Drilling Holes Into My Wood Speargun

[Michael Guerrero]

So I'm looking at adding a light mount made out of PVC to my wood speargun. Anything I should know before I screw holes into it? I'm planning on drilling pilot holes first.

Is having a light useful? I'm thinking it will give me a quick splash of color for those fish that that is important for and will allow me to look into cracks and under rocks where grouper like to hide.

It will be kind of like this but much less professional looking

Speargun Flashlight Bracket | MAKO Spearguns

 

[gkrane]

I have an Ocean Rhino RX4 which uses this light configuration. Maybe this will give you some ideas. I find having a light very useful.

 

[gkrane]

Here is a link to the adaptors if it helps:


Speargun Lights | Ocean Rhino

 

[Akimbo]

You might consider drilling a hole through the wood and using washers and a nut rather than a tapered wood or self-tapping screw. That can reduce then chance of splitting and stripping threads.

 

[Water Boy76]

Really not a big deal to drill holes into your wood gun. Just make sure that you use SS screws and drill a pilot hole first. If you can, use some form of sealant. I've used 5200, silicone, West Marine Epoxy and never had issue. Put the sealant in the hole not on the the tip of screw. Cleanup with acetone afterwards.
I've got buddies that don't use any sealant, they have no problems yet. But cheap insurance I suppose.

Regarding the lights, yes they are very handy to have. But I personally don't like them on the end of my gun. It makes the tip of the gun heavy so the balance is off and it's harder to maneuver and aim. For the size of the light's on the gun you don't get much light. They are better than they used to be, but it's still not much.

I use a larger light clipped to my BC that I can quickly unclip. If a fish is rocked up you have time to quickly grab your light. Same amount of time it takes to turn light "on" at the end of a gun. Plus larger lights gives more radius to see what I'm shooting at. Light in my left hand and gun in my right. Sometimes you light up a different hole than the one you shoot into. Can't do that with lights on end of gun.

Better to have any light than no light. Personal preference where you put it.

 

[Michael Guerrero]

Well, my homebrew version isn't pretty but I think it will do the job.



Should be out of the way of the shaft line and is straight down the muzzle. The light is only 230 lumen, but I'm thinking that will be less likely to scare the fish compared to higher power lights.

 

[KDAD]

Looks nice. If the velcro doesn't hold well you can substitute in some of those zip ties - the removable ones

 

[Yoyodyne-88]

My experience with grouper is that they hate lights, they startle and bolt. Some other types of fish don't care at all.