electricity generating paintball gun

[zipity_Bop]

alright so e-mags run om mech and electric right. well i was sitting around and though could there be a way to generate electricity from every shot on paintball gun?
I'll try and be more clear lets say that you created like a turbine(IDK the word to use) that was internal and air was forced to pass through it.. is it possible to generate enough electricity to power a paintball gun with it? I'm looking for any input here so hypothetically you enter a paintball field with a dead batt..... you shoot a few times with mech and have a charge enough to turn on the board electric aspect and then in turn power your gun by playing.

[flyingpootang]

I think any type of turbine regen would'nt work because of mounting the intake duct without getting in the way of the paintball. I was thinking maybe winding a coil around the ram/bolt, so that every time you'ld fire it created a electro magnetic field that would charge the battery or charge a capaictor for the next shot. Or you can always mount solar pannels on top of your hopper

[Railgun]

The bottom line is that it takes energy to generate energy. By using some of the difference in pressure of the air to generate electricity you don't have as much PSI difference to push the paintball. So either you end up living with less velocity or you use more air to do the two jobs at the same time.

For the same reason pneumags will always be slightly less efficient than a straight mechanical release. It's due to using that tiny bit of air to do the triggering. You're using the air to do work that your finger would do otherwise.

[zipity_Bop]

I'm no expert scientist but doesn't the tank itself have stored kinetic energy? i mean it gets hot that means there a reaction going on from the metal expanding...... and this wouldn't make the gun less efficient, if anything(and I'm sure we could make this less of a problem) it would just slow recharge time to the valve making less cps.... the turbine doesn't have to be in the valve there are many places that this could be planted just think of it....

so to clarify what I was saying earlier the turbine would not be in the body of the gun. nor would it have to be in the valve.... im not to sure on it but there are may places air passes through on a paintball gun

[captian pinky]

dude just use the magnet threw the coil of wire thing and put the magnet on the bolt so every shot should be enough to click the noid if done correctly alot easier than a turbine

[zipity_Bop]

lol

alright

[Pneumagger]

Pinky may have been poking at this, but just magnetic induction. On the body of the paintball gun provide windings and install a powerful magnet core into the bolt (or permanently magnetize the bolt). When the bolt flies through the coil windings at high velocity it will generate current. You would have to use a diode of sorts to filter the positive and negative current generation into the proper storage devices during the forward and backward bolt motion, respectively. This is because the simple forward/backward motion of the bolt is an equal and opposite charge producing motion. I'm not an Electrical engineer so this sort of thing is beyond me though.

It's like a solenoid in reverse. The amount of current depends on the strength of the magnetic field, the number of coils, and their relative placement. Although, putting an oscillating magnetic bolt on an emag would wreak havoc on a hall sensor. But this would be a cool idea for normal electros.

Check this link ot that i pulled off google - a good visual of what I'm trying to explain:

http://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/electromag/java/faraday2/

[cyrus-the-virus]

Or you can spend $2 and buy a 9V battery.

Everything you guy's have been mentioning are both expensive and complicated, neither of which is a good thing to do to a paintball gun considering half of all paintballers are retarded.

[longi]

Yes it can be done, unfortunatley though it would increase the guns weight and size somewhat making it somewhat impractical. Most of all though it would be very expensive. Our current level of technology doesn't make electrically generating parts small or efficient enough, not unless your going use a peizo.

[Pneumagger]

Or you can spend $2 and buy a 9V battery.

Everything you guy's have been mentioning are both expensive and complicated, neither of which is a good thing to do to a paintball gun considering half of all paintballers are retarded.

[y0da900]

Magnetic induction: with the electrical draw on the system when the magnet moves through it, the magnet will encounter physical (magnetic) resistance, meaning that it needs more energy to get moving to the appropriate speed than the bolt by itself would with no magnetic field. This means you need more gas to move the bolt than normal, lowering your efficiency there. Try spinning an electric motor that is not plugged in (reasonably small). You can often times spin it freely. Now connect the leads that would typically supply electricity to something conductive (light bulb, themselves, bar of metal, etc...), and notice how much harder it becomes to spin.

Turbine: as the turbine spins, it will lower the airflow velocity and pressure of the air passing through it, again reducing the energy available to propel the ball or cycle the system than if it were not in place. Efficiency killer here too.

Either idea is feasible, neither is practical, and both reduce mechanical and pneumatic efficiency. Trying to harness the heat created in the system due to inefficiencies and friction will also result in a loss of efficiency. As gas cools, it becomes more dense. As a fluid becomes more dense, it needs more energy to move at the same velocity. So you would need to start off with more air than normal in that situation as well. Solar gains are about the only method that wouldn't hinder efficiency elsewhere.

[longi]

Yoda you took the words right out of my mouth! The turbine idea that is. Run a pneumag conversion tap off from the load side of the lpr into a turbine with a small dynamo, it then charges a small battery. The problem is storing enough current to power a board continuosly for an extended period. I disagree with the heat factor, your running a turbine spinning at 100,000 rpm like car turbo. All you want it to do is charge a battery enough to run a simple board. The real problem is going to be the power consumption of the board, it's going to be sucking power as quick as you can pull the trigger, so storing enough power quickly enough would be a real headache. We use some really efficient electronics at work in our fire alarm panels so i know it could be done. Another problem is the fact that there is no call for a super efficient board in the painball industry right now, 9 volt batteries are the order of the day for the forseable future, so are the cheaply made inefficient boards you find in today's markers no matter how expensive the marker is. The boards are rubbish. It's just laughable it really is! Anyway i digress! Unless someone is currently making a tiny turbo/dynamo/charger, it may remain a pipe dream. Nice idea though.

[y0da900]

The real problem is going to be the power consumption of the board, it's going to be sucking power as quick as you can pull the trigger, so storing enough power quickly enough would be a real headache.

The real problem is that there is no such thing as a free lunch. You take energy from the gun to charge a battery, it's that much more energy the gun needs to use per shot to achieve the same results (3 gram sphere moving 300fps). Could it work, yes. Would you just be trading batteries for more air fills, yes.

[zipity_Bop]

The real problem is that there is no such thing as a free lunch. You take energy from the gun to charge a battery, it's that much more energy the gun needs to use per shot to achieve the same results (3 gram sphere moving 300fps). Could it work, yes. Would you just be trading batteries for more air fills, yes.

yes but air is free batteries cost money and you need to charge

[y0da900]

yes but air is free batteries cost money and you need to charge

Air is not always free, there are still lots of places that charge per fill, or per all day fill. Hell, I have to drive at least half an hour (one way) to get anything besides CO2. If you started putting contraptions like these onto guns, you would go through so much more air than you do now, that it would either force an increase in price, or just stop being free. It isn't like we are talking a tiny amount of energy, there would be a drastic drop in efficiencies.