Dangerous modification of childrens toys. Nerf.

[lilredmachine]

Sorry if the nerditry bores you, but I thought it would break up the monotony of waiting for celebrities to die -Gary Rhodes, whodafunkit?- to see if anyone else is into the weirdness that is hobby level nerf modification. Here are a few of my more unusual items I have built/bought over the last couple of years. All of these fire Stefan nerf darts which are essentially .50 cal nerf darts cut in half with differing tips depending on the required effect, apart from the small electric semi auto pistol in the top left, which fires conventional full lengths out of a radial magazine.

https://i.postimg.cc/d33jTpfg/IMG-20191203-212222157.jpg

The furthest left is a Worker Hurricane, which is a small sidearm that is capable of firing 6 full length darts at around 110fps in a couple of seconds. standard it shoots around 90fps on a 3s lipo -11.1V- but it has Twill textured flywheels and an aluminium guide barrel that lift Fps by around 20 or so. Incidentally, this is about as hard as you would want someone to shoot a nerf dart at you from 10 foot or so against skin.

The next is another sidearm called a rainbow pistol. The handle is a 3d printed piece with a transparent PVC tube containing the spring and plunger rod assembly. The name is derived from the style of catch it has, a rainbow shaped latch that can withstand huge loads. Originally it would have shot a Stefan around 200fps, which is not too shabby but I have modified this one with a 20kg Worker spring and an enhanced air seal which means it's FPS is closer to 300 these days. A hard tipped stefan dart will blow through a can like it isn't there at these velocities, as they weigh 1.5g which is around .6 of a gram heavier than a roughly standard 14 grain .22 rifle pellet.

https://i.postimg.cc/7Y3sg8tT/IMG-20191203-213320047.jpg

https://i.postimg.cc/L84TLqZr/IMG-20191203-213326912.jpg

https://youtu.be/7oapk7Lxsak

I have included a pic or two of what I mean. And a video of what shooting a can from relatively point blank does. The bluntness of the tip of the nerf dart does impede penetration, but if a hard tipped dart is used, it will obliterate a thin skinned metallic object. the only thing that stopped this dart is the hardwood bed frame...

incidentally, the mark on my hardwood bed frame after the dart has entered and exited the can is precisely why I don't usually fire these inside. Uninhibited, these will bury themselves in the wall.

https://i.postimg.cc/nzK2qq0f/IMG-20191203-212136018.jpg

Next from the left is a Worker Caliburn, my newest aquisition, which is a mass produced, 3d printed nerf sniper rifle kit originally designed by a bloke called 'captain slug'. I won't bore you with the details, but it's basic form fires 230 fps or so, with the advantage of a magazine fed, pump action that makes repeat firing a lot easier than the loading process of the Rainbow pistol, which is a far longer ordeal. The whole gaff is a fully 3d printed affair, and I have modified it with a Talon magazine kit and aluminium plunger, trigger and sear in preparation for a much heavier spring. A K14 spring should be capable of pushing this to around 400fps or so, and fairly accurately as well. The basic construction of the rifle is a sandwich, with 7 steel rods running through the whole gun sheathed with carbon fibre supports on to which the 3d printed pieces slide.

https://i.postimg.cc/4d1MXCCc/IMG-20191203-212251700.jpg

The next is my first build and my favourite nerf gun. This is a longshot rifle, first released many years ago and with an oddly oversized plunger tube for the intended purpose. Modders jumped on it and it all went haywire with 400 fps builds appearing all over the place. Mine is pretty much maxed out, with an Artefact hunter Stefan kit, enlarged plunger tube, 100 percent air seal, 34kg of spring -that's 75lb of force required to prime - a pump grip kit, a 400mm tight fit barrel and a continuous ability to break itself. I have never managed to get it on to a chrono but it would not surprise me if this could fire a hard tipped stefan at over 400fps. It's internals are all metal, there is not a single piece of plastic inside it. In the bed pic you can see the barrel attachment on it, this is an actual ported, rifled choke which was sourced from Australia, and is like you would get on a shotgun or similar. The effect it has on accuracy is vast, it can hit a can or similar size target from around 100ft which is outrageous for a high powered nerf gun.

