Buzz Bee Xenon

General water gun discussion.
gilad50303
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Buzz Bee Xenon

Post by gilad50303 » Sun May 21, 2006 8:38 pm

How does it maintain pressure?
Is it a good water gun?
Is it powerful?
Thanks!

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Silence
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Post by Silence » Sun May 21, 2006 9:23 pm

If you don't know anything about a commercial soaker, go to iSoaker.com. The iSoaker.com Reviews are the most thorough out there and they cover practically every homemade soaker, and the iSoaker.com Forums are the best place to discuss commercial soakers. The Xenon review should cover everything for the 2005 edition, and iSc Reviews also has the Argon (excellent value for its size) and the Krypton. In 2005, all three only needed 3 pumps to fill the (rather small) PC; now, the Xenon needs 4 easier pumps, and the Krypton went up to 5 (it took 3 rock-solid pumps earlier). The changes aren't reflected in the reviews, but they're even better now (though you could do a partial PreCharge and have an option for either extra-quick or easy pumping with the 2005 models, and you can get old 2005 models off of Amazon very cheaply).

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m15399
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Post by m15399 » Sun May 21, 2006 9:23 pm

It works like this:
http://www.geocities.com/m15399/prechargesystem.html

Here's the review:
http://isoaker.com/Armoury/soaker_stats ... ID=wwxenon

The 2006 model is easier to pump than the 2005 one. It takes 4 pumps instead of 3. Since you don't seem to want to pump much (other thread), I must warn you that you have to repump prechargers quite often.

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Silence
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Post by Silence » Sun May 21, 2006 9:29 pm

I'm assuming m15399 was working on his reply (getting the links, maybe) while I completed mine. Oh well.

That's correct, the commercial PreChargers use (1) very few pumps (2) at slightly above-average difficulty to (2) pressurize smaller PCs. That's about all you need to know, besides the fact that they don't lose the initial extra air pressure (so you don't have to pressurize that again) and that there's less dropoff.

EDIT: Corrections concerning m15399's article:
-You actually are pressurizing when you fill the PC with water, as you compress the air chamber.
-Because of PreCharging, there is always relatively more pressure than a standard air pressure soaker would have at a specified number of pumps
-Because of the above two points, you do experience dropoff, and at the same rate, too--it's just that at any specified point, you'll have relatively more output/pressure than a standard air pressure soaker. Earlier, the consensus was that there is reduced dropoff, but that is not the case--the power is increased by PreCharging throughout the shot, not just at the end.
-This should be easy to construct by hand, and I plan to build a PCgH (if you haven't caught on yet :p ). It's just slightly more complex than an APH.

m15399, your site says that the stream is like CPS (without dropoff), but then you say that the pressure is not quite constant :confused: !
Last edited by Silence on Sun May 21, 2006 9:39 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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m15399
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Post by m15399 » Mon May 22, 2006 1:18 am

What is the second statement aimed at? There's nothing in the article that contradicts that.

The amount of dropoff is unnoticable. If you've ever shot one, you'll see that it's much less than a Blazer or Flash Flood.

Constructing a piston in a large pipe is not easy, so I will say that it's hard compared to an APH.

I wrote most of the articles on my web site a long time ago, so they may be slightly inaccurate.

gilad50303
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Post by gilad50303 » Mon May 22, 2006 3:37 pm

Does anyone actually have this gun? I heard that it maintains pressure well, but lacks shot length and power, is this right?

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Silence
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Post by Silence » Mon May 22, 2006 9:15 pm

@ m15399: Actually, there is quite a bit of dropoff. The Blazer and the Flash Flood use Hydro Power/CPS technology, so if anything, they are the soakers that won't have dropoff. Trust me, the PreCharger weapons do have noticable dropoff, though the overall performance is still outstanding. If there's any false knowledge out there about PreCharger weapons, it might be due to my poor knowledge at the time I started my PCgH thread, but much of this has been cleared up now. However, they are effective in their efficiency/battle practicality and in their flexibility.

