19 replies to this topic

[Blacksunshine]

I will write this in three sections. First we will look at the internal modifications of the blaster itself. The What makes it tick stuff.
Then we will move onto the barrel itself. I felt that the barrel should merit its own detailing since after all it can be applied to any coupled blaster.
Then finally a little on the paint and cosmetics.

So first off. We take your standard BBB.

Internally the BBB is a great blaster, large plunger tube good seal and plunger head and of course that strong spring. Now adding springs to the BBB can prove to be a pain in the ass and a let down on performance since its hard to shove a lot of interlacing metal in there. the nightfinder springs can kind of work but ehh..
So to get more oomph behind the plunger I replaced it with and industrial spring similar to the one used in the plus bow. I had to take large pliers and flare out the end that was to go against the rear of the plunger tube or it would slip thru the opening. This was very hard task to do by hand.


Of course this extra power behind the plunger head is going to require some reinforcement at the plunger head itself.
So a steel washer under the plastic one. And a little something at the head of the plunger to keep it on when vacuum loading darts. I apoligise for not having the sizes of these washers. I don't generally look at the size I just look at if it will fit and buy based on that. All of these can be found at your local ace or lowes. Ace is better if you just want one or two.

The front of the plunger head I shaved down and added some reinforcement



With all this extra beef hitting the front of the plunger tube that was obviously also going to require some beefing up. So lets move on to the PH.
Here I like to remove as much deadspace as possible. I also like to redirect the airflow directly to the rear of the barrel. So
to do so you must drill out the white plunger stop dead center and fill the exterior with something strong and airtight. Goop or hot glue works fine here.
The original barrel itself is of course chopped down. And fitted with a coupler.that has been bored out to allow the original barrel to center it.



Now for the dead space I have opted to use a small petg barrel about 2" long with a steel wire thru it attached to the hole drilled in the plunger stop. This extends thru the original barrel and to the center of the coupler.
*
(*I didn't get a good picture of it on this blaster so I am using an example from the solarflare BBB I made a while back.)

Now since there was going to be metal slamming into the front of the plunger tube I felt a little padding on the receiving end could be a good idea. So I took some handy thick craft foam that can be found at Joann's Fabric cut out a circle in the right size and super glued it in place.

Now to seal it all up and make sure that air continues to flow in the direction I want it I sealed the front of the plunger tube to the rear with a ring of Elmers rubber cement and then wrapped it all in some super 2" wide electrical tape.



That is our power delivery system.

Edited by Blacksunshine, 12 February 2009 - 07:02 AM.

[Blacksunshine]

Next we have our barrel assembly, the idea here is high rate of fire and ease of reload. So to keep the clean look of the blaster I decided on a sliding breech. I wanted to retain as much barrel lenght here and reduce deadspace between the plunger head and the rear of the dart. So this breech is the perfect setup for this.
The actual barrel is 9/16th brass. at the tip I have a bout 3/4" of 19/32 and around that a slightly shorter peice of 5/8" brass tube..

For the tip of the outter barrel here I have used a 1/2" PVC coupler with about 1 1/2" of 1/2" PVC in the rear of it and a 1/2" grey conduit butt connector. (these can be found in the electrical conduit section of lowes)

The brass tube assemble fits very snugly in this setup. Most likley it needs not adhesive to keep it in place but I use some of this.

And a few dabs of superglue.


Now for the rear of the breech I took about a 7" lenght of 1/2" PVC and decided on where I wanted the opening of the breech.


I used a dart to be sure there was going to be enough clearance to load. I used a piece of electrical tape as a guide so that the guidelines I drew would be straght and leave it looking clean.



With it all marked off and the tape pulled I took a dremmel to it and opened it up. Then slid a peice of 19/32" brass in and marked off where it needed to be cut.



Once the 19/32" was cut it could be lenght matched to the PVC outer barrel and cut down.


Once that was done it was time to glue it in place. To ensure that it was centered I used about one wrapping of electrical tape at 3 points down the length of the brass tube. I used some more of that loctite extreme glue to adhere it to the inside of the PVC similar to how you would use goop.
Once it was all dry the barrel was complete and functional. It worked exactly as it should. the only downside is it is particular of dart fit. With a well fit dart it was hitting 85' attached to this blaster.

[Blacksunshine]

Next we move onto the cosmetics of the blaster. As most people I don't care for the bow parts of it. So I don't attach them. I also don't care for the front sight. So when modding a BBB I will tend to hack that off before even opening the gun.
In hacking that off it leaves a nice little gap in the blaster. Another peeve. So I take a small piece of thin polycarbonate. Mark it off where it needs to be cut to line up with the hole and build a panel for it.
*
(*again I neglected to take a pic during this build but here is an example from a previous blaster)
After it seals and hardens up I use a dremel to shave it down on the side to line up better with the blaster.

Once all the panels and things are dried I start the paint off with a coat of black vinyl dye.
*
(*another recycled pic)
For this blaster after the black was laid out I drybrushed a layer of my own custom mix of dark silver over the whole blaster. Now the blaster will have very rough steel look. From there it is all a matter of laying the hand painting on.

I can't really explain how to do this part. With hand painting you really just need to practice. Use smooth strokes and don't try to lay on too much paint at once. A little really can go a long way.

