Love springfeeds, but hate reloading?

[GoatBoy]

This really belongs on the reverse-valved mag as the air line is kind of in my way, but didn't feel like taking that one apart.

Without this mod, typical spring feed reload time is 6-12 seconds for me.

The "critical section" (time when I can't shoot) is reduced to 1-2 seconds, making it comparable to a cram-n-jam. In fact until I release the follower with my off-hand, it is nearly the equivalent of a cram-n-jam.

Hilariously, it's faster than some "magfed" player reloads. Which is probably why it would be banned.

[going_home]

The difference being not having to turn the powerfeed plug, which makes it excruciatingly slow....

Can the Gearheadz/Empire spring feed be modified to that ?

[GoatBoy]

The difference being not having to turn the powerfeed plug, which makes it excruciatingly slow....

Can the Gearheadz/Empire spring feed be modified to that ?

Exactly, that's what blows up the reload from what should be 1-2 seconds to 6-12 seconds.

I don't know about Gearheads, but the BT SA-17 springfeed which I based this off of can be retrofit with this easily; you just have to be able to cut the slot(s) in the side of the body, and then replace the plug with my modified guts.

I just happened to draw up a new one because I wanted to get away from the glued rail eventually, but the specs are nearly identical.

[river031403]

Tare you going to start selling your products?

[GoatBoy]

Tare you going to start selling your products?

No... I've just been "releasing" them under an NC license. Like this one is already public on Onshape.

The deal is my stuff really won't work with other people's marker's as is -- I depend on a body/rail spec to lock things in place, and that spec is not a naturally occurring configuration. Not even the cocker threaded adapter, which dispenses with the TL pin.

If you happen to have a classic body with the feedneck cut off and a warp left feed port along with a wingless 1" wide RTP rail with a warp left notch cut, then all of this is "free". I can point you to the design files, you can go to 3dhubs or something and find a local printer to print stuff up for you. Hell maybe knownothingmags will print something up for you. (Still dreaming about that Peek cocker adapter...)

Otherwise there's little point in me selling you something you can't actually use. I'm not super interested in doing business in paintball anyways.

The real game is getting a run of real bodies and real rails. And that's totally out of my league.

[going_home]

The difference between the SA-17 and the Empire, theres about 9/16" on the BT and 5/16" on the Empire from the end to the main body.

I am interested in your invention because I may use the spring feed at a mag fed event last weekend of this month.

[GoatBoy]

The difference between the SA-17 and the Empire, theres about 9/16" on the BT and 5/16" on the Empire from the end to the main body.

I am interested in your invention because I may use the spring feed at a mag fed event last weekend of this month.

Answer hazy.

Step 1: switch to metric system

Need total length of body, depth of inset cut, and diameter of inset cut For the SA17 the inset diameter is 23mm for instance. Inset depth is 16mm, which looks like will be shorter for yours.

Timewise, might not make it for ur shindig...

[zondo]

The deal is my stuff really won't work with other people's marker's as is -- I depend on a body/rail spec to lock things in place, and that spec is not a naturally occurring configuration. Not even the cocker threaded adapter, which dispenses with the TL pin.

If you happen to have a classic body with the feedneck cut off and a warp left feed port along with a wingless 1" wide RTP rail with a warp left notch cut, then all of this is "free". I can point you to the design files, you can go to 3dhubs or something and find a local printer to print stuff up for you. Hell maybe knownothingmags will print something up for you. (Still dreaming about that Peek cocker adapter...)

Otherwise there's little point in me selling you something you can't actually use. I'm not super interested in doing business in paintball anyways.

The real game is getting a run of real bodies and real rails. And that's totally out of my league.

Your setup with the BT Rip clip... would that work with standard bodies and rail setups? I know you didn't make that stuff (picatinny rail and rip clip). would just have to epoxy a rail to the top and have the feedneck cut off?

[going_home]

This is amurica, we dont metric, thats only europe.

