Help me with my tips!

[orlach]

I posted this to rec.sport.fencing, but am sad to say that it's as dead as a group can get. :-(

So here goes again:

OK, someone must be able to help me with this. I'm trying to sort out all
of my tips and barrels and wires, and having too much grief.

Got a couple of STM blades a few weeks back. Unfortunately, they both had
broken wires at the tang (grr!).

OK, not the end of the world. Gotta go rewire them. Shouldn't be a problem
since they're German points, same as my others. Unfortunately...

The wire isn't compatible.

The WIRE is not compatible!!!

Here are my existing weapons:
Allstar BF FIE "blue" (two of 'em)
Uhlmann BF FIE "white"
The Allstar blades have red wires. The Ulhmann blade has a blue wire.
This is apparently important, because the replacement red wires I have
("German epee wire") work with the German tips on the Allstar blades,
but not with the German tips on the Uhlmann blade. Furthermore, the STM
German tips appear to be identical to the German tip on the Uhlmann blade.

The problem I have with the red wires and the Uhlmann/STM tips is that
when I assemble the wire in the barrel, the tip will bottom out before
reaching the total travel distance. In other words, the underside of the
tip doesn't contact the end of the barrel.

Can someone tell me how I can distinguish between the various bits and
pieces, other than trial-and-error? I suppose I could get out the calipers,
but it just shouldn't be necessary, dammit!

As an aside, I want to rewire ALL of my blades with ONE type of tip, ONE
type of barrel, ONE type of screw, and ONE type of wire--then buy all of
the spare parts I'll need and only buy bare blades from now on. This is
just too damned annoying.

Thanks,
Colin

[brtech]

Okay, first let's settle on some terminology.

A "point" is the whole assembly.
The "barrel" is the part that screws on to the blade
The "tip" is the part that comes out of the barrel when you remove the screws.

All german parts are interchangeable. That includes the wires. Color doesn't matter. The cup (the plastic part on the wire) is the same size.

So, first we want to know, do you REALLY have all german parts?

The way to tell that is to look at the tip. Look at the part of the tip that moves slightly. It's a ring. If the ring just has a couple of flanges on the top and bottom, it's german. If the ring has screw holes, then it's french. If there is no ring, it's LP.

Look here:
http://www.leonpaul.com/armoury/foil/foil_parts.htm
for pictures, although the illustration of the french point is not accurate as it shows flanges, where the actual point is a smooth ring with screw holes

So, what do you have?

[orlach]

Dagnabit!

Forgot to mention that this is for Epee, where everything looks the same. :-)

Also, while the colour of the wire insulation shouldn't make a difference, there definitely is a difference in the wires (or rather, in the cups).

The "blue" wires have completely round cups.
The "red" wires have cups that are round on the outside (to fit in the barrel of course), but are actually squared off on the inside! That also means that the point setter won't fit comfortably into the cup.

[migopod]

Dagnabit!

Forgot to mention that this is for Epee, where everything looks the same. :-)

Also, while the colour of the wire insulation shouldn't make a difference, there definitely is a difference in the wires (or rather, in the cups).

The "blue" wires have completely round cups.
The "red" wires have cups that are round on the outside (to fit in the barrel of course), but are actually squared off on the inside! That also means that the point setter won't fit comfortably into the cup.

The german wires have the little raised "volcano caldera" business. If your point setter isn't fitting it, maybe use something smaller like a piece of coat hanger or something. If a) your point bottoms out on the cup and b) you've stated that your point setter isn't fitting, maybe you've just not pushed it in far enough and should try the bit-o-wire (or get a german point setter).

(me edit other point-setter alternatives include a jewelers screwdriver carefully applied or a small alan wrench that fits inside the cup. Be careful not to mess up the contacts inside the cup with a screwdriver.

[brtech]

Okay, epee it is.

All Uhlmann and Allstar parts are interchangeable AFAIK. They are not interchangeable with french parts.

Are you saying that you can't adjust the contact spring to get a contact? That's not getting the cup down far enough, that's getting it down too far (which is not possible, so it probably means we're not talking about Uhlmann tips on Allstar wires or vice versa).

That seems impossible. If the contact spring is wound on one turn, it sticks down WAAY farther than it should to make contact. Usually you have to wind the contact spring on all the way, or nearly all the way.

Sounds like we need more info.

[migopod]

Okay, epee it is.

Are you saying that you can't adjust the contact spring to get a contact? That's not getting the cup down far enough, that's getting it down too far (which is not possible, so it probably means we're not talking about Uhlmann tips on Allstar wires or vice versa).

That seems impossible. If the contact spring is wound on one turn, it sticks down WAAY farther than it should to make contact. Usually you have to wind the contact spring on all the way, or nearly all the way.

Sounds like we need more info.

From the description of the problem it sounds like the bottom of the tip contacts the cup well before the flange of the tip contacts the barrel, so the point's actually hitting the cup inside the barrel rather than contacting the rim of the barrel.

[keith]

why do I suspect that this may be due to that little extra plastic part below the wire/cup assembly?

Normally a problem when not removed when doing a rewire, but if you removed it before rewiring it could cause this problem.

[orlach]

More information you want? And so you shall have it!

Here's the problem: Apparently the cup doesn't go far enough down in the barrel. When the tip is fully depressed, there's still a gap between its flange and the barrel, larger than the small shim used for measuring travel (0.5mm I think?).

The obvious answer is that the cup isn't fully seated in the barrel. Unfortunately, it's also the wrong answer--I made VERY sure that it couldn't go any farther down into the barrel. (!) Also, I should point out that this was happening on a random barrel in a vice, so it wasn't that the barrel was screwed down too far on the blade, and that was pushing the cup up. (Don't know if it's possible or not, but it wasn't in this case.)

