Conceptual Air Pressure Series

[SEAL]

Made these a while ago, and atvan's concept reminded me that I probably should post them. I believe that air pressure has a lot of potential (Just look at how powerful APHs can be.), and since BBT can't make CPS blasters anymore, I think they should start looking into high-powered air pressure blasters, on the level of the SS/XP 300 at least. That's why some of these blasters have kind of a Water Warriors-ish appearence.

As with my CPS line, we'll start with the smallest blaster. The HP (Stands for High Pressure. Yes, it's uncreative.) 101 is designed as a small secondary or a large sidearm, and should be the smallest blaster ever to have a PC. Range should be in the mid 30's, perhaps close to 40' on it's regular 2.5X nozzle. The orange button on the side (There's one on the other side for lefties.) activates the riot blast, which should be only slightly less powerful than the FF/AB's, due to the smaller nozzle. The pressure gauge, as on all HP blasters, actually indicates the PSI amount.


Next we have the HP 202. This is one of my personal favorites, designed as a Gorgon replacement. With it's larger PCs, it should top the Gorgon in range, with it's 2.5X and 5X nozzles. Also has a riot blast, slightly more powerful than the FF/AB. I love the color scheme; I don't think it's ever been used on a stock blaster before, which is too bad, because I think it gives it a sort of "Cryo-blaster" look.


Next up, the HP 303. Dispite the fact that I made it look horrendously top-heavy, it should be able to match the SS/XP 300 in power, with it's 5X and 10X nozzles. Just like all of the HP blasters, it has a riot blast, which is comparable to a homemade's on this blaster.


Next, you guessed it, the HP 404. The shape of this blaster is kind of weird, and I'm not sure how well it would work, but damn, does it look awesome. It's 4 monster PCs should give it a range of roughly 55 feet. Nozzle sizes are 5X, 10X, 20X (Just like the CPS 2500.), and the usual riot blast, which is even more powerful than the 303.
I noticed that I forgot to add a reservoir cap. It should be on top, right next to the rear strap hook.


And finally, I present to you the world's first stock air pressure blaster with 5 PCs. The HP 505 uses a backpack reservoir to leave room for all the PCs on the body (Which also looks a little top-heavy...), and while I didn't add much detail to the backpack, it should be very comfortable, and will hold up to 10 liters. This blaster is meant for heavy gunning only, and is well suited to the job with it's 10X, 15X, 20X, and 30X nozzles, some of which are capable of hitting 60 feet. The riot blast alone can spit water out to 50'.


None of these images are to scale, so I don't want to hear things like "That trigger grip is to small!".

And that's my air pressure line. Like I said, I think air pressure has a lot of potential, and BBT would do well to know that. The Gorgon was a good start, but I want to see SS 300 levels of power in the next few years. It should be relatively cheap and easy to do, especially when compared to the Pulse series.

Comments are always welcome; I will answer any questions for you.

~SEAL

[isoaker]

Fun stuff! Not sure how the 404 (page not found? ) will work having the pressure meter at the top. Even if the external tubes are ornamental and the actual tubing is on the bottom of the PCs, would need a decent length extension to make that pressure gauge to work.

Some neat ideas above; and timing is good, too. More on why soon.

[JS]

Win.

[soakinader]

Whoa, I got to say, these things look sick. I especially like the color scheme of the HP 202; I think there was an XP270 with that scheme if I'm not mistaken?
I see you like the WW Vanquisher body style. I don't have a Vanquisher myself, but I do like how it looks, and I imagine that it would be well-balanced.

What program did you use to make these? I have a few Ideas of my own, and scans off of paper take too much time for such a low-quality result.

Bit of constructive criticism here- the handles on all of these throw the scale off. Especially the HP 303- the thing looks like it would be almost 4 hands tall, which puts the PC's full of water at a very high point above one's hand, which would make it very hard to balance.

I have to say, I really like how these blasters look, and I see a lot of potential here, but the stylings are very Super Soaker. I love the designs, both yours and larami's (and even the military-esque Hasbro Super Soakers to an extent) but I don't see Buzz Bee Toys going in this direction anytime soon. Buzz Bee designs are very... organic-looking, or spacey kind of. These things you drew look like bad-ass XXXXP's or something. OK, the first two look a bit more 'organic' in terms of design. They also aren't quite as appealing to me as the others. And I am just ranting here.

But not to beat this with a stick, these are just plain cool drawings, forget the whole BBT/SS thing. Pretty neat ideas, I always like to see what you come up with.

[HBWW]

What I got out of these: BBT ought to ramp up their aesthetics and make things look more techy; look complicated and high tech. Like how the CPS's had fake tubes around the front with ridges, surrounding the rounded PC casing.

But on the separate topic of performance, I've been saying this over and over again for a long time: higher piping diameters and flow designs (i.e. all PCs connected separately) are needed first before packing more pressure into things. In particular, they'll need ergonomic high diameter ball valve triggers (think Hydro Cannon) to accommodate higher flow, less they switch back to high diameter pull valves, but those still do not allow anywhere near as much flow as high diameter ball valves. It's unfortunate that the costs involved in these improvements do not necessarily translate into sales improvement nor allow them to increase prices without affecting sales, so the risk is something that BBT has decided is not worth taking head-on, it seems. It would, from what I can see, provide the highest cost-to-performance improvement ratio that I'm aware of.

