Intro
Presented in the dossier of “Best sling spearguns below 100 € list price“, the Picasso Cobra Rail 75 actually impresses for such a low cost products.
Basic design
With greater detail surely to be found in our dossier of “Best sling spearguns below 100 € list price”, where all best very affordable sling guns have been presented, basically the Picasso Cobra Rail 75 has a circular band on an open muzzle and a metallic wishbone. Release mechanism is in steel, while the trigger is in glass loaded Nylon with a very robust design. Handle has a useful rubber cover and an inferior metal ring. Grip is good and distance of the trigger also feels comfortable. The aluminium barrel has an integrated shaft guide. The line release lever is small, but its arched shape permits to hold the line perfectly.
General impressions in the water
Loading of the Picasso Cobra Rail 75 is easy and fast, with the release mechanism blocking with precision the shaft each time it is inserted in the slot. The open muzzle with its small protuberances is extremely compact and precise, but of course one needs to be attent in positioning the line around the shaft and such protuberances.
Pulling the circular elastic band when loading feels sufficiently easy, even though the band still gives a good sensation of elasticity and power. The wishbone is easily and perfectly inserted in the notches of the shaft.
The Picasso Cobra Rail 75 once loaded shows a perfect alignment of the rubber bands with the barrel, thanks to a great muzzle which gives the perfect direction to the bands evidently permitting great efficiency in utilizing all their power to push the shaft.
The metal wishbone on the other hand widens the elastic bands and propably determines a greater lateral section of the speargun and bands, which reduces slightly the brandishing quality, which is very good, but not excellent as one could initially hope. Most probably utilizing a narrower metal wishbone, or a Dyneema wishbone would permit the elastic bands to come closer to the barrel for a more compact final solution, with certainly an additional improvement of the brandishing characteristics.
The test of the balancing of this very light speargun, letting it go from the surface of the water once loaded, indicates an amazingly perfect setup, with the Picasso Cobra Rail 75 going down in the water with an almost perfect horizontal position, and the handle side moving down a little faster simply for hydrodinamic reasons. The barrel has in fact been recently substituted with a lighter one acting on the shaft guide shape. Well done!
The aiming and shot
The line of aim is totally clear thanks to the design of the muzzle and the wide metal wishbone. The feeling of the Picasso Cobra Rail 75 is of extreme lightness.
A few shots and it is evident that precision of the speargun and power of the circular elastic bands are more than adequate for such speargun, that can be easily positioned in a higher segment than the “below 100€” one, for what concerns performance.
The test on a sugherello moving around to hunt shoals of small fish has given a great feedback of precision and power, that can be seen in the video below.
General conclusions
The Picasso Cobra Rail 75 is intelligently designed, with lightness, balancing and a great circular elastic band that makes loading easy, but still gives a powerful shot. Cost reduction on elements such as the Nylon trigger and line release lever do not actually impact performance, for a speargun that is amazingly affordable and can definately move to a higher level segment of spearguns. Great job by Picasso in tuning all elements to obtain a simple but very effective and efficient speargun.
