17 replies to this topic

[blister]

Sorry that I was a little delayed on writing this guide. It was all ready on Monday, and then my computer quit on me. So I was a little set back on re-doing it.

Anyway, let me start by saying that this is, in my own humble opinion, the COOLEST GUN EVER! The auto-rotation, the pump ON the barrel, the goofy color scheme, etc. Too bad that the Sm1k is very rare and fragile.

Edit: Pump only up to 3 times max!

Materials needed/recommended:

Hotglue gun w/ sticks
Sch 40 PVC / Sch80 PVC depending on FBR fatness
CPVC/Brass/PETG
Tubing Cutter
Dremel
Ruler
Lubricant
O-ring from a 2k pump (or another with similar dimensions)
My Highly Informative Guide on the SM1k Internals

Ok, here is the completed gun, which is not that different looking from a stock one.


Start by gently prying off the orange rings on the pump and fake barrel. After that, open her up. Be careful when doing this, as springs inside are likely to pop out and get lost forever. Take your time and hold the blaster by the red tank part. This will take pressure off of the spring resting on top of the turret, which will fly out, unless you do this. For more info, look at the internals guide.

Here are the over all internals of the gun, when everything is assembled.


After opening it up, start by plugging the over-pressure release valve in the pump. Load up the center with hot glue. Let that dry, and lube up the plunger.


If you have a Dremel, you should cut the trigger spring down to about 1.5". It will make it much easier to reassemble and operate the gun. A good picture of the cut spring is in my internals guide.

Now, on to improving the seal. For some reason the white piece sitting on top of the airtank which is supposed to provide a seal, was completely blocking the air, making it come out of the sides. I ripped off that piece and glued on an O-ring from a broken At2k pump. Perfect fit! Sorry I forgot to take a picture of this before I closed it up, but you get the idea. Hot glue down the o-ring over the airtank and let it dry. Here is a picture of the improved seal.


To improve the barrel fit, but still allow a working turret, I used Sch40 PVC to nest inside of the original fake barrel. Depending on the thickness of your specific FBR, it may be beneficial to use Sch80 PVC, which has a smaller inside diameter. The PVC is a near perfect fit inside the original barrel. You will need to gauge yourself on the length of PVC to use, because mine is already glued in. It should be approximately 10.5" to make a good partial seal with the turret and still be long enough to fit well in the other barrel.

or


From this point, the only thing left to do is rebarrel the turret. Now this part can be a little tricky. I used about 2" of Dremel'd CPVC in each barrel, and haven't looked back. The only problem is that the turret was too heavy for the auto-rotation mechs to continue working. After only a few trigger pulls, the end of the trigger snapped. I tried gluing it, re-melting it, and nothing held. The trigger was too hard to pull and was unreliable.

So if you are desperate to keep the auto-rotation, DO NOT USE CPVC or most likely, BRASS. You should use a lighter barrel material like PETG. Be warned that if you do use CPVC or brass, you will most likely end up needing to manually rotate the turret. This was fine for me, but I am just warning you.

If you happen to be using brass or PETG, you can skip the next few steps, but you will need to glue your barrels in.

Ok so, cut 6 lengths of CPVC to this height.


And Dremel out one end like so. Picture is blurry, but sand down until the walls are pretty thin.


Rinse and repeat 6 times until your turret is full. You don't need to hammer them in, just push firmly. No glue necessary, and you can take out the barrels in a moment's notice with needlenose pliers.



If you used CPVC, then take out the pieces that make it auto-rotate, and then follow my internals guide to put it back together.

I pump it mainly 3 times, 4 and the firing pin closes up again before all the air is out. Manually rotating the turret isn't too bad, I can squeeze off all 6 shots in under 20 seconds with 3 pumps. It also makes the gun more reliable. I can confidently say that I am getting ranges of 80' or more. Accuracy is dead on, mainly because of the excessively long barrel.

I measured in my street how long each graduated line on the rain gutter thingy next to the asphalt was. I used a yardstick and each was 20'. I am a short little asian kid, 5'5", and took 6 level (or as close as I could get) shots. Including dart skip, the ranges were between 100'-120' by counting how many lines it passed. I eyeballed where each hit the ground and the ranges were between 80'-90'. Before I replaced the Sch40 with Sch80, the ranges were probably around 70'-80'. If anyone disputes these ranges, I guess I could make a video, but it's not like I'm claiming consistent 100' shots.

My airtank busted from overpumping so I am no longer able to prove any claims. I would highly recommend pumping only up to 3 times, maybe even 2.5

As requested, here is a comparison of a 2k airtank and the sm1k one.


Here is a size comparison pic next to my 2nd favoritte gun of all time, my SM5k.

Edited by blister, 03 October 2007 - 11:51 PM.

[b00m13]

You have BOTH a 5K and a 1K....
My envy for you knows no bounds...

Edit: OMFG and a X-Bow in the background!!!

Edited by b00m13, 21 September 2007 - 08:20 AM.

[Shorty]

Wow, that thing is like a compact AirTech.

[All Star]

Awesome, just awesome! Are you getting good ranges, and accuracy?

Edited by All Star, 19 September 2007 - 08:06 PM.

[frost vectron]

It's a shame that you can't increase the barrel length on this baby somehow. I think there is some potential range to be had with longer barrels.

That is a beautiful gun. I'm glad you didn't go ape-shit gone wrong on it and hack it up. The gun is a lot bigger than I had imagined.

Edited by frost vectron, 19 September 2007 - 10:47 PM.

[bpso86]

To fix the firing pin pulling back too quickly, put hot glue around the spring that pulls it back. That'll allow you to pump it up four times. I had the same problem on my sm5k (and i believe others have as well).

