Hi Majdg, My name is Can Tunçsav I am a spearfisher and freediver from Turkey. I was in the national team in past years both in spearfishing and freediving. Thank you very much for your videos. These video are very helpful, informative and educative about speargun set ups. Best wishes
my friends are jealous of the killer set up i have THANKS TO YOU and i have recently bought a custom 125 wood gun using 160cm x 7.5mm shaft. i only have 14mm small id and not 14.5mm small id. would you recommend i do 2 x 14mm stretched HOT or 3 x 14mm? thanks again man
Thanks for the great videos. Have you experimented with 1 band setups for shorter guns? It could be interesting to see for example how an 85cm performs with different band thickness/stretch choices using a light shaft (e.g. 6.5mm).
Thank you so much for the amazing video as always king of spearfishing testing. You are the only one doing this and you give so much to our sport and for those of us trying to take it to the next level. I see in your videos you are a fan of the sporasub shafts and the hunt shafts. Can't even think about dreaming to get them in my country. What are your thoughts on the high carbon spring steel shafts like Rob Allen? As it pertains to this test, since the carbon spring steel shafts are heavier and much stiffer do you feel they can take the 14.5 bands over the 14 bands in the 7mm size? Thank you very much again for all you do!
+majdq8 I agree with you 100%. Those Picasso boom 16mm is very soft but progresive and that's why I like them....very small recoil and because of that shaft is very quick and shot is also very precise. I really enjoy in yours video! :)
Bravo, excellent tests! I would not stretch bands more than 350%. Or if I use 16 mm bands I would stretch them about 330-340% on first and second pin, and 340-350% on second and third pin...
I use double 16mm bands but i have hammerhead rubber, they are stretchier that regular primeline. I get like 400% stretch out of them and are slightly lighter, still stronger that 14mm. Im pushin a 7mm shaft and passing through carp at like 15 feet
Where would you recommend to buy 14.5mm rubbers? Where I am, I can get the 14.5mm signal sub extreme but it seems they are more explosive/reactive? I would ideally prefer progressive for my set up using double bands for 7.5mm 130cm shaft ❤️🙏🏾 And my Picasso magnum power is also quite light so I would like to minimize the recoil.
The Sigal bands are not good. I don't believe in the "progressive" hype etc... You want stretchy bands that still have a lot of punch. Best are the Primeline rubber with small ID. With 7.5mm shaft either 14mm or 14.5mm will work well. I personally would use the 14mm small ID bands and stretch them higher.
@@majdq8 thanks :) did exactly this! i know you are busy and may have made other videos answering this already - but do you notice if position of flopper (hawaiian or tahitian) affects aim? slightly higher or lower?
@@primalphysique I generally like to use a cone as that dramatically reduces any vectoring caused by the flopper by steamlining the water flow over the flopper. If that is done, I really don't see much difference with flopper up or flopper down.
Hi. Nice video like every videos . One question. What you do if some of your shaft will bended. You fix it ? How ? Do you have a technic to do this. Some machine to fix the shaft ? I will appreciate your answer
Hi Juanjo, it is possible but probably only a professional workshop can do it f they also do include a heat process. Doing it alone is quite difficult - I would not recommend it. I prefer not to use bent shafts anymore, unless you use them for shooting in caves for fish like groupers (short range) maybe. Then you might cut them, drill a hole for the securing pin and attach the flopper in his new position. Or... cut the shafts and use them as fish stringers, reef/rock hooks (anchors) etc.
im shooting 140cm x 7cm spear, and using 2 x 14mm (small id) initially cut at 360% - but after a few weeks of use, the rubbers became longer and is now at 340% elongation. when you advise 360%, are you referring to when it's newly set up? in other words, should i now cut a few cm of my existing rubbers to get back to 360% elongation? over the past few months, i've read so much of your posts and videos and i think i speak on behalf of countless - thank you for what you do!
Yes new rubber bands always stretch out a little after 20 or 30 shots. Best is to cut a little shorter in the beginning and just use longer wishbones. You then just shorten the wishbones as the bands stretch out. In your case you can just cut off about an inch off one side of the bands and re-tie.
Very useful video majdq8. I have an ACID gun 110sm with 2*14 small ID bands. Do you think better to use 140 sm shaft 7 mm or 6.75 150 mm - I think that the weight of the shafts will be equal? Does the thick shaft will deteriorate the distance and accuracy? The set up will be with 2*16 bands.
Thank you so much for this video :) really appreciate your effort to document and test all these! Would there be additional range or penetration for using 3x14.5mm bands for a 7.5 130cm shaft? Or is 2x14.5mm already the most power? I’m using a picasso magnum power 90 with 3 dedicated holes for rubbers (but the distance between rubber and shark fin is actually 100cm) Thanks again ❤️
A 7.5mm shaft cannot absorb the power of the 3rd band and might actually reduce the performance. Better is 2 x 14.5 mm and just increase the band stretch as much as you can handle.
Great video! Can you ask me a question ?Recently bought a Riffe Euro 130cm, came with 2 bands of 16mm and shaft 7.1mm, i want change to 14mm. What do you recomend me ? I'm brazilian. I'm still practicing my english, sorry for the erros in the text. Thanks.
Riffe Euro does best with 2 x 14.5mm small ID bands and a 7mm or 7.5mm shaft. Problem is that if you power up your bands, the impact point drops dramatically. This is due to the very thin profile of the gun for its length, so it flexes. You can put a carbon fiber sleeve over the gun and that dramatically improves things without adding much weight.
I appreciate your videos extremely, thnx for these moments of enlightment :). I'm just confused, why all the brands deliver 2x16mm setups with shafts >7.5mm ? I mean, from the empirical knowledge you present, its totally superficial to get 16mm bands for regular spearguns (80-125cm pipe and 6-8mm shaft diameter). Isn't that so ?
Yes it is confusing!!! Why will 16mm bands perform much worse than 14mm bands for some shafts ??? More rubber should mean more power! But it seems there are other factors involved. I think a main factor is contraction speed of bands in water. Thin bands contract much faster as they have less water resistance. Of course you reach a point where this advantage is negated with heavy shafts where the thin bands have a limit to how much they can propel heavier shafts. But from my experiments this only happens around 7.5mm shafts @ 140cm. So any shaft lighter than this would perform much better with thinner small ID bands. The idea of this test was to show that in action in a test environment. You can see that with light shafts going with heavier bands and the same stretch factor the thicker bands actually perform worse !!!!
@@majdq8 I have ordered the pathos nitro rubbers, 14mm o.d., 1mm i.d., so they shall perform great! Do you have experiences with them, used them in any test videos of yours here ?
@@tunculuc I have never tried those bands but generally speaking all rubber bands are made by one of 2 major manufacturers and are re-branded. Not sure which manufacturer Pathos went with but it most likely is Primeline. If so then they should be excellent choice for shafts up to 7.5mm diameter.
Do you find you have to cut bands after the first few uses? I cut to 360% and loved my gun. It’s now firing a little soft faster about 10 uses. I think the way you handle this is by making longer wishbones and shortening the wishbones. I’ll try that I’m gonna try to get them as short as I can. Thx for vids they are amazing.
I don't use regular ID bands anymore ... they just don't have the same performance. I don't know the exact reason why ... could be less chance of water intrusion , more streamlined and thus less water resistance ... or that a large void somehow hurts band contraction under water. All I know is that in testing the small ID bands just perform better.
majdq8 Have you tried 16mm small ID? Just ordered couple of ft of these as well (mainly for rollers) whereas I've converted all my prior 16mm regular ID to 14mm primeline small ID at 360-380%. As you said, better performance in that less recoil and better accuracy!
Yes I have ... I find that best performance for 7mm shafts and lesser diameter is 14mm small ID ... then up to 8.5mm best is 14.5mm. The 16mm small ID bands would be good for 9mm or heavier shafts and maybe for rollers. For rollers even 19mm or 20mm work well.
Amazing video! If you're making 2 bands for a gun do you make them the same length or different (one for the first shark fin and the other for the second one)? And what's the best way to figure out what length to cut the band at?
I make my bands based on the distance of the band hole to the shark fin. If I want to start at 350% stretch, I take distance from band hole to shark fin I will load that particular band to ... then X 2 for two sides, then divide by 3.5 for 350% stretch. With wishbones I try to keep them around 4cm to 7cm depending on how the bands will sit. Sometimes it is worth it to make one wishbone a little longer so that you have a better and less jumbled line of sight.
Thank you for the video. I am wondering with 6,75mm and 7mm shaft with 140cm length with 105 gun at double 14mm and 16mm band. I be appreciate if you tested
I noticed that u only use 14mm bands on most tests and the seem to be fine. but why do companies like pathos have larger bands on the (open laser carbon) stock while they can place 14mm instead, for better performance?
+Moabz z Good question and I really don't know why Pathos doesn't setup their guns with the 14mm as it dramatically improves performance with less recoil. But most gun manufacturers do not setup their guns well and you need to fix it yourself.
