paintball gatlin gun .....NEED HELP!

[GA Devil]

Tippman did this years ago. Its mounted on the front of the hell hound and is run by a dewalt drill. Look into them. It does work. They just dont use it much with the lame excuse that its to hard to clean the vehicle.

[SlartyBartFast]

A quick way to build a quad-cannon:

4 Mags mounted on a common assembly with a solenoid for each Mag and one trigger.

The trigger has a circuit that determines TOTAL maximum ROF and alternates a trigger pull signal to each Mag.

Required components:
4 - Mags
4 - Solenoids
1 - Trigger Frame
1 - Mounting assembly
1 - Circuit board.

First three are easy to get, building the assembly might take some skill, and the circuit board could be quickly put together using a BASICStamp.

[Big'n slo]

Obviously a couple of guns tied together will work better/easier but lacks the intimidation factor of a gatling style gun.

So, I drew up a quick design for an mag valved, 8 barrel, gatling gun.





A little description:
The purple tube is your ball feed, it dumps into an 8 point "star" chamber with each point dumping into the chamber of a barrel. Centrifugal force would chamber the next ball after the valve resets.
The air supply would be a 4500psi SCBA (grey bottle) tank mounted in the middle of the barrels. It would spin with the assembly.
Each valve has a sear mounted via the grey plate, when the assembly spins a trigger activated ramp applies pressure to the bottom barrels sear just under the on/off pin. This will fire each barrel as it passes the bottom of the rotation.

[SlartyBartFast]

Originally posted by Big'n slo
Obviously a couple of guns tied together will work better/easier but lacks the intimidation factor of a gatling style gun.

So, I drew up a quick design for an mag valved, 8 barrel, gatling gun.

I don't disagree with the intimidation thing, and your quickie design is a neat approach.

But feeding the gattling gun at speeds exceeding what a single barreled paintball gun could shoot would be VERY difficult. I'm doubtful the centrifugal idea would be reliable. The Tippmann idea uses two feed systems, which effectively cuts the required feed rate on each to an acheivable 25 bps (considering their claimed 50bps).

I'd also mount the air tank so that the tank doesn't need to spin. A swivel joint could easily be used.

[Big'n slo]

Originally posted by SlartyBartFast

I'd also mount the air tank so that the tank doesn't need to spin. A swivel joint could easily be used.

Thought about a swivel joint but with the feed system as it is the only way in would be from the front.
As for the feed system itself, if the feed tube was force fed and kept the "star chamber" full the only factor would be the rotational speed of the assembly.

[SlartyBartFast]

Originally posted by Big'n slo
Thought about a swivel joint but with the feed system as it is the only way in would be from the front.

You'd need to have bearings front and rear anyways to support and spin th whole assembly. That actually complicates the use of the large diameter feed tube more than anything else.

But as you'd already have front and rear bearings, why not put the gas through a swivel joint in the front.

Originally posted by Big'n slo
As for the feed system itself, if the feed tube was force fed and kept the "star chamber" full the only factor would be the rotational speed of the assembly.

Still, disregarding the three big IFFs, your design problem is the same as the problem faced by current hopper designers. How do you get more than 20 bps from a hopper/feed system?


(IFF = If and Only If)

[Big'n slo]

You'd need to have bearings front and rear anyways to support and spin th whole assembly. That actually complicates the use of the large diameter feed tube more than anything else.

But as you'd already have front and rear bearings, why not put the gas through a swivel joint in the front.

True, a bearing in the front would be required, the rear would run on the gearing with idler gears to keep it steady. With that setup I would go with the swivel joint for air supply.

Still, disregarding the three big IFFs, your design problem is the same as the problem faced by current hopper designers. How do you get more than 20 bps from a hopper/feed system?


