If this is your first time upgrading a gun or opening your gearbox, close this thread. This is not a beginners guide or a walk-through of all the required modifications that need to be done. You must figure out how to do those on your own, through research on forums (especially this one, airsoftmechanics and airsoftforum), youtube, stickies, etc. It is not hard, all you need to do is have a willingness to learn and the audacity to do so.
- If you expect this to walk you through a clear cut way to make a high speed aeg, your wrong. This guide will give you a tremendous amount of information, hints, tricks and tips for building a high speed airsoft gun. But it is not a step by step guide on what to do, because, for obvious and not so obvious reasons, that simply wouldn't work. This is a good explanation of what spoon feeding information does to the community [taken from Zardichar (slightly modified with some of my personal thoughts)]
Why is research better than spoon feeding?
1. You don't waste other people's time.
2. In your research, you learn other related information in addition to the info originally sought, furthering your knowledge on the topic and enabling you to help others in your similar position.
3. With spoon feeding, you are rewarded for not doing any work. With research, you are rewarded for doing work. Which one do you think produces a more productive society?
Also, in the words of Star_Folder: "By telling someone to do their own research, we are helping. If someone is willing to do the research they need to do, then they will be willing to do the mods they need to have a successful build. If they just expect to be spoon fed, they'll drop in parts, and nothing will work right. We tell people to research because we want the best from them."
- If you are not willing to read, learn, expand your knowledge PAST THIS THREAD and continue researching/improving ideas, you should not be teching. I've been building airsoft guns for over 3 years now, and I still find myself learning new mods, techniques and ways to approach a problem. This thread does NOT hold all the answers to building a high speed gun, there will always be more.
Now, onto the guide. It will take me a bit to write up, so please, bare with me everybody.
*Note: This guide is not about upgrades in general, it's not about DMRs, hopups or how to tune and mod your aeg. It will cover different aspects of a topic, but only one topic. That being what is needed for high rps aegs. Therefore, I will put MOST of my attention on the drive train of the gearbox and disregarding some other aspects of the gun. (Don't worry, if its important I will include it, if its not, there will be plenty of information about it the stickies as well as these forums.)
How does an AEG shoot? How can I make it shoot faster?
First off, I will overview what makes the aeg shoot, and why certain parts make it shoot faster.
Your battery sends power to your motor, which spins its pinion gear. This spins the bevel, which spins the spur, which spins the sector. On top of the sector gear there are teeth that contact the piston's teeth. As your sector gear is spinning the teeth on it meet the teeth of the piston and begin to pull it back, against the force of your spring, which is held in place by the spring guide. Once the sector gear pulls back the piston a certain ammount of length, the teeth disengage and the springs force is released, pushing the piston forward, through the cylinder, until it contacts the cylinder head. All of the air that was in the cylinder is pushed through the cylinder head, through the air nozzle, and through your hopup pushing your bb down the barrel. Now, your sector gear continues to spin, pulling back the tappet plate, which pulls back the air nozzle, which allows another bb to enter the hopup. This cycle continues (this is full automatic firing).
Breaking that long, boring wall of text down. There are only certain parts of the gearbox where the speed at which they move can actually be changed. That being:
-motor (the speed it spins)
-gears (the amount of rotations the sector makes in a given time period)
-piston (The speed that it returns back to the cylinder head)
So, in essence, a high speed gun is trying to increase speed in these things:
-The motor, because it dictates the possible max speed of fire. This is what turns the gears in your gearbox. This is done by installing motors with different TPA ratings and Neo magnets.
-The gears, because they can contribute to how much time it takes to pull back the piston, which results in a shot. This is done by installing lower ratio gearsets.
-The piston, because its return time controls when you can begin another shot. (if the gears are spinning faster than the piston can return, the piston will hit the gear teeth, you will hit pre-mature engagement, and your gearbox will make a very loud shrieking sound, which will ruin your day.) This is done by lightening the piston assembly and adding a stiffer spring.
The Basics
In any upgraded aeg, you want to make sure your gearbox is running as efficiently as possible with as little stress as possible. This is where DIY mods (such as shimming, aoe, grease, radius, sorbo, rewiring, etc.) come in handy. They increase the reliability, longevity, and performance of your parts.
Motors are all made differently for different reasons (will discuss this more later). But to be brief, there are 3 main types:
-HS (High Speed): low TPA, high RPM. Can spin the fastest, but has the least amount of torque. So it is strained easier.
-HT (High Totque):High TPA, low RPM. Cant spin as fast, but has more torque to pull more stressful loads.