Hussein Marey it's because it is given for deep dive spearfishing, which effects the thickness of the robbers, let's say under -20 meters... If you are at -25, the two 14,5mm will not send the 7mm shaft as far as it should but the two 16mm or 17mm will do the job... You don't buy a carbon gun for spearfishing between 0-20 meters. This is a job for aluminum barrel guns and set up at 6,5 shaft and two 14mm robbers ;)
Teo Tsakiris you may be wright. The physics in higher pressure may affect the performance of the bands and majd only tests them at shallow atm. For specific results, I need to test them at a 20+ depth. I recently got a denton 120 and will be applying the 15mm cressi scarlet for deeper dives. I'll have my pathos carbon 120 set to cressi brown14mm bands and a 7mm shaft. And my denton to the 15mm with the 8mm shaft. I will be making target testing soon. Thanks for the reply.
That is absolutely not true. The problem with deep diving and shooting at depth is water infiltration and not band power loss. Bands have a void and if you do not take steps to prevent water infiltration (most people don't) water will get inside your bands. This dramatically reduces performance of bands. With small ID bands this is much less of a problem. I have never heard anyone say they lost performance with small ID bands ... at least not at depths of 35m. Thick bands are used because it is common sense that more rubber will push the shaft better, but unfortunately this has been proven to be wrong and you have to to balance the band contraction correctly to the shaft mass you have.
Hi majdq8, have you ever noticed if a stretch at 360-380% is diminishing bands performance after 30 min or more of consisting loading (spearfishing conditions) VS a stretch of 3,3-3,5 ? It would be very interesting if you could conduct a test like this!
I did do a 45 min soak test with a full load ... not much change in power even at 380% ... so maybe this is not the problem some people think it is. You can see it here th-cam.com/video/H-mTmi6dlkM/w-d-xo.html
When you say for example 360% cut does that mean you are measuring stretch from the length of band cut and not counting the length of bridle line and the extra bit of band before the tie on the bands?
Can you help with the choices of bands (very few available in Greece), between Bleutec 14,5mm, sigalsub extreme and reactive evo 14,5mm, cressi 14mm and 15mm and also meandros 14.5mm. Note that all the above have 1mm ID!
Lol ... the only one of those bands I have tried is the Sigalsub ... so sorry can't help. But in general, all bands are identical and differ only in how much the rubber has cured or what the ambient temperature was during manufacture. Bands dipped during hot summer months will be stretchier than bands done in the summer. Also bands that are fresh out of manufacture will tend to be softer than bands left out a little longer to cure. At least this is true with dipped bands and extruded bands are different. More important for performance is the inside diameter of the bands ... the smaller it is the better the performance ... not sure why but that is what I noticed in testing.
No. The wishbone length is optimally about 5cm, but you can increase the length on new bands as extra flexibility in dialing in the best performing band stretch. It is much easier to make the wishbone length smaller than to cut the bands and re-tie.
Thanks for your answer, but I am a little surprised. I thought longest is the part of shaft out of the barrel more you will create oscillation. Also with hard stainless shaft (52HRC). Maybe I read it from abellan web site. Regarding the web site it's an easy tool, but when I do the test there is more than 30% of gap between the real weight of shaft and the website results. Can you tell me the weight of the Trygon diam 7,2mm you used? I have the same gun and I would like to use a shaft with similar weight to improve my setup. Thanks.
+spearboy9 I just use the tool and really don't actually weigh the shaft. I guess some SS must be heavier than others ... but it is very small difference.
Hi Majd, thank you very much for all this info/work, very interesting. Quick question if I may, I am considering switching my abellan 110 from 8mm shaft with 15mm cressi pure smallID (original config) to 7.5mm shaft with 14.5mm sigalsub smallID (to gain in precision a bit, as i find the recoil with the 15mm cressi makes the gun "jump" a bit and it loses accuracy over the long shots). I am unsure which sigalsub I should consider though, between extreme (more punchy, with greater extension coeff) or reactive (more progressive, lower extension coeff). My natural inclination would be to take punchier/extreme but I've read that the recommendation for longer guns was more towards using the reactive/progressive one, while the extreme was more recommended for guns shorter than 90cm. Given the extensive testing you've done, I was wondering if you had a view/recommendation regarding which of extreme/reactive to use. Thanks in advance if you can let me know, cheers.
I think all rubber is the same and this thing with progressive and reactive ... not so sure it is relevant. I find that the best rubber is the one that is a little stretchier as that gives a smoother release. If the shaft does not come out of the track stable you will lose velocity very quickly and also accuracy will be terrible. So you want your setup to push the shaft out in a way where the shaft is totally stable. This ensures that the shaft does not lose velocity quickly. That is why sometimes with less band power you can get more shaft velocity. I like the Primeline small ID bands in 14mm for shafts 6mm to 7.25mm and 14.5mm for larger diameter shafts.
@majdq8:Thanks a lot for all those very interesting test. Regarding the shaft, do you have the weight of the shaft used during test? My feeling is I can get better result when I increase shaft diameter and decrease the length for a similar weight. What do you think about?
+spearboy9 It is true for certain lengths and would also depend on the gun design and how stable it shoots the shaft out. Gun design has a lot to do with allowing the shaft to be completely stable in flight ... which allows less dissipation of velocity due to shaft whip. Poorly designed guns will benefit by using shorter shaft with higher diameters (thus same mass), but generally speaking a well designed gun will benefit more from a longer thinner shaft (so long oscillations are under control) due to the smaller cross section area. You can calculate mass of shaft by using this website www.random-science-tools.com/physics/beams/rod.htm
great work..i wonder if shafts length does make any different on bands combination and accurate? i think 13mm twin bands will work fine on 6mm to 6.5mm thin shafts, but what about length? does 140cm 6.25mm shaft works good as much as 120cm 6.25mm shaft with 13mm bands you reckon?
Problem with thin shafts like 6mm or 6.5mm is that after you go above 120cm, "shaft whip" or shaft oscillations become a factor once you start powering up your setup. Uncontrolled shaft oscillations will quickly dissipate shaft velocity and kills accuracy.
Hello I have a Geronimo elite 95 cm open muzzle and am thinking to add two 14 mm bands instead of the factory setup with one 18 mm band. The shaft is about 6.5 mm but am thinking to add a 6 mm or 6.25 mm to increase shooting speed. You think a lighter shaft will increase speed and shooting distance?
16mm bands cannot be pushed as hard as they can destabilize the shaft at high stretch. Maybe with heavier 8mm to 9mm shafts it would be useful, but lighter shafts get better velocities from 14mm and 14.5mm small ID bands.
@@davidkoba For high shaft velocity you need the minimum band diameter which still has enough force to move the shaft. Even if you get 16mm at same stretch and the shaft doesn't have enough mass to absorb the extra energy, you won't get more shaft speed with thicker bands. You might actually get less shaft speed. You can see the test for yourself in this video th-cam.com/video/FSK4HkkimXk/w-d-xo.html
@@majdq8 umm, thats why i said a 16mm band at 325. stretching your band at over 350 starts to do more internal damage to the latex. Two 16mm bands at 325-350 will give you about 160 lbs of force, a 7mm shaft for a 110-130 cm gun will handle that.
Hi Marko, I would go with 2 x 14mm small ID bands at around 360% and then keep my wishbone initially a bit long (about 8cm) and then I would shorten the wishbone slowly to 5cm to see if I get improvement in flat trajectory. If you need more power you can go to a 6.75mm or even a 7mm shaft ... this can absorb more band power and really gives a huge boost in performance at longer ranges. Properly setup, your 105 gun can easily outperform older 130cm guns.
Hello, I read and watch your tests with great interest, and appreciation for your adherence to scientific method. Living in Key West, Florida I tend to use relatively heavy shafts, most often 8 mm x 165 cm. I want to use 14.5 mm bands at 380%. My problem is I cannot find a US source for 14.5 mm. I can get Salvimar green 14 or 16 mm, and Primeline 14, 15, or 16. Can you suggest a supplier for 14.5 mm? Given my tubing options noted above, which would you think would give me best TV with my 8mm x 165 cm shaft? Thank you very much.
+Elite Zion The speargun used for testing in this video is the Abellan Denton 120. Roller guns cannot compete with properly setup classic guns except for for smaller guns @ 95cm or less.
For 7mm shafts best is 14mm small ID with as much % stretch as you can feel comfortable to load. Usually that is 360% to 370%. For 7.5mm to 8.5mm better is 14.5 to 14.8mm small ID bands with as much % stretch as you can handle.
Hi Majd. Something a bit off subject, do you know anything about the sigalsub nemesis handle? Im about to put together another speargun and im using that handle. Any idea whether the trig mech will hold 7.5mm shafts without damaging it? Thanks a lot
From the photo online it looks like the trigger sear is metal and I don't think the shaft sear has a roller. This would mean that this is a friction reverse trigger and thus it most likely will suffer from galling at higher loads.
@@majdq8 Max l'm thinking of is double 14.5 rubber and 7.5mm shaft but most likely 14 and 7. Will those be ok? Not exactly sure what higher loads mean to you, you've gone triple 14.5 and 8 in some of your vids!