@ gilad50303: As I've said, PreCharger weapons (including the Xenon) do not maintain pressure any better than standard air pressure soakers do--however, because they need less pumps to fill the PC, the pressure can be brought back very quickly, and in only a few pumps. Part of this is because the stock PreChargers have smaller than average PCs, which is why you're correct in saying that they have shorter shot length and because they must conserve water, they have less power. However, I plan to change all that with my PCgH.

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m15399
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Post by m15399 » Mon May 22, 2006 11:15 pm

Trust me, the PreCharger weapons do have noticable dropoff
Excuse me, but who is the one who actually HAS a precharger? I'll take a video of it if you're still determined to convince me.

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Silence
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Post by Silence » Mon May 22, 2006 11:20 pm

Excuse me, but who is the one who prefers a PreChargers Argon over a CPS 4100 and the various other soakers out there? PreChargers have as much dropoff, percentage-wise, as standard air pressure soakers do, because like standard soakers, their pressure drops at a constant rate. There is no CPS bladder or anything that applies a constant amount of force in PreCharger soakers.

EDIT: Read through this post in the PCgH thread if you're not convinced.

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m15399
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Post by m15399 » Tue May 23, 2006 12:33 am

who is the one who prefers a PreChargers Argon over a CPS 4100
Cerainly not me.

I admit that mathamatically they should have dropoff. I was referring to stock, not homemade prechargers, and I suspect the water in stock prechargers is forced through a small enough hole (either the nozzle, or as it's leaving the PC) so that the water cannot be pushed out fast enough to get more range than lower pressures.

I'm going out to take a video right now.

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DX
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Post by DX » Tue May 23, 2006 12:34 am

Excuse me, but who is the one with the power to close this topic if it gets too hot? :p Just tone it down a bit, that's all.

Oh, and from what I've seen, stock Precharger guns do have quite severe drop-off. [Severe to me, at least, I have a few APHs with next to no drop-off]. So does Ben, which proves that guns using air pressure can have reduced-to-very little drop-off if you make strong designs. [Or get lucky in your design] So homemade prechargers could be made to have little, but the stock guns do have it.
Last edited by DX on Tue May 23, 2006 12:39 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Silence
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Post by Silence » Tue May 23, 2006 12:36 am

A small nozzle won't do anything for preventing or even just reducing dropoff...the rate of output/range will decrease by a constant no matter what.

I must see this video if you're so insistent...

EDIT: I didn't see Duxburian's post...

I don't think this is getting too "hot", but if it is, I'll just tone it down a bit...

I don't see how certain designs can reduce dropoff more than other designs, but that might have something to do with m15399's point about the nozzles. However, even though my Argon has severe dropoff, I'm still more than content with it.

EDIT again: Maybe the PC size has something to do with the dropoff; for example, you'll really have to drain a large PC to see noticeable dropoff, but if plotted as output/range vs. x, where x equals the shot time of the soaker in question, you'll still have the same dropoff rate. Interesting.

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DX
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Post by DX » Tue May 23, 2006 1:08 am

It happens in really big pcs that drain very quickly, and in small pcs that drain quickly. I noticed this in the APR 1000. The quite small pc yields a 1-3 second shot time and then just dies-there is pretty much no drop-off.
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m15399
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Post by m15399 » Tue May 23, 2006 1:23 am

Sorry SilentGuy, I didn't know you also had an Argon.

Hmm.... either BOTH my Argons are special, or your Argon is special (in a bad way ;) ). Duxburian, which precharger do you speak of?

Sorry it took so long. Photobucket wasn't liking my video so I had to register an account on Putfile.

Video!

The first shot is the Blazer. Immediately after that is the Argon, then a shot of the Blazer firing backwards at half speed (it just looks so cool!).

I would get my Flash Flood in there, but it's not in great condition at the moment... As you can see, the dropoff of my Argon is less than half a second, which is much better than my Flash Flood and Blazer.

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DX
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Post by DX » Tue May 23, 2006 1:46 am

The Xenon, actually. It had quite a lot of drop-off after making those 4 hard pumps [4 Xenon pumps are much harder than 10 21K pumps by far] and firing. I think I was doing something wrong though, it had terrible range and no power whatsoever. Maybe it wasn't precharged? I don't know, it is a teammate's gun and I've only shot it once.
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