AGD future upgrades

[Virem]

So what do you guys think are we ever going to see anymore innovations/future upgrades from AGD? or is everything new thats automag related going to be made 2nd hand?

[Chronobreak]

i wouldnt expect much or anything major from agd.

i would expect more from 2nd and third parties

[Bad_Dog]

I expect to see some neat stuff that goes along with RogueFactor's products.... after all he never did explain why he had a slot cut into the underside of the back on one of his rails ;)

[smegle5]

i can see a lighter level ten bolt, and or a emag frame with the y grip setup
( i can hope cant i)

[Chronobreak]

smeagle-a lighter bolt wouldnt hurt

a e-y-grip would be AWESOME

ur sig is a tad too big

[WenULiVeUdiE]

It's already been proved by The Electrician that a lighter bolt wouldnt help efficency (if thats what you're getting at)

I think the majority of parts will come for 2nd and 3rd parties. Look at Bob Long. What uypgrades do they put out? Compare that to 2nd and 3rd parties.
If AGD came out with the CO2 kit for the X-Valve, they would do better in the scenario market.

[peewee]

Never count out AGD... I'd love to see a hybrid blind bolt made for mags. :headbang:

[NewMagMan21]

Personally I think AGD is pretty much done... except for a couple of parts. But also People like Rogue will probably make the best mags in the near future.

[smegle5]

no i want a lighter bolt for less kik and coolness facter

[Echo419]

NewMagMAn What do you mean make the best mags... Mags = Xvalve and level 10 bolt... thats the best mag, everything else is personal preference... If rouge every comes out with a Valve that owns the X, then he might MAKE the best mag, but until then AGD is what makes Rouge stand

[NewMagMan21]

Excuse me for being so dumb :eek: !!!
My bad for that when I say mag I mean everything including X valve - bolt - body - grip etc. But what Im saying is that 2nd parties are making the best Mags as but in your terms Best mag accesories.

[Miscue]

I was thinking - it would be cool to have a new Intelliframe that is EASILY converted to an electro frame. It would be neat if you could buy your RT-Pro - and maybe $100 worth of parts to make it electro.

The way the Intelliframe has a switch that the trigger can actuate like for Intellifeed... something like that could be used.

Plus some way to make it mechanically very simple to shoot the marker that makes it easy to add a solenoid. Like... if there was a way to mechanically shoot the gun with something like those old mechanical remote cables that plug into cameras to take a picture.

Also - There's no rule I know of that says the board/solenoid has to be inside the marker. Could make an external black box of some kind.

And... imagine if there was an "NPPL" black box type deal that plugs into the marker, and you had to use theirs? Your trigger has to be wired to it.

[Scott Hudnall]

I am right on target with your thinking, Miscue......

personally, I would love to see some frames produced where you could easily "bolt on" the various boards, have the spot for the solenoid ready to go, and have an e-grip for any mag out there.

Once the frame is produced, the rest should be pretty easy to assemble......my goodness.....could even come in a "kit".

[Miscue]

I am right on target with your thinking, Miscue......

personally, I would love to see some frames produced where you could easily "bolt on" the various boards, have the spot for the solenoid ready to go, and have an e-grip for any mag out there.

Once the frame is produced, the rest should be pretty easy to assemble......my goodness.....could even come in a "kit".

A kit that a 3rd party could easily make. AGD technically is not making an electronic marker.

[Virem]

The biggest problem with electronic automags is how expensive they are... Why does a devilmag frame cost 450 dollars to bolt on? and an entire b2k5 cost 500? why does an entire devilmag cost 900 and a Z timmy 700? would anyone say a devilmag preforms better then a Z timmy?

And i personaly dont think AGD is going to be doing anything that involves upgrades or new guns...

i wish someone from AGD would actualy let us know what the deal is going to be.

[White Wolf]

Virem the answer to that question is Volume. ICD sell more bushmasters in a week then AGD sells mags in a year. The numbers go up even further when your talkign about timmys, angels and Eblades.

To get a mag frame at a non reaming price you need to get into 1000+ quantities and to do that it would mean that you would need huge adoption rates that just won't happen. To make the Cocker frames worthwhile you can get by with a very low percentage since there are so many of the damn things.

