Masks, Vintage & Modern

[SeaRat]

David Richie Wilson mentioned that we have neglected some aspects of vintage diving, mainly how we see the world. Here's his quote:

I understand why the main focus is on regulators and related scuba-specific gear, but such an exclusive emphasis frustrates me as a vintage equipment snorkeller who doesn't scuba-dive. I'd love to see, and contribute to, a few threads about the historical development of masks, fins, snorkels and suits. I'd also like to see more reviews of vintage diving books, particularly period instruction manuals.

Well, I have used a bunch in my time. I started out with an oval (which was about all that was available). I had this great one which was yellow:


In the USAF, I used an oval one for a while, but liked the Scubapro tri-view, which they called the "Supervision." However, I was pretty specific that I liked it without the purge valve. Here is what it looked like in the 1970s:



I went through three of these masks, then decided to get the silicone version of this mask. By that time, I no longer had the original lens, so I couldn't convert it to a mask without a purge. I considered the purge valve to impinge on my field of vision. But here's that mask:

I always liked being seen, and so with this mask I put some reflective tape around the top and sides of the metal rim.

I used a Pinocchio mask for my free diving, but don't have a photo of it as I was not taking pictures at that time (high school, in the 1960s). But this mask was great for deep free diving as it had a rubber insert that took up almost all the dead air space of the mask. So I didn't have to snort much air into the mask as I descended. I did use the Scubapro Supervision for free diving, but it did have that disadvantage when diving deeper. I would sometimes use the ol' standby oval mask for free diving because of that. I have a Dacor mask with a purge valve which is probably the most comfortable mask I've ever worn...

...but it has a disadvantage too...

...in that it is not very photogenic

That should do it for this post, although I have a number more which I'll certainly talk about. David, what about your choices of masks?

SeaRat

[william]

One mask design that when Stored Correctly works Much Better than ANY Other Mask I have ever used in my entire life. And I have used them all. Once experienced with the Foam Rubber Skirt Mask Models, you will never want to wear any other design. It is just the Softest mask you will ever wear, garunteed. That is important when having to wear a dive mask for long periods of time and during many days on a vintage dive trip.
The Foam Rubber Skirt Mask Design is without a doubt the best and being SUPER=Soft it is the only choice when having to wear a mask for very long hours, even day after day for long hours. It is the Most kind to your facial skin having a foam rubber material is just the softest, especially when Scuba Diving and especially when Free-Diving frequently and after day after day on a month long diving trip to exotic locations.
{ The less problems you and your frinds & loved ones have with the diving equipment, the better.}

{ The Wonderfull Foam Rubber Skirt Vintage Diving Mask, made by Voit Swimaster in 3 designs & by Sportsways in one design is amazing in how it Never makes your face sore, nor hurt you, nor feeling your skin raw and sensitive to the touch.
( If this had been in the Owner/Operation Manuals for these types of masks, they would most likely be the main type used in modern times to this day. I have no doubt of that. Actually the design should have been manufactured with the foam rubber skirt Already slanted outwards a little bit from the factory.
(1) The Swimaser "WIDE-VIEW" with lowered Hognose Purge Valve,
(2) The Swimnaster "SUNMASTER" lower Hognose Purge Valve
(3) The Swimaster "COMPETION" vintage round glass model designed with a Small Very Low Air Volumn so Freediving is much easier useing this mask. ( But it has No hognose purge valve. Yet, Moving Fast in freediving, it stays in place excellently.
(4) Sportsways Hog-Nose Foam Rubber Skirt Mask. They followed with their own model of the foam-rubber-skirt-mask with theirs having a lowered Triangle Hog Nose Purge Valve.
The Hog Nose design keeps the water in the mask much lower which keeps water Out of your nose so when equalizing ear pressures you get less water trying to enter your Inner Ear greatly reduceing chances of inner ear infections=less pain when you dive frequently & no doctor visits needed for antibiotics from inner ear infections.
Also, the foam rubber skirt eliminates the need for Nose Pinch Recesses in a mask because pressing upwards under your nose is so soft, doing this easily closes your nose openings making clearing your ears a snap to do. When you get the hang of clearing your ears this way, you wonder why the nose pinch recesses are even necessary to have on any mask.