-Balanced: Medium TPA/RPM. Balance between above two.
*Motors work based on efficiency. So, even though a HS motor can spin the fastest, it can only pull a certain stressed load before it starts to slow down, which is where HT motors come in. (will refer to this in next section below)
Gearsets come in different ratios. (18:1, 16:1, 13:1, 12:1, 10:1, etc.) The lower the ratio, the less rotations of the pinion (motor) it takes to spin your sector gear 360 degrees (one full shot), so the higher the rps of your gun (low ratio = shoot faster). However, the lower the ratio, the more stress is put on your motor. So, referring to above, not all HS motors can pull setups on low ratio (fast) gearsets. This means if a HT motor can pull a setup on 10:1, but the HS can only pull it on a 16:1, the HT might have a faster rps than the HS.
Now lets use this information...
There are different levels of high speed airsoft guns, and different ways to approach each level. I will do a rough categorization (Fps value at around 400 for estimations):
-low stress build - <20 rps
-medium stress build - 20-30 rps
-upper stress build - 30-40rps
-high stress build - 40-50+rps
There are different ways to meet each goal listed above, I will start with a low stress build.
LOW STRESS BUILD
Low stress builds generally don't require too many aftermarket parts. They are the simplest to build, easiest to maintain, and they don't make your wallet try to commit suicide.
**Important Note: There are MANY different ways to approach these builds. For example, I can build a gun at 30rps with probably 100+ different types and combinations of parts, but here will be a generalization.
If your goal is only <20 rps, you will not need to change much to meet it.
To get this speed you *can:
-upgrade your battery, a 9.6v NiMh 1600mah+ will work, but I recommend a 11.1v LiPo with at least 15c discharge and 1600mah for any speed build.
-rewire your gun to at least 16awg, deans and a 3034 MOSFET, lower resistance wiring and connectors increase the power that can be given to your motor from your battery, the mosfet protects your trigger contacts from carbon buildup wearing them down.
-upgrade your motor, a nice HT motor will get 20rps with a 11.1v LiPo battery on stock gears (and have a bonus effect of much quicker trigger response), but if your goal is to stick with a 9.6v NiMh, I would suggest a speed motor. (personally I would go with the 11.1v and HT motor, because it is more reliable and increases the trigger response time)
Some High Torque motors include: SHS HT, Lonex A2, Lonex A1, DA HT, Matrix Magnum HT, JG Blue
Some High Speed motors include: SHS HS, DA HS, Lonex A3, G&P
-DIY mods to correctly run your new gearbox speed. These include (not limited to):
-Shim, Grease, AOE
-Swiss Cheese piston (if you need to increase its return speed)
-radius cylinder window
To reinforce your new gearbox you *can:
-upgrade spring guide to metal ball bearing to help sustain the increased amount of times the spring will be compressed against it. Not always needed, but its very cheap and isn't negative in any way. (ZCI bb spring guides are very good, and cheap.)
-upgrade to a metal toothed piston. Also not always needed, but if you don't want to risk stripping your piston teeth with your new rof, this is recommended. A full metal racked piston will greatly increase the strength of the teeth, which makes it able to handle higher stress setups. (SHS 15t pistons remain lightweight while having extremely tough teeth.)
You *can keep:
-stock ratio (18:1) gears
-stock spring
-stock spring guide, if metal
-MOST stock polycarb pistons (I personally don't trust VFC, G&P, A&K)
-stock piston head
-stock cylinder head
-stock GB shell
-stock metal bushings (Not CM brass bushings)
-anything else not mentioned
*notice how I used the word "can". There is no definite way to increase your speed, reinforce your gearbox, or meet your goal. This is teching, the basis of it is replacing and modifying parts to work at the level you desire. These are examples of ways you can meet your goals, but these are far from the only ways to do it.
Medium stress builds generally don't require too many aftermarket parts. They are pretty straightforward to build and maintain.
If your goal is between 20-30 rps, you will need to change a couple more parts to meet it.
To get this speed you can:
-upgrade your battery I recommend a 11.1v LiPo with at least 15c discharge and 1600mah at this point, technically a 12v NiMh will work as well, but LiPo batteries are more reliable. A battery, even 11.1v LiPo, with a low amp output will not be sufficient for your motor to properly run. It will lack the "juice" needed to reliably run your setup.
-rewire your gun to at least 16awg, deans and a 3034 MOSFET, lower resistance wiring and connectors increase the power that can be given to your motor from your battery, the mosfet protects your trigger contacts from carbon buildup wearing them down.
