16 replies to this topic

[AssassinNF]

Well, I'm sick and tired of the crappy performance I get out of my Mavs, so I'm going to try to make a Nite-Mav. Does anyone know if there is a write-up for them? I have all the materials, (NF plunger, Mav, epoxy) but I want to know the right way to do it before I F-up my NF and Mav. I'm completely broke, so I can't afford to mess up too many times.

If there isn't a write-up anywhere, I'll try to do it myself and I'll post a write-up if I'm successful, but I really don't know where to start.

[CaptainSlug]

I can't find a write-up anywhere but Falcon did post this image in the mod picture sticky and said it's incomplete (as stated in December though).

You might want to ask him directly. There's no write-up on his site about it either.

[AssassinNF]

Thanks!! Really, that picture was all I needed, now I can see where everything needs to go.

I will post a write-up when I'm done if I can get my digital camera working.

[Sage]

Just a note, Falcon's been working on that for a while with practically no success.

I know the picture looks like it's all done, but it hasn't worked properly properly, hence why it stays in his garage, alone and abandoned.

If you manage to get it to work, I'm sure he'd like to know

[AssassinNF]

I talked to Falcon. He says the reason why his didn't work is because it fired before the barrel rotated all the way, so if I move the piece of the NF trigger over a little, it should work.

I didn't think of that, and if it weren't for him, I'd have epoxyed the triggers together in the wrong place and had the same problem. Thanks again Falcon!

[pat 1st Lt]

I wish you luck with your endeavor to make one of my favorite sidearms.

The hardest part for me was getting the NF plunger to catch, since the catch spring would not stay in place.

The trigger problem was a one-time mistake: I made it too. All I did was carefully cut the triggers apart again (I didn't want to just snap them apart and risk breaking them), and experiment with different trigger placements.

Just make sure you don't over epoxy the triggers together, incase you have to re-place the trigger more than once.


If you get it completed, I'd suggest doing this mod to it, to increase reload times:
http://nerfhaven.com...272&hl=maverick

It's a good mod, to compliment a good gun.



Sincereley,
pat

[Falcon]

The hardest part for me was getting the NF plunger to catch, since the catch spring would not stay in place.

You're right. It won't stay in place if it's just pushing up against the top of the inside of the Mav's shell.

That's what all that sheet metal I epoxied in there is for. I dremeled out all the plastic that made the mav's original plunger system work, and replaced it with sheet metal tracks for the catch to slide it, among other things.

Basically, I rebuilt the inside of the shell for the NF plunger with sheet metal.

[pat 1st Lt]

The hardest part for me was getting the NF plunger to catch, since the catch spring would not stay in place.

You're right. It won't stay in place if it's just pushing up against the top of the inside of the Mav's shell.

That's what all that sheet metal I epoxied in there is for. I dremeled out all the plastic that made the mav's original plunger system work, and replaced it with sheet metal tracks for the catch to slide it, among other things.

Basically, I rebuilt the inside of the shell for the NF plunger with sheet metal.

Falcon,

I didn't use sheet metal (Nolan and I are very reluctant to use sheet metal, as we have no power tools, and it takes quite a long time to size, cut, sand, file, pollish, and install securely), but I did have to make little 'tracts' as you call them, out of strips of plastic I cut out of various other projects over the years, reinforced with some high-strength metal-wire (Very thin, fishing-wire like stuff wrapped around the plastic, and epoxied in place). To hold the plunger itself in place, I ran several small bolts through the casing itself, like the two screws in the NiteFinder casing.

Once I finalized the design on our Night-Mavs, combined with the removable clip system I linked in my previous post, our Nite-Mavs are our favorite side-arms: amazing ROF, decent accuracy, and ranges just short of a modded NF (We're consistantly getting around 63 feet! Out of a Maverick!).

Again, I hope your design works out with your Nite-Mav, or Mav-Finder, or whatever you decide to call it.


Sincereley,
Pat

[ompa]

I had serious issues with the seal between the plunger head and the turret. If you don't glue it in straight the first time, you're basically screwed. I managed to get the rotation and catch to somehow work, but the whole front-of-plunger-has-almost-no-seal-with-the turret issue doomed the gun. I've basically scraped the entire thing for parts now.

So just warning you, make sure you get that alignment right.

~ompa

[CaptainSlug]

I managed to get the rotation and catch to somehow work, but the whole front-of-plunger-has-almost-no-seal-with-the turret issue doomed the gun.

