12 replies to this topic

[kaiman299]

As most of you know, there has been many a dispute over the firing system of the RF20. Some people say air pressure is used to cock a spring-powered plunger. Others say the spring is used to meter and release compressed air. Which theory is right? To keep you on the edge of your seat, I won't tell you 'till another section of this article.

Examining the spring shaft.

I actually stumbelled upon this by accident while I was half-asleep, and just screwing around. I pumped the gun once, and pulled the trigger. Obiously, the gun didn't fire, and the piston didn't advance fully. So, I pushed the turret slowly in, and to my suprise, the spring didn't push anything forward! This showed me that the whole assembly is one big valve! To better explain this, here's a video:



Now take a look at these pictures:






Valve open





Valve closed

If you look closely, when the trigger is pulled, air pushes the whole tube forward, thus releasing the big black rubber thing's seal on the tube. Then the air is allowed to flow for a split second, untill the spring forces the tube backwards again, restoring the big black rubber thing's seal on the tube.

From this comes my conclusion:


The RF20 Operates on Air Power!

Thank you for your time, and if you have any questions/critiques, pleast tell me.

Edited by kaiman299, 09 May 2006 - 08:01 PM.

[joeyaglr444]

Is it me or did 99.9% of the world figure this out already in fact did you know that all nerfguns use air ?
whoa at 28 posts your doin pretty badly

[ompa]

Alright you idiot, he's describing the system by which it fires; spring or a release of compressed air from an airtank, like an AT2k.

~ompa

[kaiman299]

Is it me or did 99.9% of the world figure this out already in fact did you know that all nerfguns use air ?

Well that sure took a genius to figure out. Have you noticed that ALL guns also either use an airtank with a valve, or a spring powered plunger? Good for you . Although all nerf guns use air in one way or another, I specified THE METHOD of how the air is compressed and released. Usually if a gun uses a spring powered plunger, it is referred to as a spring gun. If it uses an airtank or bladder, it is referred to as an air gun.

If you're going to go off criticising everybody aboud crap, make sure you actually know what you're talking about, and try to make it constructive.

I know I basically repeated what Ompa said, but I went into more detail so thay you may have a chance to comprehend an extremely simple concept.

Edited by kaiman299, 09 May 2006 - 09:17 PM.

[Forsaken angel24]

For starters I am going to state that the Rf20 uses air to keep the parts moving. It is the parts that launch the dart. The clear shaft moves forward and then snaps back sliding over the plunger head inside of the clear shaft. This is very similar to the scout,warthog and crossfire. If the RF20 was airpowered like the LBB,Titan or the sm3k than a single barrelled Rapidfire would work.

I had a broken rapid fire with a turret that was permafucked. So I thought hey what the hell why not. I single barreled it and lets just say the result was weak. Real weak, like I would pull the trigger and the air would be all out of the chamber in a few seconds instead of right away.

To clear the confusion the RF20 is a spring gun that has been made full auto by using air pressure.

It is a fully automatic because of air pressure and it fires darts thanks to spring power. (Incase you thought the above was confusing.)

[davidbowie]

Forsaken, where did you attach the barrel? Was it right after the trigger valve, or was it using the output after the plunger? Attaching it after the plunger wouldn't really prove anything, but it would work a lot better.

You didn't have it set on semi-auto, did you?

My personal opinion is this: it uses compressed air, not a spring. I'm assuming you attached your single-barrel right after the trigger valve, because that's the only way it would appear to prove anything. I think that the trigger valve itself has very low flow, to prevent the ROF from getting too high. The plunger area allows the pressure to build before the spring is compressed far enough, and the firing valve is opened. The plunger might help a little bit in pushing the last bit of air out, but the bulk of the work is being done by the compressed air itself.

[Forsaken angel24]

I gutted the RF20's firing mechanisms and used the tubing that would supply the firing mechanism with air and test fired that. Just like it would If it had a firing mech, It let out all the air in a course of 3-5 seconds. It was not set on single fire.

How does an inflated rubber tube generate more air pressure in a small section at the front of the gun than the existing air pressure in the rubber tube itself?

I am starting to see the other side of this debate here.

Edited by Forsaken_angel24, 09 May 2006 - 10:47 PM.

[Carbon]

By my understanding of it, it's a matter of how quickly that pressure is allowed to escape.

The pressure, when allowed to vent through the valve supply hose, is pretty weak, due to a small ID. That hose supplies the firing chamber, where air pressure compresses the spring. The spring could be looked at as a trigger. When a certain amount of compression of the spring is achieved, a triggering point is reached, opening a large vent hole for all that accumulated pressure in the firing chamber. That pressure coming out of a small ID hose is rather low, but coming out all at once is much greater.

