Salvimar Metal Speargun Review

The Salvimar Metal speargun is one of the best selling spearguns from the Italian speargun & freediving equipment manufacturer. 

We were eager to get our hands on it and see why it so popular and put it through its paces to find out how it compares to other similar spearguns that are available on the market right now.

Does Salvimar's Metal railgun stand out in the crowd and does it deserve your hard-earned money..?
Read on to find out...

About The Salvimar Metal

There are four different versions of the Salvimar Metal Speargun each available in various different lengths. 

The different Metal versions are:

We got our hands on the Original Salvimar Metal which is the most common and popular of the four versions and tested it out for this review. 

This is actually the second generation Metal speargun. The biggest differentiating factor compared to earlier versions being the improved trigger mechanism. But more about that later...

The speargun is an aluminum barreled railgun powered by two 14mm bands. The speargun comes in 7 different lengths from 60cm(23inches) to 125cm(49inches). The spearshaft also comes in 2 different thicknesses depending on the length of the speargun. Below is a table showing the different barrel lengths and the corresponding shaft and rubbers.

Since the length listed above is barrel length you can add an extra ±26cm(10in) to get the total length of this Salvimar Speargun including the muzzle and handle with the buttpad attached but excluding the spear.
The spear overhang is another ±16cm(6.3in)

All the lengths come standard with a gun reel. The lengths up to 85cm with the Salvimar Mini Reel and the 95cm and longer spearguns with the Salvimar Max Reel which can hold 75meters(246feet) of 1.5mm shooting line.

The loading-butt is removable but keeping it in place is much kinder on your chest when loading it and doesn't even add an inch to the overall length of the gun.
The olive green handle is comfortable in the hand and even if you are ham-fisted you won't have a problem with the size of it.

The natural grip angle and clean line of sight along the barrel to the open muzzle and spearpoint makes aiming and shooting more instinctive and accurate from our experience. 

The safety is placed on the grip and can easily be engaged and disengaged with the index finger and thumb without changing your grip. The position of the safety also means you can feel(with some practice) whether your safety is engaged or not without looking at the gun. 
Something you'd appreciate if you've ever lost an opportunity on a fish because of leaving your safety on

The trigger mechanism is Salvimar's heavy metal trigger mech that has been tested to hold a load of up to 350kg(771lbs).

The whole trigger mech is made from 17-4ph stainless steel. The trigger and the sear are made through a process of Metal injection molding(MIM) which allows Salvimar to manufacture these intricate and beautiful parts in-house.

The sear has a small roller which makes this trigger buttery smooth even at high loads. The roller also reduces the metal on metal wear that is common with other trigger designs. 

The line release, made from the same stainless steel, sits on the right-hand side of the gun as standard but can easily be moved to the left-hand side if you'd prefer that.

And to top it all off, you can also adjust the sensitivity of the trigger by adjusting a screw on the bottom on the trigger guard. Turning the adjusting screw clockwise gives the trigger a heavier pull and anti-clockwise a lighter pull.

The barrel of the Salvimar metal is made from anodized aircraft-grade aluminum. The outside diameter of the round barrel is 28mm(1 1/10in) and the wall thickness approximately 1.3mm(3/64in)

The barrel has an integrated shaft guide that helps with accuracy. An interesting aspect of the shaft guide is that it only runs for about 3/4 of the length of the barrel before having small sections cut out from it.

The way we understand it, is that this serves two purposes:

1. It helps water to flow underneath and around the spear making it easier to swing the muzzle on target.
2. To reduce friction on the shaft while still keeping it in line.    

The effect of the first is probably minimal and would be hardly noticeable. The second, although difficult to measure probably does have some impact on the speed and accuracy of the shaft. By the time the shaft reaches this section it has reached its terminal velocity and any extra shaft guide would increase friction and reduce the shaft's speed. It looks like Salvimar added just enough to keep the shaft tracking straight without slowing it down. 

The shaft is made from heat -treated 17-4ph stainless steel - Salvimar calls this their Capture Shaft.
It has a single bottom flopper and three shark fins - two at the back and a "rest" or half-load fin. The detailed shark fins are made by Metal injection molding and then laser welded by a computer to the shaft - some of the neatest work we've seen.

The shaft overhang is 16cm(6.3in). Transitioning from our usual go-to speargun, a 90cm Rob Allen with a much longer overhang was no problem for us.

Salvimar's Capture shafts have a cut-out that squares off the shaft in the flopper area. This does make the flopper impossible to "tune" and stay open like their Pacific shaft that comes with the Salvimar Hero Speargun. Luckily the flopper does have a prominent curve on the tip which serves its purpose and forces the flopper open before it passes back through the speared fish. A little rubber o-ring keeps the flopper closed and spear hydrodynamic during flight.

The metal comes standard with 2x 14mm rubber bands with dyneema wishbones. The thinner bands are easy to tension and the extra shark fin or rest tab makes it even easier. This makes the gun powerful enough for experienced divers while still being easy to load for beginners.

There's enough space to add a third 14mm band in the single hole muzzle or swap both out for thicker 16mm bands. We can't help to wonder how it will perform with 2x 16mm bands and will update this article once we've tested it with this upgrade.

The most remarkable features of the Salvimar Metal include:

What Others Are Saying

It seems that others are just as impressed with this speargun as we are. Most of the reviews - 8-9 out of 10 - that we found online are very positive.

Everyone was happy about the inclusion of the gun reel in the set and feel that the speargun is great value for money.

The biggest complaint that we found regarding the gun is that it did not come assembled.
This will depend on where you buy it from.
If you buy it from an online store like Amazon or direct from the Salvimar factory then it would typically not come assembled.

That does not mean you will have to build or assemble the speargun from scratch but you will have to attach your monofilament to your spear and do the final knot on the dyneema wishbones once you've placed them through the muzzle.
Something that every spearo should know how to do in our opinion.

Your package will include some monofilament and double barrel sleeves but you will need a crimping tool a knife and a lighter to crimp the sleeves.

Since this was the number one complaint we found we've decided to make a short video to show you how to do to rig your speargun.

Know someone that's looking for a new speargun...? Please share this article with them.