STZman

There is an official Nerf dart box (available here) but it strikes me as a little unorganized, so I'm trying to work out making my own.

If you're not willing to spend $20 on darts per game, then chances are you go pick them up afterwards. Chances also include that they sometimes get stepped on. And even then, having darts in a clip for too long deforms them.

So I want my ammo box to help fight the squished-dart blaster-jamming problem.

So far my list of materials includes:
- cardboard
- 1/4" hardwood dowels

I first measured the dowel into roughly 2.5" sections, then I used a scroll saw to cut the dowel into multiple tiny pegs.
After that each dowel was sanded down on both sides with a belt sander.

Next up is cutting the cardboard to make a box. I used a laser cutter at my local hackerspace.
Attached here is a link to my .svg image.

Right now the box is just held to together with tape. I'm hoping to either epoxy or bondo the finished box and then paint it with some sort of rubberized truckbed liner. That said, the darts fit well, and I can already see that storing deformed darts with the dowels helps push them back to normal.

The cut template:


The grid to mount each peg in:


The box:




Also, I'm not quite sure where to put this thread. Is it a mod? ehh, not really. A home made blaster? eh, also not quite. It is discussing darts? I'm not sure.

Ah, drat. I was almost really excited to get to enter the 2013 modding contest. Alas, the rampage is apparently disallowed

Anyway, I hereby create this thread to catalog my less-than-awesome journey through Nerf Modding!

First, the idea:
I have a Nerf Rampage. I really like it too, works reliably, shoots well, and has gotten me through two HVZ games so far.
But I don't like the barrel. It screams 'useless' to me, what with the 1.5x dart diameter interior so the darts get no guidance, and childish rifling that twerks the darts all over if you shoot while turning.. Yeah, not a fan. So I decided to fix it, replace the barrel with something better.

I started out by purchasing some PETG tube that fit the elite darts more snugly. My thought was that I could ingeniusly interface this new tubing with the forward-orange-bulkhead-thingy and have the dart be accelerated the entire length of the barrel.



It. Uh. Didn't work. I was so disappointed that I didn't even take any pictures of me fumbling around trying to get the thing to shoot reliably.

Then I had the bright idea to cut the PETG tube into strips, and glue them where the original barrel went. That way I'd have a cool-er looking barrel and maybe even better functionality!

So I bought and set out with a Dremel and made some PETG spaghetti. The tube was hand carved into four roughly equal strips. The outside curve of each strip was sanded along with the sides.



Here you can see the strips lying above the blaster shell:



Then I installed the strips with hot glue:



And I detoured to remove the catch on the side-break:



The finished semi open barrel design looked alright, and worked reasonably well, but I wasn't quite happy with the blaster yet.

So I added some LEDs:







Oooo






Aaand that's a wrap for tonight. It's not perfect, I'm not super duper happy with it, but I think it worked out alright.
There are a bunch more images in the Imgur album if you care to look.

Till next time,
STZman - Strike Team Zebra