Hi Everyone

While having a look on the forum I was surprised at not finding a thread devoted to them. Or maybe I'm just blind...

I've currently got a pair of gara professionals, and have been looking into getting a pair of carbons.

I've tried a pair of freedivers hard blades and I must say I really enjoyed them! However I have noticed that I was kicking quite inefficiently with them, as I've heard guys saying you must let them do the work for you. They got me down and up with considerably less effort, but I wonder if anyone of you have any tips to try make them work as efficiently as possible?

I've also heard about them losing power at depth. Has anyone experienced any problems with this? If I upgrade my fins I would get a hard compound, so I'm not sure how much of a worry this would be. I'm not worried about them for spearfishing, but occassionaly I like to try go to a quarry and freedive down a line so I just mean in that sense.

I just wish I invested in blades with footpockets at the start, because now it will be a costly changeover...

cheers

Johnny

Hi Johnny,

Being using Cressi fins and masks for my freediving for quite sometime, have had three pairs of GARA 3000, one pair is finished, the four struts on the under side of the fins between the blade and foot pocket cracked right through, my second pair shows strain at the struts as well and my third pair is still going strong. I loved my Garras until I took Rob Allen’s personal Carbon fishtails for a spin at the UKZN freediving meeting last year … Man I was sold there and then. I purchased a pair of RA Pure Carbon Med strength coupled to Omer Millennium foot pockets a few months later … Took me a month of pool training to get use to fining with these new fishtails. Now that I know how to use them … I’ll never go back. Be patient and learn how to fin with carbon fins it worth every single cent, time and effort you make, you’ll never look back once you get the hang of fining with carbon blades…

As far as depth is concerned, I only managed a max of -26m this year, I’ve been plagued by sinuses since last year, however my blades came into their own below 20m. I felt almost no lactic acid build up on my legs after a 1.30Hrs of diving. This weekend I’ll be back to the quarry I normally freedive, I’ll let you know how they perform at -30m on Monday.

to be honest buying 1 piece fins is definately bad advise. here is my thoughts... I bought a pair of RA plastics and they worked they were too big for me but i knew this when i bought them. Then i tried a pair of freedivers mediums... i am 6ft tall and weigh about 95kgs... these fins had me flying around the pool with no extra work or strain i could feel the difference, and so began my quest. I bought what i would call good plastics Omer Stingrays which are softer with nice comfy foot pockets. Next for me will be Some of my very own freedivers mediums. Remember to try all the different strengths you may prefer ones you havent set your mind on... most people are medium. to be honest i am starting to find my plastics a little dissapointing when i do a big kick off the nbottom they are half useless and i can sometimes feel the blade pushing into my foot. but in general soft was a lot better than harder for me easier to fin around up and down just not for those big kick dont get me wrong i will never go back to hard plastics.. cheers

I thought I'd mention something that a lot of guys don't consider when testing or buying fins: for a fin to work the blade has to bend. Ideally the blade should be stiff, angled 45 deg to the direction you want to travel and move only perpendicular to the direction of travel. Flexible blades are an attempt to attain this.

This is why composite fins have a big advantage over plastic blades - the properties of the composite blade can be varied by the manufacturer at will. Some things follow on from this.

Carbon blades were very stiff a while back, but the trend has now moved towards a softer blade. The bend can either be constant along the whole length or stiffer and flatter at the pocket end and softer and more curved at the tip. The footpocket you use will also affect the curve of the blade.

When choosing a composite blade you should first decide on what type of spearing you will be using them for and then consider your weight.

As a quick rule:

Light person deep diving for reef fish - soft blade.

Heavy person gamefish only - stiff blade.

The choice will vary between these to extremes according to the individual. A reputable dive shop or manufacturer will be able to advise you according to the properties of the brand they sell.

When you actually use the fins it is important to remember that you cannot judge their performance by the way they feel.

Soft blades have low acceleration, but with slow constant kicks build up speed using very little of your gas (hence used for deep reef fish diving.) It feels like there is nothing on the end of your feet and because of this they are often rejected as useless. Check distance swims in a pool with a watch and judge how you feel at the end. Also feel for fatigue in your calf muscles.

