New FiberBlades for SporaSub!!

[A Brownsword]

I bought a pair of these fibre bi-fin blades from Waterways back in September. They must have been one of the first pairs that Peter sold (in fact, I think they may have been my idea as I suggested it to Peter after trying his open heel bi-fins ). I finally got some extra footpockets and got around to mounting the blades and trying them out (only 8 months later! my apologies to Peter for being so tardy on this).

Mounting these is a bit of an issue -- I had to cut off most of the rubber stripping that comes on the edges of the blade that goes into the footpocket. To keep them together I took a drill to the blades and put 2 holes along each of the footpocket "rails", and 2 holes where the screws normally go, and then used the miracle of zip-ties to secure it.

I only spent about 10 minutes in the ocean with them today. They felt quite stable (i.e. no twisting / torque) and I think they delivered noticably more power than my plastic blades. These fibre blades are slightly longer and have a square tip with a semi-circle cut out on the end. The strangest thing about them is that they are completely flat, unlike the plastic blades, so the angle of the blades feels a little different. I'll need to use them more to get a good feeling for the differences -- perhaps some dynamics in the pool. The fibre looks like it'll be more fragile than the plastic, but that's just an intuitive impression based on the look and feel of the material compared to the plastics. I might try a friend's carbon fibre C4s as well for further comparison.

 

[reidfish]

I like them

I ordered a couple of pairs of fibreblades from Peter last month. The #3 (medium hardness) arrived first and I fitted them to my girlfriend's standard sporasub foot pockets.

I just pushed the rubber edges in and glued them with black silicone glue. I had to drill two holes for the screws, but it was good that they come undrilled, so you can put them on whatever you have. The tang of the blades is slightly wide for the standard sporasub foot pockets, so they don't quite get to the back of the slit where the blade goes under the foot, but they are within 5mm of the back, so close enough. I suspect they fit pockets for Pure fins better and they woudl get more support. I will try fitting them to my Picasso fins when my blades arrive, but if they don't feel good I'll get some sporasub pockets.

As for testing, I have had a go with them and yes the blades are very very nice to use. Like carbon, they give amazing bang for your bucks. Plastic is so inferior, there is no comparison. I am not qualified to say if the fibreplastic is better or worse than carbon, but at $US99 they are better for my chequebook. They are very very nice blades and look a bit more hardy for spearfishing than carbons.

Having recently tried some sporasub variant carbons (broke those pockets in a 2 day spearfishing comp), the #3 blades are slightly stiffer. After trying the #3 blades, I felt they were a little bit soft for the serious spearo who is used to swimming all day in hard fins, but my girlfriend finds them good to use (doing -30m constant). I have therefore sent back the #2 blades I ordered for her, to swap for #4's for me. As I have strong legs and am of average to large build, I expect these will be nice and hard and challenge my legs.

I'm still waiting on the waterway mono, but am looking forward to it!

 

[kirehe]

reidfish,

i had a pair of sporasub variant carbon before, before my foot pockets broke. They broke on the side where the blade connects. is that where your's broke too?

the store where i bought them told me that he had never seen that problem before on them, but i was sceptical as both of them broke at the same spot, indicating that there was a material problem.

so i got interested when i read that you broke a pair too. anyways, im on my second pair now after they replaced the broken ones. im waiting for these to break too, but i havent used them that much yet so time will tell what happens.

safe diving,
Erik

 

[reidfish]

I think I see a pattern appearing here...

Yes Erik, that's where they broke :waterwork. Funny, another guy in our apnea club broke his there too, but I suspect he hardly does the miles that I do.

Both fins have the same problem - the spine that extends down each side of the blade has a thick rubber tie that arches over to connect to the area where it is affixed to the blade. The rubber tie gets all the movement and strain. The rubber cracked, down to the plastic core of the spine :waterwork. They are still useable, but I have returned them as I was only given them to trial.

Quite nice fins, though, I ejoyed the carbons and thought the 'angle of the dangle' was a good concept and gave optimum use of power I think they could go for a stiffer carbon too.

 

[kirehe]

reidfish,

yes i really like the fins too. granted they are supersoft, but i like it. I lent them to a fried once, and i used his carbono 21, which are really hard. We raced, but even though i have a better technique than him, we swam equally fast. I was very impressed with the variant carbon's performance.

also, i love that i can take them apart, and the foot pocket is the most comfortable i have ever tried.

But as we both noticed, they break oh well maybe sporasub will fix them soon?

speaking of harder blades, there was another guy here on the forum who owns a stiffer blade, but i havent seen them anywhere. he picked up his italy, where freediving is very common though.

I also thought about buying a pair of waterway blades, and modify them so that they would fit. that way you could choose hardness, and not have to worry about breaking the blade. Also, you would get around the fact that the waterway blades are entirely straight, as the bend is in the foot pocket.

Erik

 

[Pezman]

Tried a #4 this weekend

I tried a #4 pair of Waterway fiber-blades briefly this weekend. I think that they were mounted in Omer foot-pockets? They seemed dreamy to me. You could flick your way down w/ almost no effort (i.e. the blades would bend enough to provide thrust), but if you stepped on them they were stiff enough to get you going pretty fast. They also seemed to have a resonant mode if you did really fast flutters. Absolutely no twist to the blades even when you really wail on them -- the tips never touched once.

At any rate, they made my Gara 2000s look pretty sick. One of my dive-buddies tried them too -- maybe he'll post his impression.

