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All About Guns What's your weapon of choice, and why? Discuss the beloved speargun here! |
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08-26-2023, 07:51 AM | #31 |
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Re: Ermes Avatar mods thread
In the early Champion Arbaletes they hammered cork plugs into the barrel ends and these proved to be effective unless the gun was taken deep and if the cork did not rot. I have noticed "O" ring plug guns with an alloy barrel like Swiss cheese at the end where water sits with the gun in storage, usually the handle end. I bought an old Aquacraft gun like that to get my hands on the grip handle, but the barrel was toast, unless you chopped about a foot off the barrel length.
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08-26-2023, 04:44 PM | #32 |
the deeper the blue.....
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Re: Ermes Avatar mods thread
[quote=spearq8;……..[/QUOTE]
solid advice there thanks Majd have used your cut-foam-with-5200 technique on a few pipeguns now, works perfectly and much lighter than rubber or silicone plugs. |
08-27-2023, 02:22 PM | #33 | |
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Re: Ermes Avatar mods thread
Quote:
In the marine world, if foam is not sealed once shaped, it will just hold water in voids if it cannot absorb it. I've never had a barrel flood on me past the plugs. Prior to assembling, I always RTV my components to get a water free finished product. |
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08-27-2023, 04:44 PM | #34 |
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Re: Ermes Avatar mods thread
Well obviously you have to use the right type of foam, one with closed cells and that does not crush. Polystyrene foam is formed by a whole bunch of balls squeezed together and heated to form strong packaging materials, but I would not suggest it in a speargun taken to any great depth. Deep diving submersibles use special foams that contain myriad glass spheres encased in a substrate. You can buy that stuff, syntactic foam, but it is not cheap.
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08-27-2023, 07:33 PM | #35 |
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Re: Ermes Avatar mods thread
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09-13-2023, 11:25 PM | #36 |
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Re: Ermes Avatar mods thread
Out of curiosity I weighed my old Aquacraft handle which has an “O" ring seal on the front boss and found that it weighed 257 grams. Compare that with the Avatar handle and it weighs 358 grams which is quite a bit more. Putting a metal cassette in a tube gun handle has a weight penalty and makes such a gun tend to be tail heavy. Sea Hornet were one of the first to have a metal cassette in their tube gun handle, the Pacific, but they soon switched it over to a plastic version. The original all metal mechanism had been designed as a mortice mech for a timber gun where there was plenty of timber to offset the extra weight in water. A tube gun does not have such reserve of buoyancy unless you fit it with a buoyancy bulb or a float type sleeve jacket.
Last edited by popgun pete; 09-13-2023 at 11:44 PM. Reason: added a photo |
09-13-2023, 11:56 PM | #37 |
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Re: Ermes Avatar mods thread
For those that don't remember Aquacraft the guns were eventually taken over by Bandito who are actually still around using that same handle and mech. It is a good handle and has a good cam lock mech, which is why it does not need a metal cassette. Sportsways used the same innards in a more angular handle shape styling-wise, but it worked in exactly the way.
Last edited by popgun pete; 09-14-2023 at 08:28 PM. Reason: added the Sportsway gun photo |
09-15-2023, 05:37 AM | #38 | |
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Re: Ermes Avatar mods thread
Quote:
First of all, I made a handle out of clay and tweaked it as much as I need it to make it perfect for my hand. Then I smoothed it out and filled some voids with putty. Sanded, etc and finally clear coated it to make it slick. I made the mold out of special silicone for molds. From then on, I can make them in 5 minutues each (counting the measurements of the two components, mising and casting). It is THAT quick. What you could do is replicate my method and then split the casted recoil handles in half (bandsaw), trim the excess, trace the shape of the handle stem from the gun on the freshly sawed face of the handle (both sides 50%), carve it out and then slap the two halves together with epoxy adhesive. Casting directly on the handle stem seems too tricky for me. Mikel |
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10-01-2023, 12:17 AM | #39 |
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Re: Ermes Avatar mods thread
Here is a surprise, the Ermes Sub Avatar handle is 41 grams heavier than the cast alloy grip Beuchat Canon handle. I was rebuilding a Canon from new spare parts as I didn’t want the last version with a very skinny spear. All I need is the cocking stock tube, I have everything else, having plenty of spare spears. In later years Beuchat upgraded all the innards of this iconic handle. The only thing the Canon needed was a plastic guide track, which will be going on my new cannon.
Last edited by popgun pete; 10-01-2023 at 06:45 PM. Reason: added a photo |
09-09-2024, 04:35 PM | #40 |
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Re: Ermes Avatar mods thread
Mario improved the band hook on the bottom so no more bands popping out on rollers.
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09-11-2024, 04:34 PM | #41 |
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Re: Ermes Avatar mods thread
Looks like the sliding block has disappeared which was a potential weak point and may have been made more so by cutting that hook higher up in the slim body. No great loss to get rid of it.
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09-11-2024, 07:16 PM | #42 |
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Re: Ermes Avatar mods thread
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