Regarding pressure gauges, I think those are a waste of money that can go to better materials, higher diameter internals, better PC's, etc. But disregarding that, I don't think it'd be much trouble otherwise to use a simple spring and piston style gauge, like those used to trigger the electric power gauges in their old blasters. I like the fact that they measure PSI in this concept instead of "full" and "empty".

[SEAL]

I also have a conceptual CPS series, but I don't think it turned out as well as the AP series.

Thanks for the feedback (even though it's almost a year late and I have different ideas now); yes, I did make the trigger grip on the 303 too small, and I'd probably design some of these completely differently if I was asked to draw them all over again. I actually drew a 606 and even a 707, but they aren't on my computer. I was really happy with the 606, but the 707 was just a result of goofing around, and would be extremely impractical if it were actually built.

Yeah, they are styled much like Super Soakers (my CPS series is too), but what can I say? I love the designs of most old CPS blasters; while the Nerf ones look more "cool", they just don't compare to the older ones in my opinion, especially the 2000/2500 and 1000.

Oh, and I used MS Paint to draw all of my concepts.

[marauder]

This is ridiculously awesome. I love conceptual blasters, and these are some of the best I've seen. The 202 is a particular favorite of mine, it looks like a Gorgon redesigned by an old school Larami XP engineer, and the colors are very close to Carolina Panthers colors. Soakinader, there is a an XP 270 color scheme similar to this, but it's not the same. My fiancee has that edition, it's silver with a medium/royal blue.

I agree with CA99 about the larger pipes. The 300 has very large pipes to help accommodate such high volumes of flow. The way to maximize AP potential is to have large pipes combined with a laminator and tapered nozzles. The ball valve would help out too I think, which is why I theorize that the Hydrocannon may have even greater potential than the CPS 2000. I also agree regarding BBT having more external styling. That's one thing I love about my Gorgon.

[scottthewaterwarrior]

Actually I have seen a Max-D 6000 with a color scheme that was exactly like the 202. I'm not sure why, but it makes me think that the water it shoots would be colder then the rest. A top pressure gauge wouldn't be a problem, the XXP 275 has one on top, and it worked for that. I think there was another blaster somewhere that had a top mounted pressure gauge too.

In battle I would probably use the 404, I'm not that big a fan of the Vanquisher type design, but somehow this one looks like it would be a little easier to hold then the Vanquisher was. Personally I would go for the 202 if it had better range. Output isn't really that important to me, I never use anything other then the 5x on my 2500 and actually find it a bit to large for my tastes. The only reason I use it is for the 45ft range, if I could get 45ft out of something smaller I'd take it any day.

Great job on these designs, they look fantastic! I think I might have to try drawing some concepts some time, not very good with MS paint, but I could probably make some pretty nice hand drawn ones!

[marauder]

The XXP 175 also features a top mounted pressure gauge. Have you considered a CPS 1500? They are a little smaller than a 2500, but most good ones shoot 45 feet. I also imagine you could mod a 4100/Monster into shooting that far.

[thelaminator]

hp404 not found... all of them were purchased already

oh, the 202 color scheme is the inverse of 2011/2012 MD6K releases.

[SEAL]

Does anyone have a picture of these 6Ks? I've never seen them before. I'd imagine that they'd look a lot better than my blue and silver '08 6K (never been a fan of that color scheme).

[isoaker]

Well, I believe this is one:

Super Soaker Max-D 6000 (color variant)

maxd6000.jpg (12.39 KiB) Viewed 15189 times

[SEAL]

That is the exact same color as mine. The blues are completely different than on the 202 concept.

[scottthewaterwarrior]

The XXP 175 also features a top mounted pressure gauge. Have you considered a CPS 1500? They are a little smaller than a 2500, but most good ones shoot 45 feet. I also imagine you could mod a 4100/Monster into shooting that far.

I have been considering getting one. Even if I don't like it as much as the 2500, it would be another great gun to add to my arsenal. I'm a little slow when it comes to buying something that I'm not dieing to have; I hope to buy one before the prices go up for summer again though.
Personally I wish I could get my XP 105 to shoot 45ft, it's actually a pretty sucky gun, but the texture on the hand grips is just amazing!

[marauder]

Personally I wish I could get my XP 105 to shoot 45ft, it's actually a pretty sucky gun, but the texture on the hand grips is just amazing!

You should consider adding new pressure chambers. I'm pretty sure you could easily get 38 to 39 feet. After that, well I'm not sure how difficult it would be, but I'm sure it's possible. When I first joined the online community I got the impression that the 105 was a top air pressure performer. I'm glad the community has realized the truth. After owning 3 of these I can say that while there is a lot to like about the 105 that all doesn't matter due to the low range and shot time. I'm thinking it would have been better off with one, taller, PC, rather than one short PC and one mini PC. Someone who understands pressure and fluid dynamics better than me, feel free clarify.


I have a mod in the works for applying custom texture grips like on the 105. Just something more to look forward to seeing this off season...