Stiff blades have good acceleration and don't bend too much and "wheelspin" with hard fast kicks. Good for chasing a cuda. They use more energy though, as you have to kick hard to get them to bend. If you weight 120kg you have to kick hard anyway to move, thus a stiffer fin is needed.

I weigh about 64kg and dive for reef fish, so use the softest blades in Pathos footpockets (very light ribs) to give a constant curve. Rob uses XXH blades as he is a cudashuda and weights 90kg.

I have had the good fortune to have dived with a number of Carbon and composite fins over the last few years. Its kind of been a personal quest to find and experiment with new fins and theories on fins.

Before I go any further I have to say lets only talk about 100% Carbon fins. There are a number of fin manufacturers out there that claim 'Carbon Fins' but in actual fact they are a mix with glass. The reality is that as little as 20% glass will render the fin only as good as a glass fin, just a bit lighter. In most cases the 2 outside layers of cloth are Carbon and the rest glass. My take is dont waste your money just buy glass composites they work just as well for half the price!!

So when you see 'Carbon' fins for cheap ...first ask why are they cheap.

Back to the discussion now that I have that monkey off my back

The more I dive with different fins and in different situations the more I realise that there is no one fin for everything or all diving.

I have found when diving in winter with a 5mm suit and a few kilo's extra weight a stiffer pair of fins works well.
When diving in a 3mm and less weight my ultra light fins are amazing.
The problem for me is when I have to swim the extra weight off the bottom I need extra power, but as Jeremy pointed out you need more gas and that effects dive time and stamina.

I have 2 fins that I have settled with for now after testing and using maybe 10-15 pairs of different fins from different manufacturers local and abroad. (often both in pool and on a few sessions diving)
They are a medium Rob Allen Carbon fin (they are about 4 or 5 years old and in std RA footpockets)
And a pair of medium light Subcraft blades in Pathos pockets.

I wont go into the specifics of why I chose these fins now and the different manufacturing processes used in each.

The most important thing to as your self is what are you going to be using the fins for, like Jeremy said. But even then there are other factors you might want to consider aswell.

I have found that the cape guys tend to like stiffer fins, which is probably a combination of the heavier weight belts, sometimes shallower diving and having to pull Yellowtail off the bottom.

I have also noticed that some guys initially leaned towards stiffer fins because of the style of kick. I think South Africans have a unique situation in that many of us shore dive through surf and have grown up with std plastic Genesis / Picasso type fins. This combination causes you to bicycle kick, where you bend your knees to bring the blade forward and through the water.

If you try and use this kick with soft fins they just fold underneath you and are useless. The correct way of finning is with a very little bend of the knee. This is way more efficient and taxing on your legs. But try this with stiff fins and your legs want to fall off.

The guys in the Med have perfected this and dive very deep even in thick suits with very light fins. Just go watch some of the better Med divers Youtube clips and then watch some of our local vids ...... we are a bunch of rugby players.

I have had loads of guys chuck out soft blades because they felt like they did not work or were too soft. The question I want to ask is how much time did they spend focusing on their fin technique?

It took me months to break the habit of the ol' bicycle rugby player in me. And even now I have to concentrate when coming off the bottom to fin properly. That said when I go back to my stiffer blades I often don't last long before going back to my old habits. I guess you will adapt to the fins you have.

There is more to say But I will leave it there.

C

A quick note on blending another fibre in a carbon blade. As Chris noted, if there is too much glass in a carbon fin is will adversely affect its performance.

That said, a finblade is actually the same as a beam if you analyse it. Down the middle is a surface lying along what is called the neutral axis. Material close to this has very little influence on the bending. The reason is that when the blade bends it is neither compressed nor stretched. The convex side of the blade is stretched (i.e. it is in tension) and the convex side is compressed.

This means that the manufacturer can use a material along the axis with different properties. Some might make a choice because of lower cost, but some materials can offset a big weakness that carbon laminates have - bad impact resistance. Glass would not be the best choice for this, but others work very well.

I can tell you that the premium Rob Allen blades are not 100% Carbon and have a small percentage of another fibre, but I'm not ashamed to do so. It is done to improve the blade. We actually sell a pure carbon model at a lower price.