US 5,304,081 AGranted

Swim fin

AssigneeTabata Co., Ltd.

InventorRyoji Takizawa

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Abstract

Swimmer's downkick causes a swim fin to be incurved transversely thereof to generate a powerful propulsive force. The swim fin 1 comprises a foot pocket 2 and a propulsion blade 3 which is, in turn, provided at the transverse middle and between this transverse middle and respective side rails 6, 6 with a groove 15 and grooves 16, 16, respectively, wherein each of these grooves 15, 16, 16 is curved convexly from the topside toward the underside of the propulsion blade 3 and extends from a forward end of the propulsion blade 3 toward the foot pocket 2. The swim fin 1 is integrally molded from a hard type elastic material 40 and a soft type elastic material 30, wherein opposite side edges 10, 10 of the propulsion blade 3 are formed from the hard type elastic material 40 and a zone defined between these side edges 10, 10 is formed from the soft type elastic material 30.

A swim fin integrally molded to form adjacent sections composed of (a) a hard type elastic material and (b) a soft-type elastic material that is softer than said hard-type elastic material, said fin comprising

(1) a foot insertion pocket,
(2) a propulsion blade extending outwardly from said foot insertion pocket, said blade having a forward end (8), two spaced apart lateral edges (11), an underside and an upper side,
(3) a side rail (6) located adjacent each of said lateral edges (11), each said side rail extending both upwardly from the upper side of said blade and downwardly from the underside of said blade,
(4) a plurality of grooves (15, 16) in said blade that are located inwardly of said lateral edges (11) and which extend from the forward end (8) of the blade toward said foot insertion pocket, said grooves including a middle groove (15) which extends along the middle of said blade and at least one side groove (16) located on each side of said middle groove (15) at a spaced distance therefrom, said grooves (15, 16) being partially curved convexly from the upper side of said blade to the underside of said blade, each side groove (16) having an inner side edge (13) and an outer side edge (12), each inner side edge (13) being closer to said middle groove (15) than each outer side edge (12),
(5) the outer areas (10) of the blade that extends between said lateral edges (11) of each blade and the outer side edge (12) of each side groove (16) consisting of hard-type elastic material so as to offer high deformation resistance,
(6) said grooves (15, 16) and the intermediate areas of the blade extending between said grooves (15, 16) consisting of at least one material selected from the group consisting of
(a) a soft-type elastic material, and
(b) a laminate of a soft-type elastic material and hard type elastic material,
whereby said grooves and said intermediate areas of the blade offer less deformation resistance than said outer areas (10) of the blade to thereby assure that the blade will be smoothly incurvated as a swimmer downkicks and the shape of the incurvation is sufficiently stable to be free from undesirable distortion that would disturb a water stream thrust downward.

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Abstract

Claims5