Something that is possible, I suppose, is that the tips on the Allstar (or Uhlmann) blades aren't actually German. Hmm. How can I visually distinguish between French and German parts? I've noticed that the tips on the STM blades (which are the same as the tips on the Uhlmann blade but not the Allstar blades!) look _slightly_ longer. Here's a diagram (which only works well in a monospaced font)

Uhlmann/STM tip
__ _
| || |_____
| || | |
| || |_____|
|__||_|
^
|
|
Teflon band
|
|
_v _
| || |_____
| || | |
| || |_____|
|_||_|



Well that didn't _quite_ work, but the point is that the Uhlmann/STM tip is wider to the left of the teflon band. This of course doesn't affect anything, but is the only visual cue I could really see between them. (And I suppose that the Allstar tips are thinner there just from heavy wear, since they're on blades that I've used for two or more years.)

[migopod]

It's almost easier without having a known French and German to compare to just look at the
cups that came out of them when you took out the old wires. The French ones have the contact posts exposed, and the german ones have the volcano collar.

[Mr Epee]

oh, tips...

Well, that's not very interesting.

I mis-read the thread title.

*moves on to another area of the forum*

[brtech]

I'm pretty sure we have mixed French/German parts here. I think you are putting a german wire in a french barrel or vice versa.

Do double check to see that there isn't an extra washer below the cup, but it sounds like that isn't the case. If the tip doesn't go all the way in, assuming the contact spring is wound on correctly (or not there at all), then indeed the cup is not sitting in the barrel correctly, and that is mismatched cups and barrels.

You gotta use one system. Real german (Uhlmann, Allstar, FWF) are interchangeable: wires, barrels, tips. French parts are not interchangeable. If some of your wires are simple cups with contacts sticking out, they are french. If they have the top hat (migopod calls it "volcano caldera"), then they are german.

Check the illustration on:
http://www.leonpaul.com/armoury/epee/epee_parts.htm

The LP cup looks a lot like a french cup. See how the german cup is taller? If that's the difference you are seeing, then you know what you are dealing with.

[DangerMouse]

For epee, I have never had a single problem mixing wires or tip parts (other than screws) from German, French, LP, StM, SG or PbT points. The only incompatibility I have ever encountered is with generic Chinese made tips.

My money is on one of these two situations:

1. The blades were wired with the french wires that use a seperate spacer ring under the cup and when you went to rewire you didn't remove the spacer ring first.

2. I have had a few batches of german wires that were not properly finnished so there was excess plastic sticking out of the base of the cup making it too wide. A few seconds with some sand paper fixed this.

[ACrimsonRapier]

I fence foil, but I heard red wires = french and blue = german, usually. :X I don't know how true that is.

[Mergs]

I would check to see if the spacer ring was left in the barrel from the previous wiring job.

[Fechter1]

I would check to see if the spacer ring was left in the barrel from the previous wiring job.

QFE!!!

95% of these problems are due to the little spacer ring. Unfortunately, the ring is not easy to see... A tiny screwdriver would be your best bet at extraction...

[fencerbill]

I had trouble with StM Epee blades with wiring from StM, but it was several years ago.

I couldn't replace the original StM wires with German wires without changing the tip also.

Tracked it down to the skirt on the cup and the recess of the plastic around the threaded end of the tip that the contact spring goes on.

The StM tips need a cup with a shallower skirt on the cup. The plastic sleeve around the threaded post of the tip contacts the skirt before the contact spring contacts the two pins in the cup.

If you replace the StM tip with a German tip, I could get it to work. You might try to make the German cup skirt more shallow, maybe sand it down. That seems more feasible than trying to shorten the plastic around the threaded post on the StM tip. The plastic around the threaded post is very critical. As you put a new contact spring on the threaded post, it goes down inside the plastic "sleeve".

[orlach]

Solved!

Unfortunately, NONE of us get a cookie for the right answer. It was, as these things usually are, far easier than I was making it.

Turns out the travel spring was all crudded up, and wouldn't compress properly. No compression = not enough travel for the tip.

I beat it around a bit and twisted it to make it fit, but I'm very suspicious, and once I've got the blades wired, I'll probably put a new spring in. It's rather an important part in making touches. :-)

Thanks all!

[Mergs]

Hey! We were eventually going to get around to that part. Damn. You took all the fun out of it. :-(

[SJCFU#2]

I fence foil, but I heard red wires = french and blue = german, usually. :X I don't know how true that is.

I'm afraid it tends to be a bit more complicated that that.

Prieur (French) wires are generally wrapped with white silk.

Sport 7 (also French) generally uses red.

Allstar (German) used red as well, however they usually mix some white threads in there as well so it looks more like red with white flakes.

Uhlmann (also German) uses blue, but they also mix some white threads in there so it's more like blue with white flakes.

IIRC Leon Paul uses brown, possibly with some white threads mixed in as well.

Then you throw in of other brands - looking at the picture on their web site it appears that PBT uses a red/white wire similar to Allstar but without the "Volcano" on the tip, Absolute uses grey for their house brand wires, and FWF can be either red or blue (hopefully with white flakes in there). I'm sure there are others I have missed.

Fortunately in épée most wires from different manufacturers are reasonably compatible with one another. Just watch for that plastic spacer ring on the Prieur wires (the best way to tell whether to not you have to worry about one is to look at the old plastic base when it first comes out. If it is significantly shallower than the new base then there is probably a plastic ring still inside the barrel).

[migopod]

Last wired epee blade I ordered had an ulhmann tip and wire of unknown provenance that was wrapped in navy blue. It was a BF Blue as well, so at first glance it looked like it had a complete* tip without a wire.

*nearly complete... for some reason BG left out one screw.