At least, that's my understanding of it. I sketched up a diagram of a full-auto SNAP some time ago that uses much the same principle. Maybe it'll even get built some day.

[The Inventor Guy]

Oh, for FUCK'S sake.

This is NOT new! No! It's... just... gah!!
It's stupid that you guys are only just figuring this out. The RAPIDFIRE 20 uses the compressed air to fire the dart, and not like a spring gun, but like an air gun ie AT2k, SplitFire etc.
Please read my posts
here
here
and here

I have experimented with the skeletal valve and naked system to prove this theory to myself and it is, in fact, correct.

BTW, most of you guys actually underestimate the flow and power of compressed air. It flows ALOT faster than what you think. I think you think it's slow because of what you have learned about spring guns (air restrictors and such). Compressed air (Rapid Fire 20's run at ~50psi) flows pretty quickly here. I thought alot of you guys actually knew this kind of stuff - it shocked me...

-Tidge.

Edited by The Inventor Guy, 10 May 2006 - 04:35 AM.

[ompa]

Most of us HERE knew, but I can pretty much garuntee that over 50% of NHQ didn't know, and that is where this was originally posted. Different target audience than the guys who have had experiances with the RF20 I guess.

~ompa

[Black Wrath]

Oh, for FUCK'S sake.

This is NOT new! No! It's... just... gah!!
It's stupid that you guys are only just figuring this out. The RAPIDFIRE 20 uses the compressed air to fire the dart, and not like a spring gun, but like an air gun ie AT2k, SplitFire etc.
Please read my posts
here
here
and here

I have experimented with the skeletal valve and naked system to prove this theory to myself and it is, in fact, correct.

BTW, most of you guys actually underestimate the flow and power of compressed air. It flows ALOT faster than what you think. I think you think it's slow because of what you have learned about spring guns (air restrictors and such). Compressed air (Rapid Fire 20's run at ~50psi) flows pretty quickly here. I thought alot of you guys actually knew this kind of stuff - it shocked me...

-Tidge.

Quit PMSing man, nobody cares.

The guy thought he'd share some information with us, and he was fine in doing that. Would you like a medal for being the "first" person to "figure this out"? I'm sure it'd calm you down some, wouldn't it?

On the internet you'll rarely get credit for things. I do however believe that you were not the first, so you needn't continue your gloating any further.

Also, calling us all stupid because we don't know how an automatic air gun's internal mechanisms work is just juvenile.

I'm shocked that you think that you needed to conduct yourself like that.

[davidbowie]

BTW, most of you guys actually underestimate the flow and power of compressed air. It flows ALOT faster than what you think. I think you think it's slow because of what you have learned about spring guns (air restrictors and such). Compressed air (Rapid Fire 20's run at ~50psi) flows pretty quickly here. I thought alot of you guys actually knew this kind of stuff - it shocked me...

Well, around here, compressed air flows at different speeds depending on the size of the smallest orifice it has to travel through. The trigger valve of the RF20 has fairly low flow, making it pretty bad as a main valve. It's got enough flow to fill up that secondary chamber fairly quickly, however, and the valve between that and the barrels has much higher flow, allowing the air to move a lot faster and fire the dart.

Let me put it this way: the same air supply is going to move at very different speeds when it's dumped through a 4" opening and a .35" opening.

[The Inventor Guy]

I'm shocked that you think that you needed to conduct yourself like that.

Yeah, you're right.
Ah well, it kinda just frustrated me. Sorry.
Edit: Reading your post again, I wasn't gloating that I was the first or whatever, blah blah, I didn't mean for it to sound like that at all. I was just saying that this has been around for a while and I have become accustomed to people knowing that kind of stuff, but maybe I was wrong... In fact, nowhere in my post did I say I was the first person to figure this out, and I KNOW I wasn't. And I wasn't calling everyone stupid, I meant the fact in general. Sorry for the ourburst as it may have seemed, but as I said, I was frustrated. That's all that needs to be said about it now. If you want to have a go at me, do it somehow else, but not in this thread.

davidbowie, I know and understand that, I was just saying I think alot of people underestimate the flow of air. Though you put it into much better terms than I did, but not exactly what I was trying to say. But you're the end of a leg*. :thumbsup:

-Tidge.

*legend

Edited by The Inventor Guy, 11 May 2006 - 06:11 AM.