Even when stock the turret on the gun wiggles all over the place.
My updated end-clip modification seems to have fixed some of the more annoying interactions between the two parts. I took the turret completely apart after figuring out how to remove the end pieces and then I added a thread to the advancing mechanism. Then I used some washers, the removed axles spring, and a really long machine screw to reattach the turret without the front of the gun so that it rotates perfectly level with the mouth of the plunger.
Some kind of sealing around the plunger mouth might improve the configuration further. I'm going to experiment with some adhesive-backed felt to see if I can fix that problem without adding too much friction.

It's a very frustrating gun to say the least.

Edited by CaptainSlug, 05 April 2006 - 07:35 PM.

[pat 1st Lt]

I managed to get the rotation and catch to somehow work, but the whole front-of-plunger-has-almost-no-seal-with-the turret issue doomed the gun.

Even when stock the turret on the gun wiggles all over the place.
My updated end-clip modification seems to have fixed some of the more annoying interactions between the two parts. I took the turret completely apart after figuring out how to remove the end pieces and then I added a thread to the advancing mechanism. Then I used some washers, the removed axles spring, and a really long machine screw to reattach the turret without the front of the gun so that it rotates perfectly level with the mouth of the plunger.
Some kind of sealing around the plunger mouth might improve the configuration further. I'm going to experiment with some adhesive-backed felt to see if I can fix that problem without adding too much friction.

It's a very frustrating gun to say the least.

I've been very fond of your end-clip for the Maverick, and that machine screw fix seems to have worked very well.

Anyway, about the plunger seal, I find the LIGHTLY filing the holes on the back of the actual barrels enough to fit a very small o-ring in there has worked wonders.

It took two broken Mavs for me to figure out how to get the whole o-ring thing down, but it helped the performance a great deal. The hardest part is filing just enough to get the o-ring not to snag, but not too much, so that the o-ring is too far away.


I've always felt the Maverick is a gun wth a LOT of potential, it just has to be lovingly and carefully coaxed out of it. Like replacing the plunger, re-doing the plunger seal, putting reinforcement bolts throught the casing, modifying the hell out of the turret, and experimenting with different barrel materials.

But eventually, it's all payed off to give me my dream gun: a six shot revolver with insane ROF, pre-loadable interchangeable cylinders, and a range consistantly in the low to mid 60's. It's a helluva gun once you get it all down.


Sincereley,
Pat

[AssassinNF]

A small Progress update:

It's working so far, I've got the plunger in the case, I've almost got the plunger to catch successfully without it ripping itself apart, and I haven't had to rebuild the case.

The only things left to do to it is to get a good seal between the plunger and turret, and to get the trigger to work, but I find myself needing to make a few parts from scratch. What material should I use for this? (I don't have the resources or the tools to work with sheet metal) I need to extend the trigger catch a little, and I have to make a part to join the NF plunger tube with the stub of the Maverick tube I'm using to get a good seal.

[pat 1st Lt]

For the trigger, just get a small piece of excess plastic from the Mav parts you scrapped, and tape it to the trigger.

The, experiment with different trigger lengths by just untaping the plastic, and moving it to a slightly different position. The key to this horrible, several hour-long process is TINY movements in the trigger piece.

Once you find the right place for the extra scrap plastic piece, keep it EXACTLY where you had it, and add expoxy to keep it in place.

I'm not sure if that is what you meant by 'trigger catch'. I'm familiar with a trigger plate, and a plunger catch, but not a trigger catch. Sorry.

Pictures with circles and arrows and words on them could help a lot.

To span the gap, I took some vinyl tubing, cut it down the middle, as to make it a flat strip rather than a tube, and cut it to be the right length to wrap around the NF plunger casing/Mav plunger tube head.

Then, I expoxied it on to hold it there tightly, and then ran a bead of hot glue over it in an attempt to make it airtight.




Also, I find that LIGHTLY sanding the barrel holes in the back of the Mav turret until some very small O-Rings fit in there helps the seal a lot.


It takes a lot of LIGHT sanding and testing to find the depth that allows for the O-Rings to create a good seal, but not have them far enough back as to impede the turret movement.

Again, good luck in your endeavour to create, in my oppinion, the best Nerf sidearm to date.



Sincerely,
Pat

[AssassinNF]

I need to extend the Plunger catch (sorry about that) because I put it a little too high in the case. That allowed it to catch the plunger very well with minimal effort, but the trigger cannot reach it. I managed to fit the NF internals into the gun without cutting out alot of the case (most of it is still there) and I don't have any cut pieces big enough to use.

I can't get pics up, sorry.

I will post a write-up when I'm done IF I can get my digital camera working.

Stupid thing's still not working

[Pineapple]

Pictures with circles and arrows and words on them could help a lot.