Ok ive watched most of your videos and i was wondering if you ever tested a koah standard fay back i have a 57 and im on a budget and trying to dual purpose it to reach out a little further. I understand this might not be ideal but its what i got right now it has a 5/16 or 8mm shaft with 16mm bands. First how do you calculate how long you bands should be and second should i switch to 14.5 mm bands as per this video says the performance is improved on the playform your running im very interested to hear what you think
There are new 15mm small ID bands that might be perfect for 8mm shafts. I would try those and you can get them from Benthicoceansports. As for band stretch, the 14.5mm bands are much easier to pull back than 16mm bands and so can go with stretch. For 8mm 380% is very good but just in case you can't load them start at 360% and then cut shorter. Band stretch calculation is distance from loading shark fin to muzzle hole the x 2 then divide by 3.8 (for 380%).
Hello , I own an Omer Cayman Gi 110 and I plan to upgrade it I will get a 2 bands open muzzle , and put 150cm 7mm or 7.2mm shaft ( or is it better shorter and heavier ? ) I will put 2x14 or 2x14.5mm 360% stretched Do you this this kind of setup is doable on this kind on gun ? I can't decide between the Cressi pure brown (14mm) , Omer performer 2 ( 14mm) or the Seacsub power blue ( 14.5mm) , do you have any experience with those ? Thanks
Hello! Good videos I like your test, I have a question about this test. Why is it tested at 360% for 2 bands 14mm and 380% at 3 thicker bands 14.5mm? I want to say that 14.5 is thicker and more percent.What happens with more% in 2 * 14mm? Can be more recoil, but more power too? Please answer, I have small identification of 3 * 14mm, the sales Of the spearamerican store, and shaft 7mm @ 130cm w / the 7cm flopper.I want to cut rubber but I want to know it is ideal%
It is a little more complicated. With a light shaft you don't need heavier bands to get the shaft moving, so the thinner bands move quicker in water and even at 360% can deliver more velocity to the shaft (also less recoil). As you go to a heavier shaft the thicker bands are better as the thin shafts cannot get the shaft started at high velocity.
majdq8 ok. tnks for answer, i like be a personal cuestión, I've 3x14mm small interior diametter @320% , and shaft 7mm @130cm. you think may be is Good for be 6m shot? or used 2 bands @ 360%? yea i know is necesary real test, but your think is high value to me before cut bands.
7mm @ 130cm shaft is not enough mass for the shaft to perform good at 6 meters. Remember that when I say 6 meters I mean 6 meters from the tip of shaft to target ... so that is about 7.5 to 8 meters from your eye to target. Better than 3 x 14mm small ID bands @ 320% is to just use 2 x 14mm small ID @ 360% stretch. That will give you much better shaft flight and much better performance.
i know is 6m of the tip the shaft yo targget, tank you for answer. Keep making your videos, they are tests that we all want to do at some point. have a nice day!
please tell me which crossbow is better, Omer Cayman ET Camu 105 or Sporasub One 105, and what is better for them, harpoon 6.75 or 7mm.a you can more under what harpoon which traction is better?
+majdq8 Hi! Can you tell me yours opinion about Devoto shaft. I will buy 7,5x1300 for my denton 110, I use Pathos but they are sandvik steel and they are very strong but devoto is 17-4 SS are they strong enough, reef hunting....rocks!
Yes the Devoto shafts are 17-4 PH SS and also the pin and flopper are 17-4 PH SS ... very strong. They are a little raw and need some dremel work to remove sharp edges on the back of the shaft and on the shark fins ... but after that they should be perfect.
Hello Majd I would be greatful for some advice right now. I have a bleutec 115 raptor,I notice that the 7mm shaft is very soft and I would like to replace it with a better one or even try 7.5mm. Could you please inform me on what shaft to buy please and if 7.5 is too heavy,I use 14.5mm small ID bands at %380 ATM.(alot of recoil) My old gun has a rob allen shaft and I do like its strength. So I was also wondering if rob allen makes shafts to suit my raptor. Thanks mate.
For a 7mm shaft you don't need 14.5mm @ 380% ... you will actually get much less recoil and much higher velocity with 2 x 14mm small ID @ 360%. The Raptor 115 will shoot a 7.5mm very well. The Bleutec guns have terrible handles and I would recommend you look at my Handle Mod videos to see how to re-shape your handle. The difference will be like night and day.
. Hi. I got a mvd Predator gun 120 size And 130 cm band strech. 7.5 And 160 cm Shaft I Buy 1.5 meterse of 14.5 mm small id band . what size cut the bands ??
I use 1.9mm dyneema and length I usually keep about 5cm of exposed length. Sometimes if the bands are not laying nicely I will increase one wishbone more than the other to let the bands "fit" better. I like to have a clear line of sight without bands on top of each other.
I do have a couple of Bucanero shafts and they seem OK. I didn't like the flopper pin as it felt weak ... also didn't like the hole in the shark fin as it seemed not centered and way far to the edge. Also didn't have a cone ... but that was easy to add. The new Hunt shafts that are coming out now are simply the best shafts I have seen anywhere and much improved over the original shafts. They have a welded 316 SS cone, they have hardened floppers and hardened flopper pins ... they have increased their welding on the shark fins and have a very nice hole to tie line to on the rest tab. Very very accurate and very strong.
I saw pics of the new hunt shafts and it seemed to me that the last sharkfin is waaay to back and maybe would not fit in a c4 urukay (it would fit an albacore 130 or a trygons). Is that true?
Yes they have a shark fin way back as they are producing the shafts for Abellan now and Abellan wants as much band stretch as possible. The new shafts fit perfectly in a C4 Urukay ... as for Trygon guns am not sure as I don't have one.
when u say cut at 360% stretch how do u work that out. is like from the muzzle to the last tab then like what do u do idk just wondering how you work that out
hi. I got a Salvimar 95. V-pro. I wanna know which size exactly of bands. I got to 14..mm small ID . I know take the hole of the band and shark fin and then? 360% ? more? less? 340?? thank you
I don't think you need 4 bands unless maybe with a 10mm shaft. You can go for thicker small ID bands if you need more power on a very heavy shaft. Today you can get the small ID bands in 15mm .
You will get a slight shift in elevation ... flopper down usually vectors shafts up while flopper up usually pushes down. You really don't want to have the flopper vectoring the shaft as that only vectors the front and you end up with a "wheelie" type shaft flight. This loses velocity very quickly and has poor penetration. That is why I always use a cone on my shaft or I make sure the flopper is recessed enough where it won't affect shaft flight.
thanks for the information I exactly understand what do you mean with "wheelie" term. Shaft cones is very good solution for proper shaft trajectory. But hard to find and expensive parts. Do you suggest anywhere which I can buy ? 7mm for example
You can buy cones from diveinn.com For sigalsub cones get one size larger ... so for 6.75mm get 7mm .. for Salvimar cones you can get exact size or 7mm for 7mm. www.scubastore.com/#/dffullscreen/query=salvimar%20cone%20cone&query_name=match_and www.scubastore.com/#/dffullscreen/query=sigalsub%20cone&query_name=match_and You might also get them from Devotosub and those you can also use exact sizes.
Come on man, you tell me the handle lve asked you about might not be good for me but fail to give me an another suggestion?! Thats out of order majd lol. Any 26 int, 28 ext dia handles u recommend? Had to insist and hope i have better luck this time...😆 Thanks
I don't think you need to change the handle ... just fix it and you can use it. If you haven't bought one then best would be Pathos D1 handle as there is a double roller trigger for it with minimal modification. I actually helped design the trigger for that modification just for that reason. You can see in this test how I modified the handle to use a full DR trigger. But with the new DR trigger for the D1 handle you get same results but without the major work involved in modifying it. th-cam.com/video/K-sN4pQkWSU/w-d-xo.html
+ehab mohamed 16mm bands will not give better performance than 14.5mm bands except with maybe heavier shafts than 8.5mm. In the tests here I just wanted to show how bands and shaft mass interact. More band power is only necessary if you have more mass on your shaft ... otherwise it is just added recoil that can actually work against. you.
Thinner bands contract much faster than thicker bands due to less water resistance ... but of course there is a limit to this being useful for speargun shafts. The limit is that the band has to be strong and thick enough to start off the acceleration of the shaft. So it is a very fine balance. For 6.0 to 6.5mm shafts, there is a possibility that best would be 2 x 13.5mm bands ... since that is not very common, I would just go with 14mm small ID bands. What I can guarantee you is that 2 x 17.5mm bands will not be as good as 2 x 14mm bands even if you use the same band stretch. I know it is hard to believe and many make fun of this statement, but you can see for yourself in the test in this video.
take distance from band hole to shark fin you will load at, then multiply by 2 and then divide by 3.5 to 3.6 (depending on how strong you are). I would start at 3.5 and then cut shorter if I feel I need more power. This estimate is based on using 14m or 14.5mm small ID bands.
+Παναγιώτης Μπονέλης The gun used was an Abellan Denton 120. It has 121cm band stretch and is about 135cm total length. I will put a review on this gun soon.
The 14mm Primeline small ID bands can vary from batch to batch ... from 13.6mm to 15.1mm !!! I just caliper the bands before buying and choose the best size for the shaft I am using.
Thanks for the fast awnser. They arent sold in this country(Thailand) so i sadly cant check them before buying them since i order them on ebay and i dont have access to a calipher . But for now im goin to use them for a 130 cm 7mm shaft so i guess its okey if it would be as low as 13.6mm
Hello majda8! Have you tried meandros x pro bands? I've heard good of them, in terms of performance and durability! I think I'll try them in 14,5mm instead of primeline's! Regards and keep up the good work!
thank you so much! very help full, great test. can you please compare between 14 and 14.5 with 16,18, and 19? with differennt diameters of shafts ( 7, 7.2, 7.5, 8) thank you.
