes in the boots where they’d finally worn through …. big holes!

So it was replace the boots time and, for reasons I can’t remember, I decided to do it myself. Boots, glue, tape and solvent were all purchased from hillcrest2003 (eBay) and they turned up quickly and well packed with instructions (on seals though not boots).

So I sat in the garden, it being a lovely day, and set about it …

1) took off the old boots by simply cutting them off the suit – as it happens I bought this suit second hand and it was built for a MUCH taller man so I didn;t mind losing a bit in the leg so to speak

2) I put a rolled up mat in each boot to keep it stiff, fitted each boot into the correct leg facing the correct way (!) and turned back the suit a little

3) Cleaned the suit and boot top with solvent and applied a layer of glue

4) waited for the glue to go off a bit then put on another layer, when that went off I added more and turned down the suit thus gluing it to the boot .. squeezed tight!

5) once dry I turned each leg inside out, cut a little v into the boot top so it laid flat and glued the top of the boot to the leg all around .. held it with pegs and once done ran some liqued rubber around the top

6) turned the boot back, cleaned around the join and applied tape (after letting a layer of glue dry on the tape and leg first)

7) Gosh, it’s done!

Needs a dive to confirm but its looking good at the moment – I believe the glue will continue to strengthen for another two days ….

Not sure if I’d do it again, didn’t save a huge amount of money, but it was quicker than sending it off or waiting for a shop and it was certainly satisfying!

UPDATE: One boot leaked where I’d had to fold the top and the otehr didn’t … not too bad, will just BlackWitch the leak and that’s it done.

2 Comments

  1. Eighteen months later and no sign of problems … the dry suit has been dived regularly (well, not as regularly as I’d have liked but often enough) and has kept my feet dry throughout

  2. Ok, so one of the boots has started leaking again, after nearly three years, not bad, nothing some more BlackWitch can’t sort out. Quite pleased with the repair overall 😉

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