Magfed Minimag

[GoatBoy]

This is really what I was hoping for: someone should mill a one-peice rail/magwell/trigger assembly (one that would accept standard M16 grips, like the old Nelson pumps from 20+ years ago). For $350 a piece, should be doable and would probably be sturdier, although his build seems to be strong. As I keep dreaming of it, I might still order a modified kit from him as I've always dreamed about a Mag-fed Mag. :)

No need to mill it if you can just 3d print it (laser sintered nylon). Prices have dropped a lot for that service...





So anyways, complexity is a Hell of a thing.

As it turns out, the big $100+ blimp on top of the gun is actually a pretty complicated device. It's got custom molded funny looking private parts, motors, gears, sensors, microcontrollers, batteries, etc.

It's just that the manufacturers have absorbed the blimpy complexities so all you have to do is cough up the scratch.

And speaking of complexity...

The current Automag pump mechanism interacts directly with the bolt, which in general is kind of cheesy. "All things should be made as simple as possible -- but no simpler."

Instead, it should have interacted with the sear, in which case the whole thing again becomes a rail affair. It's pretty much the equivalent of a bolt carrier/delay mechanism in real firearms. Pump rod can be moved to not interfere with bottom-feed. And hey, as it turns out if you really wanted a nice bottom-feed gun, you have to mod the rail anyways. The extra meat necessary for the magwell could even be integrated with the pump rod guide.

Of course, it requires someone else to suck all that complexity (like, 2 rods and 2 springs, plus pump rod) up into a rail unit, just like someone did with the blimps.

[Nobody]

Fn303 mags are easy to get, if you know the right people. Too bad i have no desire for a FN303

[mpsd]

No need to mill it if you can just 3d print it (laser sintered nylon). Prices have dropped a lot for that service...





So anyways, complexity is a Hell of a thing.

As it turns out, the big $100+ blimp on top of the gun is actually a pretty complicated device. It's got custom molded funny looking private parts, motors, gears, sensors, microcontrollers, batteries, etc.

It's just that the manufacturers have absorbed the blimpy complexities so all you have to do is cough up the scratch.

And speaking of complexity...

The current Automag pump mechanism interacts directly with the bolt, which in general is kind of cheesy. "All things should be made as simple as possible -- but no simpler."

Instead, it should have interacted with the sear, in which case the whole thing again becomes a rail affair. It's pretty much the equivalent of a bolt carrier/delay mechanism in real firearms. Pump rod can be moved to not interfere with bottom-feed. And hey, as it turns out if you really wanted a nice bottom-feed gun, you have to mod the rail anyways. The extra meat necessary for the magwell could even be integrated with the pump rod guide.

Of course, it requires someone else to suck all that complexity (like, 2 rods and 2 springs, plus pump rod) up into a rail unit, just like someone did with the blimps.

I understand what you say but I'm not really interested in a pump mag for that purpose, to be honest. A semi would do it for me and should be simpler to build.

Having said that and back to the first phrase on your response, I have two questions:

- How sturdy would a 3D printed rail be, compared to milled aluminum? Sorry for the newb question but I really have no idea about the materials durability and strength for 3D printed plastic parts (even no-moving parts like these)
- How much would it cost to design the part and how long should it take to do it?
- In thinking a bit more on the idea of having a one-piece part with rail, mag-well and trigger assembly/housing, do you think it would be possible to retain the original body attachment screw, so that one would not need to mill a body and use new screws like he did on his project? If so, that would allow one to use ULE, Carbon or Tac-One bodies as well and would be really easy to assemble.

Thanks,

Mendel.

[GoatBoy]

- It's "sturdy enough for normal use". I still have my nylon printed rails from several years ago. It won't last forever like aluminum, but "half of forever is still not bad".
- Dunno; I'm just a hobbyist. The rail part is already a known quantity, so it's just the magwell part that's in question. It's maybe an evening's worth of work. The problem isn't the CAD part. Not for an angry mob all armed with computers, AMIRITE?
- The original body screw is in the paint path. It has to go. Even if that is fixed, I would not recommend ULE or Tac-One bodies for this. I tried to warn that one guy way back against modding a ULE body for FSR, and he didn't listen, and well, that turned out badly for him. Even if you cut the bottom feed hole, you still need to close up the previous hole in the breech. The entire thing is much easier with a classic body where you just use a mag to cocker adapter to rotate the breech.

There are different ways to handle the frame screw problem, but the best ones involve metal work. That's always been the problem.

Find the guy to cut the old neck off, cleanly cut the FSR feed hole and accurately put a second weld nut onto the body. And put me in for 2 if you ever find such a person.

