French vs. German Epee parts -- interoperability

[oiuyt]

Hey all,
I've gotten basically every possible answer to the question of whether or not french and german epee parts can be mixed and matched from "absolutely yes" to "absolutely not" to "yes, but these parts only in this direction (ie German part A will work with an otherwise entirely French point but not vice versa, OR exactly the opposite of that)" for basically every possible part in the point.

So, in your experience what parts can and can't be used with one another? My team is in the process of switching from French to German and we would like to know which of our old parts are still useful to us.

-B :)

[Gav]

Weeelllll no-one that I am aware of gives a toss about whether a tip is French or German. Most of us have a "big bag of parts" and fit together tips which work. I have parts from German, Russian, East European and French blades and although there are slight differences the basix construction of the Epee tips is the same. Some barrels are deeper than others but then you just use slightly longer springs. The only guys that I know of that bother with French v German are the guys on this board.

Might be a local thing might not be.

[damianip]

Brad,

I've been able to put together "Franken-tips" from French and German parts, but I believe that they are worse than a straight French tip. The situation has always been at a tournament when a desperate team mate or friend has a dead weapon, and I'm out of German parts. I never recommend keeping the weapon that way once "real" parts are available.

The big differences are the tolerances, the choice of materials and the wire. I think I've been able to make most combinations/permutations work, and it usually comes down to fiddliing with the springs.

When I switched my son's and my épées from French to German, I just kind of did it as the tips or blades broke. It seemed less traumatic financially.

I think we're now finally French tip free. However, I've got a bunch of French parts laying around my parts bin, and that's how they end up getting re-used.

BTW, the best German tips lately seem to be from PBT (I guess they are actually Hungarian). However, I found the insulation on their wires to be a bit fragile. Take extra care when assembling a weapon with them.


Paolo

[DHCJr]

The sizes for German, French and British are the same, but the tolerances are much different. You can interchange the parts, but as noted before the French don’t work quite as smoothly. One exception to the rule is British screws. If you look at them you will see they have sharp threads, where the German and French are rounded. Once you have put a British screw in none of the others will stay in. You should only use a British screw if the tip has been stripped.

Also, this is a personal preference. I do not like the Uhlmann FIE type wire. These were designed when the FIE required that tips could not come out of adjustment. The Uhlmann style had a lot of problems and when the FIE dropped the requirement, Uhlmann went back to their old style tip, but kept the FIE type wire. I have found the travel spring to sometime catch on the lip and stop working. I prefer to use a wire that is not of that style.

[MikeHarm]

Where do you get the British tips? Are those the Leon Paul ones?

[DHCJr]

Yes, I said British because I said French and German. I don't know if anyone sells Leon Paul in the U.S. The last time I got any Leon Paul parts was at the Leon Paul booth at the Worlds a few years ago.

[DHCJr]

It seems I made one error in the compatability of the British (Leon Paul) parts. I checked Leon Paul's website and they also have an FIE tip, but it does not appear to be compatable with the Uhlmann wire. From the picture it appears it has a square base, where the Uhlmann had a Octagonal base. It appears it still uses the same barrel and screws like what Uhlmann did with their FIE tip. I have never seen these Leon Paul FIE tips, only a picture, so I can not be sure. Has anyone had experience with the Leon Paul FIE tips?

I know this is off the original thread of German vs. French, but I wanted to correct my original post.