https://i.postimg.cc/nrrsnQSt/IMG-20191203-212242391.jpg

Last on the bed is a Longshot rifle, which is essentially a reverse plunger gun with a direct plunger kit installed. There was a quite a bit of modification required to fit this kit and it's still a bit janky. It fires however, and I have bumped the spring by about 10kg and fitted a longer barrel made from 13mm ID Aluminium tube, taking it's fps from around 120 to closer to 180, but there is still a lot of work to do before I'm happy.

I have about 120 nerf guns in total, I have been collecting since I was about 12, and am now 31 so I still haven't grown up. They've just gotten gnarlier and more unpleasant.

It could be worse, I could be wasting my life on WOW I guess.
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Bikes: too many, too much for one man to maintain anyway.

[AldridgePrior]

Right. I've just read through that and have mixed thoughts on it.

One bit of me is wanting to be a dick and have a pop (excuse the pun) at the anorak approach to children's plastic toys. I mean, if someone said they had spent years modifying Super Soakers and they now could squirt more than his bath tap you`d maybe think along the same lines.
BUT, hey, I`m an ex soldier, like guns and shooting (from a .243 on deer to a .22 air rifle on rabbits as well as paper targets) so `kinda` get the gun thing. Don`t hunt now at all by the way. Anyway, your hobby requires no license and its an interest so fair enough plus its better than WoW or some other online sad fantasy shite.
The way I want to see it is if you could engineer one to shoot semi auto/fully auto at quadruple the muzzle velocity then we could be on to some kinda home defence.
For me it woud boil down to being able to do some kind of damage to an intruder or some prick in your shed stealing your tools. Probably better with a German Shepherd for that.

Is that your current objective?

[stinkwheel]

You may already be aware of this but can I just point out that if you make a pistol that fires a 1.5g (23 grain) projectile at 400fps, you have a muzzle energy of 8ft/lb. The legal limit is 6ft/lb for air pistols.

An 8ft/lb pistol would exceed the limit for an air weapon not declared as specially dangerous and since handguns are banned, it means it goes beyond being classed as a firearm and becomes a prohibited weapon. So you couldn't get a licence for one even if you wanted one.

As an air rifle, fine, you can go up to 12ft/lb. Just make sure it's not a pistol because the police have absolutely no sense of humour about that kind of thing and there is, as I recall, a mandatory 5 year sentence for posession of a prohibited weapon. It would be treated in law in exactly the same way as if you were in posession of a .45" handgun.

So minimum 30cm barrel, minimum overall length of 60cm. Some of those barrels are pretty short. You can't turn a pistol into a rifle by making it longer. If it was sold as a pistol, it stays a pistol.

Take care, especially if you are putting pictures and specs up on the internet. The police DO read this forum. You might wake up one morning to your door being kicked in. It happened to one forum member years ago for posting up videos of him arsing about on the Cat and Fiddle.
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“Rule one: Always stick around for one more drink. That's when things happen. That's when you find out everything you want to know.”
I did the 2010 Round Britain Rally on my 350 Bullet. 89 landmarks, 3 months, 9,500 miles.

[thx1138]

co-incidentally I'm watching a re-run of the Sweeny on my Tivo box, where kids are running around with converted "cowboy" guns.

[Sister Sledge]

Interesting but I suppose I could 3d print a blue housing around a hand gun..