+Elite Zion It took me forever to do this test and to add 16, 18 and 20mm bands would be a nightmare. Obviously I have tried all these setups, but don't have video. Take my word for it that bands in 14mm and 14.5mm small ID are the best performing for all shafts up to 8.5mm. They might be also for larger diameter shafts such as 9mm and 10mm ... but haven't tested those.
really nice I like the test and very helpful topic I think the the power you gain here is approx90-95 Ib for both rubber and it give the idea to everyone
I think the power alone is not important, it has to be controlled power that keeps the shaft stable. Many times in my tests I add more power and get less performance!
On a Abellan Denton 110 2x14.5 Sigal extreme (370%) and 7x130 shaft work good. But my opinion is that 2x16 Picasso boom black (390%) with 7.5x130 is much faster and for long range shots. With those 14.5mm rubber's shaft is precise but the speed is not so good.
+Robert Margan Best is to use small inner diameter bands. Somehow the air cavity inside allows the bands to contract better if it is small. Not sure why but that is results from testing. Once you get to terminal velocity of a shaft with a certain mass, you cannot get any more velocity by increasing band power (can actually get less velocity). The only to increase velocity in that situation is to add mass to the shaft, or make the shaft more hydrodynamic, or of course use thinner line with less drag.
Hello sir, how to calculate the band length? That is my big problem right now. I use 8mm @130c m and 6.5mm @130cm to my handmade speargun loaded of 2x16mm band. The result is not good. i need your suggestion sir on how to setup my speargun. Thank you sir for your inspiring video. From cebu Philippines..
Band stretch is calculated by taking the distance from the band hole to the shark fin or notch on the spear. Then you multiply by 2 (2 sides) and then you divide by 3.4 (if you want 340% stretch). Of course it is not an exact science as you can also play around with the wishbone length and bands can be of different diameters and different stiffness from batch to batch, even from the same manufacturer. I think for such a small gun, it is much better to use a thinner 6.5 to 7mm shaft and load it with 14mm small ID bands.
Lower penetration power with a conical (Riffe) than a pyramidal point (Hamilton) shaft has to be considered... The gun range decreases with the depth... a test made at 2 m depth has nothing to do with a test made at 20m depth... I have a weak for "smooth" bands!
Actually I plan to test that as that is one of the last remaining mysteries. Why does band power decrease as you go deeper? Is it because the inner cavity somehow changes the dynamics? Maybe the air inside acts like a pump and water intrusion in the bands causes a drop of power. Or just that band material reacts differently when it is pressurized. Hopefully will get answers soon.
There's a significant factor that you seem to ignore my friend. The power/time ratio. When spearfishing, guns can stay loaded for too long before shooting. Each band behaves differently and usually the thinner and more elongated it is, the more power it loses. It'd be interesting if you tested this.
Of course I don't ignore that. I tested this for almost a week. Depending on temperature and band shore hardness there will be a drop with time of band power. It can range from 5% to 20% depending on conditions. So I just overpower the bands 20% over the Terminal Velocity of the shaft and that takes care of everything. If shot is 20% more powerful, it will still shoot the same as the TV does not increase no matter how hard you push things.
+llOrteg4ll A sargos would be the equivalent of about 2.5 cm of hard construction styroboard (probably much less). Most of these setups are penetrating 10cm of styroboard at 6 meters from tip of shaft to target ... which is equivalent to penetrating a very large Wahoo or King Mackerel. So although these are using 14mm and 14.5mm bands ... I guarantee you that there is plenty of power there. I think you will be shocked at the power of small ID bands.
+majdq8 really? but, if got one bone u lost fish...maybe 3 14.5 ok...i believe...and the shot is very slow, 6 mtrs shoot wahoo, you miss certainly. Sry mate, but my opinion is : that config is for small fishes. ;)
I don't blame you for having that opinion and maybe a few years ago I would have thought the same. But these are NOT to be compared with normal 14mm bands and this is an Abellan Denton which is extremely effecient power wise. The setup you see here with the 7mm shaft is more powerful than a Riffe 120X with 3 x 16mm bands. The styroboard used in the test is very accurate in testing penetration on fish and if anything is a little conservative. Look at my Seal invert roller test and the penetration test on 15cm styroboard ... here is a slightly less powerful version of the gun shooting a 150kg tuna through the spine. th-cam.com/video/6pjAnliWx2k/w-d-xo.html And if you want to see Wahoo hunting at long range using only 2 x 14.5mm bands ... th-cam.com/video/7cUcnxirZT8/w-d-xo.html So give them a try ... they are not only for Sargos ;)
+majdq8 here, 2x14mm u dont get fish...sry Badejo / black grouper/cubera and others, that config dont spit him....one large fish 15kg ++ somentines with 3 mtrs 2x16mm dont spit if hit the head bone. Maybe your fish reality is different from my...in your region, this setting is ok...but here nops.
Your not getting the precise time in hitting your target this makes your aim towards a fish percept very differently as to a staying still target and reaction time .... haven’t stop to think that the bigger bands gets your shaft to your target faster than the thinner one Just an opinion
Hi Majdg,
My name is Can Tunçsav I am a spearfisher and freediver from Turkey. I was in the national team in past years both in spearfishing and freediving. Thank you very much for your videos. These video are very helpful, informative and educative about speargun set ups.
Best wishes
Thanks for the kind words! Happy all this data is useful.
my friends are jealous of the killer set up i have THANKS TO YOU and i have recently bought a custom 125 wood gun using 160cm x 7.5mm shaft. i only have 14mm small id and not 14.5mm small id. would you recommend i do 2 x 14mm stretched HOT or 3 x 14mm? thanks again man
Thanks for the great videos. Have you experimented with 1 band setups for shorter guns? It could be interesting to see for example how an 85cm performs with different band thickness/stretch choices using a light shaft (e.g. 6.5mm).
Thank you so much for the amazing video as always king of spearfishing testing. You are the only one doing this and you give so much to our sport and for those of us trying to take it to the next level. I see in your videos you are a fan of the sporasub shafts and the hunt shafts. Can't even think about dreaming to get them in my country. What are your thoughts on the high carbon spring steel shafts like Rob Allen? As it pertains to this test, since the carbon spring steel shafts are heavier and much stiffer do you feel they can take the 14.5 bands over the 14 bands in the 7mm size? Thank you very much again for all you do!
+majdq8 I agree with you 100%. Those Picasso boom 16mm is very soft but progresive and that's why I like them....very small recoil and because of that shaft is very quick and shot is also very precise. I really enjoy in yours video! :)
Thanks very much for your help. I appreciate your information a lot.
Bravo, excellent tests! I would not stretch bands more than 350%. Or if I use 16 mm bands I would stretch them about 330-340% on first and second pin, and 340-350% on second and third pin...
what do you mean by stretch bands at 3##%?
Have you ever used a hammerhead speargun if not you should check on out they make wood guns and rail guns I recently bought a 100cm it is great
I use double 16mm bands but i have hammerhead rubber, they are stretchier that regular primeline. I get like 400% stretch out of them and are slightly lighter, still stronger that 14mm. Im pushin a 7mm shaft and passing through carp at like 15 feet
Thanks for this video, had to change these 16mm bands on my 7.5mm shaft was just too hot
Where would you recommend to buy 14.5mm rubbers? Where I am, I can get the 14.5mm signal sub extreme but it seems they are more explosive/reactive? I would ideally prefer progressive for my set up using double bands for 7.5mm 130cm shaft ❤️🙏🏾
And my Picasso magnum power is also quite light so I would like to minimize the recoil.
The Sigal bands are not good. I don't believe in the "progressive" hype etc... You want stretchy bands that still have a lot of punch. Best are the Primeline rubber with small ID. With 7.5mm shaft either 14mm or 14.5mm will work well. I personally would use the 14mm small ID bands and stretch them higher.
@@majdq8 thanks :) did exactly this! i know you are busy and may have made other videos answering this already - but do you notice if position of flopper (hawaiian or tahitian) affects aim? slightly higher or lower?
@@primalphysique I generally like to use a cone as that dramatically reduces any vectoring caused by the flopper by steamlining the water flow over the flopper. If that is done, I really don't see much difference with flopper up or flopper down.
@@majdq8 you are the absolute best.. thanks!
I just ordered standard ID Rob Allen 2x14mm for my 140cm/6.5mm shaft at 340% for now. Hope it works..
Works???better than 16x2??
Hi. Nice video like every videos . One question. What you do if some of your shaft will bended. You fix it ? How ? Do you have a technic to do this. Some machine to fix the shaft ? I will appreciate your answer
Hi Juanjo, it is possible but probably only a professional workshop can do it f they also do include a heat process. Doing it alone is quite difficult - I would not recommend it. I prefer not to use bent shafts anymore, unless you use them for shooting in caves for fish like groupers (short range) maybe. Then you might cut them, drill a hole for the securing pin and attach the flopper in his new position. Or... cut the shafts and use them as fish stringers, reef/rock hooks (anchors) etc.
