The mostly DIY post
After more than a month of week-end and duty tinkering, I was finally able to get my carbine to function.
Last month, my gearbox was noted to have a crack, affecting both sides. Since I was moving up to a reinforced gearbox, I decided to upgrade the other components as well. As is always the case, upgrading presents certain problems with getting the new components to mesh with each other. The brief list of the components I got:
- CTR stock
- Piston body
- Double O-ring cylinder head
- Air-seal nozzle
- Systema SP130 spring
- CA super torque up gears
- Terminus IRF1404 MOSFET
- CA reinforced gear box
- Bremenhaus 11.1v 1200mAh LiPoly battery
- Whole bunch of micro-relays
- 3 prong 30A horn relay
- AWG 18 silicone wires
- Heat shrink tubing
- Connectors (including a dean’s plug)
- SRC pinion gear
- One-point sling
- 6mm steel bushings
The biggest draw for me was the CTR stock. After weeks of poitively lusting over it, I finally got one to replace the old crane stock. What prevented me from getting one before was the fact that I would need a smaller battery. Then I’d probably have to get a smaller MOSFET. So after weeks of hemming and hawing, I saw a cheap one in Quiapo and got it. To burn bridges, I then immediately sold off my old crane stock and battery. I was committed. One new lipoly and small MOSFET in the stock tube, and I was back in business – for a while. Apparently, the lack of a heat sink lead to the soldered points coming loose. The Terminus was terminated. Back to plan A: Relays.
I’ve always preferred relays to MOSFETs. The thought of a purely solid state device controlling potentially eye-damaging projectiles gave me the jitters, especially since previous experiences with my first MOSFET where my rifle continued to fire on full auto even without pressing the trigger. Like I said – potentially eye-damaging projectiles. Relays, on the other hand, were something easier for me to handle. Problem was the size. A good 30A relay would never fit with the battery inside the stock tube without major modifications, that is. So back to the grind – literally. After a lot of cutting, shaving, and grinding, I was able to fit the battery AND relay into the stock tube. Luuuurve it.
My old pinion gear was getting ratty, so I opted for a new one from SRC. Unfortunately, during testing, I misaligned my motor so both my new pinion and bevel gear were a bit chewed up. Then my EG1000 motor gave out. Still haven’t figured out why, but that’s another 1.8K down the drain. Borrowed/bought Mark’s old JG motor with new pinion gear, and finally got the thing to crank.
MORAL: Sometimes it pays to just get a damn gunsmith to do all the work. But its nice to know that there’s still some DIY left in me.
Sometimes 
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Speaking of DIY, I decided to switch to propane from green gas. On the ACM boards, it was mentioned that a local shop sold adaptors for around 2K. Went to the shop, and got the price down to 1.8K. Was told that the adaptor was for CO2 tanks and not propane, but I still went ahead and bought it. Talk about severe buyers remorse. Went back the next day to see if I could get it changed – even willing to pay a re-stocking fee, but all they could do was give me store credit. Which was fine, and allowed me to get a balance charger, a dean’s plug, steel bushings, and hi-flow wires. In retrospect, I should’ve just gone with an extra magazine. Then again, I do have a box magazine (which I still need to motorize). Anyway, after getting rid of the unusable adaptor, I was back to square one. Solution? DIY. After cutting up an old green gas can, scrounging around for a quick disconnect coupler, and looking for epoxy, I had all the parts I needed. I filed down the coupler to make it fit into the Schrader valve of the propane tank, then epoxied it to the green gas nozzle. Voila. Total cost: Zero.
Next project will be to rework an LPG regulator in order to refill my coleman tank. That would really drop gas expenditures to practically a pittance, with most of it going to silicone oil.
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DIY. You gotta love it.
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It takes about 30 minutes to reduce a kitten to a pile of ashes that can fit inside a thimble. I learned this last Sunday when by chance I had the components to test it:
1. 1 dead kitten
2. 1 Blow torch
3. 1 Free Sunday afternoon
The sad thing is that this was my favorite kitten from Calico. Never did anything to it. Cam home and found it splayed out inside one of the garage cabinets. Not wanting to dispose of the body in a plastic bag (like I did to the black-and-white kitten last week), I opted to burn the sucker.
After the initial stench of burning hair, it started smelling like a backyard barbecue, complete with sizzling and occasional body fluid squirting from hollow organs. Small parts, like the extremities and tail were easy to cremate. The trunk and head took some time. Bone would glow white hot at the onslaught of the torch. The brain and liver were the hardest to get rid off. I guess if I didn’t mush up the brain, it would’ve taken twice as long. Made me think of what it takes to cremate people. At the end of the process, I’m sure someone has to go and pulverize the cremains.
At the end of it all, what was left was some residual carbonized substance that would fit inside a thimble.
All I used was just half a can of butane.
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Few weeks ago, I decided to reduce the amount of trash in my room. Most of my holy week holiday was spent sorting through bags of bric-a-brac. My initial objective was to reduce by at least 50 percent the amount of junk squeezed into every nook and cranny of my room. Included in the pogrom were all my old springer rifles, and the old steyr. Considering the 7-8 bags of trash I managed to sort, I think it was mission accomplished
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One good purpose of cleaning up: it makes room for new junk
Foraging through my favorite junk shop, I found a KMB 18 mask - a full face commercial diving mask complete with headphones and microphone. The junk shop owner mistakenly thought that it was something used for fumigating mango trees. He was selling it two years ago as a set (with sprayer) for around 2K. Way too much for a piece of junk. Next time I saw it, it was dirty and had a rat’s nest in it. Asking price was 500, got it down to 400. If not for anything else, its a great conversation piece.
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