With a lot of my blasters I like to apply my personal logo. To do this I take some Avery clear sticker label blanks and print my logo on them. I cut to fit and place as needed. I will usually supplement the original glue that comes on the label with some superglue. Be carefull not to get any on the face of the sticker.

The next steps will also ensure longevity of the sticker.
And that step is Sealing and gloss. But before you start spraying any kind of aerosols make sure you are wearing your mask.


Now first we take a bottle of this-


And spray evenly over the entire surface of the blaster. Make sure you hit every part visible.


Its most important to hit the parts that will expect wear such as the handle and moving parts.


Once you have hit the entire blaster with sealant let it dry overnight. You don't want to rush here. This is one of the most important parts because it determines how rugged the paint will be and how much abuse it will be able to take.

If you chose to have a glossy paint job you can then the next day take some of this -


Make sure to spray evenly and not to linger on any one spot. This stuff will thicken up real fast and run if you aren't careful.
On this blaster I opted not to put gloss on the part of the blaster that slid into the front section. The thickness of the gloss can tend to inhibit the moving parts of a blaster so you have to be careful with it

After the gloss is done drying it's time to put it all back together again.
And this is our end result.

Edited by Blacksunshine, 22 March 2013 - 06:39 PM.

[NerfGrassHopper]

1 word. Pimpin'!

[dizzyduck]

Very detailed and comprehensive write-up. I also love when people do writeups on their paint jobs. Well done.

[ninja mods]

thats pretty cool! i think i might do some of those to my bbb. did you have any ranges?

[xbox180]

thats pretty cool! i think i might do some of those to my bbb. did you have any ranges?

He said 85 feet in the article.

[Forsaken angel24]

Very nice my friend.
I see someone else is part of the brotherhood of Iron.

[VACC]

I see someone else is part of the brotherhood of Iron.

Your S&M facebook group is WAY more popular than mine!

Very cool BBB sunshine. It just makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside when people put a lot of time and care into guns that are really war practical.

[Blacksunshine]

Very nice my friend.
I see someone else is part of the brotherhood of Iron.

Yeah. I used to put in about 12-14hr a week at the gym. Then I got married. Now my 6pack has been upgraded to a keg.

I see someone else is part of the brotherhood of Iron.

Your S&M facebook group is WAY more popular than mine!

Very cool BBB sunshine. It just makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside when people put a lot of time and care into guns that are really war practical.

Haha Thanks Vacc I appreciate the complements from ya. With all my blasters my first goal is function. The way I see it if it doesn't perform then there's no point to taking the time to lay paint on it. Then its just a show queen. This comes from the way I see cars. I'm not down with the all show and no go.

And BTW the way to get more popularity on your facebook group is to offer cookies.

Edited by Blacksunshine, 13 February 2009 - 03:22 AM.

[sputnik]

Dude, this is fucking awesome.

Like, head exploding awesome.



How tight is the breech on your darts?

[popatachi]

Very nice! I just finished modding my BBB with a handyman spring #9713 nested with the BBB spring. Up next is to cut off the front sight and add some Plasti-struct there to cover the gap.

Edited by popatachi, 13 February 2009 - 08:09 PM.

[Drew is nerfing]

why not add another spring? mine has the stock spring, recon spring, and a nitefinder spring in it, and the ranges are incredibly over 110 feet flat! That is a crazy cool paintjob too, although I have to wonder why you cut off one of the sights.

[Merzlin]

Drew, he added a +bow (near) spring, which is near topnotch springs for guns like these. He cut off that site because it's completely useless and it looks cooler without (In my opinion)

[Dayko]

That is pure awesome! Excellent job, SunShine. I really like the breech set up.

[Homestarune]

Congratulations on this beautiful mod. I'm rather impressed with the paint job and the amount of time you must have spent working on this.

[boom]

[quote name='Blacksunshine' date='Feb 12 2009, 07:18 PM' post='211895']
[quote name='Forsaken_angel24' post='211751' date='Feb 12 2009, 10:01 AM']
Very nice my friend.
I see someone else is part of the brotherhood of Iron.
[/quote]
Yeah. I used to put in about 12-14hr a week at the gym. Then I got married. Now my 6pack has been upgraded to a keg.



Woot woot keg's are better.

[Draconis]

Woot woot keg's are better.

I know that you don't understand the reference, as in this case, kegs are certainly not better. And in the circumstances that kegs ARE better, you are six years to young to know.
Here's the lesson, though kids: Don't give up your outdoor and other athletic activities when you get married (or even just get older). It's substantially more difficult to resume later, both for physical reasons, and for relationship reasons.

[Muttonchops]

As an additional note for those daring individuals who wish to undertake this mod, the new (red) BBB has some substantial differences between it and the old purple bow.

The biggest three are:
1. Weaker spring. The red BBB has fewer coils in it but is composed of the same gauge wire
2. Stronger side catches. The red bow has thicker side catches with a 'slightly' stronger internal catch
3. Thicker spring post. This one not many people have noticed yet, as the new and old BBB springs both fit fine, but NF springs and anything similar rubs against the post and slows down plunger travel speed.

Yes, I know this is a necro, but I believe this is important information for anyone looking to reproduce this the blaster and the old red BBB topics have been closed.

[Blacksunshine]

Oooohhh

Edited by Blacksunshine, 03 April 2017 - 08:34 PM.