@@DeepBlueSpirit2 thank you
@@juanjosebritolara3432 Un gusto ;)
dude ! you have like an arsenal of spearguns ,must be every spearo's dream to have that diversity of guns .
im shooting 140cm x 7cm spear, and using 2 x 14mm (small id) initially cut at 360% - but after a few weeks of use, the rubbers became longer and is now at 340% elongation.
when you advise 360%, are you referring to when it's newly set up? in other words, should i now cut a few cm of my existing rubbers to get back to 360% elongation?
over the past few months, i've read so much of your posts and videos and i think i speak on behalf of countless - thank you for what you do!
Yes new rubber bands always stretch out a little after 20 or 30 shots. Best is to cut a little shorter in the beginning and just use longer wishbones. You then just shorten the wishbones as the bands stretch out. In your case you can just cut off about an inch off one side of the bands and re-tie.
@@majdq8 thank you so much
Very useful video majdq8. I have an ACID gun 110sm with 2*14 small ID bands. Do you think better to use 140 sm shaft 7 mm or 6.75 150 mm - I think that the weight of the shafts will be equal? Does the thick shaft will deteriorate the distance and accuracy? The set up will be with 2*16 bands.
I would prefer the shorter 140cm shaft @ 7mm.
Thank you so much for this video :) really appreciate your effort to document and test all these!
Would there be additional range or penetration for using 3x14.5mm bands for a 7.5 130cm shaft?
Or is 2x14.5mm already the most power?
I’m using a picasso magnum power 90 with 3 dedicated holes for rubbers (but the distance between rubber and shark fin is actually 100cm)
Thanks again ❤️
A 7.5mm shaft cannot absorb the power of the 3rd band and might actually reduce the performance. Better is 2 x 14.5 mm and just increase the band stretch as much as you can handle.
@@majdq8 thank you!
What about 140cm shaft, 8mm and 3x14 rubbers? Is it ok?
hello, great test, thanks
you never use 16mm bands?
Great video! Can you ask me a question ?Recently bought a Riffe Euro 130cm, came with 2 bands of 16mm and shaft 7.1mm, i want change to 14mm.
What do you recomend me ?
I'm brazilian. I'm still practicing my english, sorry for the erros in the text. Thanks.
Riffe Euro does best with 2 x 14.5mm small ID bands and a 7mm or 7.5mm shaft. Problem is that if you power up your bands, the impact point drops dramatically. This is due to the very thin profile of the gun for its length, so it flexes. You can put a carbon fiber sleeve over the gun and that dramatically improves things without adding much weight.
I appreciate your videos extremely, thnx for these moments of enlightment :). I'm just confused, why all the brands deliver 2x16mm setups with shafts >7.5mm ? I mean, from the empirical knowledge you present, its totally superficial to get 16mm bands for regular spearguns (80-125cm pipe and 6-8mm shaft diameter). Isn't that so ?
Yes it is confusing!!! Why will 16mm bands perform much worse than 14mm bands for some shafts ??? More rubber should mean more power! But it seems there are other factors involved. I think a main factor is contraction speed of bands in water. Thin bands contract much faster as they have less water resistance. Of course you reach a point where this advantage is negated with heavy shafts where the thin bands have a limit to how much they can propel heavier shafts. But from my experiments this only happens around 7.5mm shafts @ 140cm. So any shaft lighter than this would perform much better with thinner small ID bands. The idea of this test was to show that in action in a test environment. You can see that with light shafts going with heavier bands and the same stretch factor the thicker bands actually perform worse !!!!
@@majdq8 I have ordered the pathos nitro rubbers, 14mm o.d., 1mm i.d., so they shall perform great! Do you have experiences with them, used them in any test videos of yours here ?
@@tunculuc I have never tried those bands but generally speaking all rubber bands are made by one of 2 major manufacturers and are re-branded. Not sure which manufacturer Pathos went with but it most likely is Primeline. If so then they should be excellent choice for shafts up to 7.5mm diameter.
@@majdq8 i’ll share my experience. Cant wait to try them out!
Do you find you have to cut bands after the first few uses? I cut to 360% and loved my gun. It’s now firing a little soft faster about 10 uses. I think the way you handle this is by making longer wishbones and shortening the wishbones. I’ll try that I’m gonna try to get them as short as I can. Thx for vids they are amazing.
Hi Majd, would be quite interesting to test 16mm small ID vs 18mm regular ID vs 16mm regular ID. Very informative video.
I don't use regular ID bands anymore ... they just don't have the same performance. I don't know the exact reason why ... could be less chance of water intrusion , more streamlined and thus less water resistance ... or that a large void somehow hurts band contraction under water. All I know is that in testing the small ID bands just perform better.
majdq8
Have you tried 16mm small ID? Just ordered couple of ft of these as well (mainly for rollers) whereas I've converted all my prior 16mm regular ID to 14mm primeline small ID at 360-380%. As you said, better performance in that less recoil and better accuracy!
Yes I have ... I find that best performance for 7mm shafts and lesser diameter is 14mm small ID ... then up to 8.5mm best is 14.5mm. The 16mm small ID bands would be good for 9mm or heavier shafts and maybe for rollers. For rollers even 19mm or 20mm work well.
@@majdq8 is the small id bands are all the same or it hase to be the primlane ... ?
Bro, wht u prefer lemgth bands for 135 cm gun. Rubber 14mm x2 or 16mm x 2???
What will happen if you make a shot at 15-20 meter depth in the he sea? The results are the same?
Amazing video!
If you're making 2 bands for a gun do you make them the same length or different
(one for the first shark fin and the other for the second one)?
And what's the best way to figure out what length to cut the band at?
I make my bands based on the distance of the band hole to the shark fin. If I want to start at 350% stretch, I take distance from band hole to shark fin I will load that particular band to ... then X 2 for two sides, then divide by 3.5 for 350% stretch. With wishbones I try to keep them around 4cm to 7cm depending on how the bands will sit. Sometimes it is worth it to make one wishbone a little longer so that you have a better and less jumbled line of sight.
Thank you for the video. I am wondering with 6,75mm and 7mm shaft with 140cm length with 105 gun at double 14mm and 16mm band. I be appreciate if you tested
I noticed that u only use 14mm bands on most tests and the seem to be fine. but why do companies like pathos have larger bands on the (open laser carbon) stock while they can place 14mm instead, for better performance?
+Moabz z Good question and I really don't know why Pathos doesn't setup their guns with the 14mm as it dramatically improves performance with less recoil. But most gun manufacturers do not setup their guns well and you need to fix it yourself.
Hussein Marey it's because it is given for deep dive spearfishing, which effects the thickness of the robbers, let's say under -20 meters...
If you are at -25, the two 14,5mm will not send the 7mm shaft as far as it should but the two 16mm or 17mm will do the job...
You don't buy a carbon gun for spearfishing between 0-20 meters.
This is a job for aluminum barrel guns and set up at 6,5 shaft and two 14mm robbers ;)
Teo Tsakiris you may be wright. The physics in higher pressure may affect the performance of the bands and majd only tests them at shallow atm. For specific results, I need to test them at a 20+ depth. I recently got a denton 120 and will be applying the 15mm cressi scarlet for deeper dives. I'll have my pathos carbon 120 set to cressi brown14mm bands and a 7mm shaft. And my denton to the 15mm with the 8mm shaft. I will be making target testing soon. Thanks for the reply.
That is absolutely not true. The problem with deep diving and shooting at depth is water infiltration and not band power loss. Bands have a void and if you do not take steps to prevent water infiltration (most people don't) water will get inside your bands. This dramatically reduces performance of bands. With small ID bands this is much less of a problem. I have never heard anyone say they lost performance with small ID bands ... at least not at depths of 35m. Thick bands are used because it is common sense that more rubber will push the shaft better, but unfortunately this has been proven to be wrong and you have to to balance the band contraction correctly to the shaft mass you have.
Hi majdq8, have you ever noticed if a stretch at 360-380% is diminishing bands performance after 30 min or more of consisting loading (spearfishing conditions) VS a stretch of 3,3-3,5 ?
It would be very interesting if you could conduct a test like this!
I did do a 45 min soak test with a full load ... not much change in power even at 380% ... so maybe this is not the problem some people think it is. You can see it here th-cam.com/video/H-mTmi6dlkM/w-d-xo.html
Can you recommend an online shop in EU with 14.5mm bands with small ID?
When you say for example 360% cut does that mean you are measuring stretch from the length of band cut and not counting the length of bridle line and the extra bit of band before the tie on the bands?
Can you help with the choices of bands (very few available in Greece), between Bleutec 14,5mm, sigalsub extreme and reactive evo 14,5mm, cressi 14mm and 15mm and also meandros 14.5mm. Note that all the above have 1mm ID!
Lol ... the only one of those bands I have tried is the Sigalsub ... so sorry can't help. But in general, all bands are identical and differ only in how much the rubber has cured or what the ambient temperature was during manufacture. Bands dipped during hot summer months will be stretchier than bands done in the summer. Also bands that are fresh out of manufacture will tend to be softer than bands left out a little longer to cure. At least this is true with dipped bands and extruded bands are different. More important for performance is the inside diameter of the bands ... the smaller it is the better the performance ... not sure why but that is what I noticed in testing.
