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....travel-speargun....

Thread Status: Hello , There was no answer in this thread for more than 60 days.
It can take a long time to get an up-to-date response or contact with relevant users.



....one thing i noticed from the time you posted that picture, the overlap-section from the joining part on this spear is much longer then the one on the riffe spears. dont know if it could prevent the bending on the longer spears, but sure would improve strenght....
 
The long overlap was easier to make on that 3/8" diameter shaft as there was much more material thickness to work with in terms of the diameter of the resultant dowel section and the wall thickness of the machined "tube" section that it slid into, plus the spear is not that long and thus less leverage can be applied around the join in the shaft. Now that you have had two of these 170 cm modular Euro shafts bend you really need to check with Riffe as if this was a typical result then the complaints would be flooding in. The shaft sections need to be tightly screwed together so that the facing ends are butted hard up against each other. This usually requires the use of some hand tools such as pliers or vice-grips in order to apply a twisting effort on the shaft to both assemble it and take it apart.

JBL used to supply a roll of very thin white teflon tape for use on their 2 piece spear connecting screw threads, rather like the plumbers tape which is used to seal water pipe screw thread joins. The teflon tape removed any play in the screw threads and kept water out which can lead to corrosion if the spear is seldom taken apart.
 
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....hi pete,
i did use a lot of force to screw the two pieces tight togehter.
i also used the white teflontape on the threading to prevent any play on the threading .
you can actually see some remains of that tape in the pic of the broken spear.
my conclusion about what happening, is the same what i expected to happen.
the threading of the spear is naturally a weak point. and thats where the bending and breaking took place.
no surprise here.
what concerns me is under wich conditions it happened.
if the contact to a fighting 5,6,7-kg fish can cause such bendind,
i really wonder what kind of testing riffe used on their spears ?
ok, i gave it a try, even though i had concerns about the strenght of the spears, i bought two, price for one was around 80.-us.
took one shot with each, with very dissapointing results( i did landed the two shot fishes though).
guess i will send the pics and a short note to riffe, and i will call it a funny story for myself to remember and forget about it.
 
I mentioned this problem on another forum (Spearboard) in the context of a travel gun thread put up by another member and queried whether anyone had bending problems with two piece spears. So far there have been no comments and possibly very few spearfishermen use them, but as I said earlier the spears and guns have been available from Riffe for some time. It is a mystery that no one is talking about them as such faults if they occur tend to produce a lot of negative comment with people citing their own experience and dissatisfaction.

You seem to have covered all the bases in terms of preparation before using the spears. Being an integral tip spear these shafts are going to get a workout whenever someone shoots a fish, unless they stone it. The Riffe website says nothing about the spears in their "safe use instructions" or their FAQ page, other than to list them.
 

They are never test the product, just sold to market after production, i am interested with this euro modular, but i wont buy it after i read this problem
 
What about using a slip tip? I imagine the to torque of a regular shaft sticking out the side of a fish is worse for these shafts than a detached engaged slip tube which will orient the force on the shaft colinear with the shaft instead of perpendicular to it.
 
Slip tips or breakaway tips enable the shaft to detach and trail on a cable connected to the tip that is stuck in the fish. Personally I prefer double flopper detachable spear tips, such as the JBL models, but their thick trailing cable can steer the shot. On a fast slim shaft you don’t want a bulky tip and that is where slip tips work best. Basically the slip tip is the piercing point and flopper function combined, but if they don’t separate then the tip and shaft may pull straight out as the fish hits the accelerator. The two-piece "Gunslinger" shaft has a screw on head even though it looks like an integral tip shaft. The JBL "Travel Magnum" uses a detachable double flopper tip.

Actually now that this thread has come up again I will ask Riffe about it. Message now sent.

Hi, just wondering if the travel spears have had any problems with bending at the threaded join when under high loading by a fish trying to escape. The larger the fish and the better condition it is in after a hit then the more force it can apply to the shaft as it tries to shake it off or the shaft is sticking out of its side. Do you think a slip tip or breakaway head would add to the survivability of these shafts when shooting more powerful specimens?

P.S. No answer received as of 11/08/2019
 
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I mean i wouldn't trust what riffe says, they aren't going to say their product is faulty even if it is. As far as not using a slip tip its simply not an option because this gun is to be used on fish such as wahoo.

With prices for oversize baggage on international trips comming to around $600 round trip. The cost of bringing a speargun somewhere is getting very out of hand, i could basically by a brand new speargun and throw it away at the destination and it would be the same.

Its just odd that that this is basically the only report positive or negative about these shafts on all of the internet and they've been out for a while now. I'm guessing any negative reports on "that other board" would be immediately scrubbed since riffe is a sponsor for them.
 
popgun pete said:
Now Alemanni has travel versions of their guns.
Click to expand...

Any idea on whether the alemani shafts differ in structure or connection or thickness in any way vs. riffe?

These shafts differ in that the alemani website says they "break apart" after being shot to prevent bending at the joint. I have no idea how that is supposed to work. anyone?
 
