3 replies to this topic

[An unnamed cell]

Let me just open this by saying I know this is kind of a dumb and lazy question, but I have little experience with motors and am incredibly interested in this concept.

 

I was recently thinking about where to find motors in common appliances, when I suddenly remembered that pencil sharpeners have motors. I did some research on different kinds of sharpeners and potential motors, but got lost in Amazon pages and DIY Youtube videos. I would just take apart a pencil sharpener myself, but I only have one pencil sharpener that is in decent condition (no reason to waste a perfectly good appliance) and am incredibly impatient, so my options are limited. I did a quick search of the forums, but nothing came up.

 

I want to know is if anyone has taken apart any electric pencil sharpeners and how have they been used in modding?

Could it be easier/less expensive to obtain motors/other parts from pencil sharpeners/appliances?

 

I have no idea. Hopefully we will all learn something from this (unless it gets locked for being a lame topic).

Edited by An unnamed cell, 02 May 2017 - 06:56 PM.

[The2ndBluesBro]

I feel like you wouldn't really save any money considering MTB motors are already cheap enough and are specifically tuned for nerf. 

[Meaker VI]

Could it be easier/less expensive to obtain motors/other parts from pencil sharpeners/appliances?

Easier? No. For nerf, you'd need to basically custom build a system around the motors you found, and you'd either need to find a matched set or build a system that doesn't need one. An AEG-style blaster would do fine with a single motor, but the level of complexity required to build one would imply a cost not reliant on found parts.

Less expensive? Maybe. If you found/thrifted matched motors from something, you might get them cheaper than if you bought them from MTB. But the trick is in the finding: you'll probably spend weeks looking before finding something, and you're only saving $12 or so.

As is true in many things (not just Nerf, not just motors), if you are willing to trade time for cash you can usually acquire or build something for less than the cost of the thing. The analysis needs to be if your time, effort, and the end result will be worth the savings. In this case I really don't see it unless you're trying to build a custom monster - MTB motors could be bought with an hour or two of work at most (go mow someone's lawn for $10, now you can buy the motors) and are more than adequate for the task (more/less powerful motors will hurt performance: more powerful will just waste power because of the glass ceiling , less because why not just use stock?).

[Maniacal Coyote]

For the motor from a pencil sharpener, assuming it is DC (battery powered), you would have to build your own blaster around it.