Challenge: Achieve a distance of 70 ft.

[Ben]

This year seems as if it will be a very productive one, and no challenge will make it any less productive. The goals of this year seem obvious: improve all water guns by any means. Duxburian made a poll that listed many people's goals for this year. One of these goals is extended stream distance, which should be the easiest goal to achieve given most people do not have the experience my brother does in making triggered PVC guns.

We know what will improve the stream distance of a water gun. We know that higher pressures typically mean more distance. We know about improved nozzles with super-laminar flow such as Chris Bloch's fuzzy nozzle. We know the practice of linear design will also create the most streamline flow. We know about ideal nozzle size and how to find it by empirical means. When is someone going to make a water gun that is a cumulation of all this knowledge?

I am challenging all homemade water gun builders to create their water gun designed for stream distance. The water gun does not have to be usable, and ideally it wouldn't be if you wanted only distance. However, I will set some clear rules:

- Only water may be shot (i.e. no additives)
- Distance measured must be accurate
- Use a tape measure to the inch
- Do not use approximations or guesses
- Do not measure to the last drop, measure to the end of the large patch of water
- The water gun can be elevated as high as 5 feet at most

Last year I made a water gun that was very large and used a simple design that I hoped would get extended stream distance. The design had problems I could not foresee, and as of now I would not suggest a similar pressure chamber design to anyone. The nozzle and valve however was a step in the right direction. I am going to modify the nozzle to work very much like Chris Bloch's fuzzy nozzle. I also am going to make an air-pressure piston water gun to attach the valve-nozzle assembly to that should provide more than enough power in the right design to achieve an extended stream distance.

Hopefully with a thread about achieving the highest distance possible, we'll get even more ideas out that people haven't tried yet and also generate interest in the achievements possible through water gun modifications and homemade water guns. People complain that the new gun's range are low, yet they do nothing to improve upon it. Let's change that.

[pigtailsboy]

I was thinking of something along those lines.

What would I need to start? I'm back to classes now so everything outside of my studies is hard to pull. I should get my student aid soon and I'll be able to focus some funds to this years water gun purchases and creations. I've got a few ideas I'd enjoy pulling out of the freezer yet I'd like someone to check up on the possibilities of the designs. Still a novice on how to use the tech but I'm hoping to change that with some help.

[da_respect]

ihave made a gun that only makes around 65ft
i set it with pre pressurizedpaket make for bbguns and i set about 15 in the sides of the chamber and it went well and it hurts..

[joannaardway]

da respect - that post made no sense - please rewrite it with proper grammar and spelling. Put spaces in, capitalise I, and put more information in - posts devoid of useful information are practically (if not) spam

"only makes around 65ft"? Most people would be stunned by 65ft - however how accurately did you measure it?

Water guns shouldn't hurt - don't shoot anyone with it.

[m15399]

Probably by looking at it and guessing...

What are "pre pressurizedpaket"s? co2 or something?

[joannaardway]

I'd love to try this challenge, but I doubt that what I built would be much use for combat, and UK PVC isn't cheap, so I guess it will never be the case.

This particular section is very empty - it goes on one page and the time range on that page is around 3 years.

Physics (I always spell that psychics) is important, and often isn't understood well enough - so the lack of input is sad.

[Lewis]

This section is still relatively new. All these topics were originally part of the single Tech section, which included all the tech topics.

Even if you don't build for battle practicality, your creations would still help advance soaking tech. You would be surprised how few homemade builders actually build guns designed for fighting with instead of raw power. In my homemades, I rarely see over 55ft, but then again, you can carry them into battle and at the least keep up with any other soaker. Battle Practicality in homemades is still sadly a rather new concept. Homemades still have that "expensive, hard to build, and dangerous" reputation because not enough people build cheap, easy, practical ones. Even my craziest stuff goes under the $50 mark, while others might see $200 costs per each. My record lowest cost was $21 [$10 less than some stock soakers in stores], but then again it only has a 30x riot blast [low for a homemade] and ranges in the upper 40s.

[joannaardway]

Well, I'm sure my homemades will be expensive, so practicality is foremost in my plans.

I don't want to fork out £50 ($90) for a water weapon that isn't of use to me.

However, when I can see other uses for a homemade (other than watering the garden), extra cost isn't a problem. The Cerberus is going to be expensive, but I can use it to shoot cans.

I enjoy target shooting, but don't get to do it that often, and don't want to go that far to do it. With something as safe as a water balloon, discharge in an urban area isn't a problem (possibly a bit noisy though - thus porting to be added).

But of course, if I could make a practical weapon that could shoot 70ft, then that would be a true breakthrough for me.

Anyway, so I know, how should I go about constructing a weapon that can fire 70ft?
Links are a perfectly good answer to this...

[wetmonkey442]

So when I win this contest, what do I get?


Sorry, but now the pressure is on between Duxburian, Doom, and me. I shall win. Or not. Depends on how much time I have. Lacrosse takes up a lot of time. And money. And patience.