Inside the two are the same, as you can see they have the exact same powerfeed plug, and the ends are interchangeable as far as which end the feed goes in and which end the plug goes in.

I'll give up on doing your mod for the scenario but I'm still intrigued.

[GoatBoy]

Your setup with the BT Rip clip... would that work with standard bodies and rail setups? I know you didn't make that stuff (picatinny rail and rip clip). would just have to epoxy a rail to the top and have the feedneck cut off?

Yes, I was being my usual overly literal self when I referred to "my" parts -- specifically the body cowl thing that I've been doing.

The BT/Empire rail/Rip Clip stuff is... not mine. So yeah you can just glue the Trracer rail onto the body (the body OD is different so I sand it down) after cutting the feedneck off of the Classic body.

Eventually, I think the glue will fail, but you'll get some mileage out of it.

This is amurica, we dont metric, thats only europe.

Inside the two are the same, as you can see they have the exact same powerfeed plug, and the ends are interchangeable as far as which end the feed goes in and which end the plug goes in.

I'll give up on doing your mod for the scenario but I'm still intrigued.

I swear I'm going to move to a 3rd world country just for the metric system.

So here are the details. My design takes a LOT of shortcuts given how it's used and what's available to me, which is also why it's sometimes hard to translate my cheats to other setups.

The internals of my "stack" go like this:

1. Rotating plug -> screw lever to the outside
2. Big ol' rollerblade bearing because I have a bunch of them lying around
3. Badge holder torsion spring

All of that fits inside 16mm.

Major difference 1: In the normal Empire over-the-top springfeed adapter, the mechanism is going to be out of reach of your gun hand unless you have monster 9" fingers or something. And probably even worse for the abomination that is the Gearheadz version.

That's OK but it implies one thing: a locking mechanism.

Since everything is within reach in my setup, I ditched the locking mechanism and just use my finger as the lock.

Major difference 2: Also since cutting slots is "free" for me, I just cut the slot in the body, and the plug lever also acts as the retainer to keep the plug inside the housing.

So that one part (literally 1 screw) performs triple duty of lock + retainer + plug rotator.

Cutting slots is not "free" on the Empire feedneck, in fact it sucks hardcore, and worse yet, you need like 125-ish degrees of rotation to really divert the paint correctly I think.

I'm thinking we move rotation lever/mechanism from the top of the stack to the bottom of the stack, effectively as your end cap.

What remains is the specific design of the spring-loaded lock so you can rotate, dump, then unlock and it will automatically rotate back in place.

And if we stuff the torsion spring inside the new end cap, then all that's left is to drill a single retainer hole in the Empire housing.

That's kind of been my complaint of Empire, and everyone else for that matter -- nobody ever thinks of expansions or upgrades. Like I understand making the basic model that's as affordable as possible, but ... man, 1 hole, and you can come back and sell everyone the "expert reload" upgrade for exorbitant prices. THAT'S HOW YOU MAKE MONEY IN PAINTBALL.

OK I'm done.

[Laku]

this is amurica, we dont metric, thats only europe.

lol

[Nobody]

This is amurica, we dont metric, thats only europe.

Inside the two are the same, as you can see they have the exact same powerfeed plug, and the ends are interchangeable as far as which end the feed goes in and which end the plug goes in.

I'll give up on doing your mod for the scenario but I'm still intrigued.

On any automobile built from about 1985-ish on uses metric bolts.

So, unless you use an adjustable wrench. 10mm for the battery cables & 12mm socket for the battery holddown.

[zondo]

We use metric all the time in my job for calculations. Makes it much easier to do stuff in your head.

[captian pinky]

any chance you can post some pics of what you actually made. While i understand the point of the video is to show how fast you can load. I can't exactly see what you did.

[going_home]

On any automobile built from about 1985-ish on uses metric bolts.

So, unless you use an adjustable wrench. 10mm for the battery cables & 12mm socket for the battery holddown.

I have a mechanic for that stuff.