Hi bro, as for what I know Cressi and Primeline are real manufacturers - the rest buys from (other) manufacturers and brands the rubber bands...
@@majdq8 Maybe because more material is in the band with smaller hole, thus it's fuller and hevier.
Hi sir..how do u measure your rubber settings?is it from rubber hole to shaft fins?
Do you account for the wishbone when you measure the 360%? Thx for vids
No. The wishbone length is optimally about 5cm, but you can increase the length on new bands as extra flexibility in dialing in the best performing band stretch. It is much easier to make the wishbone length smaller than to cut the bands and re-tie.
Hi! Very clever test, definitively we don't need more than 2x14,5 for méditerranean spearfishing. Can i use 14,5 bands with a 7mm shaft at 350-360%?
+LeJu2a Yes should work.
Hi i have savimar carbon 130cm barrel length and have 7.5 shaft what is calculation for bands
It is roller
Thanks for your answer, but I am a little surprised. I thought longest is the part of shaft out of the barrel more you will create oscillation. Also with hard stainless shaft (52HRC). Maybe I read it from abellan web site.
Regarding the web site it's an easy tool, but when I do the test there is more than 30% of gap between the real weight of shaft and the website results. Can you tell me the weight of the Trygon diam 7,2mm you used? I have the same gun and I would like to use a shaft with similar weight to improve my setup. Thanks.
+spearboy9 I just use the tool and really don't actually weigh the shaft. I guess some SS must be heavier than others ... but it is very small difference.
Can you suggest a band setup for a roller 130 gun with 7mm shaft? Along with band length.
My setup is a 110 with a 7.5mm 140 shaft x 2 14mm bands , watching this i think i may be underpowered. I could benefit from the 14.5mm more
Sir im making a speargun is it ok if my set up is 140cm shaft, 8mm and 3x14mm rubbers? I hope you help me thanks...
Hi Majd, thank you very much for all this info/work, very interesting. Quick question if I may, I am considering switching my abellan 110 from 8mm shaft with 15mm cressi pure smallID (original config) to 7.5mm shaft with 14.5mm sigalsub smallID (to gain in precision a bit, as i find the recoil with the 15mm cressi makes the gun "jump" a bit and it loses accuracy over the long shots). I am unsure which sigalsub I should consider though, between extreme (more punchy, with greater extension coeff) or reactive (more progressive, lower extension coeff). My natural inclination would be to take punchier/extreme but I've read that the recommendation for longer guns was more towards using the reactive/progressive one, while the extreme was more recommended for guns shorter than 90cm. Given the extensive testing you've done, I was wondering if you had a view/recommendation regarding which of extreme/reactive to use. Thanks in advance if you can let me know, cheers.
I think all rubber is the same and this thing with progressive and reactive ... not so sure it is relevant. I find that the best rubber is the one that is a little stretchier as that gives a smoother release. If the shaft does not come out of the track stable you will lose velocity very quickly and also accuracy will be terrible. So you want your setup to push the shaft out in a way where the shaft is totally stable. This ensures that the shaft does not lose velocity quickly. That is why sometimes with less band power you can get more shaft velocity. I like the Primeline small ID bands in 14mm for shafts 6mm to 7.25mm and 14.5mm for larger diameter shafts.
Thank you
Very meaningful test, very nice. Thanks for sharing Majid.
You are welcome, thanks for looking at the channel!
@majdq8:Thanks a lot for all those very interesting test.
Regarding the shaft, do you have the weight of the shaft used during test?
My feeling is I can get better result when I increase shaft diameter and decrease the length for a similar weight. What do you think about?
+spearboy9 It is true for certain lengths and would also depend on the gun design and how stable it shoots the shaft out. Gun design has a lot to do with allowing the shaft to be completely stable in flight ... which allows less dissipation of velocity due to shaft whip. Poorly designed guns will benefit by using shorter shaft with higher diameters (thus same mass), but generally speaking a well designed gun will benefit more from a longer thinner shaft (so long oscillations are under control) due to the smaller cross section area. You can calculate mass of shaft by using this website www.random-science-tools.com/physics/beams/rod.htm
great work..i wonder if shafts length does make any different on bands combination and accurate? i think 13mm twin bands will work fine on 6mm to 6.5mm thin shafts, but what about length? does 140cm 6.25mm shaft works good as much as 120cm 6.25mm shaft with 13mm bands you reckon?
Problem with thin shafts like 6mm or 6.5mm is that after you go above 120cm, "shaft whip" or shaft oscillations become a factor once you start powering up your setup. Uncontrolled shaft oscillations will quickly dissipate shaft velocity and kills accuracy.
@@majdq8 so you mean if you go above 120cm shaft it must be 7 or 8mm?
Hello I have a Geronimo elite 95 cm open muzzle and am thinking to add two 14 mm bands instead of the factory setup with one 18 mm band.
The shaft is about 6.5 mm but am thinking to add a 6 mm or 6.25 mm to increase shooting speed.
You think a lighter shaft will increase speed and shooting distance?
great work. instead of cutting the band to 380 why not go for the 16mm band on the heavier shafts?
16mm bands cannot be pushed as hard as they can destabilize the shaft at high stretch. Maybe with heavier 8mm to 9mm shafts it would be useful, but lighter shafts get better velocities from 14mm and 14.5mm small ID bands.
@@majdq8 but you wouldn't need to stretch them as much to achieve the same lbs of force.
@@majdq8 a 16 mm band depending on what brand is about 80 lbs at 325.
@@davidkoba For high shaft velocity you need the minimum band diameter which still has enough force to move the shaft. Even if you get 16mm at same stretch and the shaft doesn't have enough mass to absorb the extra energy, you won't get more shaft speed with thicker bands. You might actually get less shaft speed. You can see the test for yourself in this video th-cam.com/video/FSK4HkkimXk/w-d-xo.html
@@majdq8 umm, thats why i said a 16mm band at 325. stretching your band at over 350 starts to do more internal damage to the latex. Two 16mm bands at 325-350 will give you about 160 lbs of force, a 7mm shaft for a 110-130 cm gun will handle that.
Im about to buy a sea sniper 150cm black mamba.....what band set up do you recommend for 8mm and 7.5mm shaft? Also what length shaft should i use?
Hi, great video. Could you advise on a band strecth for a 130x6,5mm shaft with 2x14mm smallID bands (105cm wooden gun). Thanks. Marko
Hi Marko, I would go with 2 x 14mm small ID bands at around 360% and then keep my wishbone initially a bit long (about 8cm) and then I would shorten the wishbone slowly to 5cm to see if I get improvement in flat trajectory. If you need more power you can go to a 6.75mm or even a 7mm shaft ... this can absorb more band power and really gives a huge boost in performance at longer ranges. Properly setup, your 105 gun can easily outperform older 130cm guns.
Hello, I read and watch your tests with great interest, and appreciation for your adherence to scientific method. Living in Key West, Florida I tend to use relatively heavy shafts, most often 8 mm x 165 cm. I want to use 14.5 mm bands at 380%. My problem is I cannot find a US source for 14.5 mm. I can get Salvimar green 14 or 16 mm, and Primeline 14, 15, or 16. Can you suggest a supplier for 14.5 mm? Given my tubing options noted above, which would you think would give me best TV with my 8mm x 165 cm shaft? Thank you very much.
You can get small ID bands from spearamerica.com or benthicoceansports.com or spearitco.com
I recommend 14.5mm small ID bands for 8mm shafts.
Do we need to weigh the shaft? My spear feels heavy but the rubbers are quite punchy and I don’t know if that is affecting the accuracy.
which kind of speargun do you use?
and can you show comparison between rollerguns and convensional spearguns, thanks
+Elite Zion The speargun used for testing in this video is the Abellan Denton 120. Roller guns cannot compete with properly setup classic guns except for for smaller guns @ 95cm or less.
i wonder what happen if you cut 14.5mm bands at %350 instead of %380? maybe then it might beat the 14mm %360 setup?
wooo...nice one bro...how about review about percentage of cutting the bands according to gun length..?..
For 7mm shafts best is 14mm small ID with as much % stretch as you can feel comfortable to load. Usually that is 360% to 370%. For 7.5mm to 8.5mm better is 14.5 to 14.8mm small ID bands with as much % stretch as you can handle.
8mm shaft 170cm long can 14.5mm bands handle it?
Thanks for the video! What about a 90cm roller gun? What do you recommend?
Check out hammerhead speargun rubber
Hi Majd. Something a bit off subject, do you know anything about the sigalsub nemesis handle? Im about to put together another speargun and im using that handle. Any idea whether the trig mech will hold 7.5mm shafts without damaging it? Thanks a lot
From the photo online it looks like the trigger sear is metal and I don't think the shaft sear has a roller. This would mean that this is a friction reverse trigger and thus it most likely will suffer from galling at higher loads.
@@majdq8 Max l'm thinking of is double 14.5 rubber and 7.5mm shaft but most likely 14 and 7. Will those be ok? Not exactly sure what higher loads mean to you, you've gone triple 14.5 and 8 in some of your vids!
Btw, if not the nemesis handle, what handle with 26mm internal diameter would you suggest? Thanks again!!!
And what overhang of shaft is the best?
