APH article v2

Build a homemade water gun or water balloon launcher and tell us about it.
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SSCBen
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Post by SSCBen » Thu Sep 23, 2004 7:23 pm

Article revision version 2.0

The Air Pressure Homemade is the standard homemade water gun. By far the most popular design, it combines simplicity of construction with power. Performance unmatched by anything other than it's brother homemades, the APH will keep us battling long into the night.

Design features
  • Ball valve trigger
  • "Step-up" design
  • Possible backpack or included reservoir
  • Large PCs
  • Riot-blast (35 - 55X in output)
  • Multiple nozzle settings
  • Extremely long range (50 feet +)
Materials

All PVC and fittings are schedule 40 and female unless otherwise stated.
  • 3" ID PVC
  • 3/4" ID PVC
  • 1/2" ID PVC
  • 3/4" PVC ball valve
  • 2 1/2" PVC check valves
  • 1 washer that fits in 1/2" ID PVC joints
  • Teflon tape
  • 1 3/8" alluminum rod
  • A few 3/4" screw on endcaps (for the nozzles)
  • 1 3/4" male adaptor
  • 2 pressure chambers (add or remove parts to make more or less chambers):
    • 2 3" to 2" reducers
    • 2 2" to 3/4" reducers
    • 2 3/4" PVC tees
    • 2 3" PVC endcaps
  • 1 1/2" PVC Tee
  • 1 90 degree elbow
  • 2 1/2" female/male couplers (turns female 1/2" PVC into male screw on threads)
  • 1 1/2" to 3/4" coupler (don't know what it's called, it has a 1/2" male screw on side and a 3/4" female pipe side)
  • 1 1/2" PVC endcap (or a 1/2" male adaptor and a 1/2" screw on end cap if you want a better option for a pump cap)
  • Styrofoam or something to keep help separate the pump and the PCs
  • Electrical tape
  • Lubricant of some sort (Vaseline works)
  • PVC Primer
  • PVC Cement
  • A whole bunch of tools I won't mention
Pricing and Performance


Depending on what you have, your first APH could cost you anywhere from $40 to $150. You may not have any of the tools we'll be using to work with the PVC, that is a one time investment. You also seem to get a lot of extra PVC from making a homemade water gun, and that PVC can go a long ways in other water guns. I've built 3 guns from my first installment of 1/2" PVC, and 2 from my 3/4" PVC (with some to spare).

Performance-wise this gun crushes the competition. It is my choice in battles due to it's performance. The tests below were at 50-55 pumps. Remember that because this is an air pressure gun, more pumps equals more pressure, so it does get better than what is shown below. I have not taken every statistic I could have, I felt I didn't need to because what I had spoke for itself.
  • Range at 45°
    • 1/4" nozzle - 52 feet effective range, 56 to the last drop
    • 3/8" nozzle - 55 feet effective range, 60 and a few inches to the last drop
  • PC Capacity (2, 4" long chambers)
    • ~ 1500 ml
Review of the gun

Doom posted his experiences with his first APH at the SSCentral forums on May 9th, 2004 in response to a post announcing his completion of the gun.

I battle tested it yesterday, the battle was very fast-paced because it only had 3 people, this gun is nice, my 1000 would have done better in this particular battle, here's my observations:

You'll be pumping this gun forever. Well not forever, but it still takes a while, in battle it depends on the amount of air in the backpack, sometimes air gets pumped in with my backpack and it will make you pump a few more times to get the same power. Try to conserve your water, most of the time you'll be using a large nozzle because of it's killer range. The small nozzles I have made also were very useful due to the very large PC size, shot time reigned suprime. This is seriously a sniper/HWO type weapon with the larger nozzles, if it had a single PC it likely could be a good grunt weapon too. I'm going to make my next one have one chamber, and then a crazy one with 4 maybe.

The range, as when I tested it, is highly superior. It's really a lot higher than standard weaponry. It was so much higher I wasn't ready for it. I really wasn't ready at all. I still was standing about 40-45 feet from my targets to hit them, I'm just used to it at this point. You'll have to work on moving farther back to hit them. I also noticed how the stream breaks up in this battle, I really need to get the straws in, but since this thing is very powerful, just putting them in blows them out, so I'll have to concoct a new way to get them in that won't screw up the stream.

The riot blast feature was very useful for slaughters, I didn't tell anyone here it had it but it did. I rioted them while they were pumping, then I ran away because I had to pump up this beast. I also noticed that the riot blast shoots pretty far, it was nearing my bro's 1200 in range. The nozzle selection system could have been better, I know now to put all my nozzle settings (they screw on, there is no selector) in my pockets, not the backpack I was using! I couldn't get at them there.