Good write-up, I'm constantly on the lookout for these.

[blister]

Thanks for the compliments, guys.

b00m - Actually, I have two 5k's...lol.

To bpso - Thanks for the advice. I was planning on doing that, because you had mentioned it in one of my other threads, but it apparently slipped my mind.

To frost - Thanks, I am also glad that I didn't hack it up. And yes, there is substantial pressure and air volume. I was considering attempting to lengthen the barrels, but there would be no way to make a seal against the airtank. Also there's the problem of the pump. It's already semi-difficult to pump, and but is helped by the guiding barrel. Maybe if you got one....

[Retiate]

Instead of putting hotglue all over the spring, you could find a pen (I think a BIC pen would be too small) that has around the same diameter and replace it with that.

Cool mod, I had no idea this gun had so much potential, I was expecting more like 60'. How are people not using these in wars?

[blister]

Instead of putting hotglue all over the spring, you could find a pen (I think a BIC pen would be too small) that has around the same diameter and replace it with that.

Cool mod, I had no idea this gun had so much potential, I was expecting more like 60'. How are people not using these in wars?

Well the BIC pen mod only works for guns like SM/AT 1.5k, 2k, 3k, etc. because the trigger that holds the rubber membrane in place in the airtank is stronger. This means that the valve requires more force to open, and thee air sort of explodes out. The 5k/1k need the help of the mech that opens the valve faster, or else air would just leak out. I hope that made sense, but you kinda need to see how it works to really understand.

Addressing the issue of usage in wars, mainly because SM1ks are really rare and difficult to mod and put together.

[frost vectron]

Haha, send it over, man!

[blister]

Yeah, X-Boxes are really rare. I think you meant an X-bow? Heh. Nice mod, Blister. You might get better ranges if you used SCH80 in the barrel, it has a closer fit on micros.

Actually, that's a pretty good idea. I will try that and come back with results. The only downside is the contrast of dark grey and white on the barrel. The cool thing about the Sch40 was it still looked pretty stock.

Haha, send it over, man!

At a Bay Area war, you should check it out. I'm curious to see what better modders might be able to do with this gun. I'm also wondering why FA_24 hasn't posted a writeup for it yet. I know he has one from a topic on NHQ.

[blister]

Ok, more official ranges are in. I changed the Sch40 to Sch80 PVC, which has a smaller inside diameter. I also took pictures of the improved seal I made.

I measured in my street how long each graduated line on the rain gutter thingy next to the asphalt was. I used a yardstick and each was 20'. I am a short little asian kid, 5'5", and took 6 level (or as close as I could get) shots. Including dart skip, the ranges were between 100'-120' by counting how many lines it passed. I eyeballed where each hit the ground and the ranges were between 80'-90'. Before I replaced the Sch40 with Sch80, the ranges were probably around 70'-80'. If anyone disputes these ranges, I guess I could make a video, but it's not like I'm claiming consistent 100' shots.

As for adding nested brass in the PVC, I don't think it will work. The turret alignment is ever so slightly off center, so you need a little bit of margin.

I am now about to edit my first post to include the Sch80 and turret seal pictures.

Oh yea, and the topic from NHQ: http://www.nerfhq.co...hp?topic=4372.0 . It's more than a year old, so yea...

Edited by blister, 20 September 2007 - 01:21 PM.

[Forsaken angel24]

I just repaired it. At the time I opened it up I was not ready for it. I am sure I can handle it now.

[nerfturtle]

The size difference between the tanks is quite amazing, I thought the 2k was powerful! To extend the barrels, you could always ditch the auto-rotate mech and slap a 2k turret on there. Tne only other turret that I can think of that only needs support from the back would be the RF20 turret, but that would be just a little heavy and cumbersome. Buuuut.., you could attach the RF20 barrel advancer onto the trigger, and have it automatically advance. I really need to look at one of these things.

Edited by nerfturtle, 22 September 2007 - 04:36 PM.

[blister]

A quick warning:

DO NOT PUMP YOUR SM1k MORE THAN 3 TIMES. 3 is plenty, and your gun is less likely to break. The reason I am warning against this, is because the part holding the valve closed snapped, and now I need to open up the gun and epoxy it. SAVE YOURSELF THE TROUBLE AND PROTECT YOUR BLASTER. PUMP ONLY UP TO 3 TIMES!!!

The size difference between the tanks is quite amazing, I thought the 2k was powerful! To extend the barrels, you could always ditch the auto-rotate mech and slap a 2k turret on there. Tne only other turret that I can think of that only needs support from the back would be the RF20 turret, but that would be just a little heavy and cumbersome. Buuuut.., you could attach the RF20 barrel advancer onto the trigger, and have it automatically advance. I really need to look at one of these things.

I would do those things to get better ranges, but I really like the Sm1k for its style. Plus, you don't even need to use a ramrod to load the darts.

[blister]

If you are fortunate enough to acquire an Sm1k, but unfortunate enough to break the airtank, because you overpumped it, despair not! I managed to use a spare 2k airtank and make it fit into the space.



Crude, ugly, effective.

The picture is pretty self explanatory. Rip out the protruding pieces of plastic that held the original tank, goop some vinyl here and there. Glue the airtank down. Use Bic pen mod, and hot glue it.

If you can glue it well enough and keep a good seal, then this might actually improve ranges. The smaller airtank allows for greater pressure with the same number of pumps. The 2k airtank is also built better than the 1k.

No ranges yet, the goop is still curing.

This is why you must be VERY FREAKIN CAREFUL with your SM1k!!!!