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You would be surprised to learn that many spearfishermen don't look at forums and never contribute to them, so what the majority think is unknown.
 
That is just the translation being taken too literally, break apart means that they disassemble and that means a screw threaded connection. If you enlarge the spear photo you can see it is a threaded end on a turned down shank or dowel section, similar to the Gunslinger spear and the Riffe travel spear with a matching counter bore in the female end of the shaft.

Here are JBL's breakaway tips.

and one of my Undersee "Mako" breakaway tips.
 
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The longer the overlapped section is in the two-piece shaft then the stronger it will be, but it will never be as strong as a single-piece shaft. Also if there is a slight bend in the overlapped section then it will be very difficult to unscrew the shaft as its two sections are no longer on a common axis. Similarly doing it up again would require the sections to be straightened first, a very difficult task. Best approach is to remove the bending stress from the shaft by using a detachable tip or make the shaft rather thick. A shaft of 7.5 mm diameter is probably the minimum size you could use and in the past 9 mm was the choice for two or three piece shafts.

Of course the longer the overlap then the more expensive it is to make that shaft as longer pieces of metal are required and the female end has to be drilled out and tapped so that the male end screws in flush as you don't want any gaps with the shaft fully assembled.
 
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are to sure about that pete? some of the alemani shafts do screw in, just like the riffe travel shafts. However i think the newer ones do break aparts during each shot and function sort of like a slip tip.

if you watch the youtube pool target practice videos of this gun by alemani, videos you can see that the joint has a line like a slip tip and the shaft comes apart when it is collected from the target after the shot.
 
For that to happen the line would have to run from the forward spear section back to the gun. You would then need two lines, one to each shaft section as otherwise in deep water the back end of the shaft could sink into the depths and may be lost. Linking the two shaft sections by cable with the shooting line as usual connected to the rear of the shaft would mean problems in stowing the center cable before the gun was shot.
 
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Drilling axial holes in 17-4 PH is tough on the drilling tools, especially deep holes, so I think those manufacturing two-piece spears want to keep the overlap section as short as they can get away with. JBL made things slightly easier by using a 3/8" rear section in regular stainless and only the forward 5/16" section in 17-4 PH, the rear spear section carrying the female thread.

 
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it does have a line. the line does not link the forward spear section back to the gun. it links the forward shaft section to the back section of the shaft which is then linked to the gun. Did you check out alimante's videos on youtube of target practice of the vela?

there are a very few instances you can see what i'm talking bout, and its not even that great of an image. Thats why I emailed alimani on friday to try and find out more about this, maybe get some pictures close up sent to me.

I'm really interested in his guns, i've heard he's a perfectionist and an innovator. However the pricetag on his guns is so extreme that buying one and not even knowing how they work worries me and I would like to see tihs set up for myself. For that price tag you should be able to test drive it like a car before buying .

i know that other guy earlier in this thread posted that the riffe shaft bent on him, but even a 1 piece shaft with no slip tip that is 7.5mm and long can be bent by not even that big of a fish. As i said earlier i'm hoping a slip tip would help avoid this since the dirrection of the force excerted by the fish would then be colinear to the shaft instead of perpendicular to it. like if i want to warp a fork, i don't pull on both ends of it like i'm trying to stretch it...this would never warp it, i bend it by applying pressure perpendicular to the shaft of the fork.


did you hear anything back from riffe? I a'm interested in their travel shafts and guns also. It would be really nice if they could provide some data or videos to back up these shafts. like rolls the shaft on a table to show they are perfectly straight. show torque applied to the shaft to show it does not bend, etc.
 
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I looked for that video, but cannot find it, only saw the one where the guy is pulling the gun apart and stuffing it into the carry bag. You will have to give me the URL as there are lots of videos of the standard guns shooting, but it is the travel gun that is of interest.

"it links the forward shaft section to the back section of the shaft which is then linked to the gun." That is what I described in my third sentence, but how is the linking cable between the two sections dealt with as it could create a snag as the shaft flies from the gun, especially if any sort of loop is created?

Nothing back from Riffe so far, but the time difference and the intervening weekend may play a part.
 
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On another forum I speculated about a C4 Carbon gun being created as a travel gun by combining the features of a "Mr Dark" and the discontinued "Joker". An adjusted image is attached with the "Mr Dark" body extended into a socket which would receive the front barrel section using the “Urukay” style muzzle.
 
Finally found a video where we can see the travel spear being unscrewed.
This gun must be an earlier version as the metal plates top and bottom secured with screws that help hold the gun halves together are not used on the later travel gun which has a central peg of a thicker diameter that sockets into a matching receiver on the front end of the gun. On this gun the shooting line secures to a tab near the rear of the front end of the shaft which means that it has a half shaft length in the line wraps. This is probably done to stop the loop formed by the line doubling up on itself as the shaft tail exits the muzzle lassoing the bands on the way out. It can happen intermittently on some guns and pull up the shot prematurely which is a WTF moment when you miss.
 
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