Lvl X overly complicated?

[brianlojeck]

Here's a goofy question...

wouldn't it have been possible to replicate the LvlX's effects simply using stronger springs? (thus eliminating the issues with the extra leaks, carriers, less tuning, cheaper to make/sell/buy)

I figure you'd need several springs for various FPS ranges (much like are used now). at 250 you'd put in the XXX spring, at 280 you'd put in the YYY spring.

I figure Tom must be smarter then me, so am I nuts, or am I missing something?

[TMAXXKING1]

hmm

hmm i guess so .. i thought the whole idea behind the lvl 10 was to stop the chopping ...

[FooTemps]

With a stronger spring you'd need more pressure to get the bolt to move from idle. That means an even higher input pressure and means less gas available to shoot with. The lx was designed so it woudl vent when using only a moderately stronger spring so it wouldn't require an input pressure boost.

[brianlojeck]

With a stronger spring you'd need more pressure to get the bolt to move from idle. That means an even higher input pressure

not necessarily. if you figure a set of springs, in order of strength from left to right as shown below:

(Normal) (normal +1) (normal +2) (normal +n...) (too strong)

at Normal the gun operates normally, with (too strong) the gun won't work without more pressure. there must be a spring in there somewhere where the bolt will move without more pressure, yet not cut a ball in half...

and means less gas available to shoot with

no it doesn't. expanding gas doesn't lose it's energy pushing a bolt. the gas would still push the bolt, then push the ball. I'd say the biggest risk is slowing the bolt down, but that's a risk anyway with the lvlX (hence the two-stage bolt stem)

. The lx was designed so it woudl vent when using only a moderately stronger spring so it wouldn't require an input pressure boost.

hmm... I hadn't thought about venting the pressure out though... otherwise it'd just cause bolt-stick every time the bolt caught a ball...

there must be a simpler way though...

[Aleis]

to get a bolt to not chop a paint bal it has to have very little forward preasure, think about how easy a paintball breacks when it contacts something like say a peice of steel.

In a mag the thing that dictates teh foraward preasure on the bolt isn't the spring, yes it's there and it seems strong but fire your gun and see how quickly the bolt over comes it. It's the force of the air behind the bolt that needs to change, the PSI, so you have 2 options for an easy solution

1) Lower the operating preasure of the vlave, but of course then you need more volume thus a larger valve==bigger gun

2) since PSI stands for Pounds per Square Inch you could reduce the thickness of the stem on the bolt, Less inches means less punds, but then the amount of room the air has to escape the bolt decreases thus taking longer to shoot the ball, slowing down teh marker.

A mag can cycle and fire pretty fast and is comperably fairly small, so you might be able to fudge a little on both of those factors, but why comprimise.

[brianlojeck]

to get a bolt to not chop a paint bal it has to have very little forward preasure, think about how easy a paintball breacks when it contacts something like say a peice of steel.

quoted for truth.

In a mag the thing that dictates teh foraward preasure on the bolt isn't the spring, yes it's there and it seems strong but fire your gun and see how quickly the bolt over comes it. It's the force of the air behind the bolt that needs to change, the PSI, so you have 2 options for an easy solution

erm... no. as it's presently set up at Lvl7, the spring is insignificant in bolt movement, but somewhere between the normal spring and a spring that's so strong the gun stops working, there MUST be a spring that lets the gun work, while making the bolt more gentle.

in thinking about it last night, there's three problems I see with my idea:

1: the spring would have to be too finely tuned, bringing us back to the old nelson-spring-kit days of swapping springs all the time at the chrono

2: the need to vent air to reset the bolt in a chop situation, preventing bolt lock

3: having a spring strong enough to make the bolt gentle might likely slow it down too much to maintain a rapid rate of fire, hence the lvlx's 2-stage bolt stem, hence the carrier and extra o-rings I'm trying to eliminate

that third one is kind of a doozy... I'll have to think about this some more...

edit: fixed formatting problem

[trains are bad]

having a spring strong enough to make the bolt gentle might likely slow it down too much to maintain a rapid rate of fire, hence the lvlx's 2-stage bolt stem, hence the carrier and extra o-rings I'm trying to eliminate

this is correct.

[Gunga]

Here's a goofy question...

wouldn't it have been possible to replicate the LvlX's effects simply using stronger springs? (thus eliminating the issues with the extra leaks, carriers, less tuning, cheaper to make/sell/buy)

I figure you'd need several springs for various FPS ranges (much like are used now). at 250 you'd put in the XXX spring, at 280 you'd put in the YYY spring.

I figure Tom must be smarter then me, so am I nuts, or am I missing something?

The use of stronger springs with a L7 bolt were tried early while Level 10 was being researched. Level 10 is a bit more finicky to set up, but is a better solution that the use of a stronger spring with a L7 bolt.

[ScatterPlot]

-The gun has less air to use (or something, lost this quote in bigger quote)-

no it doesn't. expanding gas doesn't lose it's energy pushing a bolt. the gas would still push the bolt, then push the ball. I'd say the biggest risk is slowing the bolt down, but that's a risk anyway with the lvlX (hence the two-stage bolt stem)

He means that once the pressure in the tank gets low enough, the gun will stop working. With a higher working pressure, the useable air gets lower.

to get a bolt to not chop a paint bal it has to have very little forward preasure, think about how easy a paintball breacks when it contacts something like say a peice of steel.

What else would have influence over it? If the pressure is low, no chop. If high, chop. The LX causes that pressure to be very low up until a certain point, then it will hit the higher pressure. If you put a straw in the LX breech, or like a popsicle stick or something that is thin and will sit at the end of the hole then it will hit it with a lot of force.

[brianlojeck]

What else would have influence over it?

;-) The spring.

it's a balance between air and bolt spring.