A bit of a knack to it for sure. But you usually load from chest . Again , check out the guys doing it and you will see once learned quite easy to do. Might pay to start with the 14mm rubbers first before going up to the 20mm ones most of us use.

Russ

Dane...... our ones where so powerful the only way we could load them was by having a notch halfway up the spear which we could pull the first rubber to with the butt of the gun on your thigh and then move it on up to your chest and then we had to do it again as we used two rubbers......

if the whole rig is too long for your arms it may be a good idea to have someone weld a notch onto it for you dont cut one as this will weeken the sharft......

or you might like to make up a small hook just to get the rubber to your hands when its up on your chest......

hope this helps sort out you problem........

hold the right hand rubber in your right hand with palm facing down.at the same time hold the butt with your left hand. then push the butt up to your chest. this makes the rubber allready half way stretched then grab the other one&pull. ive seen people try with palms up and that is impossible for me.

i hope that helps.merry speary.

Case is right on. You need an overhand grip so that you are using your back and shoulder muscles to load the gun, not your biceps. There is a gun loading tutorial on the rob allen website. I think I saw one that Reid had written too that was pretty good. Once you have done it a couple of times it is a piece of cake.

Paul G

thanks eric.

   i just got a new rob allen 1.2m maybe i should of got an edge gun instead looks awsome i like the sights. the aussies swear by them on the adrenilin forum...  have you dived the 'bridge' at mana?im keen to try the fishos seem to recon theres a few snapper there and kingies. i only just found out where it is recently after boating over it  a few times

Rob Allen makes great guns, I have 2 of them.  I use twin 16's on my little 120, as I found I got just a bit more range for shooting big snapper in awkward hunts than a single 20mm rubber.  And I think the shaft moves faster with twin 16's also.  I've gone back to one wrap though, as I reckon you are pretty unlikely to hit or land a fish past the end of that. 

Save your 1m Picasso for a winter gun. I have thoroughly enjoyed using a 106 for snapper etc this past 6 months, and found my 120 a bit hard to move around last weekend when snooping snapeprs at Rabbit Island. 

Little compared to my 140.  It has tight twin 16's and ... wait for it ... an 8mm stainless spring steel shaft...

ooohhh  aaaahhh now I know what petrolheads get off about talking about their cars ... grunt grunt full throttle fuel injected ...  grunt grunt...

When the shaft hits fish they just about die of shock, bone shatters, and they usually stop moving. 

Ive seen a RA loaded with two 20mm bands, excessive...yes, grunty.... yes, accurate...don't know, would guess not. 

I notice that with twin 16mm bands on my RA 130 it was less accurate untill I got used to it and really needed to lock your arm. I belive the second rubber causes a slight jolt at the tip due to it being at a different level to the spear.

Hey Reid

What type of shaft is that? Any disadvantages? Is it less prone to bending?

Paul G

I find the 6.5 mm spears can bend if the fish is shot bad, but the 7mm spear on my 110 RA has landed 7 or 8 kings with three going over 50# in the last year and its still straight as. A couple of these fish were not the greatest shots either.

Amazingly the springsteel shafts can bend to nearly 90 degrees (seen this when a kingi swam under me with the shaft hanging out bent at 90) yet will form back to perfectly straight.