Frenzel is not done by controlling the muscles in the ear. It's done by controlling your epiglottis and your tongue and push air against a blocked nose. So while it's hands free, it's not the same.[1]
With controlling the muscles in the ear, one can do it without a nose clip. It's called BTV (or VTO sometimes in English)[2], and instead of forcing air in to open the eustachian tube, you just open it by muscles.
That second link is a gold mine. Thank you so much for sharing.
I've known how to do the basic BTV/VTO for many years, but it wasn't quite enough for me to equalize pressure while diving (without descending very slowly, I suppose). Just a few minutes with the techniques on that page has already improved my ability dramatically.
Cool, hope it will be of use! I freedived for years before trying scuba, so for scuba I have no issues. With the head up and all air going there, my VTO is good enough.
But for freediving with the air going towards the stomach and much faster descent it's still a bit tricky. One thing is if I'm not equalizing quickly enough, no amount of force I can muster will open the tubes again without actually doing a more classic pinch nose technique. Doing a classic equalize you will often "overblow" air in and can descend a bit before needing to equalize again. But with VTO you're only equalizing to a perfect balance so will need to make sure to keep equalizing to not get under pressure. But of course not as much hassle hands free, I try to just do click-click-click continuously, almost every kick down to remind myself to keep it open. But yeah, if I get too much under-pressure I'm not able to open it again hands free.
I also feel head angle matters a lot, so trying to not bend the neck too much to look down, but instead swim down while looking "straight ahead" instead of where you're actually going helps for me.
I used to scuba dive, and yes - can "click my ears" while breathing freely through my nose and/or mouth. We were taught to use Valsalva when feeling pressure during ascent/descent, and after a while I found I was able to just use the right muscles voluntarily instead.
That only allows you to increase the pressure in your inner ear, but not decrease like opening them does. For example, it would be useful while an airplane is descending, but it wouldn't help while ascending.
There is, however, a simple trick anyone can do to equalize the pressure both ways: swallow. Works wonders with babies and toddlers.
> "[...] relieve your ear pressure without moving anything else"