 

[Walrus]

Hi All,
can anyone tell me how the number stiffness, compares to the one in kilograms ?
I'm thinking of getting some Waterway Blades there are 6 grades - 2.5, 3, 3.5, 4, 4.5 & 5 rated in Kg. How come the Canadian water way site has only 5 grades, going #1 to #5 ?

ie someone mentioned using a #4 stiffness fins, what's that in Kilograms ?

And can ayone compare them to say C4 40's, where would they rate in stiffness in this scale ?
I'm used to stiff fins, I use Picasso Carbons, which are stiffer then the C4-40's, mostly due to the blade not being tapered. ie the tail of the fin is much stiffer. Just trying to work out what grade fin to get. Wouldn't want anything softer compared to the 40's

Thanks in Advance,
Wal

 

[icarus pacific]

I'm being sent a few sets of mono and "stereo" fins for review from one of your competitiors. While you describe your fins as fitting the Sporasub pockets, will they fit an OMER Millenium pocket or any other pocket using the one or two screw/cemented rails method of mounting?

And the whole thing about fiberglass being called fiberGLASS comes from DOW being the outfit that spun the glass, as in real glass into fibers for the fledgling telecommunications industry looking for smaller conductors than the metal based wire. The fiber in the composite sandwich, be it carbon, glass, an aramid such as Kevlar, or burlap for that matter- it's all composite construction- a fiber woven with a varying warp and weft of varying weights and thickness and encapsulated in a resin matrix. no biggy.

 

[Jon]

I'm being sent a few sets of mono and "stereo" fins for review from one of your competitiors

Svenster,

You just gave me an idea.:king

In the scuba biz companies send out "test gear" to dive shops, drystuits are the first thing that comes to mind, and people at a certain shop can try them out for a week or two. The shop needs to fix, or pay to fix, anything that they break and they are then responsible for paying the shipping on sending it to the next shop.

What about setting something like this up with freediving gear? It would be well worth the cost of shipping to try a new $400+ pair of fins before shelling out the cash for them. It would also be a great way for compaines to get their gear in the hands of a number of divers so they can sell themselves on buying it- unlesss it's total crap and then they wouldn't want to have any part of this idea anyhow. This could be set up through locla shops, freediving schools, or clubs.

I know that scuba companies have been doing this for at least 20 years and it has worked out very well for them- just think how many drysuits DUI sells after one of it's DEMO days.

Since you the man in the "know " with the connections I think that you could spearhead this whole thing.

 

[icarus pacific]

hmmm.

Thanks, Jon. It's something that I'd give serious consideration to, but as with everyone else here, maybe excepting Anderson as he's outta work, the time factor would be a bummer. One of my many problems or as I prefer to describe them- behaviors is that when I'm out in the water, I'm not there to dick around with my gear, new or not. I just throw it on and go. Trying new stuff is fine and all, but when the water's nice, the last thing I want to do is strap on, uh, er... put on some new fins, grab a new gun or a new snorkel and have it not behave like I need it to.

That said, yeah I'd do it.

There's a guy out here, actually down in So Cal, Steve Barsky who has been putting out a monthly newsletter that advertises and everything, in color no less and is in all the dive shops. Kinda like those free rags on the news stands that are for singles... :hmm Anyways, he'll do a review of a piece of gear every issue or so. I look at the stuff as just another piece of color coordinated plastic crap, but the newbies don't know the difference, so the guy has stroke. Lord knows the newsletter lets him pimp his other publications and self promotions. I'll have to give this some thought and call some of the manufacturers where I still have bridges.

 

[Jon]

So are Steve's reviews any good?

I have met him, and his wife, at Dema and I have a few of his books, Drysuits, Small Boats, Rebreathers, Spearfishing,ect.

I know that he has been around for a long time and has done marketing stuff for Viking, DUI and others. Maybe he could get the ball rolling with the companies.

I know that they have been doing this for the bubble blowers for a long time. I would think that it would be even easier for the freedivers because our gear is SO much less expensive than scuba gear.

Maybe we could get Eric Fattah to start it off by sending around a pair of fluid goggles for us all to try.

 

[caymandiver]

I'm a bit confused.

I want to get the figerglass fins but the sportasub foot pocket seems to break.

Does anyone know for sure if it can fit to the Omer foot pockets?

Thanks!

Christian

 

[icarus pacific]

It's my understanding that the fins use the same nut/bolt and rail mounting system as OMER and the rest.

 

[w3ac]

OMER pocket will work

Christian,
They blades will definitely fit into OMER as I have #2 powerblades in OMER pockets. Sven is right saying that it uses the same screw and lock system. Couple of things. You will need to drill the holes for the screws in the blades yourself. Don't wory about damaging the blades because it won't. I also found that the blades would not fit into the pocket ribs unless I trimmed down one side of the rubber rails on the blade. What I did was insert the blade into the blade pocket then mark off where the ribs ended on the blade. Next I trimmed the entire top rubber rail to the marked point. This allowed the blade to fit snugly into the rib. I also found that the end of the rib would pop loose so I drilled a hole on the side of the blade next to the plastic clip and put a small zip tie there just in case.

These fins are absolutely incredible. I have gone spearfishing for over 4 hours with them and no camping or fatigue. Actually, I will get the #3 blades when I have the cash because I want a little more snap at the end of the kick. Still, these are the smoothest and most responsive fins I have ever tried. Have fun.

Brad