Cetatek Fins....a review

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danvolker

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I'm a Fish!
Thanks to Robert for letting me try his at the BHB yesterday..........As I recall, there had been a post about them claiming that they were a revolutionary new kind of fin, and the best, etc, and this had caused me to offer some severe cynicism....So I used the Cetateks on a pretty long tour--we probably swam close to a mile with all the roaming around we did.
These fins are very precise, they frog kick extremely well due to the "scooping" effect they create with the sudden frog kicking motion when you go to push for each forward thrust part of the kick, and this allows a good glide between....not as big a push or glide as my huge DiveR freedive fins, but much better than the majority of scuba fins I have tried. At least as good if not better than Scuba Pro Jetfins--old and lame technology--but which is still precise and functional for frog, reverse, helicopter and modified flutter.
The Cetateks do modified Fluter actually better than they do flutter kick--this is a kick technique you might use in an easily silted area, when there is no side to side room for a frog kick( since with a frog kick your legs push your find way out to the sides, and in a narrow corridor setting, you would be hitting the walls)..With the modified flutter your feet are pointing up more at a 90 degree angle, and flutter kicking from there....
For normal flutter kick, the Cetateks provide less efficiency when going at a medium pace--very slow, and efficiency is of course no issue....at medium, you feel the scooping effect as a muscle work action that is not helping much...but at high speed scenarios, when you want sustained high speed, the scooping somehow becomes efficient, and they do a good job of using leg power to push you fast and efficiently on a high speed cruise ( one of my complaints on the jet fins--they are bad at efficiency for a long high speed cruise with flutter kick).

The Cetateks were very precise for Reverse kick and helicopters, and you use the same skills or technique you would use with Jets----with some fins like my big DiveR freedive fins, you have to change the technique a little to make reverse kick work optimally---but this is not the case here.

One aspect worthy of note....for a diver that tends to be foot heavy--their feet tend to fall and trim does not tend to stay flat horizontal, the Cetateks seem almost to be buoyant fins, so these may help you with trim if your legs have always tended to sink....but if you NEED heavy fins, as in a dry suit wearer, these may be a bit of an issue for you.....

Overall, I rate these far above the Scuba Pro Slingshots, which are a flimsy design that is easily overkicked unless your legs are pretty weak, and which could not be expected to last much beyond one or two seasons, before structural breakage.....The Cetateks look like they would last--even though they have a little bit of the concept of the Slingshots employed---they just look like they figured out how to do this in a smarter way. So ...if you don't want to go with freedive fins, then these Cetateks are great fins, and my apologies to Cetatek for my earlier slammings :)
Thanks Robert for letting me try them.
 
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Thanks for the review Dan. One point though, Scubapro doesn't make "Slingshots"...Aqualung does. Were you talking about Aqualung Slingshots (crap fins in my opinion) or Scubapro Seawing Novas?
 
Thanks for the review Dan. One point though, Scubapro doesn't make "Slingshots"...Aqualung does. Were you talking about Aqualung Slingshots (crap fins in my opinion) or Scubapro Seawing Novas?


What are the fins Doug is wearing in this video...click to about 4 minutes and 30 seconds in...[video=youtube_share;zhuffVfpiXY]http://youtu.be/zhuffVfpiXY[/video]
These are the fins I am talking about.
 
ScubaPro SeaWing Novas.

Are the Cetateks you mentioned the aquabionic Warp 1 fins?

http://www.scubaboard.com/forums/fins-masks-snorkels/438669-cetatek-warp1-fins.html

Yes.... see aquabionic | warp technology What they created, does actually feel ...REAL.

So my DiveR Freedive fins are like a Lamborghini Gallardo...the Cetateks are like a Ford Mustang. Actually not that far off a comparison. Except if you were doing a shipwreck penetration, in a tight and exploration level passageway, the Cetateks WOULD BE SUPERIOR....In very tight passages, especially if the ceiling is low, there is insufficient room to keep the huge long Dive R's from occaisionally scraping the ceiling...which could be bad/ stupid / I don't chance things like this. But this is pretty much only in an exploration level penetration where this could come up..... penetrations like this one, where I shot the video of the Jewfish deep inside the Mispah, are very easy to handle with the DiveR's--they actually provide extra stability for a steady video platform...
[video=youtube_share;xKUgKhvcELk]http://youtu.be/xKUgKhvcELk[/video]

You can see I was hovering and even reverse kicking with the DiveR's, exactly as I would have had I been wearing the Cetateks....I only wish the divers you see standing on the silty bottom in the distance, would have had an interest in buoyancy control, hovering, and fin techniques to avoid silting !!!!

BJ, this is Palm Beach Diving.... :)
 
Looking those fins, it looks like they would be similar to Mares X-Streams. Have you used those fins, and if so do they feel at all similar?
 
I'm glad to hear you've changed your tune, Dan. I too looked at these fins when I first saw them and couldn't help but scratch my head. They did seem a little gimmicky however after trying them my mind was blown. I had been using seawing novas and thought them to be the best fins a man could own. But once i slipt on the warps i knew there was no going back.
In answer to Beanojones, these are similar to the X-streams, however they differ in a few key ways. Firstly the Warp1's fin blade attaches to the foot pocket portion in a different way than the X-stream, making the warps stiffer than the x-stream. The xstreams have a "hinge" area that connects the fin to the foot pocket, while the warps have two arm things that connect to the blade. Sorry for not going into greater detail, but it's hard to describe over a message board.
Secondly, the clear section of the warp1s, which is similar to the x-stream, can expand as you kick thereby creating greater surface area and more force. The x-streams have a similar area on thier blade however it does not expand in the same way.
I should mention that I have not used the x-streams extensively diving, my sister is the one who uses them, but i have used the warps on at least 80 dives and they preform superbly with any kick, in any condition.
 
Also, if you looked at the baitfish video, you can see the dorky fins of the photographer friend of mine, overflexing like crazy.....the Cetateks DO NOT do this at all, even under my full power, which is probably three or 4 times what Doug could push with.
 
https://www.shearwater.com/products/teric/

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