All 4 Masks should be Stored on a Mannequin Head, like the Styrofoam Heads that are sold in any of the ladies Beauty Salons for $5 each. Place the mask on the head and with your finger go around the Skirt inner edge flipping it Outwards so it will be stored in the same shape like you would wear it in when scuba or feediving. Keeps insects like spiders out of the inside of your mask as a added benefit. I had that happen once and had a heart attack getting the mask back off,ha. After a week or two, storing the mask on the styrofoam head shapes & forces the foam rubber to Stay like that after you take it off the head. Just take the head with you when you go diving. When ready, take it off the foam head and it will slip right onto your own head Easily & Perfectly every single time. It keeps the Foam Skirt-Curled-Outwards so it is so easy to don the mask and not have Any difficulty at all keeping the skirt curled in the correct direction when placing the mask on anytime you need to. If you do not have, or can not find the Foam Head to store your mask on, a Jiffy Peanut Butter Jar will work very good too, to maintain the skirt in a Curled Out Shape. Storing the masks this way WILL keep the rubber skirt curled outwards so doning your mask is Always easy for you to do. It works Perfectly. Not doing this makes doning the mask very difficult and no fun at all to have to deal with it, especially if you lose your mask in a dangerous cituation when deep down in the water. Being able to get your mask Back-On very quickly could actually save you or a friend from getting chocked when you are trying to re-don your mask as fast as you can, like when you have a dangerous fish on your speargun, like a Shark, or Wahoo, or like a big Barracuda.

.................................................................Swimaster "WIDE VIEW" Foam Skirt...................................................................


................................................................Swimaster "SUNMASTER" Foam Skirt.....................................


..................................................................Swimaster "COMPETITION" Foam Skirt..............................................................
.........................

.................................................................Sportsways "WIDE VIEW" Foam Skirt........................................................
...............................

..................Swimaster "WIDE VIEW" Mask on Mannequin head to keep Foam Rubber Skirt Curved Out Properly............
................................

[DavidRitchieWilson]

First, I'm very grateful to John for starting this thread in response to my plea. Basic gear can be something of a cinderella subject in the world of vintage equipment diving. Thanks to John and William both for their informative messages, including the great illustrations.

The image above shows my UK-made Typhoon Super Star mask, which dates from the early 1960s. It wasn't my first dive mask, but it's the one I cherish most because it was a teenage birthday gift from my parents. It's in remarkably pristine condition, the rubber skirt is still as soft and pliable as the day it was purchased and the mask perfectly matches my facial dimensions. It came in a small rectangular red and white cardboard box with images of other Typhoon products on the side.

The mask is a classic oval with a top screw. Behind the screw you can see a small protuberance. This could be used as a socket to receive a snorkel worn above the head and held in place by a harness. One disadvantage of the mask was that it didn't have any easy means to pinch the nose for equalisation purposes, which is why I decided, in 1966, when I entered university and joined its sub-aqua club, to purchase another mask, with a compensator.

The Typhoon Super Star was manufactured in London by Typhoon, the brand name used by E. T. Skinner and Co. The firm still exists today. One of its founders, Oscar Gugen, also founded the British Sub Aqua Club and was something of a character, if his Wikipedia entry is anything to go by:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oscar_Gugen

I'll leave matters there for the moment. My Typhoon Super Star wasn't my first mask and it certainly wasn't my last by a long way. It has pride of place on my shelves. In a future message I'll write about my first, child's, mask and also about my quest for modern classic oval masks with rubber skirts, including a few coloured ones. Black and translucent aren't the only mask skirt colours available nowadays.

[SeaRat]

This is a Dacor mask I got in the 1980s for a very cheap price.
The dive shop was in Medford, Oregon and this mask fit me very well. Why couldn't they
sell it? Well, it had a pink colored plastic rim. No one would buy it. I still have that mask.
It was made with black silicone, and has withstood the test of time.


The mask the diver standing up in the surf one I used for a while--this is the original
Pinocchio mask, as I recall. It was a great free diving mask.


John

[DavidRitchieWilson]

John mentioned the Cressi Pinocchio mask. It has attained something of a cult status, not least because it remains in production more than half a century after its launch, making it the world's oldest mask design - the first to feature a nosepiece - to be continuously marketed. Currently, the Pinocchio is Cressi's only rubber-skirted mask.

The mask's original designer was Luigi Ferraro (1914-2006), shown above wearing the mask. He also developed the world's first full-foot fins, Cressi Rondines. An account of Ferraro's remarkable life story can be found, in Italian and English, on his official website at
www.luigiferraro.it/
A page on this website is devoted to the Pinocchio:
www.luigiferraro.it/en/node/1058
According to this page, the Pinocchio

was a "second-generation" design, enclosing the nose in its facial coverage, while earlier masks were modelled on goggles, covering the eyes only. There's an interesting Historical Diving Society of Italy publication at

www.hdsitalia.com/articoli/20_attrezzature.pdf

dedicated to diving masks of the 1950s. The Pinocchio is No. 17 in the document, while No. 16, a nose-free mask of French manufacture, resembles the Pinocchio in its shape, colour (light blue) and the metal rod at the centre. Note the bulbs at each side of that French mask, used to equalise pressure underwater.

