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A standard diving dress consists of a metallic (copper, brass or bronze) diving helmet, an airline or hose from a surface supplied diving air pump, a canvas diving suit and boots. An important part of the equipment is the addition of lead weights, generally on the chest and boots, to counteract the buoyancy of the helmet and diving suit.
This type of diving equipment is also known as hard-hat equipment or a "John Brown" rig, so-called after the British company that built many of the helmets. It was commonly used for underwater civil engineering, commercial diving and naval diving.
History
The watershed development in hardhat diving was the "closed" dress, in 1837 by Augustus Siebe, where the helmet was sealed to the suit making the suit watertight, the helmet could not flood no matter how the diver moved, resulting in safer and more efficient underwater work. The overall design changed little over the years until superseded in the 1960s when SCUBA, modern fiberglass helmet designs, and saturation diving became more common.
External links
Diving equipment | Environmental suits
"Standard diving dress"