19 replies to this topic

[Daniel Beaver]

I've been working on a hopper clip design for the last month, and I've been meaning to showcase it on the Haven. I've experimented with it on a bunch of different blasters, and eventually got around to making a simple blowgun with an integrated clip. Trying it out resulted in an interesting side effect: since the next dart automatically slides into position, the blowgun will keep firing as long as you keep blowing.

The hopper clip is my own variation on Carbon's hopper clip, which uses a PVC wye instead of a Sanitary Tee. Carbon apparently abandoned his hopper clip due to reliability issues – this updated design rarely jams, and eliminates a lot of dead space.

Materials:

• Barrel -- I used 1.5" of sch80 PVC (the grey stuff). Your barrel material will depend on the darts you are using. You want the darts to slide through easily.
• Clip -- I used 1.5" of thinwall PVC. Regular sch40 should work just fine.
• PVC Endcap.
• 1/2" PVC wye. I bought this online. I've never seen them in stores.
• PVC mouthpiece. I used 2" of thinwall PVC. This isn't required, but makes it easier to use.

Assemble like so:



The grey piece is the barrel, and the angled piece is the clip. It operates like any other blowgun: blow into the mouthpiece and darts come out the barrel. It is easiest to fire a bunch of darts at once. I can fire two darts at once if I control my breath. With more practice I think it will work better. Ranges are about the same as a regular blowgun: I get about 50 ft out of it.

Video
In this video, I'm using different barrel material, and a shorter clip. I think it is a 10-shot clip I'm firing.

Edited by Daniel Beaver, 19 April 2011 - 10:53 AM.

[soccerbeast003]

This is pretty cool. Do you think that the clip might be too large/practical in a war with a nerf gun other than a blow gun due to the fact that its angled upwards?

[Carbon]

Pretty cool! The hopper used wider tubing, and allowed the darts to sit next to each other, not in a line. The linear arrangement is what made the inline clip usable, too. It's actually more like an RSCB with a bend in it than a hopper clip.

Nice use of the wye. The relaxed angle might actually make the full size hopper a bit more reliable. Hmmmm....

[Daniel Beaver]

This is pretty cool. Do you think that the clip might be too large/practical in a war with a nerf gun other than a blow gun due to the fact that its angled upwards?

I tested this on a Big Bad Bow, Big Blast, Mega Missle and a Bow N' Arrow before I got to this point, so you can definitely use it on regular primaries. The clip pictured here is very large (a 15-shot clip), but you can make them smaller and less awkward if you want.

Carbon: Yeah, its basically an RSCB all squished together. I think it combines a lot of the advantages of the RSCB clip and inline clips. Didn't you originally make an inline clip that had a 4-dart cross-section? I would be curious to see that design at Chano 3.

EDIT: I found the hi-cap inline clip I was thinking about. I wonder how well it would work as a clip for this?

Edited by Daniel Beaver, 08 September 2009 - 09:41 AM.

[TantumBull]

That would be cool to see what would happen if you hooked this up to something that had fairly limited flow (so you don't lose all your air at once) and a large reservoir of air. Maybe you could make a pretty effective automatic out of a set-up like that. Nice idea, looks like a lot of fun to mess around with.

[cheesypiza001]

It would also be cool to hook this up to a magstrike bladder. As Tantum said, it could be a very effective automatic.

Edited by cheesypiza001, 08 September 2009 - 03:14 PM.

[Nerf Bros]

I thought this might just be some noobish lameness... than I realized it was Beaver, and it was actually was cool.
I think the coolist thing to do with this is convert water guns that have been declared "un-nerf-convertible" like the MaxD 3000, into fully auto weapons. hmmmm...

[Bedhed117]

This thing is awsome! I got some supplies lying around and built one. It took like a minute and a half. Its pretty much like a longshot and a magstrike combo. You can shoot regular single shots like 45 feet or blow real hard and get magstike ranges.

[Zack the Mack]

So the darts curve around inside the wye... How long are your darts?

[Daniel Beaver]

So the darts curve around inside the wye... How long are your darts?

I use 1.3" darts. The inner section of the wye is large enough that they should fall in.

I think the coolist thing to do with this is convert water guns that have been declared "un-nerf-convertible" like the MaxD 3000, into fully auto weapons. hmmmm...

I didn't think of that - this may be a good application for converted Super Soakers, since some of them provide a more constant stream of air rather that a single "poof".

[Zorns Lemma]

What's the maximum angle (measured from the plane of the wye to the upward vertical) allowed for it to still pull the next dart in?

I imagine that it wouldn't work upside down (180 degrees), but if you have to keep it perfectly vertical (0 degrees) then it looks to be kind of awkward to use, what with almost like a giant fin in your face. I'd guess that gravity alone would be enough to feed darts up to maybe 80 degrees, and gravity plus airflow will enable it to work up to the horizontal, but will it work below horizontal (110 degrees or so)?

Also, provided I'm right and this still works around a 30 degree tilt, then you should rig two up in series with ball valves on each such that you can open one valve and close the other for a "fire-enabled" clip and a "reload this one" clip.

[dubcwill]

Thats pretty cool, do you think you could put a ball valve at the end with a tank to make it much more powerful?

By the way, the sm3k came in.

[Daniel Beaver]

Zorn: you can hold it close to horizontal and it will still fire. The shallower the angle, the slower it fires, since the darts will slide more slowly.

[Bedhed117]

then it looks to be kind of awkward to use, what with almost like a giant fin in your face.

I put an extension on my blow end so that there's some dead space, but its more comfortable.

[ilzot]

Very original. I like it.

I'm still confused on the dart falling from a 45 degree angle to horizontal, but it seems to work well.

Nice job Beaver.

[xtremejumpy]

ANF did this. He's still on suspension I think, but he did something different and what seemed to be more effective. He took a deodorant clip on SCH.80 PVC and they shot out faster than a magstrike. I would love to see that on a larger scale. his only took like, 7 or 8

Edited by xtremejumpy, 13 September 2009 - 09:51 PM.

[Daniel Beaver]

I used this yesterday at September MNNO '09, and it performed beyond my wildest expectations, netting me more kills than my +bow. I really encourage everyone to try this, as it is a very fun gun to use. Definitely practical in a war.

[SonReeceSonJensen]

I will in-face vouch for the effectiveness of this ‘blaster’. You can canvas an area in no-time at all AND you get +.02 outs-per-out cuz it is a friggin blow-gun: I’m pretty sure cave-men had these and no-one bitch’d about not having a +bow.

[OnyxZenith]

You know this can be very revolutionary to broken magstrikes, for magstrikes whose pistons have fail and could be singled, but instead of just a single barrel you can add this onto it then with left over room underneath you can add in ornet internals and make a marvelous magstrike with more RoF

[imaseoulman]

Actually I was already thinking of putting a working piston on one of these. I really wonder what the results would be. This is a much more compact size and several pistons could be in one blaster and we all know how much fun that could be. I'm ordering some of those wyes to try this out, but if anybody wants to try this first and post the results, I would be most interested.

Edited by imaseoulman, 24 September 2009 - 12:26 PM.