As a child I was given a toy shotgun. It had metal rolled tin plate barrels and popped corks out of the ends. It worked using two tin plate pistons on springs within the barrels. I soon got bored. I then removed the springs and stretched them. Instead of corks in the ends of the barrels I would put fine gravel inside them. Now it fired proper shot 'just like dads guns'. My friends were not amused!
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CCM 404 DS

[lilredmachine]

[AldridgePrior]

[Easy-X]

I think firing a German Shepherd from a nerf gun would get you into trouble with the RSPCA...
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Husqvarna Vitpilen 401, Yamaha XSR700, Honda Rebel, Yamaha DT175, Suzuki SV650 (loan) Fazer 600, Keeway Superlight 125, 50cc turd scooter

[lilredmachine]

[stinkwheel]

If one were looking to own a potentially deadly weapon. You can just buy a 100lb draw compound bow and have it delivered to your house. That'll kill someone through a brick wall at 60 paces.

Blade head arrows are illegal but wouldn't be hard to make.

Accurate over several hundred yards. With practice, you could have fired 3 or 4 arrows before the first one hit the ground.

Being hit in the chest with a 2" broadhead would probably get a thiefs attention.
____________________
“Rule one: Always stick around for one more drink. That's when things happen. That's when you find out everything you want to know.”
I did the 2010 Round Britain Rally on my 350 Bullet. 89 landmarks, 3 months, 9,500 miles.

[AldridgePrior]

Well, now that we're all onside I have an old Compound Crossbow in the cupboard. 185lb draw and (apparently) 390 fps with the supplied bolts. I did make my own backstop consisting of an old living room carpet rolled up and placed in front of my shed. There was fuck all behind my garden so a stray wouldn't have been an issue.
Accuracy wasn't bad at 25 yards. Not exactly tight groups but good enough to hit what I was aiming at. One shot I did miss and it went straight through both sides of the shed and stuck in a tree so pretty impressive.

Stinkwheel you know your ballistics mate, what kinda muzzle energy would that be roughly in Ft lbs? Any idea? According to the spec its 390 fps with the supplied carbon bolts.

[stinkwheel]

[Sister Sledge]

Crossbows? We were playing with one that someone had brought to the farm. I fired it at one of those large wooden boxes that go onto tractor trailers when harvesting potatoes. The box was empty, the bolt went straight through it. That's when we stopped playing!
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CCM 404 DS

[Ayrton]

I work in one of those "modern" offices where everyone has a nerf gun and was thinking about 3D printing myself one of those caliburn rifles. I've bought a few official guns but they are incredibly boring since they don't shoot hard enough to do anything more than piss off someone trying to concentrate on work... I guess this would be too powerful?
We did send one guy to the hospital once though when he got shot in the eye

[lilredmachine]

[trevor saxe-coburg-gotha]

[lilredmachine]

https://youtu.be/M-AyW_8EAnQ

What the Kronos looks like smacking a can. Like I said, you'd feel it.

And pictured here with it's big brother, the Hades. These are on offer in the entertainer at the moment for 35 quid, which is really cheap considering a 50 pack of rival ammo is about 20 quid on it's own, and this comes with 60 and a massive hunk of plastic gun. they hit about 100fps stock. The Kronos is more like 85 stock.

https://i.postimg.cc/QChJHWD9/IMG-20191205-025047484.jpg

P.s the Hades is fucking massive. The Kronos is a hand cannon as it is, this picture doesn't really show it but the Hades is about 80cm long.
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Bikes: too many, too much for one man to maintain anyway.

[Ste]

Hmmmm, a modified nerf gun could be just what I need to defend myself in nerf gun wars.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F6a2M2dY3BA

[Polarbear]

I now want a crossbow. My air rifle is so passée, even the local rats laugh at it.
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Triumph Trophy Launch Edition

[andyscooter]

[wr6133]

[Jmoan]

[lilredmachine]

I'm bored and ill, so decided to sort out my modded Rival Apollo which had a flid about a month ago whilst I was shooting some mates with similarly modded guns.

