I used a half inch bit. But the mech is a bit wider then .5. So I had to widen it by hand. I messed up and over widened the top a little bit too much, so the top of the mech is kind of swimming in the pocket. But the bottom fits Snugly. So I think it should be good when I pin it.
Posts by Reefchief
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The first and the last shavings <img src= " height="23" srcset="https://spearfishing.world/forum/images/smilies/emojione/1f606@2x.png 2x">
Couldnt stop. Cut the pocket. Turned out rather nice. Last time I spent a long time on it. This time I was a lot better with the chisel. Using a router to plunge the hole instead of a drill left me a much cleaner pocket to work from as well.
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So I havent posted much in the last week. I have been a bit busy, as well as still gathering parts and building up the confidence in my decisions to start cutting.
Tonight I finally starting building.
First I cut the gun to length (exta will be wood for grips). I also cut the track.
Measured about 90 times and got everything perfect. The first cuts on my new router table were absolutely amazing. So much control and confidence in my cutting.
I also picked up Speardiver 5/16 shaft from Dan to fit it. Its quite the spear.
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This got ran into the ground pretty quickly and a lot of them are annoying. But I still see versions that make me laugh and smile. This one is one of those. Although I wish the second part was them all underwater, would be that much funnier.
This is my favorite so far. The walrus doing situps had me in tears.
SeaWorld San Antonio: Harlem Shake - YouTube -
Sdeisen, ok, I see. You are correct, I don't dive in waters full of boats.
My GF has 2.5 or 3mm suit (forgot which, but I think 2.5mm) that she uses for SCUBA and when she used it where I spear she was cold too (she usually dives in warm waters like in Egypt, Thailand, etc), I had expected it to be warmer than my shorty but she got colder faster. I also end up getting cold which is usually the reason I stop fishing. That is the reason that I was thinking of a 5mm.
Keep in mind the vast vast difference between a well fitting open cell suit and a scuba suit. The amount of water that flows in and out of a scuba suit makes them cold almost no matter how thick they are. A well fitting open cell suit on the other hand prevents basically any water circulation. This makes an open cell suit way warmer then a scuba suit for any given thickness.
My dad's been using a 7/5/3 scuba suit for the last few years and just tried his new 3mil spear diver open cell last week. He said it was much much warmer then the 7/5/3 on a 70* day.
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I need a hood because I am a fairskinned red head. Any skin left exposed burns to a crisp in minutes. Even my summer rash guard is full body with a hood while all my friends are diving in surf shorts lol.
Aside from needing one I enjoy wearing it. I prefer my hood on, but like you I easily overheat and get sick in my speardiver suit here in warmer months in Floirda. In the early and late winter when the water is around 75-76*F I often end up taking down the hood and letting water in to keep cool. The hood around my neck doesnt bother me, I dont notice it.
If you overheat in your suit I would say a hood is better. It will allow you to keep the hood on when you are cold, take it off when you are warm, and let water in with it off when you are really warm. On the other hand there is no escaping a 5 mil. And for me it seems a hood makes a 3mil atleast 20+% warmer so with a hood its closer to a 5.
Another great option you can add into the mix is a vest. I picked one up from Dan this fall and it made the transition from warm to cold water great. First I wore my rashguard with a vest for a few weeks. Then the vest and pants a few times. Then the suit without a hood. And now Im diving with a hood full time. It requires remembering how to +/- weights for each configuration but once you figure it out its easy.
I also feel I can usually hear boats in the water as good with a hood as without. Hearing outside the water can be restricted, but with boats its always the buzz in the water I hear first anyways.
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Thanks judah. Cant go wrong with a Sublime cover of a Marley song. Oh and speaking of no damage to fillets. My wife is a fillet master.
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I saw some ad's on ebay for those blanks when I was starting my build. Personally to me they look a little bit sloppy. The teak didnt look like the greatest stuff ever and the lams didnt really match. But this was based on pictures on ebay.
I ended up going with a blank from Wood Guy who is here on the forums and I couldn't be happier with the product. This gun seems somewhat important to you. Plus a hybrid I think is a bit of a complicated build you will end up investing a lot of thought and time in. So I would say consider giving Wood Guy a buzz and seeing what he can do for you.
Also that AR-15 handle and grip are seperate. If you want a rubberized grip for the handle there are dozens or maybe hundreds of models out there for AR-15's. Althought I know Dan is carrying a few types.
Good luck with your build and welcome to the forums.
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Thanks for the info. Dont plan on messing with them but good to know.
Since a lot of the video was green as hell I went back into cinestudio to see what I could do. I found out you can easily keyframe all your video settings such as exposure, w/b, contrast, etc. I did what I could to make it look decent.
The raw video is actually quite green and washed out. Partially because I started recording them at depth and the viz/color wasnt that great. But it also seems that the gopro 3 tries to correct the blueness more then the gopro1 did.
With more cinestudio tweaking I think it turned out better but some colors are still weird. Although I like it better then the washed out monochrome blue everything of my go pro 1 videos.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X9gKEW2V8BI
Im really interested to see what this thing can do with a red snap on filter from Dan, good viz, and some less intense tweaking in cinestudio.
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I found the species of scorpionfish Spotted stonefish (FLMNH Ichthyology Department: Spotted Scorpionfish) but cant find any regs.
