Posts by tinu

hey man,
sure i am anything else then a "gearwhore", and i dont give much about how my gears looking, as long that they do the work. but your guns, and this one in particular are something else.
respect.

hi,
finally michael made it across here from tobagos big sister island tinidad, and came for a dive.
i used to spearfish now and then with his big son, brian, at the oilrigs on trinidads eastcoast for some years, so it was a pleasure to show "the old man" some of the marine life in tobagos water.
he normally dives in trinidads green low vis waters, so even we didnt had the cleanest water at our dive,
30-40ft, for him that was very good vis. after fighting a bit with seasickness, he manage to pick up a nice 12pound hoggie, and shot his first washaroo(rainbowparrot), amongst some barras,jacks,etc.
great diving,great fun, full cooler.
looking forward for the next visit.

hey dan,
this line loooks very promising. i normally use any kind of line available, and it never last long.
but when i look at the picture with the black rubbers that you posted here, i think i should just let you ty all my rubbers. looking very well done !

hey lomartin,
i cant tell you how long these rubbers, i just cut them by feeling. and anytime they start to cut around the tyingline i just shorten them again, until they definetely getting to short. see the blue rubber on the gun ?
that one was already to short, so i gave it an extra long wishbone.
the writing on the boat says : YOUTHMAN ON THE RISE

dan,
the silicon grease seems to help. but again, i dont mantain my rubbers much, i tend to just use them hardcore until they done, and get new ones. if a new one last 3 month without a bigger problem, thats good enough for me.
and you right about the black trigger. the guts smell really stink. they dont get big. 2-2.5 pounds.
but once cooked, taste nice.
and you right again about the comp 3x, i miss a little range now and then. so i just use shorter rubbers.

lunker buster,
you make me really laugh. when i check the pic again, it really looked liked that gun is bend like hell.
but actually that is the brand new second hand riffe comp.3x that i got a month ago.
but this is probably how my bend riffe comp.4x really look. i only using the bend one for back up.
the comp.3x doing the work pretty well as you can see.
the queen trigger is famous eating here, evn more then the oceantrigger.
but for its taste the most famous is the black trigger. is it called black durgeon or so ?
hey dan, about the rubbers. i find they getting really sticky, the rubber almost dissolving when i leave them in the muzzle. i never took much care of them, sometimes dont even wash the gun with freshwater when going out the next day. but recenly i started pulling them out, rinse, and wipe them with silicon grease at the part where they touching each other in the muzzle. think it helps.

hi,
the water is nice these days, so we taking advantage. went out yesterday, find some nice schoolmasters and some black jack. and these two nice size barras came in a little too close to check me out .
all the best, stay safe....

hey marco,
btw, did you realize that i did some pushups ?
really try to keep up with you PR-divers holding up all this big stringers full of fish for the camera.
greets

hi,
a good thing that i found out that the minimart next corner have a pretty strong wifi-lan.
so i can buy a drink and sit outside the shop with my laptop, and dont need to go to these internetcafes, really hate them.
yesterday i met some clean water 80ft vis and some fish around.
gliding down on a big pinnacle, start seeing this sharklike looking fish on the bottom in about 90ft.
as the fish see me he start swimming straight at my guntip.made it easy for a decent shot. one of my bigger cobias.

seaweed,
i am not sure, but i think the hoggie was 12-14 pounds.

hi,
some pics from some days ago.
a nice yellowmouthgrouper and a good size black.
and the next day, just to prove that you florida divers not the only ones who get decent hoggies,
i get one of my bigger hoggies for the season.
happy easter everyone

"Very nice vid tinu, as usual. I think soon you have enough material for "spearifishing Trinidad" DVD. I'm sure you can come up with some interesting narration."

hey dan,
i dont have such intentions, and it would be more a spearfishing tobago than trinidad.
but i would be ready to bring my share for a "forum-members in action" dvd.
greets

check the thread "hoods and boats"

lunker,
i had two underwatercams so far. the first one was a canon powershot 460 with the housing , in 2008,
4.8mp , price with housing 450.-us.and after i lost that one to neptun i got a canon powershot 650is with housing in nov.2009. 10mp , price with housing 500.-us
anyway, i found out that the video modus is always the same with canons in that pricerange.
once they go with 30pics per second, at 480-640, the quality is the same.
all my vids done with that. and i always hear people say how good they find the quality, and i not talking about youtube !
bottom line, i find the price-result work out very good for me, and i use my cam under the the same conditions i use my other diving gear. rough sometimes.

hi,
the advise you get here from some others are very good. JET SKIS are very hard to hear most times.
beeing overrun, damaged and almost killed by boats already, i would mention boattraffic as the number one
danger of diving alone. these days i dont do much solo shorediving again, because i am kind of traumatized
from my accident, so i keeping my head most times out of the water instead of under, wich dont make the diving so effecient and fun, as it used to be.
big float and flag, ears always open, (you may take a look at the thread "hoods"in this forum), because using a hood can minimize your hearing options a lot.
to me the best thing about solo diving is what dan mentioned. you will learn to deal with any problem by yourself. you will have to. once you dont push yourself too hard, and prepare yourself and your gear properly, you will have some great expierience.
about 80- 90% of my diving i am doing alone, and i really like it.
and if you into that, meditate or pray before the dive.
blessings

lomartin,
i dont know if opening your eyes wide works in general, but at certain point of the approach, when i see the cuberas already coming for the bullet, i just do it. same with dog-and muttonsnapper..works good for me so far.