-upgrade your motor, a nice HT motor with lower ratio speed gears (16:1) will get 20-30rps with a 11.1v LiPo battery. Now, as you should know, not all HT motors have the same torque-speed output. For example, a JG Blue is slower than an SHS HT and on 16:1 gears with an 11.1v batttery, the JG Blue averages 22rps while the SHS HT averages 28rps. Combining these motors with different gear ratios and batteries will yield different rps values. You can also use a HS motor, but keep in mind it will put more strain on your gearbox, is less reliable, and generally a different build setup.
Some High Torque motors include: SHS HT, Lonex A2, Lonex A1, DA HT, Matrix Magnum HT, JG Blue
Some High Speed motors include: SHS HS, DA HS, Lonex A3
-upgrade your spring, as your rps increases your gears spin faster. Your piston needs to be fully returned and waiting for the sector gear to pick it up to start another shot. If it is not yet fully returned when the sector gear engages it, you will hit PME and have a big mess to clean up in your gearbox. That being said, generally an m110 equivalent rated spring (or higher) should be used. You can short stroke to reduce fps if needed.
-DIY mods to correctly run your new gearbox speed. These include (not limited to):
-Shim, Grease, AOE
-Swiss Cheese piston (if you need to increase its return speed)
-radius cylinder window
To reinforce your new gearbox you can:
-upgrade spring guide to metal ball bearing to help sustain the increased amount of times the spring will be compressed against it.
-upgrade to a metal toothed piston. A full metal racked piston will greatly increase the strength of the teeth, which makes it able to handle higher stress setups.
-upgrade to solid metal bushings. Bushings are a high stress part of the GB commonly overlooked, bearings can also be used in 8mm+ GB shells.
You can keep:
-stock piston head
-stock GB shell
-stock cylinder head
-anything else not mentioned
You might also run into feeding issues. It is unlikely, but the combination of your air nozzle, hopup, magazine and bucking can affect how the bbs feed in your aeg. You can modify your feeding by adding a sector clip (which delays tappet timing), trying different magazines, a new hopup or bucking, etc.
Upper stress builds generally require more specific aftermarket parts. They are more difficult to build and maintain. DIY mods must be perfected.
If your goal is between 30-40 rps, you will need to change even more parts to meet it.
To get this speed you can:
-upgrade your batteryI recommend a 11.1v LiPo with at least 25-50c discharge and 2200mah at this point, technically a 12v NiMh will probably still work, but LiPo batteries are more reliable.
-rewire your gun to at least 16awg, deans and a 3034 MOSFET, lower resistance wiring and connectors increase the power that can be given to your motor from your battery, the mosfet protects your trigger contacts from carbon buildup wearing them down.
-upgrade your motor, a nice HT motor with low ratio high speed gears (13:1) will get 30-40rps with a 11.1v LiPo battery. Now, as you should know, not all HT motors have the same torque-speed output. For example, a JG Blue is slower than an SHS HT and on 13:1 gears with an 11.1v batttery, the JG Blue averages 30rps while the SHS HT averages 37rps. Combining these motors with different gear ratios and batteries will yield different rps values. You can also use a HS motor, but keep in mind it will put more strain on your gearbox, is less reliable, and generally a different build setup.
Some High Torque motors include: SHS HT, Lonex A2, Lonex A1, DA HT, Matrix Magnum HT, JG Blue
Some High Speed motors include: SHS HS, DA HS, Lonex A3
-Upgrade your spring, as your rps increases your gears spin faster. Your piston needs to be fully returned and waiting for the sector gear to pick it up to start another shot. If it is not yet fully returned when the sector gear engages it, you will hit PME and have a big mess to clean up in your gearbox. That being said, generally an m120 equivalent rated spring (or higher) should be used. You can short stroke to reduce fps if needed.
-DIY mods to correctly run your new gearbox speed. These include (not limited to):
-Shim, Grease, AOE
-Swiss Cheese piston (if you need to increase its return speed)
-radius cylinder window
To reinforce your new gearbox you can:
-upgrade spring guide to metal ball bearing to help sustain the increased amount of times the spring will be compressed against it.
-upgrade to a metal toothed piston. A full metal racked piston will greatly increase the strength of the teeth, which makes it able to handle higher stress setups.
-upgrade to solid metal bushings. Bushings are a high stress part of the GB commonly overlooked, bearings can also be used in 8mm+ GB shells.
-install an STS.
-upgrade to a high durability* GB shell (Lonex, G&P, VFC, sometimes DBoys and JG shells are strong too)
-upgrade to a high durability* cutoff lever
-upgrade to a high durability* anti-reversal latch
-upgrade to a high durability* piston head
-upgrade to a high durability* cylinder head
-perfect all DIY mods.
