In praise of using freediving gear for scuba diving

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2airishuman

Contributor
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Location
Greater Minnesota
# of dives
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Two years ago I got a 7mm freediving wetsuit. A year later I got a 3mm freediving wet suit. This year I got freediving fins and socks, and my daughter got a 7mm freediving wetsuit. We use freediving weight belts.

I don't freedive unless going to 10-20' for 30 seconds counts.

I think this gear is great for the kind of scuba diving I do and offer this review.

"Freediving" gear I have
* Speardiver (Fredivestore.com) men's wetsuits in 3XL in 3mm and 7mm
* Mako women's wetsuit in L in 7mm
* Mako 3mm rock socks with kevlar sole
* Mako rubber weight belts
* Mako 2 pound "pinch" weights
* Mako 1.6 pound "quick" weights
* Mako "competition freediver" fins
* Mako lower leg weights

Wetsuits: the tradeoff

Freediving wetsuits are more fiddly to don and doff. In general, donning requires that both your skin and the wetsuit be thoroughly wetted. Some amount of lubricant is usually required, and to some extent you can get away with less wetting if you use more lubricant. Either way, it's awkward to do (but possible) on a crowded boat. There is a certain amount of rolling and stretching, and you have to have good shoulder mobility or a helper.

The tradeoff is that the suits are warmer and more comfortable in the water than typical scuba diving wetsuits. They are also considerably cheaper.

Many of my dives are long shore dives in very cold water. I find the comfort, warmth and streamlining to be more than worth it.

Mako vs. Speardiver suits

The suits are similar except for the cut (men's/women's) and size with some minor differences in construction that don't affect function. I don't see a difference in overall quality. Mako does ship same day while freedivestore.com in my experience does not.

Lifetime of suits

I have 53 dives on my 7mm suit and 40 dives on my 3mm suit.

The 7mm shows some wear at the seams and is not quite as buoyant as it was when new as I can get by with less lead. However it is still very warm. I recorded a water temperature of 34 degrees F on a recent dive in it. The 3mm doesn't show meaningful signs of wear yet. In addition to having a handful fewer dives, the material is not as stiff and isn't subject to as much stretching when donning and doffing.

In comparison, my Neosport 3/2 scuba diving wetsuit has only 32 dives on it and has lost a noticeable amount of elasticity.

I see wetsuits as wear items and will be happy if I can get over 100 dives on them.

Fins: the tradeoff

Freediving fins are long, stiff, full-foot fins. Except in warm water, they are worn with neoprene socks and are sized accordingly. They do not have any venting or split. Because of their length and stiffness, it is considered unwise to make a giant-stride entry with these on as they may be damaged or come off. Alternatives are a backroll or donning the fins in the water.

I found these to be far more comfortable than either my Cressi Reaction fins (with wetboots) or my Tusa Solla full-foot fins (warm water). The freediving fins spread the pressure out on the metatarsals rather than concentrating it on the toes, and do not move relative to the foot. They are also more streamlined.

These are very efficient fins, and my air consumption rate was a whopping 20% lower than it had been when I did the same dive under the same conditions with the same equipment, except with the Cressi Reaction fins, last summer.

The Cressi Reaction fins lasted for about 120 dives before the expensive bungee strap came off the heel on the right side. While replacements are available, they cost nearly as much as new fins, so I'm scrapping these. I'll report back in a couple years on how the freediving fins lasted, by way of comparison. I wore out one set of wetboots after around 100 dives.

Weights and belts

I dive a BP/W and pretty much always have except when checking the operation of gear I have set aside for other people. I don't usually use much lead, between the steel BP, the freshwater dives I make, and the steel cylinders I use.

I use the Mako "quick weights," which are 1.6 pounds each, when I need a total of 6 pounds or less on my belt. I just put them on the waist belt of my BC. These weights have a bungee band and groove that allows them to be removed with one hand without undoing the belt, so they would be easy for me to ditch, should that ever become necessary.

I get floaty feet when I dive a twinset, and I use the lower leg weights to compensate. They are more comfortable than ankle weights.

I use the rubber weight belt when need more weight, with either the pinch weights or with standard weights on dive boats or the larger 5 and 10 pound weights I have when those are needed. The rubber belt is more comfortable and does not slip down, compared to a nylon belt.

Camouflage

The wetsuits I have are camouflage. On those occasions when I dive with other people, I do get some complaints that I am harder to see as a result in marginal viz.

I do believe it is possible to approach fish more closely without spooking them, though.
 
