cheap fins or expensive

[OceanMan]

I am sorry to say that I think that not much thing can be said about the efficiency of the fins out of the test you did Dave.
Speed is irrelevant when judging the efficiency of a fin because you also need to know the amount of energy you spent to reach that speed which is, as you said, totally subjective here.

Maybe by using a good pulse oxymetre at the end of the dive... and doing enough dives to do statistics...

If I rely on my own experience, I would say that fiber is alway better than plastic if the stiffness is the same.

[hteas]

There is another factor in the stiffness dialogue. How much time do you spend swimming on the surface? I have no problem getting to 30 m (in Hawaii) with my Picasso Black Teams, but send me off on a 1/2 hour surface swim to get to a dive site, or while fighting to stay in position in a strong current and I be glad to tell anyone what I think of stiff fins. I HATE THEM.
My medium glass blades also get me to 30 m with no difficulty, but they are so much better on the surface that there is simply no comparison.
I just got a pair of Omer Winter blades, and am very curious to try them out now that the water has cooled off. The glass blades may still win out however, since, when the surface water drops to 2-3 degrees C, even the winter blades may get pretty stiff, while the glass blades don't seem to change enough to notice. At that temperature I tend to notice more problems with my performance than with my fins.
Howard

[Spaniard]

Good info. from everyone. I suppose you have to factor in what your main freediving activity is i.e. pool training for dynamics, depth disciplines up and down the rope, spearfishing, recreational freediving etc. etc. I can only base my experiences on UK spearfishing where I have used plastic Dessaults, Sporasub Radicals, Sporasub Pure Carbon, Cressi Gara and Omer Millenium. I have never had to dive deep in the UK but I would say that when fighting tide and current and long surface swims I really got on with the Sporasub Pure Carbon. I am quite slight in build, weigh 70kg about 5'7" tall. However I did mentally 'worry' more when wearing them because of bashing them against rocks etc. whereas with the plastic Dessaults you don't care so much!

When I did my freedive course in the 30m SETT tank I swapped between the plastic Dessaults, Sporasub Radicals and Sporasub Pure Carbon and didn't really notice any massive difference? Horses for courses I guess.

Interestingly, Old Man Dave had a go with my Sporasub Pure Carbons in Guernsey for spearing and didn't really get on with them and he is someone who has thousands of hours of spearing experience under his belt. Perhaps we get acclimatised to one fin and adapt accordingly to it and that becomes our benchmark?

[Mullins]

Originally Posted by OceanMan

I am sorry to say that I think that not much thing can be said about the efficiency of the fins out of the test you did Dave.
Speed is irrelevant when judging the efficiency of a fin because you also need to know the amount of energy you spent to reach that speed which is, as you said, totally subjective here.

I am pretty confident that energy input was similar across the dives, if not exactly the same. If it was significantly different, I would have felt it. This is a subjective measure but it is better than relying on the 'feel' of the fins, which can be very misleading. e.g. the C4 30s felt 'snappy' and fast, but the profile said otherwise.

What the graph does say is that I can do identical dives with fins of any material and not feel any more or less tired. I think that's fairly significant. There are probably differences in efficiency, but they must be very small ones.

I do agree though that a totally objective test would be fantastic.

Originally Posted by OceanMan

If I rely on my own experience, I would say that fiber is alway better than plastic if the stiffness is the same.

If you think my test was uncontrolled (and it was to an extent), then personal experience with no objective data is even more unreliable!

[Mullins]

Surface swimming would depend on blade angle, stiffness and length. I think material would be even less relevant here.

[hteas]

Stiffness is really the big issue for the surface. I tried SpecialFins hybrids in the pool during a subjective test last winter. We had medium hybrids and stiff hybrids in identical Omer footpockets. The mediums were consistently one half kick better (14 1/2 vs 15, counting right foot only) than my medium fiberglass blades in similar footpockets, and the stiff hybrids were one half kick better than the medium hybrids (14 vs 14 1/2) in a 25 m pool, but only when completely submerged. On the surface the mediums (hyubrid or fiberglass) were so much better that there was no real comparison with the stiff blades.
I'm slowly converting my dive buddies to more flexible blades, either plastic or fiberglass.
I have heard that blade angle makes a real difference too, when on the surface, but have almost no experience with them.
My vote is for flex!
Howard

[spaghetti]

Great info by everyone no doubt. But sorry I'm loosing the centre of gravity of this discussion.
Was it about cheap vs. expensive? Carbon vs. non-carbon? Stiff vs. Flex?
These three matches don't match, they are three different questions. Cheap doesn't mean flexible, Carbon doesn't mean stiff, and in some cases plastic doesn't mean cheap (see the Omer Ice or C4 Wahoo). The plastic Sporasub HD Elite (black blade) or Gara 2000 are stiffer than Falcon 25 and Bat 25, and also much cheaper. But which is better? Better is a relative concept. So the question is:
Which is better for you?

[flying_spanner]

I agree this thread has gotten a bit off track,

One thing I've noticed when it comes to spearfishing gear, what one person swears by, someone else rubbishes.

I think that swimming with a pair of Picasso Team Black's are like strapping lengths of 4" x 2" lumber to your feet, but my dive buddy Jonathon swears by them.

I didn't like the pair of Gary Fisher Power Fins that I tried, but there must be a good reason that those fins are almost reaching a cult status with spearo's here in NZ and abroad.

Fin choice is such an individual thing, there are many factors governing your decision,

"do you scramble over rocks or do you do mostly boat dives"
"are you a spearo, or are you a pure freediver going for records"
"how long to ship goods from the US or do I buy locally"
"is my wife gonna kill me for spending $500 on a new pair of fins"

(the answer to the last one is YES ABSOLUTLY!!!!)

Take all these factors into account and you may come to a final decision on a paticular type of fin, or you may try several before trying something which works for you.

So to answer your question "Cheap Fins or Expensive" I say cheap plastic blades are fine, I love my Immersion Esclapez. Others will swear by C4 carbon, omer ice etc etc and say that you get what you pay for.

Who's wrong? well neither of us, as it all comes down what works for you, as it's such an individual thing.

[Kars]

To Dave, I just measured from you graph the spread of the fins' times leaving out the two slowest, and I found at 30m depth a difference of about 4 seconds. With the Fisher Power fins at approx 36s touching plate, and with Omer Millenium at 40s. 4 second measured over 40' is to me like a 10% difference.

I think that different fin caracteristics translate to different intensity, different workload and use of different musclegroups. Explaining why we seem to like such a wide range of different caracteristics.

Testing fins going deep is also very diffrent to dynamics in pools.
I think that differences in material become more pronounced going to greater depths.
But Dave's graph can be a good guide for the beginners to show that it's a good idea to start with a medium or soft cheap fin that are durable and comfortable with a good angle. Work on one's muscles, test different blades over a year or two, going deeper, develloping one's own style and then choose a fin matching your personal develloped preferences.

Perhabs Dave you can use the same footpockets and switch blades as you try out what you think is a typical plastic, fibreglas, and carbon blade to 50m dives. A HR monitor recording allong with your divegraph would be intresting. Have good rest between dives, laying your legs high to get rid of any acidation. When you decide to test 3 blade types,
conduct 3 sessions, shifting the order of blades used.

I'm looking very much forward to your dynamic tests, as well as you monofin tests!

Love, Courage and Water,

Kars