couple days after, i went and dive along the coastline, some similar rocky ground, but not dropping so deep. about 30-70ft.after shooting a 5pound snapper i looking down at 40ft and seeing this nice size dogteeth passing by. so i dive down on a rock and hold on to a seafan again. i got this habit from an old comercial diver here, ho told me that is the best trick to get these big cuberas to come close. hiding yourself motionless behind a big seafan. and ???? nothing! after shooting a barracuda, i see the dogteeth passing again. so i try the same thing. nothing.shot a next snapper, the same thing happen, and again.... finally i seeing this big rock with a cave entrance on two sides.dogteeth love such places to hang out. so i dive down to find out that he is not inside. but coming up from the dive, i see
him again swimming in the distance, watching me. guessing the fish at 30pound, i make a decision. the seafantrick didnt work,he is not in his condo, lets get desperate and do something stupid. i start swimming fast behind the fish. he swims at 40ft depth at a horizontal distance of about 60-70ft. after chasing him for a minute and not getting much closer, i start diving straight behind the fish. as i start going down he stops, and turns around.i stop kicking my fins, just gliding towards the fish in an 45"degree angle. and he start doing the same thing, swimming towards me from the bottom in an 45"degree angle.
i almost closed my eyes for a while, but now coming into shooting range opens them as wide as i can. the fish now looks more like 40pound to me, and still having in the back of my head that i using the same smaller gun with the same slack rubbers,i start stretching my gun arm, the fish turns broadside, and fire. fire on the reel.90 ft of my line flying over the bottom before the fish get stuck between two rocks.get my backup gun, shoot him again. entangle the lines, and fish in the boat.
this time the spear went in half inch behind the gillplate, all the way through the fish.
on the scale turns out almost to be 50pound. btw, the same day i saw one 100+cubera hanging out in 20 ft in the shadow of a rock.
excuse the grimy face of the boatman, he had to lift the fish several times that day for a picture.
all the best....

hi there, find some time to do some writing on the computer.
all you will excuse my bad english . i went out a week ago, to dive at some offshore rocks, a steep dropping rocky ground, with some big pinaccles, rocks and canyons. dropping straight down at 50-90ft, and then sloping down at some 300ft+.this place is normally rough and have current.
these are the places some big fish like to live. after shooting a 25pound rainbowparrot with my
riffe comp 4x, i handed the boatman the gun to pull in the fish, and he handed me my next gun, my brand new second hand riffe comp.3x, so i can continue diving one time. the 3 rubbers on that gun was a little too long, because they where the backup rubbers from the longer gun.
so i dive down in this big canyon, to land down on one of this big rocks at the bottom at about 50ft.
i hold on to a small seafan that is growing on top the rock, looking down the canyon into the deep with
a vis. of about 90ft. i see some 4-6 poundschoolmaster snapper and a 15pound rainbowparrot comming out of there caves and watching me from a distance. after a while i see a big shadow coming from the deep into my direction. coming closer i make out i nice size dogteeth(cubera)snapper.
looked like 30-40pound in this crystalclean water. but the closer it comes, the bigger it finally gets.
reaching in front of the opposite wall of that canyon i am in, about 30ft away from my guntip,
a now 70+pound snapper watching me with skittish eyes. a big remora sticking on his back,
he is not sure what to do.turning himself about 3 times but not coming any closer.
i dont know how long i am already down on this rock, but just watching this beautiful fish in front of me made me realize late that i am running out of air. since the fish not looking to nervous, i decide to make my final move before my face starts turning blue. i open my eyes as wide as i can,staring at the snapper, pulling myself of the rock and gliding towards the fish. closing the distance to the fish feet by feet, he start doing the same thing. opens his big eyes even wider, starring at me and start swimming towards me.
coming into shooting range, i start stretching out my gun arm, lining up the fish and wait for the moment he turns to show me his broadside. still in the back of my head the slack rubbers i using on my gun,
the fish finally turns, and i fire. ready for my reel to get some fire, all i hear is "bonk"! and i see my
spear on the ground and the fish swimming away easy, like nothing ever happened. i hit him right at the hardest part of the gillplate, and the spear bounced back like hitting a rock. back in the boat i decide not to use the smaller gun today anymore, and tryed to get over this story as fast as possible by shooting some more fish.
here the picture of my boatman holding a nice size rainbowparrot from that day.

well, i know this was not diving in some tropical waters, but it was still under water.
while spending a visit to switzerland in summer 2008, i went and do what i normally trying to avoid. entering the water without a speargun. carryied my cam instead. this is the river "limmat" , zurichs biggest river , that flows all the way through the city. in the summer very popular for people bathing all along the river.
10 years ago there was europes biggest open drug-szene located just along the river at this place where you see me diving. after they closed down that szene, i went and dive there the following summer.
very creepy. needles,spoons, knives,cellphones,bicycles,guns,amunition, covered the ground. along with samurai-sword, parking-meter, money-safe, church-donationbox, basically anything that the junkies carried to that place in exchange for drugs, and been throwing into the river during the many police-raids.
at that time i picked up 135 of the same famous swiss-armyknife in two days. the dealers used them to portioned the drugs.
the same summer the towns diving-policesquad made a big riverclean up. the foto with the things they pulled out that river made it to the frontpage of the local paper. apperntly i did not found all the guns.
anyway, after that year they continued doing a yearly river clean up.
but as you can see in my vid, there are still some "good stuff" to find.
for the ones who havent seen it, all the best....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g07dNiX7le4

thanks so far for your tips. i am not much of a craftsman, so i think for now i will just use this gun as my backupgun and aim a little higher.
marco, i am kind of konservative when it comes to my speargun. the riffe used to work fine for me, so i stick to it.
lunker, if i would been living in the us, i would probably contact riffe about that problem. but from down here i dont want to go through all that.
anyway, bought a second hand riffe comp.3x last week, so i gonna use this one as my premiergun.
got a nice fish with it already today, pics and report coming soon.
keep it real....