Pat, please receive this with the utmost sincerity...

...but with an annual budget of 7 grand, can't your "clan" or "organization" or "council", or "squad" invest a couple hundred in a decent digital camera? Anyone there with a camera phone?

I don't doubt your work on the five BS-8 SCAR rifles, your Mega armor piercing Titan rifle, and the other hybrid creations like the Nite-Mav that you and the SF3G are doing. But some of your posts equate to a small manuscript, that often loses people in translation (it does for me sometimes, and I consider myself a fairly accomplished reader).

You know the saying "a picture is worth a thousand words"? I could imagine the amount of intellectual breadth you could open up by producing a couple pictures of your creations, that way it wouldn't have to be a back-and-forth banter of "this one?", "no, not that one" kind of dialogue. And...you wouldn't constantly be putting the burden of pictures on the "other guy".

Food for thought. Good luck on the Nite-mav, AssassinNF.



-Piney-

[AssassinNF]

Thank you, pineapple.

Pat, since you have developed a good way to make nite-mavs and you've made alot of them for the SF3G, you might want to consider making a write-up for them. It would show alot of people how to make their own and enjoy using what you call the best Nerf sidearm to date. Thanks for helping me so far, Pat and Falcon.

[pat 1st Lt]

Pictures with circles and arrows and words on them could help a lot.

Pat, please receive this with the utmost sincerity...

...but with an annual budget of 7 grand, can't your "clan" or "organization" or "council", or "squad" invest a couple hundred in a decent digital camera? Anyone there with a camera phone?

I don't doubt your work on the five BS-8 SCAR rifles, your Mega armor piercing Titan rifle, and the other hybrid creations like the Nite-Mav that you and the SF3G are doing. But some of your posts equate to a small manuscript, that often loses people in translation (it does for me sometimes, and I consider myself a fairly accomplished reader).

You know the saying "a picture is worth a thousand words"? I could imagine the amount of intellectual breadth you could open up by producing a couple pictures of your creations, that way it wouldn't have to be a back-and-forth banter of "this one?", "no, not that one" kind of dialogue. And...you wouldn't constantly be putting the burden of pictures on the "other guy".

Food for thought. Good luck on the Nite-mav, AssassinNF.



-Piney-

Piney,

Thank you for that sobering slap back into reality. I just realized how crazy I must sound: working on five BS-8's, Nite-Mavs when people have been working on this since the Mav came out, a 'Super Titan', a budget of 7,000 a year, a 'council' that vote's on things.

Thank you for letting me know how crazy I must look.

Also, thank you for believing me. That may have been sarcasm on your part, but, none the less, after letting me see how unbelievable I've made myself seem, but saying you believe me is truly inspirational. I, for one, salute our newly appointed Ambassador from the White Dog Armory.



Anyway, no, none of us have camera phones. None of us own digital cameras, and nowhere around here can get normal photos developed onto a disk of some kind.

And, mind you, $5000 of that goes to paintball, and $1000 goes to Airsoft.

The remaining $1000 is a 'reserve fund'. Nerf is considered a "reserve", since it's what we do when we're either unable to get to a paintball field, too lazy to break out all the equipment for airsoft, or simply out of money.


Nerf is sort of a fallback for us. We're not really competitive about it, but we always show up for local wars. occaisonally, we'll supply a local Birthday Party with a large amount of Nerf blasters for the day, but we're not real big on Nerf.


I however, love the modding aspect of Nerf. I'm the only one who mods. Nolan helps me out once in a while: he mostly works on the paintball stuff (fixing, tinkering, etc), but isn't afraid to dabble in the realm of Nerf on occaison.




So, I doubt we'll be getting a digital camera anytime soon, mostly because the other guys probably wouldn't care about 'proving' these guns to people they never have, and probably will, never meet.



Again, Piney, thanks for the belief. I liked the 'manuscript' refference. Sometimes I say too much: I'm sort of quiet, but once I start talking (or typing) I like to keep talking (or typing). And about the being hard to read: sorry. I try to use grammar, puncutation, spelling, and formatting to make them more readable. Please don't ban me.

EDIT: AssassinNF: I'll look into a write up. I cannot really say that I've developed a good way, since I've broken 6 Mavs out of 11 Mav's I've tried to mod that way.

I guess I'll look into a write-up. Though, write-up's without pictures are often thought of very poorly by the general Nerf community here. I suppose I'll give it a shot once my big Research Paper's over with, and I'm done with the other 3 BS-8's.




Sincereley,
Pat

Edited by {SF3G}pat 2nd Lt., 10 April 2006 - 08:05 PM.