K-modding the Hydra Pak

[Ben]

I was reading a thread when mr. dude mentioned that the Hydra Pak uses spherical CPS. Because the Hydra Pak is the only recent gun I know of to have a spherical CPS bladder, I think it might be useful modified. Has anyone tried K-modding a Hydra Pak?

I realize that the internal diameter of the tubing is a little small, but it might be adequate for some streams and it might be possible to increase the internal diameter. This could be a good way to get more powerful guns easily.

The bladders themselves might also have uses in homemade water guns, giving us a good source of materials to start with. I've used balloons before and they're easy to get lots of power with, but I never felt they worked well for some reason. Maybe I should try that too...

[mr. dude]

The main problem I see is that the bladders are much larger than the average CPS bladder, so stretching the balloons will be harder. Other than that, it might work, I'll try to get a Hydrapak and try it out.
Then arises another problem, what should we name it? Perhaps Hydra Pakk? Hydra Pak-k?

[Ben]

You can get larger balloons I suppose. I don't know what sizes are available though so I guess you'll have to check it out for yourself.

By the way, the Hydra Pak is available on Amazon.com on sale right now, so you might want to buy from there.

Hydra Pakk makes sense and works if we want to keep up the renaming.

Take some pictures as you do this and put them on yourself website in a guide. It should be neat and potentially good.

[Drenchenator]

This could be an interesting modification. I was under the impression that Buzz Bee was avoiding spherical and cylindrical CPS, but I guess they haven't been. Should have good results.

Hydra Pakk makes sense and works if we want to keep up the renaming.

When I first read this, I thought it was a typo. Perhaps a capital K, like "Hydra PakK?" I don't know; neither really look too good to me for a name for this.

[sbell25]

I've toyed with the idea of k-modding my Hydra Pak as the streams are pretty weak, but I was a little worried about sawing the thing in half especially since I haven't seen any for sale since I bought mine. I also haven't seen balloons in sizes over 12", and I imagine they'd be expensive if you did manage to find them.

[CROC]

Would the hose connecting the gun to the backpack be able to hold up to the extra pressure? I can see that as a possible weakness.

[Ben]

No one knows, but I highly doubt the hose would be a problem. The diameter's pretty small, which increases the pressure rating because there is less surface area and therefore less force applied to the tube. There's only one way to find out for sure, and that's to try it out. I suppose you could make an educated guess if you examined the hose. Big Bee could fill us in too, but I think he's busy right now.

[CROC]

One would want to get some form of balloon that is at least 15", due to the massive expansion of the PCs, which grow to fill the tank completely.

If my Hydra Pak had not burst, I would have attempted to K-mod it. Now I have to try it.

[StormGlorious]

Sbell25: you do not have to saw the Hydra Pak in half to get to the bladders, you merely unsrew the pump and it comes out.

Everyone else: I believe that it is entirely possible to K-Mod the Hydra-Pak. I have just opened the thing myself and the idea seems irresistble. This might even give the big nozzle some power.
Also I might use the bladder and ballons in a homemade soon so I'll get back to you guys.

[CROC]

I have one question for you Storm:
Did you see the size of the pressure chamber? You need massive balloons to cover the whole thing. A problem could be splitting balloons or even the connecting hose bursting under the extra pressure. I am not sure how it is reinforced, so it may burst with some extra pressure.

[powersurge919]

I put Rubber bands on my Cylindrical chambers. It works just as good.
If nobody has done this before then I would like to call it P-modding

[Ben]

People have done that before. It's generally not a good idea because the pressure it applies to the chamber is uneven, so the rubber will thin at uneven rates, eventually making one part of the bladder expand while the other parts don't, and ultimately reducing the power of the bladder and popping the bladder. Rubber bands are more common in Nerf and people have had a lot of problems with them from what I remember.

[powersurge919]

no you misunderstand me. there is not just a few on it. I bundled 2 layers of rubber bands on it

[Ben]

I know what you're talking about. I've seen it done before and from what I've read it doesn't work well in the long run. If it works for you, great, but going by what I've read it can do bad things to the bladder. Getting the rubber bands evenly distributed is the problem. With a tube over a tube or a balloon over a balloon shaped bladder, the distribution is already even, but with rubber bands it's less even.

You might have more success making some sort of mold from melted rubber bands but I don't know how well melted rubber reforms. I should investigate this more.

[Drenchenator]

I would definitely not recommend putting rubber bands around the chamber. In all, it'd just stress certain parts of the chamber more than others; what you really want is even stress over the whole bladder, which improves performance a lot more.