[mpsd]

- It's "sturdy enough for normal use". I still have my nylon printed rails from several years ago. It won't last forever like aluminum, but "half of forever is still not bad".
- Dunno; I'm just a hobbyist. The rail part is already a known quantity, so it's just the magwell part that's in question. It's maybe an evening's worth of work. The problem isn't the CAD part. Not for an angry mob all armed with computers, AMIRITE?
- The original body screw is in the paint path. It has to go. Even if that is fixed, I would not recommend ULE or Tac-One bodies for this. I tried to warn that one guy way back against modding a ULE body for FSR, and he didn't listen, and well, that turned out badly for him. Even if you cut the bottom feed hole, you still need to close up the previous hole in the breech. The entire thing is much easier with a classic body where you just use a mag to cocker adapter to rotate the breech.

There are different ways to handle the frame screw problem, but the best ones involve metal work. That's always been the problem.

Find the guy to cut the old neck off, cleanly cut the FSR feed hole and accurately put a second weld nut onto the body. And put me in for 2 if you ever find such a person.

Thanks for the answers!

@Luke, would you be that guy?

[ghost flanker]

Its very cool but that is an RT body, not a Minimag. The mod is like $345 and I would like to see some pics of the mods and the quality before I dropped that kind of coin but it is very cool.

It’s $309 for the mod. But I guess after you factor in the shipping costs, . . .

Eh, it's just another mod for 'Mags...like Pneumag setups or stock class feeds.

Full disclosure, I'm not really into the whole tactical/magfed/First Strike movement anyhow. Don't get me started with "sniping" in paintball. With multiple Army deployments under my belt I guess I've had my fill of that style and enjoy simple, fun, traditional paintball.

But to each their own!

I’m not into the whole milsim thing, either; case in point, I use tennis balls for buttstocks and wear shorts and Hawaiian shirts during games. I’ve always been interested in magfed and First Strikes, though, and I love Automags as well as limited paint play. That’s sorta why I built this gun. I didn’t want an M4 lookalike that was way bigger and heavier than it needed to be.

Cool, opens up magfed games but at what costs? Granted it would be less than a Dam but the costs for the mags certainly outweighs that.

Keep the blimp on the top. So much simpler

Not really. DAM magazines are about $10 a piece. I carry 8 magazines on me.

[luke]

@Luke, would you be that guy?

A bottom feed Mag has been on my to-do list for years and the Magazine feed looks like an interesting engineering project. However, currently I have a full plate that pretty much takes up the rest of this year. If there's actually a market for it I would take the project on, I pretty much know the direction the design would need to go to make it work, completely doable but a lot of R&D. :)

[russc]

One of my favorite guns of all time was a springfed pistol automag. I'm looking to build something similar again, but with tpx magazines. Springfeeds are just a gong show when time isn't on your side.

springfed_automag.PNG

[going_home]

Gene Gene the dancing machine.

The unknown comic.

[luke]

Gene Gene the dancing machine.

The unknown comic.

Flash back to the seventies, back to the days when we only had one TV channel, KNAZ out of Flagstaff AZ (NBC). Man I had completely forgot about those characters, what a trip looking back at that. :)

[mpsd]

A bottom feed Mag has been on my to-do list for years and the Magazine feed looks like an interesting engineering project. However, currently I have a full plate that pretty much takes up the rest of this year. If there's actually a market for it I would take the project on, I pretty much know the direction the design would need to go to make it work, completely doable but a lot of R&D. :)

Please let me know, then. I'll keep an eye open anyways. I also thought that maybe a Unibody design could work even better but then it would probably make it much more expensive, right?

[luke]

A Uni-body makes the most sense to me. All the basic Automag specs would have to be reworked and worked around so engineering it from scratch makes the most sense.

[GoatBoy]

There's a reason why this is the last project on multiple people's lists. It involves the most (re)work. So hats off to anyone who gets it done.

My recommendation is for the angry cloud of monkeys banging away at their keyboards on the forums to bang away on their keyboards in a slightly different way, in cooperation, to produce the rail+magwell design. Because computers can be used for more than just posting on forums.

Then, when you do find the mythical unicorn, everyone will be ready to go. You don't really need a modified body to design/test a magwell, and again the automag rail is already a known quanity so you pretty much don't need to mess around with that. The rotating breech is also a known quantity available from multiple sources.

[Patron God of Pirates]

I suppose you could leave the breach and rail as is and just move the frame to the top side and use some type of pneumatic system to trip the sear.