I was under the impression their sting was worse then a lionfish, but reading around it seems they are perhaps basically the same.
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Yeah after looking at the video more Its definitely way green when Im not close to the bottom. When Im inside the lobster holes etc it looks really good, but outside of that its way too green. Im gonna fix it and re-upload it.
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Cool vid. But I'm not sure about the color adjustment you did, everything looks too green. To eliminate the blue tone from Gopro hero3 footage you need a red filter Snap On Filters For GoPro HERO3
http://spearfishing.store/223-966-thickbox/snap-on-hero3.jpg
I do need the red filter and that will really make them look right. But the color correction did a better job then it looks like in parts of this video. Part of the problem with these clips is I started recording them late. So the first few seconds of the video the white balance and contrast and stuff is out of whack till the GoPro adjusts. On the way down everything is dark green. But You'll notice in the hole and on the way up the reef and water looks pretty good. I didnt notice until I uploaded it since I was balancing the clips using the middle of the dive. The scoprionfish shot is also very green all the way through. Maybe I will try to fix them even more...
Also I really tweaked the tint and color to see how far I could take it here. But the more useful and important settings I found available in CineStudio were exposure/contrast/sharpness etc.
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That is some interesting tile work at the end of the video under the hog you shot. What are those interlaced concrete blocks used for?
They cover a pipeline that goes out deep.
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did you just lasso a bug ? cool
Yep here in FL they have to be a certain size so you need to catch them with your hands, a net, or a lasso. And then measure the carapace with a gauge. I prefer to use a net but the snare (lasso) works well for the deep holes and skittish bugs around here.
We have it harder then the guys who can shoot them. But much easier then the guys from Cali who can only hand grab.
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Thanks guys,
Hank if you ever make it to Florida we will definitely show you a good time.
Based on how many other peoples costa's end up prematurely dead it appears costa has stumbled on a genius business plan.
Judah, I was looking through the GoPro videos and it reminded me of the stone/Scorpion fish I didnt mention. Remember when you came up from sticking your head in the lobster hole and said "wow I just grabbed that stonefish and nothing happened" Then I dove down and chased the fatass away and had to poke it about 15 times? Im glad you didnt get stung by that thing.
I threw together a few clips from Saturday to see what the GoPro3 Black can do. So far I am pretty blown away by its quality. The incredible picture quality combined with using Cineform (the gopro editing software) to adjust the levels makes for some really nice video. Im giddy over my ability to remove some of the overbearing blue tinge from my videos and get it closer to reality.
Saturday Hog and bugs in Hollywood - Testing GoPro 3 Black Edition - YouTube
I also forgot to mention. My dad was absolutely giddy over his new sombra speardiver suit. I was bummed because mask problems prevented him from really diving. But the suit fit perfectly and coming from a 5/3/7 scuba suit he was astounded by its watertightness and flexibility. He also couldn't believe he could jump in 70* water and not even notice.
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Got out today with my Dad, Hardline, and LunkerBuster, off of hollywood. With yesterdays rain and the weird forecast I wasnt sure how today was gonna turn out. But it ended up being a really nice day. A great time was had by all minus Judah's expensive sunglasses being claimed by the sea in a series of unfortunate events.
We started out on the second reef in hollywood. Tried to anchor on some spots but the current was ripping too hard. My dad couldn't find his good mask so he captained the boat on the drift.
Early on Judah shot a trigger and Frank shot a hog. Then I found a nice little lobster hole and worked it with Judah for a while. We pulled a few barely shorts and then concentrated on one big boy who didnt want to play nice. We spent a while chasing him back and forth under a series of ledges and trying to snare him until Judah got him in a nice spot I could see him from the side and get the snare in.
We decided to hit one more spot a little north and got towed up. As soon as I dropped off the rope I dove down to get one kickless dive in and ran into a really nice hog. Then A crazy west wind picked up to the point that the waves were going out and the sea was reverse 2 foot whitecaps. So we called it a day. Sometime during the whitecap melee my dad took a wave that knocked a bunch of stuff off the center console and when it happened Judah's costa's must have flew away.
Frank took all these pics. 2 with my new gopro 3 black
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If you have a scratch you don't need to refinish the whole gun with penetrating epoxy. You can do a spot touch up.
The problem I found was that to achieve the effect I desired (still feel and see the grain very well) the coat had to be thin and even. When I tried to touch up part of the gun with a second coat it hid the grain and totally changed the texture of the spot I doubled up on, so I had to sand and do the whole gun again. The steel wooling helps even it out, but only so much. I feel like I would have the same issue trying to fix up scratches.
You can see in my photo the tip of the gun had a little thicker coating and is more "shiny" then the rest because I painted it tip down and it dried thicker there.
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For what it's worth xylene added makes a penetrating epoxy that is very light on the woods surface. Nice protection with out needing a ton of work
I did the xylene thinned epoxy coating on my hole gun. Its a nice easy finish that looks really nice. But I wasn't very happy with my inability to brush on a perfect thin coat. I also dont like that minor scratches cant be sanded and oiled with a bit of oil, but instead you need to mix up some epoxy and coat the whole gun. Plus I just really like the looks and idea of oiled teak. Although that may change after owning one.
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Thanks Woodguy. Great tips there. Cant wait to make your beautiful blank glow
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALrzpka1edk
Pretty mind blowing how well this thing can emulate various animals.
