What do you wear to stay warm underground?

[Madness]

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Lomo-Element-Fleece-Drysuit-Undersuit/dp/B00IINA3IU/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=thermal+undersuit&qid=1580681877&sprefix=thermal+undersui&sr=8-1

I bought one of those direct from the Lomo website about 6 months ago. I thought it was a bargain when I ordered it. I was disappointed when it arrived.

It is far too thick/warm and inflexible to cave in, and I can only assume that divers are a lot 'rounder' than I am.
I gave it away to a diver friend, as it would have never been used by me.

[braveduck]

After caving for 60 years, in the last few years I finally found the perfect under clothing .
Smart Wool  wet or dry if skin tight works for me . Surface digging in -8C wind chill ,has kept me alive .
Try it . Also one hundred percept Poly Propylene long stockings if you can get hold of them
I had two pairs specially made for me loop stich ,brilliant .

[braveduck]

Also to keep your hands warm under PVC or other waterproof Digging gloves ,wear Poly prop Liner gloves .
They are very thin and they wick the sweat away from your skin so keep you hands toasty warm .

[braveduck]

Best time to buy Smart Wool is in spring in Skipton ,the outdoor shops are usually selling off
much cheaper than winter prices .
 

[andrewmc]

Can't go wrong with Powerstretch
(with/replaced by neoprene for very wet conditions, obviously)

[nearlywhite]

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Lomo-Element-Fleece-Drysuit-Undersuit/dp/B00IINA3IU/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=thermal+undersuit&qid=1580681877&sprefix=thermal+undersui&sr=8-1

I bought one of those direct from the Lomo website about 6 months ago. I thought it was a bargain when I ordered it. I was disappointed when it arrived.

It is far too thick/warm and inflexible to cave in, and I can only assume that divers are a lot 'rounder' than I am.
I gave it away to a diver friend, as it would have never been used by me.

Yeah the middle is oddly big.

You can get them in different thicknesses, I definitely got a lighter one but I'd agree they're heavy. For a furry. Not something that's ever bothered me but I'm quite a big person.

[mikem]

Because they are also made to fit kayakers & sailors, the extra material allows them to sit down:
https://www.lomo.co.uk/acatalog/kayaking-undersuits-fleece-kayak.html#SID=63

They only do one weight of fleece, although that may have changed over time.

[Keris82]

I love my lomo fleece. It can be a little too warm for dry caving but it does keep me quite warm if it gets wet. As for fit, the middle is fine. It's the legs I find very narrow and have to put my wet socks on first because I can't roll up the legs

[T pot 2]

Skin,
Nowadays the way forward is to stay warm with modern kit and to rig pitches out of the water.
In the past long John's a pair of overalls, hobnail boots were deriguire.
In the words of a sadly missed caver of some repute, if ye aren't tough lad tha shunt av come.
Memories are what they always should be.
T

[Boy Engineer]

Those cuff pieces are good. If you wear gloves on a wet trip, neoprene gloves will be better than alternatives.

On trips where long delays are expected I've carried a short length of hosepipe or PVC tube (available from Ashfield DIY in Settle, if you're in the Dales and need a bit). When you have an enforced stop put one end of the pipe in your mouth and feed the other end down your oversuit. Breathe in through the nose and out through the pipe, so that air warmed by the lungs goes inside the oversuit. You might look weird but your overall heat loss will be quite a lot less. It's very light to carry (perhaps secured around a helmet if you're not taking a personal bag) and the price is right.

There’s some interesting commentary about this in the article on airway warming here: https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/fdocuments.in/amp/document/equipment-for-airway-warming-in-the-treatment-of-accidental-hypothermia.html

Spend enough time languishing in a hospital bed and you find all sorts of stuff on the Internet. 

[Ian Ball]

The 'Little Dragon' was a chemical reaction powered air way heater popular with mountain/cav rescue a few years ago, I can't imagine it isn't popular still though I can't see much about it on the web.

Combined with Pitlamp's suggestion of a pipe down the shirt it's doubly effective.

[aricooperdavis]

There’s some interesting commentary about this in the article on airway warming here: https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/fdocuments.in/amp/document/equipment-for-airway-warming-in-the-treatment-of-accidental-hypothermia.html

There's a fantastic quote in that article, detailing how one particular study was conducted:

"Table 1: Results from a pilot study investigating mistakes made by operatives in a cold room. [...] The subjects climbed into an arctic type sleeping bag in the cold room when they became too miserable to continue with the experiment."

[Boy Engineer]

I laughed at that too. Sounded too much like doing PE at my school.

[mikem]

The Little Dragon is rarely seen nowadays, for reasons explained here:
 https://forums.outdoorsmagic.com/showthread.php/10982-treating-hypothermia-in-the-field

Info on 2nd version:
https://smwcrt.org/way-out/WayOut/issue7.html

[paul]

A useful resource on Keeping Dry & Staying Warm generally in the outdoors which has some relevance: https://www.outdoorgearcoach.co.uk/publications/keeping-dry-staying-warm/

[paul]

Combined with Pitlamp's suggestion of a pipe down the shirt it's doubly effective.

One of the things I miss about having retired the old Fisma generator and carbide light was the instant warmth of putting the nice warm generator inside my oversuit when feeling chilly.

[aricooperdavis]

The Little Dragon is rarely seen nowadays, for reasons explained here [...]

I think that AW is still a valuable tool in the field, not because it attempts re-warming (which is practically impossible in a cave environment in the UK), but because it limits further hear loss.

I buy the argument that in severe hypothermia rewarming in this way is problematic, and I understand that such a tool can't realistically do any significant re-warming, but I've yet to see good evidence that using AW in the field as a tool to prevent further heat loss is harmful, or even undesirable.

Happy to be shown otherwise though!