Monthly Archives: January 2011

Banding rubber bladders

When a Nerfer wants to increase the pressure of a bladder, they generally turn to “banding,” the layering of rubber bands on the bladder. I came into this hobby from the similar water gun hobby, and I’ve often wondered why this method is so prevalent in Nerf but not water guns. It’s not that layering […]

Unfinished Nerf gun with semi-auto valve from 2007

Back in 2006 I had an idea to improve a pneumatic Nerf gun my brother made. This Nerf gun had a semi-auto valve. At the time I was interested in semi-auto Nerf guns, but I saw the valve as a more daunting task than an advancement system. Like my brother, I started focusing on only […]

How far in does a pipe fitting thread?

When drawing up homemade pneumatic Nerf guns in a CAD program, I used to wonder how deep a fitting would go in. Eventually I learned that technical drawings from McMaster-Carr and many other places offer this information in the listed “thread engagement”. See the drawing from McMaster-Carr below. Click on the image to view the […]

Pneumatic gun model on NerfEngrWiki

While what I have posted is far from complete, I have started posting a derivation of a relatively simple model of a pneumatic gun on NerfEngrWiki. Feel free to use the comments section to ask questions, etc., if you have any. I don’t suspect many people will have questions, but I do know a few […]

Kinetic energy density on NerfEngrWiki

Today I nearly finished a page on kinetic energy density for NerfEngrWiki. KED is one of the more important concepts in the safety of Nerf guns (and that much was admitted by chiefthe, a former Hasbro engineer). I detail the most important topics about kinetic energy density, however, I do not make any suggestions about […]

Older blog posts at trettel.org

Before I would occasionally blog about Nerf projects at my personal website, trettel.org. Now that I have launched a blog specifically for Nerf, that practice will end. My old Nerf related posts are accessible in the fang2 and fang4 categories at trettel.org.

NerfEngrWiki launched

Today I am launching NerfEngrWiki, the Nerf engineering Wiki. This Wiki will primarily be used by myself to organize what I know about how to engineer Nerf guns. Others are welcome to help out, though I do not expect anyone to make that effort.

Rifling: Helpful, harmful, or ineffective?

By making analogies with real guns, some Nerfers have proposed that rifled barrels may be beneficial for Nerf blasters. But is this true? I will examine the two most popular claimed benefits of rifling, that rifling increases range and improves accuracy, and conclude that rifling as implemented thus far has had no significant effect on […]

Blog launch

I decided I should put my Nerf projects and random thoughts about ballistics on its own blog. Several people in the hobby are interested in reading what I right but not interested in the rants I post on trettel.org, so this should work out for the best.