Hatchet

Bit of a work in progress still.

Speaking of front ends... Dytac don't seem to be as readily available any more (specifically the 18" SPR front) - any recommendations for sources/other manufacturers?

It'd be rude not to. Although the PRI front end is something crazy like £180...

CNC end cap turned up in a couple of days from Echigoya. Good service. Got a fixed stock on the way. We shall see how well it all goes together. Now all I need is the NG-spectre on general release. And possibly an entire SPR front end. and... well, you know how it goes...

I'll take a look. Usually it's the getting people to ship them that's the pain, but it's not insurmountable.

PTW stocks are meant to be close to RS dimensions aren't they? It'd be nice to pick up something that's not cheap rattly plastic...

Hmmm. Might have to look at SPRing it then...

Oooh, useful info, thanks. Is the method of attachment not a bit different at the receiver end though? Castle nut doesn't seem to be present on the full stock, it's all part of the buffer tube assembly. Or at least that's how it seems from the pictures.

CA. I have 2 SD front ends from back when they were made from lead, bricks, and the dark matter inside stars. The HK33 was bought as parts - unfortunately the upper receiver is broken in the usual place (shoddy design). PSG-1 stock I picked up for something else and decided to go a different direction, so had it lying around. HK33 SD would be good, but it would inevitably break in the same place unless you had it remade in steel or something...

This doesn't make sense on any level, but hey...

Why is there no solid stock for this yet? It would make life so much easier. All you'd need would be a different buffer tube that would be pretty similar to the existing one, just with a different end. Actually, I wonder if you could just machine another end cap up instead. Where the existing end cap sits, keeping the recoil assembly in, you'd just make another one that screwed in the same way but had a central thread to allow it to accept a screw, which you'd use to secure a full stock in place. You then wouldn't need to do anything with all the gold contacts, etc, because you could d

Made a couple more tweaks. Took the M110 out and put an M100 in. Also replaced the cylinder with a 4/5ths lonex one (which should give me a 1.9:1 ratio). Now seeing 330-340ish (on the stock 6.08 barrel). A bit more fettling still required though - I've managed to strip the wires *again*. Grrr. However, if it all works when I get it back together and stays around the same fps then it's not getting touched again...

Weird, BTC usually use MPPE coated wire. AWG remains the same, but overall diameter is reduced due to thinner coating. I have 16awg in mine and it fits through the buffer tube gap ok. You wouldn't get a signal wire through as well though.

Drilled holes in the end of the contact bars, solder wires in and ditched the fuse assembly/qd part. I was having no luck with it, even without a fuse (wire across the fuse space). I wonder if that little metal bit just can't handle the amps going through it. Anyway, ran all day fine on 7.2v ,2200 15c. Successful test I guess. Only thing is... I think I've got a little bored/out of love with it. Or perhaps it's just been one of those days.

And just when you think you've got it all worked out... Reconnected everything, test fire - motor won't turn over. A little bit more investigation shows that it's something to do with the QD battery setup. Putting the battery wires directly onto the contacts on the stock tube and it turns over fine. I need to take another look at the rails, etc. Although already has gold contact bars, so not quite sure what the problem is here... Still, I have.. four hours or so to work it out...

I'll assume that was a typo... Are you sure it's a full type? There's only one vent hole on it, not two, so if you're looking at the wrong side of the gearbox you'll miss it.

Just the SHS hi-torque. £35. Money well spent.

Hi torque motor has been installed and is making a significant difference. Trigger response and RoF have gone through the roof - I'm not going to test it with the 11.1 because I think it would explode. This is direct wired for ease of testing, so there may be a drop when I switch back to the quick change system. The only thing outstanding is I think I'll need to change the cylinder to a full type to make up for the volume loss from the AoE sorbo correction. More exact calculations to be taken when I have it apart. As an added bonus, I no longer have to search for my car keys. I just wave t

Lot of useful info there Richard. My shimming is quite different to that though. Using the standard systema shims, bevel gear 0.3 top, 0.2 bottom spur gear 0.2 top, 0.3 bottom sector gear 0.3 top 0.2 bottom. Which seems to run smoothly. I don't think I felt any clicking per se from the marui bushings, but I did give them a little tap with an appropriately sized punch pin just to make sure they were seated. I think I'll wait on the motor before I meddle with it again as it's going to need the bevel gear reshimming at that point (and I'm going to rewire again as the existing is ge

I have this too, which is why I went down the whole spring thing in the first place. I did it the other day and was only pulling about 320ish on a e6 M110... Checked the usual suspects (compression, etc) last time but seem ok. Will have to take another look...

Finally, some progress. I made a spacer to sit behind the piston head from a 5p piece with a hole drilled in the middle. It's pretty much exactly the right size. It needs to just cover the piston rack gear but not stick out far enough to foul. However, this wasn't the main change. What actually seems to have helped a lot is putting the original Marui bushings back in. For whatever reason, I think these are fractionally thinner than the others I've tried (or perhaps it's just how they sit in my gearbox). Anyway, the other bushings were sitting slightly more proud on the outside of the g

Yes, stock EG1000. Although I have just ordered a SHS hi-torque as another last ditch attempt to fix it. I know this is brute forcing it, but... Anyway, will have to reshim, again, when that turns up. I've been just screwing the stock on and not bothering with anything else too. When I'm "testing" I just leave the wiring loose. Actually I've unscrewed the contact plates so I can more easily connect different batteries to it to test. Have an 11.1 on the way to see what odds that makes too. TBH, if I hadn't sunk so much into it already I'd have quit a while ago. It's great when it's work

A new day, and all that... So, to try and answer some of the questions. It's a CQB-R with the original quick change system (gold contacts, eagle6 lipo). The shimming was tested with the gearbox fully tightened and no piston, etc so I was able to spin it (hornbill gears) from the top. Seems to spin fine, only the weight of the gears acting as resistance, if you see what I mean. Shimming was done from the pinion/bevel first, then the sector gear. The sector gear clears the piston rack ok, so it's not catching on that. I couldn't tell you off the top of my head what the shims are set at.

I think the spacers will be the next port of call, but I've lost the will to tackle it tonight. I did chuck some in initially, but of course that threw the AoE off... It's all good fun. I have a few more theories to test as well, including getting a known good higher voltage battery to try. Shimming was triple checked the last time I had it opened and I'm happy enough with it. Original pistol grip no good due to stripped threads on the baseplate, but the replacement is good. Bushings are the 5.9mm ones.

I have and it draws it back far enough to be an issue. Only just, but it does. I had overlooked the SHS piston. Definitely a possibility, although I was getting blown fuses prior to replacing it anyway (although that *could* be the shimming at that time). I don't have a different piston to test this against. Other people must be using this combo though. Hrmm. Edited to add - I guess short stroking the piston by removing one of the teeth from the front would test the hypothesis that it's this which is causing an issue. Of course, the lower fps might then negate putting an uprated spring