(IFF = If and Only If)

Your completely correct about the limits of feed systems. But the design isn't based on a continuous rate of fire. The larger the star chamber volume the longer a constant BPS could be held. Basically extended bursts. Then the feed system would resupply the paint reservoir.
I'd be happy to sustain 60 BPS for 20 seconds. (1200rnd reservoir)


The more we talk the more I'd like to build this

[SlartyBartFast]

Originally posted by Big'n slo
The larger the star chamber volume the longer a constant BPS could be held. Basically extended bursts. Then the feed system would resupply the paint reservoir.
I'd be happy to sustain 60 BPS for 20 seconds. (1200rnd reservoir)

The more we talk the more I'd like to build this

[Big'n slo]

SlartyBartFast,

After reading your last post it clicked, this thing would have to spin 7.5 times in a second to reach 60bps
It had better be perfectly centered at 450rpm or barrels would be flying everywhere

Thats why I figured center feeding this beast and letting centrifugal force load would be the fastest loading style with no timing involved.





A contest would be great!!
And a couple of those classic valves would help too...

[SlartyBartFast]

Guessing values, calculation of cetripital force on a paintball at 450 rpm in a 4 in radius device would be on the order of 2lb. to which you have to add all the cetripital force being applied by all the other paintballs that are stacked up.

Seems you'd risk juicing those paintballs.

[Spleen]

Seems you'd risk juicing those paintballs.

But that is just a risk you gotta take. Either way, if it turned out IT WOULD BE BAD ***, and if it didnt, atleast you have something to work from when you make the next one.

[NoFearPaintballer]

Big'n slo wut program did you use for those digital pix and how and where can i get it is it free?

[Hephaestus]

ramenjames,

Glad to see someone start the ball rolling on another concept gun! Rereading your first thread. Are you thinking about using a revolving breech using one bolt? Very tempting concept! Got my gears turning on this one!


Big'n slo,

Nice drawings!

Here are some of my thoughts......

- A 3 barrel minigun is very possible to make.

- Use a cam to set the load and fireing timing sequence on the sear.

- Feed the balls from the outside and use a warp drive.

- Use a shroud to keep the balls in the chamber.

- The frame to hold the 3 bodies together is quite simple actually. Imagine 3 classic bodies tied together with the front frame mounting screw on to a donut type ring.

- Plum hardlines to meet a rotating swivel point using a quick disconnect.


Just some of my crazy sleepy ideas.
Hope someone pulls this one off.

Heph.

[Big'n slo]

NoFearPaintballer,

Those drawings are designed and rendered from AutoCad 2004. Sorry its not free, there are some limited demo versions floating about on the internet though.


Hep,
Figured you'd make your way in here
I figure with a center feed design you bypass the need for timing and increase BPS.
I've got a mock up of the "star chamber" almost ready to test, unfortunately I'm leaving in the morning for vacation

When I get back hopefully I can test my loading design.

[sinistershame]

ok I hafta throw in my two cents

Lets take the miser approach.
1. We want to intimidate the opponent.
2. We want to be accurate.
3. We want to shoot fast.
Here is what I did:
What I built is a relatively mean looking rotating barrel system that truly only fires from one center barrel. This way we achieve all of our goals with the minimum technical difficulty. The great thing is that you could use very light materials for the rotating barrels thus cutting down on your overall weight and keeping the necessary torque, needed to rotate the contraption, low as well. I was wondering if you have decided to rotate this thing with pneumatic force or electrical force. That is beside the point.
I used a RC racing motor with the standard rechargeable battery. The motor would run the rotation via a gear system. In any case the simplicity is that you have three alignment discs each with a hole for how ever many barrels you would like plus one in the middle. You would simply slide the marker into the middle hole, use an attachment suited for which ever marker you have in mind. The hardest thing here was mating the rotating sleeves with a stabilizing plate to serve as a mount for the motor and a mount for the marker. I had to pick the brain of some one a little more mechanically inclined than myself. I was told to use a bearing sleeve. This I welded the base plate to the inner ring of the bearings and the rotating inner discs to the outer ring. Do the same thing for the other two retaining discs. That will also reduce your friction on the barrel of the gun you slide into the middle hole. I hope this makes sense. An Automag or Mnimag is what I used it was real easy to screw the attaching base plate using the ASA screw. By the way the battery pack can be placed a little to the back of the marker to compensate for the weight. Yes it was portable, yes I did carry it (with a shoulder strap) but it looked mean as hell. I would use a full auto marker today. When I built this machine we didn't have electros and the Mag was the meanest thing on the market