[Virem]

What about a cheaper board in them? I dont see the point in a 350 dollar board with unlimited rate of fire, 3 diffrent types of eyes, 345376 programable firing modes, blinking lights, and a garage door opener. What about something that has semi auto and shoots 15 bps... not something bad, just cheaper.. people would buy that

[White Wolf]

again the problem is volume... but boards on the manufacturing level are probly the cheapest part of the design. So going from a board that cost $6 to make to one that costs $5.79 is not gonna make much difference.

[Virem]

So how does a 130 dollar rogue frame (which is what they start as now) get to a 450 dollar devilmag frame? I just dont get whats costing so much.

[shatter_storm]

And you have to think about R&D. A company can't just blow a twenty thousand dollars on doing up a design and then turn around and sell their product for $100.

CNC time is expensive, tooling for a line-fabbed part is expensive, making a board is expensive, hiring (or paying salary) for an engineer to work out the details is expensive.

The only way we're going to get cheap electronic frames is if some enterprising individual buys a bunch of spyder sear-tripper gripframes and modifies them to work on a 'mag. Even then, the markup applied won't make anyone rich and the frame won't take off in the "market" because there's no easy way to implement the stuff electro frames need - like eyes and board upgrades.
Eyes require millwork and routing the wires, board upgrades require another board... even the t-board costs money.

Figure ESP frames at $80 apiece, T-boards at $50 (you work out a dealer price or bulk buy). Labor at $50/hr. Say it takes half an hour to mod a frame to fit a mag - including modding the body so that the breakbeam eyes will fit.
Without making any profit on the parts and just charging labor, you're looking at a $155 e-grip for a 'mag - that's without making a darn thing, just using bolt-on parts. No sane human will put all that together for that cheap, so say $200 and he turns a little bit of a profit, assuming he already owns the machines he's using. He'll sell at best 200 of the frames, spend 100 hours working on them, and turn a $9000 profit.

Any AO machinists want to start offering this service? :)

[shatter_storm]

So how does a 130 dollar rogue frame (which is what they start as now) get to a 450 dollar devilmag frame? I just dont get whats costing so much.

A 130 dollar rogue frame plus a 160 dollar (retail) predator morlock plus a 50 dollar solenoid plus mounting brackets and whatever mumbo jumbo he's using to get the solenoid and sear to play along means Devil's only making $110 or less off each frame. Time counts, you know.

[Virem]

I am not saying the devilmag frame isnt worth 450 dollars, or that its easy to do, or that its not time consuming, or i could do it (which i couldnt) I'm just saying that if everyone wants electronic markers, and electronic mags are going to cost 900 dollars, they arnt going to sell.

[Virem]

A 130 dollar rogue frame plus a 160 dollar (retail) predator morlock plus a 50 dollar solenoid plus mounting brackets and whatever mumbo jumbo he's using to get the solenoid and sear to play along means Devil's only making $110 or less off each frame. Time counts, you know.

And thats why i sugjested using a cheaper board.

[White Wolf]

and thus the fact that AGD discontinued all there electro's.

[Virem]

OK so, because AGD doesnt sell a lot of guns, they cant have cheap electros. But because AGD doesnt have cheap electros, they dont sell a lot of guns. Whats the solution?

[White Wolf]

advertising, marketing, hype, lying, paying cheaters to use your products.........

[MindJob]

advertising, marketing, hype, lying, paying cheaters to use your products.........

You hit the nail right on the head.

I think a creative aproach to marketing is what is needed here. It also wouldnt hurt to have something new to sell.

[Virem]

I think its low end guns.... an automag, stock with lvl 10 of coarse, a one piece body/rail/vert asa design and some sort of matching aluminum trigger frame, for less then 200 dollars. If the young people like how they look and its an alternative to a spyder it would sell.

[tyrion2323]

So what do you guys think are we ever going to see anymore innovations/future upgrades from AGD? or is everything new thats automag related going to be made 2nd hand?

Don't hold your breath for AGD. They can't seem to get a clue.

Look to Rogue and Logic.


advertising, marketing, hype, lying, paying cheaters to use your products.........
Pfaw. I thought this was a no whining zone.

AGD messed themselves up for too many reasons to type.

[Scott Hudnall]

I would like to hear from someone in PTP to hear what it would cost them to put together an e-frame "kit", and what it might retail for.

[shatter_storm]

I think its low end guns.... an automag, stock with lvl 10 of coarse, a one piece body/rail/vert asa design and some sort of matching aluminum trigger frame, for less then 200 dollars. If the young people like how they look and its an alternative to a spyder it would sell.


