New superbolt Material?

[Predator]

I wanted to ask Tom about this when I was at Ultimate Madness, but he was busy. I had the chance to hand him his barrel bag though.

What about Ertalyte? Bonebrake and DEZign use this material for their bolts and it is very strong. It also does not react adversely to paint oils, humidity, heat, or moisture. The material is stronger, and thus harder to machine that Delrin.

I have DEZign bolts in my angels made of this material, and they still look great after alot of use. I'm sure it could hold up better than the delrin on the superbolts.

I believe the problem with the superbolts is the fact that the delin, if not cleaned right after a day of play, will absorb the paint and oils. That would cause it to swell, and in turn cause it to wear against the spring faster. I'm about 100% sure thats most of the probems. I'm sure there are people who clean their mags after every day, but I bet even more don't.

Most people follow, "If it isn't broke, don't fix it." Just something to ponder.

[hardr0ck68]

how about a new design...why cant the replacable delrin part be the whole front of the bolt, like no stainless sleve for it to slide on to just a stainless tail that it could thread on to...it would be more expensive all around, and i dont know how exactly to have the parts in the center of the bolt hel din place....but it was just a passing thought

[Predator]

I believe having the bolt all machined as one piece is better, with just the sleve. If you had just the plastic for the front, it would have no support. So eventually, with the ss part of the bolt being threaded to it, it would break. the threads would hold for awhile, but they would eventually break why cycling the marker.

You also have the SS part of the bolt that slides into the powertube. That wouldn't hold for long in any type of plastic that I know of.

I don't see why the sleeve can't the threaded partially at the end though. The sleve isn't bearing any load while firing, and it would stay alot better than just pressing it on. Just another thought though.

[hardr0ck68]

good call...i havent gotten to play around with much delrin...i guess i thought it was stronger than it really is

[fearc7]

what is this Ertalyte? ive never heard of it.

[hitech]

What if instead of machining the outside of the bolt, the inside of the bold was machined and the sleve was placed on the inside, where it would be permanent? Since the "plastic" sleve would/could form the air tight seal it might even be possile to have holes/slots etc. cut the in SS to further reduce weight.

Wadda think?

[tomcat]

Better Bolt

I think using the internal part of the superbolt and replacing the delrin portion with aircraft aluminum. I would also change the head design to be more like a venturi boltBetter bolt diagram to fix the ball breakage issue.
It is clear that lighter seems to be better. The aluminum portion would be hard enough as the current portion of the superbolt is where the wear occurs.

[Cristobal]

tomcat, that's a good idea of for the bolt -- I've been thinking along the same lines myself about how a concave face could potentially lessen damage to the ball waiting. Nice to see a good diagram of how it would work.

[ts1spoc]

About Bolts... Wouldn't a tighter bolt also increase gas efficiency and velocity?
After I posted this it wasn't as clear as I thought.
To clarify, wouldn't a tighter barrel I.D. to bolt O.D. fit increase gas efficiency and velocity. And with the Derlin sleeve (or some other UHMW plastic) the friction would be negligiable. If the sleeve were easily replaced wearing it out would also be inconsequential.

[AGD]

The problem with a deeply cupped face is that the ball rolls back into it and when fired the ball waiting gets pushed back up the feed tube. No free lunch.

AGD

[tomcat]

Deeply Cupped Face

I am trying to visualize why the next ball jumps back up the feed tube, but can not see it. Can you please explain why you think this is so.

If that was the case why not use two ball dentents. One in front and one behind to stop it rolloing back? You coud use one of those plastic nubbins and put two lumps instead of one. If you can guarantee where the ball being fired is at just before the bolt strikes it and also where the ball above it is then I think you have covered your bases. Let gravity do the rest!

Days like this I bet you wish you really could share your knowledge with the collective!!! :)

[AGD]

Try this with pennies on a table top. Start with the stack of balls in perfect alignment, then move the bottom one to the right an 1/8 inch. What happens is a gap opens up between the stack and the one you just moved. The stack falls down to take up the gap. When you push the bottom ball back into position, like when you fire it, the stack jumps back up.

AGD

[ts1spoc]

As you explain it the balls are going to jump back up no matter what type of bolt face you have. The difference is with a deeply cupped face you stand a better chance of cutting a ball than with a rounded nose bolt. Correct?

[tomcat]

One more round :)

Thanks Tom,

I tried the pennies thing as you suggested. In the diagram below I have introduced a double nubbin to the concave bolt idea to stop it rolling back if that is really that big of a problem.
The "A" diagrams are the regular smooth edge bolt, and the "B" is the concave bolt idea!

The yellow arrows represent where I think the spin or direction of the ball is at that moment. Of course it might only be the most minute amount of rotation at any point.

To answer the other persons question; I even threw in an o-ring at the tip of the bolt to reduce ball chop with the sharper edge. It should be assumed that the balls are in the correct position as they fall though or ANY bolt will chop them. If there are not enough balls on top of the one in the breech then there would be a number of factors that could lead to paintball being destroyed, including bounce, blowback, latent dropping, short-stroking, bolt gas leak, etc.
I am excluding all of those factors.

After this if you still think I am wrong I will bow to your knowledge as you are the expert and I am just a paintball junky nut case :)

Scott

P.S. Labeled each diag just incase you want to set me straight on something I am missing :)

[tomcat]

Superbolt continued

So if the concave bolt worked here is what a replacement to the Delrin sleeve could look like!