The apollo is a rival springer which fires the ball type ammo. they hit 100fps stock, but this one is closer to 160fps due to a heavier spring, removed air restrictor -A/R for short- and boosted plunger seal which I suspected to be the cause. I also ballsed up when modding it and damaged the mount for the A/R which also has the job of stopping the gun from vacuum loading rounds back into the plunger itself. I picked up another spare as part of a package deal with two other, rarer rival blasters.

https://i.postimg.cc/QCdpx7DW/IMG-20191210-170451824.jpg

The modding communty has a love hate relationship with the Apollo, it makes big power and has a large plunger tube, with a handle mounted mag, but it's prime is janky and the hook on the top is extremely uncomfortable to prime with on higher spring loads. It primes through a gearbox to provide mechanical advantage but even like that it's a struggle with much more than an 18kg spring.

https://i.postimg.cc/8C1pJmFc/IMG-20191210-171135486.jpg

Inside, the modded one looks very much like the standard one, most of the changes are made within the plunger tube and the gearbox itself. All the mechanical locks are removed which prevent de-priming the blaster, repeat priming the blaster and multiple loading. This makes operation of the blaster smoother and also gives the ability to 'shotgun' the rounds, firing up to 3 with one trigger pull quite effectively.

https://i.postimg.cc/C16YByDL/IMG-20191210-171316525.jpg

The gearbox and plunger tube is a bolted together unit, which is a nightmare to separate as it also relies on delicate plastic clips. I have already been in this one and have no intention of opening the other one unless I absolutely have to.

https://i.postimg.cc/GhpdCxBx/IMG-20191210-171403469.jpg

With the plunger tube removed you can see the upgrade o-ring has herniated causing the o-ring to jam against the tube and the resulting lack of seal is what is stopping the blaster from firing properly.

https://i.postimg.cc/2SM06r0S/IMG-20191210-171431377.jpg

Quick check on the gearbox to see the teeth aren't experiencing excessive wear. Regreased with white lithium grease.

https://i.postimg.cc/XYCz9rGC/IMG-20191210-171445742.jpg

Found a new o-ring from the parts tray and it gets a shot of silicone lube. Just like in all types of air and firearms, even nerf guns appreciate correct maintenance and lubrication. Seals and gearboxes going dry is pretty much why all nerf guns fail in the end.

https://i.postimg.cc/DzDDG15L/IMG-20191210-172358385.jpg

Tearing into the stock gun and pulling the tube/gearbox assembly you can see the standard A/R in there. Essentially it's a small, spring loaded plate designed to stop children -or irresponsible adults- dry firing the gun, smashing the plunger head into the front of the tube and damaging it. Only problem with this system is that when looking for extra power it represents a major hindrance to the air flow coming out of the plunger tube and therefore lower FPS. And we don't want that. I failed to get a picture of it, but the present plunger tube has nothing in the front of it at all, after I slipped with the screwdriver and punched through the structure of the plunger tube nose when removing the orignal A/R. Taking more care this time, the tiny, cheese like screw is removed and the A/R simply falls out giving us a nice straight shot through the plunger tube.

https://i.postimg.cc/1zK9Gmfy/IMG-20191210-171950486.jpg

https://i.postimg.cc/sfkMm2Tr/IMG-20191210-172046531.jpg

https://i.postimg.cc/fRh0zbdK/IMG-20191210-172512162.jpg

When having a look at the stocker, I found something interesting. The gearbox has a metal rather than nylon gearset in it, whether this is a later or earlier model I don't know, but it is handy to know I have a metal spare should this one let go. It's also an indication of how much force even these stock nerf guns are under trying to propel this relatively heavy ammo at even 100fps.

https://i.postimg.cc/N0KD34rV/IMG-20191210-171901470.jpg

With all that done, it's time to button it up and test it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f_xeeTg5Syc

Oooooooh yeah. That's the stuff. Just as an aside, the creaking you can hear is the trigger struggling to release the spring load.

Now it works properly and I know it's good, I might splurge on the worker/F10555 3D printed kit that turns it into a pump action rifle style weapon.

https://i.postimg.cc/VLS6pZfn/44806300-253515911998581-4411398701924820605-n.jpg

A lot prettier, and easier to use.
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Bikes: too many, too much for one man to maintain anyway.

[lilredmachine]

[kramdra]

Which of these can I mount on my bike?