Ok ive watched most of your videos and i was wondering if you ever tested a koah standard fay back i have a 57 and im on a budget and trying to dual purpose it to reach out a little further. I understand this might not be ideal but its what i got right now it has a 5/16 or 8mm shaft with 16mm bands. First how do you calculate how long you bands should be and second should i switch to 14.5 mm bands as per this video says the performance is improved on the playform your running im very interested to hear what you think
There are new 15mm small ID bands that might be perfect for 8mm shafts. I would try those and you can get them from Benthicoceansports. As for band stretch, the 14.5mm bands are much easier to pull back than 16mm bands and so can go with stretch. For 8mm 380% is very good but just in case you can't load them start at 360% and then cut shorter. Band stretch calculation is distance from loading shark fin to muzzle hole the x 2 then divide by 3.8 (for 380%).
Hello ,
I own an Omer Cayman Gi 110 and I plan to upgrade it
I will get a 2 bands open muzzle , and put 150cm 7mm or 7.2mm shaft ( or is it better shorter and heavier ? )
I will put 2x14 or 2x14.5mm 360% stretched
Do you this this kind of setup is doable on this kind on gun ?
I can't decide between the Cressi pure brown (14mm) , Omer performer 2 ( 14mm) or the Seacsub power blue ( 14.5mm) , do you have any experience with those ?
Thanks
Yes it certainly would be worth a try. Of course for good performance and accuracy, the trigger is the heart of the gun and makes a huge impact.
Halo, sir. Is depth affect the power of band ?? I think below 30 ft, band will lose his power. Thanks.
Hello! Good videos I like your test, I have a question about this test. Why is it tested at 360% for 2 bands 14mm and 380% at 3 thicker bands 14.5mm? I want to say that 14.5 is thicker and more percent.What happens with more% in 2 * 14mm? Can be more recoil, but more power too? Please answer, I have small identification of 3 * 14mm, the sales Of the spearamerican store, and shaft 7mm @ 130cm w / the 7cm flopper.I want to cut rubber but I want to know it is ideal%
Greetings from Baja, Mexico.
It is a little more complicated. With a light shaft you don't need heavier bands to get the shaft moving, so the thinner bands move quicker in water and even at 360% can deliver more velocity to the shaft (also less recoil). As you go to a heavier shaft the thicker bands are better as the thin shafts cannot get the shaft started at high velocity.
majdq8 ok. tnks for answer, i like be a personal cuestión, I've 3x14mm small interior diametter @320% , and shaft 7mm @130cm. you think may be is Good for be 6m shot?
or used 2 bands @ 360%?
yea i know is necesary real test, but your think is high value to me before cut bands.
7mm @ 130cm shaft is not enough mass for the shaft to perform good at 6 meters. Remember that when I say 6 meters I mean 6 meters from the tip of shaft to target ... so that is about 7.5 to 8 meters from your eye to target. Better than 3 x 14mm small ID bands @ 320% is to just use 2 x 14mm small ID @ 360% stretch. That will give you much better shaft flight and much better performance.
i know is 6m of the tip the shaft yo targget, tank you for answer.
Keep making your videos, they are tests that we all want to do at some point. have a nice day!
please tell me which crossbow is better, Omer Cayman ET Camu 105 or Sporasub One 105, and what is better for them, harpoon 6.75 or 7mm.a you can more under what harpoon which traction is better?
I would prefer the Sporasub One 105. Just change the bands to 2 x 14mm and either a 6.75 or 7mm will work really well.
+majdq8 Hi! Can you tell me yours opinion about Devoto shaft. I will buy 7,5x1300 for my denton 110, I use Pathos but they are sandvik steel and they are very strong but devoto is 17-4 SS are they strong enough, reef hunting....rocks!
Yes the Devoto shafts are 17-4 PH SS and also the pin and flopper are 17-4 PH SS ... very strong. They are a little raw and need some dremel work to remove sharp edges on the back of the shaft and on the shark fins ... but after that they should be perfect.
Hello Majd I would be greatful for some advice right now.
I have a bleutec 115 raptor,I notice that the 7mm shaft is very soft and I would like to replace it with a better one or even try 7.5mm.
Could you please inform me on what shaft to buy please and if 7.5 is too heavy,I use 14.5mm small ID bands at %380 ATM.(alot of recoil)
My old gun has a rob allen shaft and I do like its strength.
So I was also wondering if rob allen makes shafts to suit my raptor.
Thanks mate.
For a 7mm shaft you don't need 14.5mm @ 380% ... you will actually get much less recoil and much higher velocity with 2 x 14mm small ID @ 360%. The Raptor 115 will shoot a 7.5mm very well. The Bleutec guns have terrible handles and I would recommend you look at my Handle Mod videos to see how to re-shape your handle. The difference will be like night and day.
Thank you very much for taking the time to reply and I will check out the mods.
one last question do you use metal wishbone all the time on guns with more than two bands insee you use metal wishbone on one of the rigs
Yes, the third band can obstruct my view so I like to use a metal wishbone on 3rd band.
. Hi. I got a mvd Predator gun 120 size And 130 cm band strech. 7.5 And 160 cm Shaft I Buy 1.5 meterse of 14.5 mm small id band . what size cut the bands ??
I really don't have experience with that gun, but if it is similar to the Pathos design then I would go with 2 x 14.5mm @ 360%.
@@majdq8 thanks. Really appreciate
Hi, Can you tell what branch of small ID bands you are using especially the 14 mm
They are Primeline small ID bands.
Hi! Please, can you tell me what kind of wishbone/dyneema are you using for the 14mm bands and how long? Thanks
I use 1.9mm dyneema and length I usually keep about 5cm of exposed length. Sometimes if the bands are not laying nicely I will increase one wishbone more than the other to let the bands "fit" better. I like to have a clear line of sight without bands on top of each other.
Have you had ant experience with Bucanero shafts? They seem 17-4 ph like Hunt shafts. Would you recommend them?
I do have a couple of Bucanero shafts and they seem OK. I didn't like the flopper pin as it felt weak ... also didn't like the hole in the shark fin as it seemed not centered and way far to the edge. Also didn't have a cone ... but that was easy to add. The new Hunt shafts that are coming out now are simply the best shafts I have seen anywhere and much improved over the original shafts. They have a welded 316 SS cone, they have hardened floppers and hardened flopper pins ... they have increased their welding on the shark fins and have a very nice hole to tie line to on the rest tab. Very very accurate and very strong.
I saw pics of the new hunt shafts and it seemed to me that the last sharkfin is waaay to back and maybe would not fit in a c4 urukay (it would fit an albacore 130 or a trygons). Is that true?
Yes they have a shark fin way back as they are producing the shafts for Abellan now and Abellan wants as much band stretch as possible. The new shafts fit perfectly in a C4 Urukay ... as for Trygon guns am not sure as I don't have one.
Hi Majd, what bands would you suggest for 120 gun with 160cmx7mm spring steel shaft, I was thinking 70cm of 14mm "ballistic" rubbers
as per majdq8 it would be 14mm stretched @360
when u say cut at 360% stretch how do u work that out. is like from the muzzle to the last tab then like what do u do idk just wondering how you work that out
Distance from band slot to shark fin then multiply by 2 (for 2 sides) then divide by 3.6 (for 360%). This is band cut length.
Hi..sorry to interrupt, is that the same calculation use for roller ?
majdq8 Inches? Centimeters?
hi. I got a Salvimar 95. V-pro. I wanna know which size exactly of bands. I got to 14..mm small ID . I know take the hole of the band and shark fin and then? 360% ? more? less? 340?? thank you
I am not familiar with that gun, I would use 340% stretch and if the gun can handle more then push it to 350% and 360% etc...
what about on a big blue water gun would you still use 14.5 I have a koah 140 4 band
I don't think you need 4 bands unless maybe with a 10mm shaft. You can go for thicker small ID bands if you need more power on a very heavy shaft. Today you can get the small ID bands in 15mm .
nice video, i want to ask, for a 6.5 shaft 90cm gun its good to use one 18 rubber to faster and accuare shot?
Two small ID bands at around 13.7mm to 14mm will give much better shaft velocity than one single thick band.
Hello brother, have you ever tested regular and reversed flopper for any shaft ? I wonder reversed flopper can compensate shaft drop or not.
You will get a slight shift in elevation ... flopper down usually vectors shafts up while flopper up usually pushes down. You really don't want to have the flopper vectoring the shaft as that only vectors the front and you end up with a "wheelie" type shaft flight. This loses velocity very quickly and has poor penetration. That is why I always use a cone on my shaft or I make sure the flopper is recessed enough where it won't affect shaft flight.
thanks for the information I exactly understand what do you mean with "wheelie" term. Shaft cones is very good solution for proper shaft trajectory. But hard to find and expensive parts. Do you suggest anywhere which I can buy ? 7mm for example
You can buy cones from diveinn.com For sigalsub cones get one size larger ... so for 6.75mm get 7mm .. for Salvimar cones you can get exact size or 7mm for 7mm.
www.scubastore.com/#/dffullscreen/query=salvimar%20cone%20cone&query_name=match_and
www.scubastore.com/#/dffullscreen/query=sigalsub%20cone&query_name=match_and
You might also get them from Devotosub and those you can also use exact sizes.
thanks the very informative response, dive safe
Check online brother. Price is around 0.60 per piece. Picasso is one that does them for example. Search for 'cone for shaft'. Hope this helps.