I think it even has kick on the smallest nozzle I've tried, which was about 1/16"! Maybe not... On 1/4" it has a good buck, and with riot blast it's kick is very high, this thing is just plain powerful!

The trigger set up didn't bother me at all, it was just as efficient as a normal trigger, that surprised me. My only problem is that I can't pump and close/open the valve at the same time, but I can pump while it's shooting so it's not too bad.

Overall, very powerful and useful gun, could be redesigned to work better in certain situations, so it's design is highly versatile as well. I love it, I don't care if it's air (that rhymes), it's stream actually is fairly constant due to the large PCs and high pressure.

Construction

Now after reading that review you probably are just wanting to make one. Before you skip this paragraph, be aware that you do NOT need to make the gun exactly as I have shown. You don't need to use the same exacty parts. The more general design is what you will make. You can use 2" PVC to make the PCs, in fact I think I am one of the few people who did use 3" when making an APH. You can use larger PVC, there are many possible modifications to the design, one of it's beauties. The design is 100% customizeable.

Below I will provide images showing the details of the design. If you can't make it from these images, honestly you shouldn't be making homemades just yet. It would take ages to write out instructions, and most people who make this wouldn't use them anyway. I've broken it down a lot, save the images and print them out if you're having trouble. If you have any questions or concerns at all, you shouldn't feel that way. Get all the answers you need at the SSCentral forums. Many there have built this gun and know what you are going through.

Image

Diagram with several parts labled. The handle area and a few other spots you should customize to fit yourself. My handle was 5 to 6 inches long, you could make yours larger/smaller depending on the size of your hands. Arrows on the check valves indicate the direction of the valve. Information on making pumps in in the Pumps article (it would be silly to put the same information in several articles). Also, there is info on the common homemade nozzles in the Nozzles article.

Image

This image labels the different sizes of PVC used in this gun. It can be hard to tell the difference from the other drawings.
  • Blue - 1/2"
  • Orange - 3/4"
  • Red - 2" (you will not need to buy 2" PVC however)
  • Green - 3"
Image

Some think there is something special to the PCs, but here they are dissasembled. Nothing else was used in their construction, this is the beauty of air pressure, it's simplicity.

From here you should assemble the gun as shown. Make sure everything works out before glueing. If there is a problem you'll be able to correct it, unlike after you glued it.

Finalization (Glueing)

Take all of your homemade's parts and go to a well ventilated area. I choose my garage with the door open. Due to the fact that the garage was a little dirty, I layed some newspaper down to cement the parts. I recommend that you do to. I put all the pieces roughly in the order they were in my gun. They were not put together. Then, I primed them. To do that I took the primer and put it on the ends of the PVC by wiping it around a few times. I also did the parts of the PVC joints that would be glued, basically the inside of the joint. I then waited about 4 hours to glue them, even though the can said something like 2.

To glue them I first isolated the parts that needed to be glued and those who didn't. I did not glue anything that will not be under any pressure at all, basically everything in the nozzles after the ball valve and everything before the first check valve. I am going to glue that later though, so maybe you should just glue it all. I also got out my teflon tape, this stuff makes the threaded things much stronger. You just wrap that around the threaded part and get maybe 5 or 6 layers in, and then screw on the other end. I got it screwed on extra hard by putting one end in a clamp and twisting hard with some grip thing. To glue all the pieces I applied the glue to the ends of the PVC pieces and the insides of the joints they're being glued to. That's what the can said to do at least. It also said to twist as you push it in a bit, so I did. I believe that helps spread the PVC cement. I then glued everything together. However, on the PCs I used more PVC cement than normal because the endcap's and reducer's area is much larger. Just make sure everything that is going to be touching has some cement on it. Also, push in when putting two parts together for about 15 seconds, this will keep the two parts from separating.

Let your gun dry at least overnight. To make sure it's dry wait 24 hours. You should keep the trigger valve in the open position, this way it will let the inside dry out faster.

Testing

You should test your gun for two reasons, the most obvious being to know if it works, the less obvious being that there is a bunch of PVC cement crud that is sticking out of the pipes you want to blow out.
Pump your gun until it gets hard. That is when it is really getting some real pressure, SS adds special valves to release pressure beyond this point, but you can keep going a bit more on this homemade because it is built stronger (just don't expect to be pumping forever, eventually you should stop). Make sure you have no nozzles on the gun, and test a riot blast. If it has a good buck, and a nice large spray, congradulations on your new gun. Use with caution.