John's illustrated book cover - George Bronson-Howard's "Handbook for Skin Divers" - indeed shows a red version of the Cressi Pinocchio. A number of diving titles featured the mask, including the Carriers' "Dive" (1955 edition), which priced the mask as $5.95 back then. Other manufacturers carried Cressi gear, including Typhoon, the UK's oldest continuously trading diving equipment company. I have a copy of a mid-1960s Typhoon catalogue listing the mask and pricing it at £2 3s 9d. I also own a Cressi catalogue from the late 1960s or early 1970s with no less than three different Pinocchio models:

1. Pinocchio Original: "The first mask in the world with a shaped nose. Single glass, large visual field, minimum internal volume. Rubber and rim in various colours. For universal use.
2. Pinocchio Optical: "For correcting axosymmetric and astigmatic exclusively negative. In the totalscope version the corrections go to -6."
3. Pinocchio de luxe: "Single glass mask, large visual field, rubber and chromium-plated metal rim. Especially indicated for deep-sea diving with aqualungs."

As I said at the beginning, the original version of the Cressi Pinocchio is still in production, albeit in black rubber only:

Here in the UK, Amazon supplies the mask, while Spanish distributor Subprof is prepared to ship the Pinocchio to the USA. All credit to Cressi for continuing the production of this historic mask to the present day, but I wish it was available in the original light blue, with matching all-rubber full-foot Rondine fins. That would really enable me to recreate my happy days snorkelling in the Mediterranean during the 1970s!

[scubadiverbob]

One thing everyone didn't mention about the Pinocchio mask, that probably is the reason to it's popularity, is that it is very comfortable to wear and is a low volume mask making it very easy to clear. It doesn't have a purge valve, to get sand in it, which is another good part of the design.

One of my favorite mask, I bought from Art Helwig, owner of Divers Exchange in Alameda, CA, was a White Stag Mask. Very simular to the Pinocchio mask; except, it came out in clear silicone rubber and plastic band to hold the faceplate in place (a flaw in the design). The rubber eventually went bad and the plastic band has cracks in it. If that didn't happen, I'd still be diving with it!



Here is a better picture of the White Stag Mask. You can see the cracks in the plastic bands, the silicon rubber turned from a clear to a dingy light brown, and the White Stag mask strap had been replaced with a USD strap (the original one broke). I dove with this mask for along time. It's sort of not vintage; just like I'm not old.

[scubadiverbob]

I know I'm going to get comments on 'I'm diving with a Dacor Pacer 900 and a pony jacket' .... Go easy on me please! The 900 I bought when it first came out. The mask and ScubaPro (large bore) snorkel are the oldest items I'm wearing. After having my modern dry snorkel fall apart on me the last time I went diving (at least I was in fresh water), I'm thinking about getting another snorkel like my old ScubaPro one! Like, it never fell apart, just the rubber in the mouth part of it dried out and cracked.

[nikeajax]

I've been meaning to get this mask up for a while. It's a U.S. Divers "warparound" mask. I rather like the glass on the sides as all the newer masks I've seen don't have it and gives you just that much more to see. BTW, that's a Dacor "glowtop" snorkel, I like it because it doesn't have a purge valve to leak; very simple!
Jaybird


U.S. Divers wraparound mask by Gray Pine, on Flickr


U.S. Divers wraparound mask 2 by Gray Pine, on Flickr

[duckbill]

Nov 30, 2010 15:21:23 GMT -8 nikeajax said:

...all the newer masks I've seen don't have it and gives you just that much more to see.

I've heard these are still available through USD, though yours with the acorn nuts is obviously vintage

[Deleted]

My first mask I still have, a Nemrod oval, the rubber is still sound but the walls of the mask are so thin it was not a good mask to dive with.

My second mask was a Vido, was like wearing a set of binouclars (sp) I needed that for the prescription lens installed.....42mm dia.

I had this mask shipped to me by my parents after Nixon moved the 7 Marines out of Nam and I was transfered to Okinawa. There I bought thru the mail a Pinocchio Delux from Lenard Maggoie in NY......he made prescription lens and suggested I use this mask. The lens were 72mm each......