Soak On

EDIT: Doom, can I use my "sponge bullet" design? I haven't posted 90% of the design of it yet, and if it can carry 3 or 4 oz of water, could it be eligible?

[Ben]

@ joanna

There's plenty that can be done to construct a water gun capable of 70 feet of distance. I'll give you all the links I have at the moment.

For a dated, but mostly correct and complete explanation of basic water nozzle physics, read my very old Streams article. For a much longer, completely correct, but very incomplete explanation, read my newer partial rewrite: http://forums.sscentral.org/t3476/.

My latest attempt to construct a water gun capable of shooting 70 feet is incomplete because of the weather and my lack of time: Supercannon II. My older attempt was capable of 65 feet of distance, but was disappointing in it's reliability (mainly due to the design, which I made to avoid a piston). Pistons I later found where necessary. There are a few images of the first cannon online, most notably a few images of myself posing with it: http://www.sscentral.org/images/dscn0288.jpg

The water gun physics section here also should be helpful. While it is new and relatively empty, it certainly already has served it's purpose.

The most effective methods of efficiently in water gun design are high power (via high-pressure in this case), correct nozzle orifice diameters, linear design, and conical nozzle use. Essentially, I will be following all of those practices in my design. Nothing too hard if you read my articles.

Doom, can I use my "sponge bullet" design? I haven't posted 90% of the design of it yet, and if it can carry 3 or 4 oz of water, could it be eligible?

Water and water only may be shot. The idea, as implied, is to shoot water in a stream form. I also should mention that the water can not be frozen because that would be trying to bend the rules (I've already been asked about shooting ice). Using a sponge bullet wouldn't work very well unless you had a lot of wadding to allow the sponge to actually move as opposed to only filter the air, and believe me, I've tried that idea before.

Also, the only reward is the satisfaction of the build. I simply couldn't match what you get anyway because the winner will have the most powerful water gun around. That's the real reward.

You would be surprised how few homemade builders actually build guns designed for fighting with instead of raw power.

I think people largely assume that a powerful water gun will be practical in battle, which is not true at all. We need more water gun usability really. That might be my next challenge.

Would posting these challenges periodically be fun with everyone? I have been considering turning the challenges into a annual or semi-annual event here at Super Soaker Central.

[joannaardway]

I'm guessing conical nozzles, an ideal nozzle size, high psi (or a CPS chamber and linear configuration) and a decent ID are an absolute minimum for this type of job.

Admittedly, it could be some time before this is a possibility for me. First I'm going to look at making my APH design practical, with decent range and a good output before I advance to this sort of challenge.

[Lewis]

I'm more likely to break 70 using a modded gun than a homemade at this point. Mainly because in order to hit 70 via homemade, I would need a beast of a gun that I wouldn't want to use in a war. It would have some astounding power, but would be worthless overall. Price is a big factor, as is the design itself. I'm not a backpack person, so the reservoir would have to be attached. I've been slowly building up to the point where I could get away with more range and power from a smaller, cheaper, and more practical gun.

My best modded gun still outranges my best homemade by around 10, 11 whole feet, and once outranged it by ~15ft. [21K hitting 60 vs homemades near 50] One of my older 21Ks used to shoot 65 before the trigger valve broke, I could finish the trigger valve replacement if I had some initiative to do so. Problem is, I don't know the best way to attach the pc to the PVC piping. Wrapping tape around and then gluing is the common way, but would it hold more pressure than the stock valve did? I can see future leaking and a headache.

[joannaardway]

Good glue might work. It worked for some repairs on my old XP 110.

However, I wouldn't count on it if it's under force while the chambers are filling. (It did hold on the XP 110 at 60+ psi)

So here it might not work - but it is CPS, so you're not fighting pressure, so then again.

Glues work well enough when not under pressure, but K-mods - don't know.

[Silence]

Why does there always appear to be a barrier around 60-65 feet of range? Maybe an investigation of different types of soakers is in order, because there must be some single variable (nozzle, PVC properties, etc.) that kills attempts to hit 70 feet of range. Sure, anybody can do this, but it will certainly mean becoming too impractical.
___________________________________________________________________________________
EDIT_______________________________________________________________________________
Maybe we can make this thread a portal to other actually useful threads, and have summaries of each of the other threads. I think it's about time we organised all the different ideas floating around out there.

[Lewis]

Well, for me, I set a personal bar at 65ft with my 3rd 21K and have been struggling to get back to it. 70 can be done by a modded gun, but all my 21ks are broken at the moment, leaving me with no platform for resuming the goal. I'm willing to bet that an 11K could hit 70, if not at least clear 65. I have the know-how and tools to get that done, everything except properly working internals.

If anyone sees any 2100 re-stocks around Northeastern stores, PLEASE let me know! I'm not willing to pay ebay prices for a 2100 since store prices have been under $10 in the past, often $7.

As for homemades, my new unnamed super-weapon thingy has a chance at 70 or more. I don't know if that counts as a water gun though, since it is kinda between a gun and a launcher. I still have to put the schrader valve in, so I haven't been able to test it yet. A bad version without the inverted-T did manage about 40 feet of range at a negative angle though.