Ermes Avatar mods thread

[kavachi]

Firstly a disclaimer - Ermes Avatar is my favourite pipegun, period. I love what Mario and Majd have come up with!!! It does not need any mods to work superbly for most applications - I own a 117 carbon that remains stock standard, no mods whatsoever, love how it shoots as is, straight off the shelf.

This being a modular gun tho - both handle and muzzle being compatible with a vast range of pipes and cuttles - and this being Spearboard, well......of course we'e going to try modding this thing

Top of my mod list is sleeving the carbon pipe with a nice long, low profile teak cuttle for extra float and recoil absorption with big shafts and big reel, but awaiting delivery of a router bit with which to make cuttle. but will post results when it happens!

next on the list, inevitable really given years of shaping recoil handles for my wood builds and various pipeguns, is shaping a full recoil handle for the Avatar - pic attached of handle with grip removed - but am awaiting some of that light Japanese epoxy putty to arrive for that mod, and that has been done to death already here on SB.

any mods out there, you proud Ermes Avatar owners?? rip out the bloody safety? epoxy that gopro slider into place? extend that loading pad back a bit to ease loading of real hot bands? anything??

[kavachi]

my bog standard 117cm bandstretch Ermes Avatar, no mods, straight off the shelf

140 x 7.5 Hunt shaft powered by twin 14.5mm small ID primeline bands @380%

got a few hundred fish on this gun already

just got Mario's level-wind reel for it

[spearq8]

The whole idea of the Ermes Avatar was to make a perfect gun with no DIY stuff. Of course you can always maximize performance by shaping your handle exactly to your hand and the type of gloves you wear. The super light Japanese expoxy putty with a coat of epoxy with silica sand on top and you should be very happy.

The Ermessub Leonardo reel is really something. I remember when Mario first sent me the design and asked me to 3d draw the threaded rod that properly places the line on the spool. Really the guy is a genius and nobody has anything like that for spearfishing. The only problem was to make the damn thing the cost was astronomical. Fortunately we found ways to mass produce some of the complicated parts and the cost became more manageable. I don't use reels personally, but that Leonardo reel is really ... well ... very Leonardo like !!!

[musubi]

Not that it's a significant mod, but I was able to get the handle with the gold mech.




I bought it from my friend who orders in bulk from Mario. These pictures are from him before I built my gun.

The barrel was a 140 cm cut down to 113 (about). I wanted something close to a 110 cm, but I wanted to have it fit perfect to my 150 cm shaft.

The reel that I have on now is just a Large MVD free spool type reel. I'd like to have all Ermes gear on it, but that was my budget for the moment.

Otherwise, my gun is an invert with the Ermes Formula Invert muzzle with ceramic bearing. 150 cm RA shaft.

I'm running 3 pairs of bands, all stretched at 320%. 2 pairs are 16 mm (1/8" ID hole) and 1 pair of 14 mm bands (1/16" ID hole), both sizes from Mako spearfishing.

This is a similar setup to my previous invert gun except that it's much more powerful with the ceramic bearings. I can really feel the difference in drag comparing the different invert roller muzzles (MVD vs Ermes).

After I surfaced from my first shot, my friend was amazed at how fast my shaft was moving after it passed through the fish.

FWIW, I'm still figuring out the limits of power and speed with the 7.5 mm150 cm RA shaft, since I know there will be a point of terminal velocity and subsequent issues after that.

Otherwise, the fitment of the Avatar handle and muzzle to the barrel was perfect.

I made small mods to the muzzle end to suit my preference of line wrapping. I'll have to post a picture of it later.

[musubi]

Not trying to make this a build thread for me, so I'll keep this short since it's sort of related. With the power I put into my invert in my setup above, the gun does not shoot straight at all. I had to de-power it for it to shoot straight. I believe the Ermes invert muzzle, with the roller bearings, is what's causing the difference since it's so much less-drag than my previous setup. I'll need to plot another force curve against my old gun to compare.

Separate matter, I may end up shaving down those little side wings on the Avatar handle, the ones that extend into the handle part on each side from the trigger guard. Just personal preference, but it gets in my way a little.

Got to shoot the gun a but more this past weekend and the Ermes trigger mech is very smooth and predictable in release. The fitment to my hand is good and I like the grippy texture on the handle and butt end.