You can keep:
-anything else not mentioned
*Certain stock parts are high durability, usually JG and DBoys. You will learn more specifics during research.
You might also run into feeding issues. It is unlikely, but the combination of your air nozzle, hopup, magazine and bucking can affect how the bbs feed in your aeg. You can modify your feeding by adding a sector clip (which delays tappet timing), trying different magazines, a new hopup or bucking, etc.
HIGH STRESS BUILDS
High stress builds Require pretty specific aftermarket parts. They are very difficult to build and maintain. DIY mods must be perfected. A complete understanding of how to modify the gearbox is required.
If your goal is between 40-50rps or higher (with SSG), you will need to change even more parts and modify most of them to meet it.
To get this speed you can:
-upgrade your batteryI recommend a 11.1v LiPo with a pretty high amp discharge.
-rewire your gun to at least 16awg, deans and a 3034 MOSFET, lower resistance wiring and connectors increase the power that can be given to your motor from your battery, the mosfet protects your trigger contacts from carbon buildup wearing them down.
-upgrade your motor, a HS motor with low ratio high speed gears (13:1, 12:1, 10:1, etc.) will get 40rps+ with a 11.1v high amp discharge LiPo battery. Now this build gets increasingly more difficult, since you start to run out of HT motors as options. HS motors have the ability to run at a higher RPM, but cant handle the same load a HT motor can. You have to combine these motors with different gear ratios and modifications to overcome the high spring tension needed to avoid PME. These setups require a lot of modification and trial and erroe to build correctly. They will ALWAYS run at a high stress level.
Some High Speed motors include: SHS HS, DA HS
-Upgrade your spring(ESPECIALLY IMPORTANT IN THIS SETUP), as your rps increases your gears spin faster. Your piston needs to be fully returned and waiting for the sector gear to pick it up to start another shot. If it is not yet fully returned when the sector gear engages it, you will hit PME and have a big mess to clean up in your gearbox. That being said, generally an m130 equivalent rated spring (or higher) should be used. You can short stroke to reduce fps or lessen the load on your motor if needed.
-DIY mods to correctly run your new gearbox speed. These include (not limited to):
-Shim, Grease, AOE
-Swiss Cheese piston (if you need to increase its return speed)
-radius cylinder window
To reinforce your new gearbox you can:
-upgrade spring guide to metal ball bearing to help sustain the increased amount of times the spring will be compressed against it.
-upgrade to a metal toothed piston. A full metal racked piston will greatly increase the strength of the teeth, which makes it able to handle higher stress setups.
-upgrade to solid metal bushings. Bushings are a high stress part of the GB commonly overlooked, bearings can also be used in 8mm+ GB shells.
-install an STS.
-upgrade to a high durability* GB shell (Lonex, G&P, VFC, sometimes DBoys and JG shells are strong too)
-upgrade to a high durability* cutoff lever
-upgrade to a high durability* anti-reversal latch
-upgrade to a high durability* piston head
-upgrade to a high durability* cylinder head
-perfect all DIY mods.
You can keep:
-anything else not mentioned
*Certain stock parts are high durability, usually JG and DBoys. You will learn more specifics during research.
You might also run into feeding issues. It is unlikely, but the combination of your air nozzle, hopup, magazine and bucking can affect how the bbs feed in your aeg. You can modify your feeding by adding a sector clip (which delays tappet timing), trying different magazines, a new hopup or bucking, etc.
Tips and Tricks:
-No two builds are identical, and no two goals have only one way to achieve them. If you are building/upgrading a high speed (or any) airsoft aeg, it would help to keep track of your progress. Jot things down that work, things that don't work. Use a thread on a forum to communicate with others and keep track of your progress. This will serve as reference for future needs and help others figure out how to solve problems you come to face.
-However, don't start a thread saying "I want to upgrade a gun, what do I need to buy". It shows you have done little to no research and will not work in the end because you wont have the knowledge to successfully tune and modify the parts going into your gearbox. Instead, try to follow this format proposed by Zardichar, I like it a lot actually: http://www.airsoftsociety.com/forums/f10/suggested-format-how-should-i-upgrade-my-gun-threads-70415/
-Before starting a build, plan it out. I can't tell you how many times people go into a build with no plan or under no research and have no idea what I'm talking about when I try to help them. It makes the process a lot longer and, quite frankly, annoys me. It is also very annoying when I go through a whole upgrade plan with somebody to meet their performance goals, then AFTER THE FACT I find out they have insufficient funds for their project. Plan out your build before hand, it makes the process a lot easier.