And there's the problem. You can't make the 'mag valves at a low-end cost... you probably can't make the LX kits at low-end cost either.
Both require very tight tolerances to function properly, and tight tolerances cost money. I'm willing to bet that AGD could have an upgraded RT-pro manufactured in large quantities to slightly drop the price, but it would still be a $300 marker that requires HPA. That alone stops most budget ballers from using a 'mag.
They can't really cheapen the design any more unless they do larger quantities. There's nothing to simplify, really. A one-piece body/rail/ASA would probably be more expensive than the two-piece design used today... just look at the xmags. It's a pain to carve all that crap into one block of aluminum, and the more operations you do on one piece the higher chances of it getting screwed up and having to toss the whole thing.

Plus, we wouldn't want the young people who buy walmart markers to have to tune a LX system. There's *four* things to adjust to get it working properly, most people can't even manage one or two adjustments. I believe that was one of the reasons TK didn't want to pick up the DW hAir design - there were something like six adjustment points, and that's way too much for anyone but advanced techs to figure out. Look at autocockers, they've got nine adjustment points if they're mechanial - and you wonder why they "break" and people get stumped by them?

[mag88888]

could AGD make a knock off type of mag? i dont know, they wouldve done it by now.

[JoshK]

I think its low end guns.... an automag, stock with lvl 10 of coarse, a one piece body/rail/vert asa design and some sort of matching aluminum trigger frame, for less then 200 dollars. If the young people like how they look and its an alternative to a spyder it would sell.


I still dont think that would help. I know atleast when I started paintballing and was looking to buy a gun, I picked the gun that my friends said was reliable, isnt hard to work on, and is very upgradable. I didnt actually look at the facts, I just believed what they said. That is what I believe is hype, and thats all that begginers want (alot of "tourny players" also). No offence, but I dont see mags having hype unless they are advertised, and are CHEAP. The reason why companies like Kingman sell so many is because all the begginers being poor teens with no job, or parents that dont feel like spending $300 on "the best gun ever". The need to make a classic type of mag, that is just ok looking, can be used for woodsball (that means mellow colors). It needs to be below $100. Then you need to advertise the heck out of it! Put it in AGP, get it onto fields are rentals.

That is what I believe needs to be done.

[MisterBones25]

level 10 is probably a bad idea for a low end mag. anybody looking to get a low end mag will most likely not know how, or not want to have to tune it, as a feild rental. level 10 would also be a pain in the butt to go through 25 or more mags and make sure they all work at the end of the day. agd would probably want to go back to something like a modified level 7, but make it level 10 compatible to keep a nice upgrade path. also, the people buying these low end mags will not want to spend the money on a compressed air tank, so this means agd will have to design a new valve that will accept co2. basicly, they would have to go back to the classic, aluminum or steel, whatever is cheeper. make the body threaded, vert feed, throw on a plastic 2x trigger frame, and keep it all under $200. i dont think its posible, but i would like to see it happen.

[Virem]

I think its possible, it wont happen, but its possible... i didnt want them to have xvalves, i wanted them to be classic valves... It has to have level 10 to get rid of the stigma of mags chopping. lvl 10s with the CD they come with now are easy enough for a 10 year old to understand.

[White Wolf]

production cost on a x valve is nearly the same as making a classic so there is no money savings to be had there.

[MisterBones25]

virem, if you think a 10 year old kid could tune a level 10, send me your mag and ill have one of the 12 year old kids across the street from me tune yours and we will see if its posible ;) . im not saying use level 7, but maby redesign the bolt so it doesnt nick the ball in the stack. spyders and piranas dont have level 10 and they chop, but nobody calls them a paint blender, mags could be the same way.
wolfe, i ment that agd would have to design a valve that would run on co2, if they could make the X run on co2 it would be perfect for a "low end" mag. im sure all agd valves cost about the same to make, its the co2 factor that would or wouldnt sell.
the only way to maby bring down the price of mags would be, unfortunatly, plastic parts. a trigger frame and maby a body and rail. i dont know if this would even work with agd's tight tollerances but it might be worth a look.

[White Wolf]

I could not agree more on the c02 compatability issue. I have been trying for a while to get the "co2 on-off" released by AGD as i think it would be a huge plus for Tac sales and for more entry level RT pro buyers to keep the entry cost below 350$