[spearq8]

Originally Posted by musubi

Not trying to make this a build thread for me, so I'll keep this short since it's sort of related. With the power I put into my invert in my setup above, the gun does not shoot straight at all. I had to de-power it for it to shoot straight. I believe the Ermes invert muzzle, with the roller bearings, is what's causing the difference since it's so much less-drag than my previous setup. I'll need to plot another force curve against my old gun to compare.

Separate matter, I may end up shaving down those little side wings on the Avatar handle, the ones that extend into the handle part on each side from the trigger guard. Just personal preference, but it gets in my way a little.

Got to shoot the gun a but more this past weekend and the Ermes trigger mech is very smooth and predictable in release. The fitment to my hand is good and I like the grippy texture on the handle and butt end.

Getting a gun to shoot straight can be a headache sometimes. What I have found recently is that a shaft can make a big difference in accuracy. I haven't been in the pool for a long time, but yesterday I decided to make a setup for a spearfishing trip I will going on next week. My setup was with 2 x 14.5mm bands pushed at around 370% on an 80cm gun. I first used a custom Sigalsub shaft that has the shark fins super maxed out all the way in the back ... shots from 4 meters were center with one hole groups. Also had some Salvimar laser welded shafts that shot with a little less penetration and about 2cm lower (shark fins not optimized) but center and super tight groups. Previous batch of Salvimar shafts had shot horribly, so this also means that even from batch to batch the heat treatment on 17-4ph shafts can cause big differences. I then tried a Pathos shaft ... and holy crap ... I damaged my square target and hit about 1 foot left and one foot high and hit and damaged the edge of my target holder. I tried 3 shots in a row and they were all over the place with shaft obviously veering violently left and up.

I did get the Pathos shaft to shoot much better, but I had to reduce power almost 30 to 40%. So I think that if you are really pushing things, you need to pay attention to shaft stability. Some shafts will become unstable at a much lower threshold. For a roller gun, I would advise a slightly thicker shaft and see how it goes. Thicker shafts tend to me more stable if you are pushing the velocities.

[musubi]

Originally Posted by spearq8

Getting a gun to shoot straight can be a headache sometimes. What I have found recently is that a shaft can make a big difference in accuracy. I haven't been in the pool for a long time, but yesterday I decided to make a setup for a spearfishing trip I will going on next week. My setup was with 2 x 14.5mm bands pushed at around 370% on an 80cm gun. I first used a custom Sigalsub shaft that has the shark fins super maxed out all the way in the back ... shots from 4 meters were center with one hole groups. Also had some Salvimar laser welded shafts that shot with a little less penetration and about 2cm lower (shark fins not optimized) but center and super tight groups. Previous batch of Salvimar shafts had shot horribly, so this also means that even from batch to batch the heat treatment on 17-4ph shafts can cause big differences. I then tried a Pathos shaft ... and holy crap ... I damaged my square target and hit about 1 foot left and one foot high and hit and damaged the edge of my target holder. I tried 3 shots in a row and they were all over the place with shaft obviously veering violently left and up.

I did get the Pathos shaft to shoot much better, but I had to reduce power almost 30 to 40%. So I think that if you are really pushing things, you need to pay attention to shaft stability. Some shafts will become unstable at a much lower threshold. For a roller gun, I would advise a slightly thicker shaft and see how it goes. Thicker shafts tend to me more stable if you are pushing the velocities.

Thanks spearq8. The shaft was the first thing that came to mind, although I wasn't quite sure yet how to address the shaft. It's a Rob Allen 7.5 mm thick shaft, so the first thing I'm going to do is pencil tip it, since it's tri-cut right now. Typically the RA shafts are fairly rigid compared to SS shafts, but you're right that it can still vary shaft to shaft.

I do have an 8mm shaft, but I feel like that might be overkill? Maybe not if I'm pushing the power here. I'll have to try it and see.

As far as shaft straightness, I always check and spin my shafts. As straight as they are, I do find them shooting different still.

For my invert, I have 3 pairs of bands. Two 16 mm and one 14 mm. One 16 mm is fixed, so that's my first load. Of course with all bands loaded it shoots off. With two 16mm bands, it still shoots off. With one 16 mm and one 14 mm, it shoots great. I'll figure this out somehow.

Thanks for sharing your experience with your latest setup.

[spearq8]

The RA shafts are not SS and I would not recommend pencil tipping it as would remove the corrosion resistant treatment. I would think of putting a cone and that might improve accuracy and streamline the shaft hydrodynamic slip stream ... thus make it a bit more stable. Theoretically the high carbon shafts should be stiffer, but to be honest my experience with all high carbon shafts is that they are not as accurate as the top SS shafts. It could be also due to the flopper as the high carbon shafts seem to have a huge gap between flopper and shaft. Again just adding a cone could solve the accuracy issue. I think Mako makes the cones out of a metal that has a closer galvanic coding to high carbon shafts so it would be a good match and would be less prone to corrosion.