Come on man, you tell me the handle lve asked you about might not be good for me but fail to give me an another suggestion?! Thats out of order majd lol. Any 26 int, 28 ext dia handles u recommend? Had to insist and hope i have better luck this time...😆
Thanks
I don't think you need to change the handle ... just fix it and you can use it. If you haven't bought one then best would be Pathos D1 handle as there is a double roller trigger for it with minimal modification. I actually helped design the trigger for that modification just for that reason. You can see in this test how I modified the handle to use a full DR trigger. But with the new DR trigger for the D1 handle you get same results but without the major work involved in modifying it. th-cam.com/video/K-sN4pQkWSU/w-d-xo.html
@@majdq8 thanks man. Ur advise is invaluable as always.
Very informative video.
Thanks for this test bro you a g
Mahaloz! Much appreciated 😀🐟🐟
why you remove the 16 mm bands from your calculations
+ehab mohamed 16mm bands will not give better performance than 14.5mm bands except with maybe heavier shafts than 8.5mm. In the tests here I just wanted to show how bands and shaft mass interact. More band power is only necessary if you have more mass on your shaft ... otherwise it is just added recoil that can actually work against. you.
Wow! i have a 90cm speargun, 6.5mm shaft and i use 2x16mm bands.
I guess i'm wrong?
Riffe recommends 2*16mm for the 90 gun with a 7.1 or 7.5 spear ...
What about 6 and 6.5 ? What's your recommendation ?
Thinner bands contract much faster than thicker bands due to less water resistance ... but of course there is a limit to this being useful for speargun shafts. The limit is that the band has to be strong and thick enough to start off the acceleration of the shaft. So it is a very fine balance. For 6.0 to 6.5mm shafts, there is a possibility that best would be 2 x 13.5mm bands ... since that is not very common, I would just go with 14mm small ID bands. What I can guarantee you is that 2 x 17.5mm bands will not be as good as 2 x 14mm bands even if you use the same band stretch. I know it is hard to believe and many make fun of this statement, but you can see for yourself in the test in this video.
recommended band length for 120 with 7mm shaft?
take distance from band hole to shark fin you will load at, then multiply by 2 and then divide by 3.5 to 3.6 (depending on how strong you are). I would start at 3.5 and then cut shorter if I feel I need more power. This estimate is based on using 14m or 14.5mm small ID bands.
thanx alot this was so helpful 🤘
Double wrap?
What the rubber brand name ?
Primeline small ID bands.
What lenght of speargun did you use for this test?
+Παναγιώτης Μπονέλης The gun used was an Abellan Denton 120. It has 121cm band stretch and is about 135cm total length. I will put a review on this gun soon.
+majdq8 How can i find the 14mm silver bands???
(If you want subscribe on my channel to exchanges pm...Thank you)!
Color is not important, but has to be small ID. Can buy from spearitco.com Look for Primeline small ID 14mm bands.
Excelente... buenas pruebas...
Are Primelines small id 14 or 14.5 mm?
The 14mm Primeline small ID bands can vary from batch to batch ... from 13.6mm to 15.1mm !!! I just caliper the bands before buying and choose the best size for the shaft I am using.
Thanks for the fast awnser. They arent sold in this country(Thailand) so i sadly cant check them before buying them since i order them on ebay and i dont have access to a calipher . But for now im goin to use them for a 130 cm 7mm shaft so i guess its okey if it would be as low as 13.6mm
Hello majda8!
Have you tried meandros x pro bands?
I've heard good of them, in terms of performance and durability!
I think I'll try them in 14,5mm instead of primeline's!
Regards and keep up the good work!
What gun is this
thank you so much! very help full, great test.
can you please compare between 14 and 14.5 with 16,18, and 19? with differennt diameters of shafts ( 7, 7.2, 7.5, 8)
thank you.
+Elite Zion It took me forever to do this test and to add 16, 18 and 20mm bands would be a nightmare. Obviously I have tried all these setups, but don't have video. Take my word for it that bands in 14mm and 14.5mm small ID are the best performing for all shafts up to 8.5mm. They might be also for larger diameter shafts such as 9mm and 10mm ... but haven't tested those.
+majdq8 thank you, appreciate.
really nice I like the test and very helpful topic I think the the power you gain here is approx90-95 Ib for both rubber and it give the idea to everyone
I think the power alone is not important, it has to be controlled power that keeps the shaft stable. Many times in my tests I add more power and get less performance!
On a Abellan Denton 110 2x14.5 Sigal extreme (370%) and 7x130 shaft work good. But my opinion is that 2x16 Picasso boom black (390%) with 7.5x130 is much faster and for long range shots. With those 14.5mm rubber's shaft is precise but the speed is not so good.
+Robert Margan Best is to use small inner diameter bands. Somehow the air cavity inside allows the bands to contract better if it is small. Not sure why but that is results from testing. Once you get to terminal velocity of a shaft with a certain mass, you cannot get any more velocity by increasing band power (can actually get less velocity). The only to increase velocity in that situation is to add mass to the shaft, or make the shaft more hydrodynamic, or of course use thinner line with less drag.
Hello sir, how to calculate the band length? That is my big problem right now. I use 8mm @130c m and 6.5mm @130cm to my handmade speargun loaded of 2x16mm band. The result is not good. i need your suggestion sir on how to setup my speargun. Thank you sir for your inspiring video. From cebu Philippines..
Band stretch is calculated by taking the distance from the band hole to the shark fin or notch on the spear. Then you multiply by 2 (2 sides) and then you divide by 3.4 (if you want 340% stretch). Of course it is not an exact science as you can also play around with the wishbone length and bands can be of different diameters and different stiffness from batch to batch, even from the same manufacturer. I think for such a small gun, it is much better to use a thinner 6.5 to 7mm shaft and load it with 14mm small ID bands.
thank you sir..
Elena Tabares 6,5 shaft with two 14mm rubbers is the ultimate set up for depths between 0 -20 meters
Lower penetration power with a conical (Riffe) than a pyramidal point (Hamilton) shaft has to be considered...
The gun range decreases with the depth... a test made at 2 m depth has nothing to do with a test made at 20m depth...
I have a weak for "smooth" bands!
Actually I plan to test that as that is one of the last remaining mysteries. Why does band power decrease as you go deeper? Is it because the inner cavity somehow changes the dynamics? Maybe the air inside acts like a pump and water intrusion in the bands causes a drop of power. Or just that band material reacts differently when it is pressurized. Hopefully will get answers soon.
There's a significant factor that you seem to ignore my friend. The power/time ratio. When spearfishing, guns can stay loaded for too long before shooting. Each band behaves differently and usually the thinner and more elongated it is, the more power it loses. It'd be interesting if you tested this.
Of course I don't ignore that. I tested this for almost a week. Depending on temperature and band shore hardness there will be a drop with time of band power. It can range from 5% to 20% depending on conditions. So I just overpower the bands 20% over the Terminal Velocity of the shaft and that takes care of everything. If shot is 20% more powerful, it will still shoot the same as the TV does not increase no matter how hard you push things.
...for sargos and small fish I think it is ok.
+llOrteg4ll A sargos would be the equivalent of about 2.5 cm of hard construction styroboard (probably much less). Most of these setups are penetrating 10cm of styroboard at 6 meters from tip of shaft to target ... which is equivalent to penetrating a very large Wahoo or King Mackerel. So although these are using 14mm and 14.5mm bands ... I guarantee you that there is plenty of power there. I think you will be shocked at the power of small ID bands.
+majdq8 really? but, if got one bone u lost fish...maybe 3 14.5 ok...i believe...and the shot is very slow, 6 mtrs shoot wahoo, you miss certainly. Sry mate, but my opinion is : that config is for small fishes. ;)
I don't blame you for having that opinion and maybe a few years ago I would have thought the same. But these are NOT to be compared with normal 14mm bands and this is an Abellan Denton which is extremely effecient power wise. The setup you see here with the 7mm shaft is more powerful than a Riffe 120X with 3 x 16mm bands. The styroboard used in the test is very accurate in testing penetration on fish and if anything is a little conservative. Look at my Seal invert roller test and the penetration test on 15cm styroboard ... here is a slightly less powerful version of the gun shooting a 150kg tuna through the spine. th-cam.com/video/6pjAnliWx2k/w-d-xo.html
And if you want to see Wahoo hunting at long range using only 2 x 14.5mm bands ... th-cam.com/video/7cUcnxirZT8/w-d-xo.html
So give them a try ... they are not only for Sargos ;)
+majdq8 here, 2x14mm u dont get fish...sry
Badejo / black grouper/cubera and others, that config dont spit him....one large fish 15kg ++ somentines with 3 mtrs 2x16mm dont spit if hit the head bone.
Maybe your fish reality is different from my...in your region, this setting is ok...but here nops.
+llOrteg4ll OK as you wish.
Your not getting the precise time in hitting your target this makes your aim towards a fish percept very differently as to a staying still target and reaction time .... haven’t stop to think that the bigger bands gets your shaft to your target faster than the thinner one
Just an opinion