X-mass haul?

[FreediveWI]

Wow!,
Lots of questions to answer in just one post. Oh well, here goes:

FLUID GOGGLES were developed by a Canadian record holder, and engineer, Eric Fattah- who was looking to improve on the scleral contacts that had been used by Jacque Mayol and Umberto Pellizari. The scleral lenses were reported to have cost at least $4,000 a pair and were painful to wear. They were, obviously, custom made and hard to get a hold of.

Eric utilized a Cubic Zarconia lens within a pair of swimming goggles which allowed the diver to see clearly when flooded with sea water- or saline solution. That means there were no longer any external air spaces to equalize and the diver could also equalize hands-free by the use of a special nose clip.

The main problem with his design was that it required a special bonding process to glue the lens onto the plastic lens of the goggle. To do this properly he first had to clean all of the anti-fog coating off the lens and then bond them with special glue. Failure rates were high and the goggles were expensive- around $400. The newer ones are being made by Rudi Castinera, former trainer of both Pipin and Tanya Streeter, who happens to live in Turkey with his wife/ record holder Yasmine. He has taken the basic premise and moved the lens back off the goggle face by using a mounting bracket inside the goggle. This brings the price down, along with the failure rate during production.

As to how they work, well, just forget about everything you learned in your basic scuba class because it doesn’t apply here. The goggles are filled with fluid so you don’t need a nose pocket anymore- there’s no air space so you no longer need to pump air into your mask from your nose. The lens distorts the light enough to be able to see through the water itself. They CAN be used by scuba divers and a few pairs have been sold to tech divers- not as a primary mask, but rather to be carried in the pocket as a back-up in case of primary mask failure.

When I got to try a pair of Eric’s goggles on a few years ago I was blown away by how I could read magazine covers from across the dive shop while seeing right through liquid. I’ve wanted a pair ever since, but just couldn’t justify the expense. Now that the price has been cut in half it’s time to bite.

As far as the fin comments go, the original carbon fiber fins were developed by an Italian company that made carbon fiber bike frames and race car parts. They only started making carbon fiber fins, and Spearguns, because the owner of the company happened to be a big spear fisherman.

When it comes to former Eastern block countries and monofin design, well that’s because they invented the thing back in the late 60’s- in Siberia of all places! They start their competitive fins swimmers out at 5 and 6 years old. By 8 they get their first monofin and spend hours in the water. The current, multi, world record holder, Martin Stepanik, was a monofin swimmer since childhood who grew up in the Czech Republic. I’ve had an opportunity to train with him and he is as much a fish as he is a man.

I know it was a long post but there were so many questions to answer.

As to wear to get them you can look here:


or here:



Here’s a shot I took of Eric Fattah using his fluid goggles and a “simple” warm up dive to 220’.
Jon