Posts by kmo

  • fill speargun barrel with some foam

    You could fill the tandem kayak with empty water bottles if you want to avoid adding much weight, assuming you have a large enough access hatch of course. The money you save on expanding foam you could spend on stubby holders (Australian for Beer Cosy?) so that they don't make too much noise.
    I imagine the kayak would be a write-off if the expanding foam were to become water logged.

  • Missed Fish

    I've done the same a fair few times, most notably on a couple of good wahoo who were kind enough to sit still for the shot and the reload, but didn't hang around for round 2.
    It's worth checking for bits of flesh or scales stuck under the flopper during every reload.

  • Terry Maas Freediver recovery vest

    Quote from tufual


    once he was pushing himself too far and blacked out right below the surface but because he always kept a little air in it he floated to the surface and woke up .


    If weighted correctly you should be able to achieve the same thing by being positively buoyant below the surface. Depending on diving depth a good rule of thumb is neutral at 10m.


    Nice purchase Don, here is hoping that yours never inflates!

  • Sportube Series 2 or 3?

    I think you might struggle with the hard float in the ST2. I have a ST2, and can fit plenty of guns in there and my fins, but had to stuff my wetsuit in.
    They are well made and very convenient and all, but I reckon sportube must be making an absolute killing! Pretty thin plastic and not exactly compicated bits of kit.

  • A**hole sharks

    I've used and seen bodyboards with a pool noodle here in Australian nationals where guys are shooting lots of large fish in places with plenty of sharks and 6 hours in the water with no boats.
    Here is an example from deeperblue very similar to what I setup for the nationals:

  • new to forum

    Love the idea of starting from scratch with a gun you built yourself! Good luck with the build and welcome to the forum :)

  • shark fin tabs

    How do you avoid pulling on one side Dan? Hip load? I've never had much problem pulling the bands out of alignment on 1.2m and 1.4m single rubber guns. A bit more when using twin 16mm rubbers.

  • Fish pic for the Australia section?

    Quote from Nate

    Very cool pictures. When I hear Australia, I always think of really big mackerel.


    I reckon the Paxmans might have a part to play in that! That one went 21kg gilled and gutted, still only half the size of the record shot here in WA but was my PB.


    Hopefully some other Aussies chip in with better photos soon.

  • Fish pic for the Australia section?

    The top photo was taken at one of the tourist barges moored on the great barrier reef. I took the family out there last year. They have some glass bottomed boats and observatories for non divers which my daughters loved. That was one of the hand fed spangled emperors.
    The second one is me with a narrow barred Spanish mackerel from a comp.
    The last shot is a friend of mine with a nice example of a Dhufish, endemic to Western Australia. Weighed about 10kg from memory.

  • broken shaft

    Thanks Dan, it went down well for Xmas lunch :)


    It's a 6 point pranger with 8 inch barbs. Took me about 15 minutes of knife work to remove it from the fish, it was well buried into the roof of the fish's mouth. Unfortunately a bit low and missed any major organs but did slow the fish down enough for me to find it again.


    Why not a flopper shaft? We have a 2 month closure here where can't spear some species of larger demersals which ended a week before this dive, so I had the gun rigged up for spearing small fish. Instead of changing out the spear I thought if would be a good challenge to get close to the fish and shoot them with the pranger.


    It was actually my first time shooting with the pranger. Probably won't do it again until next closure.