A Superlative LS Plunger Head!

Ah, it feels great to post a modification again...  Or a homemade rather.  

Actually, its kind of both.  A "homemadificaiton" as Ice would say.

Cue the back story.

I was sitting in my chair, thinking about my Longshot, and how I could improve the seal.  I happened to glance over at my desk and saw the Superlative plunger head that I made for my failed Snapbow, and remembered how people were using Superlative plunger heads in Snap Carbines, that have similar plunger tube dimensions as Longshots.

I had one of them "light bulb" moments, and got working.  Within a few minutes, I managed to fit the Superlative plungerhead on to the Longshot's plunger rod.  It fit perfectly, and sealed wondrously.  So I re-assembled my Longshot and tested it out.  Sure enough, it gave me a 100% seal.

If you want to replicate this, the key to getting it to work is matching the thickness of the stock plunger head.  If your homemade plunger head isn't as thick as the stock one, the blaster won't be able to catch.

Mine is a little to short, and the catch slips sometimes.  Its an easy fix though.

Watch the video below for a comparison of the two plunger heads, and a seal test:

Just another simple but effective mod for your Longshot!  I suggest everyone try it.

Longshot Project: Sneek Peek!

So some of you might know that I've been working on a Longshot these past few weeks.  I just thought you guys would like to see its current state, so I made a short vid:

Stay tuned for the finished product! (Its not anytime soon though.)  

How to: Immensely Reinforce Your Boltsled!

Everyone who has a Longshot all know of its weak boltsled.  I know there have been many guides on re-enforcing boltsleds, but this is just how I did mine and I felt like it was about time I gave back to the community!

Supplies:

Sheet metal

Epoxy puddy

Something to cut sheet metal

Some sort of strong Glue

Metal Wire  ( i.e. coat hanger, insulation supports....)

Clamps

Sorry, no in progress pics, as I forgot to take them.  (Oops)

So here's what it looks like all reinforced:

The first thing you're going to want to do is to metal plate the inside of your boltsled.  This can easily be done using a relatively thin piece of metal.
There are many write-ups on this, so I won't go to in-depth on this.  Rogue has a very nice write-up seen here.
Basically, what you're going to want to do is trace the inside shape of the boltsled onto your sheet metal, cut it out,  glue it on, clamp it in place, and let it cure.
After it cures, make sure to sand down the metal so that it doesn't rub up against your clips.

Now the way that I cut out the sheet metal,  it makes for sort of a triangle, which (probably) strengthens the boltsled more.  The slant looks like the Xplorer boltsled seen here.  However, the kinda tricky part about making this extra slant is you have to make sure that the bolt sled can travel all the way back and doesn't jam on the plunger tube:

Basicly, the slant shouldn't extend past this nub on the boltsled too much.  It can go past it, maybe a millimeter or two, but not too much.

And to further reinforce, get some wire and reinforce the outside part of the boltsled.  TantumBull made a good write-up seen here.  Tip!  Try to make the wire as long as possible to widen the area it reinforces.  
I reinforced mine with two wires on both sides.

This pic shows where I added epoxy puddy.  I pretty much added epoxy puddy everywhere that I thought needed reinforcement, but didn't impede the movement of the bolt-sled.

Once everything is all done, you can replace it back into your Longshot and enjoy insane ranges!  I've used this in my Longshot which has a 3b and k18 spring combo and it hasn't shown any sign of stress yet (I made this back in November '11).  Hopefully this was a helpful write-up.  :)