This is that mask;


I used this for snorkling and scuba........the large volume was manageable and the view was good.......it was heavy however with the extra glass lens glued to the faceplate.

When the snorkle masks started to appear with the low volume etc sales pitch, I tried a friends and did not see any advantage for scuba........hell, I was using my deluxe for snorkeling and did not feel handicaped at all. Now all you can find are snorkle masks, not much on real scuba masks at the LDS's.

I lost this thru carelessness, it sat in a box in my attic thru 7 or 8 hot Texas summers......the rubber melted.

in the 80's, I started diving with contact lens and first mask I used was a Farallon Tekna triview, but the side lens were so small they were useless to me.

I finally found in a magazine a oval silicon (light transparent green) mask and purchased three of them. I still have two and dive them most of the time.

This is the oval in Salvador de Bahia, Brazil:



I did buy another Pinocchio Deluxe from a fellow in the UK who's father used it diving at Malta. It is in very good shape and I use it sometimes.......however with my bad eye, the nose piece really blocks my vision from my good left eye on the right.



My son gave me a new (used) triview that has no structure at the corners, it is a very good mask, however, again the nose pocket blocks my view to the right. I wish they'd make this mask without the nose pocket.........the view would be astounding!

So I use my oval most of the time.

This is my son at age 12 (he's 36 now) at his open water checkout. His, to big for his face, mask is a Voit I brought from Okinawa that a friend gave me.

This is David now, he prefers the snorkel masks.

[nikeajax]

Hmmm? Found a Swimaster Wide View today thrifting for 2bux. I wasn't sure at first, that foam skirt sure looked weird, as I'd never seen one before: I thought someone did a Frankenstein at first, but nope!. I remembered William saying how nice they are to wear, so I took a chance, and it looks just like the image: gotta put it on the wig-form to reshape the skirt, can't wait to use it!
Jaybird

[tomcatpc]

Instead of starting a new topic to show my new mask, I found this old topic to bring back to life...

Just got my current incarnation of the Cressi Pinocchio Mask.
Mark

[nikeajax]

Hmmmm? Might be fun to have one! I'll have to see if my friend Jim has one to go with my original Scubair and Scuba Star... How's the viz as compared to your round mask?

JB

[DavidRitchieWilson]

Congratulations on your new acquisition! I'd also be interested in hearing how it performs in the water.

I've already contributed my 5 cents' worth to this thread, but I'll just add a couple of things that I've chanced upon more recently.

1. In 1968 there were five different versions of the Cressi Pinocchio. One model came in two sizes, "piccolo" and "grande", and there was even a device to be worn inside the mask to reduce the internal volume even further.


2. A Soviet version of the Cressi Pinocchio was manufactured in the Mosrezina rubber plant in Moscow during the early 1970s:


This mask was given the name "Buratino" (Буратино), which is the main character in a book written by Aleksey Nikolayevich Tolstoy (not Leo Tolstoy, author of "War and Peace"), who "had read Pinocchio as a child, but, having lost the book, (...) started re-imagining it many years later in an attempt to come up with a series of bedside stories for his own children." Read more at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buratino.

The Soviet Buratino mask is reviewed thus in one Russian-language diving book I won recently on eBay: "It has a dual-pointed shape lens and a dedicated nose pocket. With its very low inner volume, however, the mask is a bit short on size and visibility too. One of the significant design flaws arises from the deep recess in the lens for the nose, which frequently and very easily results in the lens breaking in half when pushed accidentally. Handle this mask with care. Furthermore, the lens configuration does not meet up with the skirt. The wire tie at the narrowest point of the lens does not guarantee that the mask will be leakproof, especially when there are differences in pressure."

DRW

[nikeajax]

Interesting with the Cressi-Soviet tie. While watching a BBC program about cars, we found out that Italy was more than flirting with Communism/Russia because of the way people were being treated by giant corporations like Fiat. To make a long story short though: Fiat sold the design of their 124 sedan to the Soviets and helped them build a factory.

If I may stray a bit further: while reading a copy of Pinocchio from 1920 my wife and I realized that the character's name means pine-eyes. Leave it to Disney to really kill the idea behind a great piece of work. Pinocchio was a truly horrible child: the character who would become Jiminy Cricket was smashed with a hammer on the wall, killed by you know who because he was irritated with him. Carlo Collodi's wooden boy was meant to scare the poo out of kids--DON'T BE LIKE THIS, STUPID! In the original book, I discovered on Wikipedia, Pinocchio died, he was hanged in a tree by the cat and fox--fluffy...

JB