In the end you need to get in the pool, take out the setup you plan to shoot with and try it out. Even minute things like lengthening the wishbone length can make a huge difference. What you definetly don't want ... is getting in the water and aiming at a fish and getting a perfect trigger pulll ... and having no idea where your shaft impacted when you miss your fish. It destroys your confidence and you end up trying to adjust aim ... high ... then low ... then left and right. You just don't want that as it just ruins the entire trip. Get a perfect setup that you know shoots dead perfect or close to perfect and stick to it. If you have to sacrifice power, then sacrifice power. Accuracy always trumps power as worse case situation you can go for a center mass shot into softer flesh or if possible somehow get a little closer to your target.

[armandozx]

Originally Posted by musubi

Not trying to make this a build thread for me, so I'll keep this short since it's sort of related. With the power I put into my invert in my setup above, the gun does not shoot straight at all. I had to de-power it for it to shoot straight. I believe the Ermes invert muzzle, with the roller bearings, is what's causing the difference since it's so much less-drag than my previous setup. I'll need to plot another force curve against my old gun to compare.

Separate matter, I may end up shaving down those little side wings on the Avatar handle, the ones that extend into the handle part on each side from the trigger guard. Just personal preference, but it gets in my way a little.

Got to shoot the gun a but more this past weekend and the Ermes trigger mech is very smooth and predictable in release. The fitment to my hand is good and I like the grippy texture on the handle and butt end.

can you post your setup pictures, I want to see bands side by side and cord rigged, if your system is not balanced you will have problems with accuracy. In other words, make sure the rig is fully balance in line and band length.

Doesn't sound like a shaft problem if it's going off that bad, shaft issues that major either stem from bent shafts or excessive power but on inverters the recoil happens a bit differently so the offset if "big" doesn't make sense.

just saw your barrel, need to look @ your set up for sure if you're not running the bands underneath you could be losing some power due to the bands bending at the shape of the barrel. With those barrels, you either run the bands at the bottom or do traditional roller.

Pure inverter, stick to the Roisub approach due to band running shape (barrel) so it's more linear. i have a few pictures of my set ups, can always upload for reference. I use Sigalsub HRC shafts though. Good idea to stay away from shafts that rust into SS mechs, they could cause unwanted headaches.

[armandozx]

"Accuracy always trumps power" so well said!

[svivian]

can’t wait to get these wet

[armandozx]

Originally Posted by svivian

can’t wait to get these wet

Attachment 249079

get some

[kavachi]

been offline for awhile, just logged in and saw all the replies on this thread. great stuff!!!!

japan epoxy from amazon still MIA so up did a slim-profile recoil grip with grit coating, epoxied the handle into the carbon tube.
removed the safety and the sliding gopro insert and filled voids with epoxy mixed with chopped fibreglass.
screwed on a wood and foam loading pad extension to make loading hot bands lazier. will post pics soon as i can

nice being able to test this modded gun alongside identical spec unmodded rig, provides a bit of a control against all the dodgy mods i'm doing

off topic a bit, but has anyone tried wood clamshell approach to putting recoil handle on pipegun handle? still cant get lightweight putty, and normal putty just adds too much weight aft with the big Ermes level-wind reel aboard. thinking of epoxying teak halves over the grip frame on the ermes handle, and then shape it with dremel as i would wood gun recoil handle. would also add some buoyancy aft

[kavachi]

Originally Posted by svivian

can’t wait to get these wet

bloody hell. thats a quiver. keen to hear how that little 70 goes. 8mm shaft and 1.6mm cable. pocket rocket!

[svivian]

Originally Posted by kavachi

bloody hell. thats a quiver. keen to hear how that little 70 goes. 8mm shaft and 1.6mm cable. pocket rocket!

I ended up doing a 7mm shaft and it’s a perfect little reef or dirty water gun. It’s got the power and range of a 90 which I love.

I’m still fiddling with the 120 in an inverted setup. The head from Mario needed to be sanded a little to fit the 8mm shaft. I’ll post pics when I get to Hawaii this weekend and see how it does.

The 100cm roller is probably the perfect setup for that barrel, perfectly balanced and plenty of power for most things.