-Do not get discouraged. Teching requires a lot of patience. Things WILL go wrong, problems WILL occur. Its all part of teching unfortunately. Figuring out what needs to be done to overcome your challenge, well that's the fun part.
Specific Information and Recommended Parts
Buying parts for your high speed aeg can get annoying and confusing...not to mention expensive. Here is a recommendation of some strong, reliable and cost-effective parts to put into your aeg. (as of Nov. 2013)
GB Shell:
-DBoys
-JG
-G&P
-Lonex
-VFC
Bushings:
-SHS
-modify stainless tempered
-TX tungsten
Bearings:
-Modify Ceramics 8mm
Spring guides:
-ZCI bb
-ZCI stainless bb
-Super shooter bb
Springs:
-guarder
-prometheus
-Madbul
-Systema
-SHS
Pistons:
-SHS blue 15t
-DA 15t
-Lonex Red (swiss cheesed)
Piston Heads:
-Lonex Pom
-ZCI nylon
-Guarder pom
Cylinder Heads:
-Lonex
-SHS
-ZCI
-JG
-DBoys
Tappet plates:
-JG
-DBoys
-SHS
-Guarder
Gears:
-SHS gen.III (18:1, 16:1, 13:1, 12:1, pinion)
-JG stock (18:1)
-DBoys/CYMA/XYT stock (18:1)
ARL:
-XYT
-SHS
Cutoff lever:
-ZCI
-SHS
Now, as stated above, different motors have different TPA ratings and turn at different speeds. This is also further effected by the battery and wiring connecting the two. So, with an 11.1v 20c 1600mah battery, and upgraded wiring (16awg with mosfet on deans), here are some estimate rof outputs for certain motors on an m120 spring:
JG Blue
-18:1 = 18rps
-16:1 = 23rps
-13:1 = 30rps
Matrix Magnum HT
-18:1 = 19rps
-16:1 = 24rps
-13:1 = 32rps
SHS HT
-18:1 = 22rps
-16:1 = 29rps
-13:1 = 37rps
Lonex A2
-18:1 = 20rps
-16:1 = 26rps
-13:1 = 35rps
Lonex A1
-18:1 = 24rps
-16:1 = 32rps
-13:1 = 43rps
Common Problems, Troubleshoots and Fixes
Here I will list some common found problems you might encounter while building your high speed aeg, what might be causing them, and how to fix them.
After a long, hard days work of tinkering with your gearbox, you finally have it all back together. Only to find out that pulling the trigger just results in an unsatisfactory "click" sound rather than an impressive speed build. Instead of throwing your gearbox against a wall, check for these problems:
-motor height way too tight (high)
-battery is weak
-battery is dead
-bad electrical connection
-weak motor for setup
-piston too thick
-extra strain in gearbox (really stiff spring with bad shimming/greasing for example)
-physical block in gears (an object is jamming the gears)
-really bad shimming
-gearbox shell too tight
Or, better yet, if your gearbox makes no noise at all when you pull the trigger. You should look for:
-dead battery
-wire came unplugged
-contacts are fried
-contacts grounding/not touching
-electrical short
Now, if your build actually works, but it is not as fast as it should be (considering the parts you chose to use) you may need to retune it. Check:
-shimming
-grease
-bevel-pinion height
-if there's any extra resistance/friction in gears or piston
When your gun shoots, but makes an earsplitting shrieking noise, check for:
-bevel to pinion height
-shimming
-grease
-worn down gears
-stripped piston/gears
If your gun is shooting, but the bbs are dropping off prematurely, check for some of these problems:
-tappet timing is off, shorten your tappet return spring o cut 1mm off the tappet fin
-bad seal with hopup, shave the front of your tappet plate
-mags cant keep up with your new rof, try new midcaps with a stiffer spring (MAG brand are good)
-tappet not being pulled far enough back, add a brass ring or sector clip and then experiment with tappet timing
-slight PME, make our piston assembly as light as you can, counteract friction in your piston rails (grease and shaving), and buy a stiffer spring if needed.
If parts you bought aren't fitting together properly, there's no space for wires, adding one shim instantly makes your gearbox lock up, MODIFY THEM! You should have things such as:
-dremel tool with various bits
-sandpaper
-files
-screwdrivers
-hammer
-superglue
-pins
-permatex
-metal polish
-grease
-silicon grease
-knives/blades
-electrical tape
-etc.
Put these tools to use! Cut, grind, shave, mold, modify your pieces to fit your needs
--
General CJ
Team Commander