I use some of my free diving kit for scuba. Rubber weight belts are so much better than the other alternatives.
I never wear my carbon fins scuba diving. They can cause a lot of damage to the substrate and on the feet of someone that is not conscious of that is a recipe for disaster.
 
Interesting, if I may ask, to what depths, time are you doing with the suits in scuba and water temps? I usually dive dry but have considered trying one of these suits and my main concern is material compression and loss of insulation at depth.

My cold tolerance has gone away with age but always loved the freer feeling of a wetsuit while diving.
 
Interesting, if I may ask, to what depths, time are you doing with the suits in scuba and water temps? I usually dive dry but have considered trying one of these suits and my main concern is material compression and loss of insulation at depth.

My cold tolerance has gone away with age but always loved the freer feeling of a wetsuit while diving.
Not my thread, but I also use a freediving suit, a 7mm Yazbeck.
I can do 60’ for a little bit but I can feel the cold creep in at that depth if I stay there any length of time. I normally dive in around around the rocks from 15’ to 40’ close to shore, high activity, covering a lot of ground hunting, etc. most of these are shore dives but some kayak dives too.
I love the freedom and simplicity of wetsuit diving.
 
Not my thread, but I also use a freediving suit, a 7mm Yazbeck.
I can do 60’ for a little bit but I can feel the cold creep in at that depth if I stay there any length of time. I normally dive in around around the rocks from 15’ to 40’ close to shore, high activity, covering a lot of ground hunting, etc. most of these are shore dives but some kayak dives too.
I love the freedom and simplicity of wetsuit diving.
Thanks Eric, so no hour long 50’ dives in 54° water for me with one of these suits I guess, I can do 60 min in my neotech but I find it hard to think of anything other than getting out of the water after about 45 min.
 
I do 2 hour 60-70 meter dives in 20-15 celsius water with my 8mm yamamoto open cell freediving suit. During deco i often feel hot.
The bad news is that the suit costs 450 euros and last around a 100 dives. They turn into distorted 6.5 mm suits of almost compressed neoprene (very uncomfortable but still better than any scuba wetsuit I ever tryed).
With thiner wetsuit you get a longer lasting suit but lose a lot of thermal protection over the years.
A 3mm nylon outside/open cell inside will last you a very long time and will have better thermal protection than a 5mm closed cell suit.
 
Interesting, if I may ask, to what depths, time are you doing with the suits in scuba and water temps? I usually dive dry but have considered trying one of these suits and my main concern is material compression and loss of insulation at depth.

My cold tolerance has gone away with age but always loved the freer feeling of a wetsuit while diving.

Most of my dives are shallower although there have been quite a few to over 60 feet and some to over 100 feet. Temps down to mid 30s F. Times to air NDLs in some cases. There is noticeable suit compression at depth but still enough insulation to make it work. I don't make technical dives so in my situation it is the longer dives at 50-90 feet that have the most exposure to cold, since the NDL times at greater depths are so short.

So far I haven't had a dive where I wish I had been in a dry suit.
 
  1. FYI
    Some years ago there was a very large active world wide company called "Voit" Willard Voit the founder and owner wanted his company that held his name to be number one diving company and only sell the very best products

    One was to produce the very best wet suit

    I was a consultant /advisor to Voit and Fred Roberts (the author of Basic SCUBA) was the chief and only engineer. It was Fred who created a very crude but never equaled test for wet suits. He collected samples of all known wet suit manufactures of that era and attached them in a row to a piece of wood/aka test board

    On a sunny SoCal day we ventured to Catalina Island to a secluded cove called Italian gardens where the ocean drops off very fast ,

    We attached the test board to a weight belt with 100 feet of line. We jumped over the side with a micrometer and measured and recorded the thickness at 25, 50 75 and 100 feet. We surfaced and as Fred recorded the data I repeatedly dropped the test board over the side and retrieved it after 25 times. Then over the side measuring the thickness at 25, 50 75 and 100 feet.

    Then surface and repeated dropping and retrieving the teat board 3 more times until 100 submersions and retrievals to 100 feet had been completed.

    The test revealed that some of the wet material began deteriorating to due compression after just a few submersions, after 100 submersions several suits were almost useless as effective thermal protection.

    So it can be concluded that usage (repeated submersions ) and possibly age that probably most wet suits even in todays market deteriorate after ageing and repeated usage.

    And that about all I have to say about west suits...

    Sam Miller, 111

    @drbill You dive to 200 feet - what at 175 at Italian Gardens ?
  2. @Scuba Lawyer

  3. @Marie13 CE
 

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