The new Freedom Contour - The Rolex of backplates.
- Thread starter Eric Sedletzky
- Start date
Please register or login
Welcome to ScubaBoard, the world's largest scuba diving community. Registration is not required to read the forums, but we encourage you to join. Joining has its benefits and enables you to participate in the discussions.
Benefits of registering include
- Ability to post and comment on topics and discussions.
- A Free photo gallery to share your dive photos with the world.
- You can make this box go away
OMG ! You are shameless. Ok, ok I'll order one if I have any money left when I get back from the Mexican Cenotes next week. Now if I can just get Bryan to throw in a Kraken
ams511
Contributor
If your looking for a narrow wing then your only choices are DSS, Oxycheq, Apeks, VDH, UTD, and Mares. Mares is the least expensive but I have not heard any feedback on it.
OP
Eric Sedletzky
Contributor
Yes!! and I'm getting one!
I just popped out a size large new style FP Contour (exactly like the stainless version) out of 1/8" 5052 Aluminum and made a light tank bracket (STA) for it out of stainless with 5/16" rods. Kind of a cute little thing.. The whole thing only weighs 2 lbs.!!
That Al plate with the VDH eighteen pounder is going to be my travel rig.
OMG ! You are shameless. Ok, ok I'll order one if I have any money left when I get back from the Mexican Cenotes next week. Now if I can just get Bryan to throw in a Kraken
Just a little more eye candy for you....
this one can be titled: "find the wing"....
OP
Eric Sedletzky
Contributor
Because then people who already have one will have to buy another one because it's the "newest" model
Just kidding...
But I do have a customer that has four of my plates because he's a collector.
The real reason:
It started when I scored an old Healthways plastic backpack for free out of my LDS's free bin. They had an old obsolete gear exchange box where you bring in something old and throw it in the box, and if there's something in there you want you take it. It's kind of an old gear rescue center.
Not only did I score the Healthways pack but I also scored an old original Hawaiian back pack, I don't know if anybody here remembers those, I'll bet Sam does.
So I started casually using this Healthways backpack for cleaning boats and doing simple shallow dives in my freediving suit with no wing, poking a few fish around the rocks. And It really hit me that the design of this old Healthways pack was just about perfect! They just nailed it better than any other company from back then.
That Healthways pack is probably the best example of the best plastic pack ever made. It's contoured up and down, has a curved waist, and it has rolled out edges so it sinks right in to the sweet spot in between your shoulder blades. Healthways is long gone and so are their packs so I don't feel bad about "borrowing" a few ideas, but I kind of went off that design to a large extent for this latest version. One thing I really liked was the curved top slots and the way the side shape is. It just worked really well. The only prioblem is all those old packs are short (14") and so the waist strap is way up high on me (I'm 6'4") and they have no inherent ballast, so all your weight has to go on a belt. For boat cleaning they work good because they are light and with a steel 72 and hanging upside down under a hull I don't even know it's there.
So, my hope is that this will be the best model yet.
Three different sizes, all modernized to work with the lastest and best components, two cam bands, Hog rigged, wing secured finally so it doesn't flop around while trying to change tanks, a bracket that can be used as a STA for slotless wings, a bracket that's set on 11" centers (9.5" on the small), 1/8" stainless with a fair and versatile amout of inherent ballast.
What more do you want?
Last edited:
OP
Eric Sedletzky
Contributor
I have thought of that.Stainless is hugely ductile. With a set of mating forming dies, (I'd estimate the cost around 10K~15K maybe more if you don't get it right on the first try) and a ~100 ton press these plates could formed in a single hit.
Cut it out (laser or AWJ)
Deburr
Form (In the giant squeeze 'O' matic)
Polish
The starting point would be digitizing an example and processing that info into a 3D surface for a CAM program.
When do we start?
Tobin
Auto panels are made this way, slammed in a giant die and formed in a split second.
I don't know if spending that kind of loot would ever pay off in the dive gear business.
I'm sure you sell a hell of a lot more stuff than I do, but you have to admit, dive gear is so specialized, and to split it down even further, the BP/W crowd is only a small fraction of of an already small group, and the Freedom Plate group is an even smaller sub group of the already miniscual BP/W group. So probably .000001% of divers?
Then figure how many units would have to get sold annually just to break even?
And three different sizes = three different dies.
This could be a reason why nobody has ripped it off yet, way too labor intensive with physical man hours, no way to economically automate production, and not enough market share.
Who needs a patent when it's naturally protected just by the PITA factor?
Nobody's going to do it.
Not to mention the repeat customer factor. Freedom plates are built to last centuries. Unless I decide to buy a solid gold Freedom plate I don't plan to ever buy another BC for the rest of my life. After I'm gone, someone will be using my plate for a long time as well.
My Freedom plate was the envy of everyone last year in Turks & Caicos on the Explorer II, coupled with an Oxycheq 18# purple wing. One day maybe I'll get one for my wife.
Bubblesong
Contributor
My daughter is looking at my new Freedom plate, as I knew she would. I may have to buy her one just to keep her from poaching mine!
Emailing Eric again.
Emailing Eric again.
Similar threads