If something went wrong and it's not working, the best thing you could do would be to post about it at our forums. You might just be doing something wrong, or you might be lucky and can fix whatever went wrong.

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DX
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Post by DX » Sun Oct 24, 2004 3:08 am

If you are making this APH wait for Doom to release the V3 article, it's much better. B) I'm still in the process of making my APH, I haven't been able to get all the parts, I'm getting the final parts tomarrow though. I really understand how it works, so actually assembling mine should be a breeze. As Doom says, it really is 100% customizable, I'm building a tracked pump for mine!
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RacerSoaker445
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Post by RacerSoaker445 » Sun Oct 24, 2004 1:49 pm

How? Darn, I want one! my APH doesn't work.
I don't check this forum anymore.

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SSCBen
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Post by SSCBen » Sun Oct 24, 2004 1:56 pm

Yep, I've built 3 homemades that are similar (if you count the CPS one as similar), and you really can do what you want to them. You can make anything and everything in homemades.

I've got my plans for more, but first I'm going to fix my CPS homemade's PC by buying a new one. The only feature it lacks from my two APH's is the amazing riot-blast, but it still has a powerful smaller stream equivilant. The APH's is the best riot-blast we've seen yet, but I'm sure it could be bettered.

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DX
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Post by DX » Sun Oct 24, 2004 3:51 pm

How? Darn, I want one! my APH doesn't work.
The tracked pump is partially done, I used a 2100 pump, wrapped electrical tape around the end, and placed it in a piece of 1/2" pvc. The two lines will have to be drilled in the sides of the pvc and a larger piece of pvc will be the pump handle. The only problem is that this pump is quite short. I could make the pump longer by using pvc instead of the 2100 pump. Would something like 3/8" work?
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Dark Elite
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Post by Dark Elite » Mon Oct 25, 2004 8:59 am

Doom, how hard is this APH to make for someone who has never made one or attempted to make one before? *cough**cough**me**cough*
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Post by SSCBen » Mon Oct 25, 2004 9:47 am

It's easy. Only people who haven't made them say it's hard. That was the way it was at Aquatica and other past forums. Anyone who could (and there weren't many if any) was thought to just be skilled.

Again, I designed this gun in the store looking at the inventory. I couldn't be that hard to construct. All you have to have in your head is the basis idea of how a water gun works.

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Spinner
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Post by Spinner » Mon Oct 25, 2004 4:25 pm

The difficulty I have is finding the necessary parts for it. Amazingly difficult, I've found it, and I still haven't managed to get what I need. <_<
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Post by DX » Mon Oct 25, 2004 10:19 pm

Same here. That's why I still haven't finished after setting out to months ago. I couldn't get some of the right sized parts and then school came around and I got busy. Now I'm back at it again, I've modified a few things, maybe that will help.
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NiborDude
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Post by NiborDude » Tue Oct 26, 2004 3:24 am

Using a 2100 pump handle is a bad idea. I would go with the pvc idea we origionally came up with.
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Post by BlueSmudge » Tue Oct 26, 2004 5:21 am

Listen to Nibor dude, so far, the nly succesful homemades I have made are with homemade pumps. With the PC volumes you get with Homemades, other pumps arnt practical. They worked, but it took 200 pumps for only 10 seconds of output.
(That was my first homemade. Had a large garden hose jet nozzle, and drained my entire reserve in one shot. Ranges close to a 1200. Amazing output. Prep time was too outragous for practical use.)
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Dark Elite
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Post by Dark Elite » Tue Oct 26, 2004 10:20 am

The parts aren't much problem for me, my dad's a pipeliner so he should be able to get the PVC I'll need, and he's got all the tools I'll need too. I'll let you know when I start on it.
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Spinner
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Post by Spinner » Tue Oct 26, 2004 10:24 am

Originally posted by Dark Elite@Oct 26 2004, 11:20 AM
The parts aren't much problem for me, my dad's a pipeliner so he should be able to get the PVC I'll need, and he's got all the tools I'll need too. I'll let you know when I start on it.
Where does he get his stuff from? Screwfix or an actual store? :huh:
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Dark Elite
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Post by Dark Elite » Tue Oct 26, 2004 10:35 am

Not entirely sure, he might buy it off someone he knows who uses it or whatever. Tools he obviously needs a lot of for his job, he bought a full Snap-On set about five years ago and that has everything an APH could ever need.
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1 Max-D 6000
1 XP310 w/my own power mod and 8 balloon XPS mod
2 piston-pistols (backup)


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