Nerf Vulcan

From Fozzee.net

Internals

Electrically, the Vulcan seems a bit anemic. All the wiring seems to be 20awg or so, and there sure is a lot of it. This may or may not account for the belt-feeder sagging under load, which in turn might be the cause of some misfeeds. I'll be dumping all the wiring for all the switches (belt hatch, trigger and safety) and the motor out the bottom, and rewiring the motor with 14awg wire (and maybe replacing the motor, if Seth can find me something better). From there, I'll be using a relay to drive the motor (to start) and maybe an Arduino for advanced functions. I'm still toying with the idea of an encoder or opto sensor to detect the feeder position for "burst" mode.

Mechanically, this thing is a marvel of plastic engineering. There's an unbelievable number of moving parts, springs, toothed-racks and other bits. To rotate the feed wheel, it uses an assembly similar to a retractable pen to turn a linear motion (basically, the "bolt" moving back and forth, via the motor) into an indexed rotating action. 5 "lands" on the cylinder means 5 indexed positions. Quick and accurate. The belt feed occasionally misses, which could be attributed to the "clutch" (designed to prevent damage in the event of a jam) or to an issue I discovered with the linear rack's mounting (it had what appeared to be a molding issue that prevented it from seating right, thus inducing additional play and some dead spots or "misses")

Overall, this thing is really well designed, with a few oversights and some QC issues.

Tripod Modification

Lots of people online are modding the Vulcan's tripod to eliminate the annoying "clicks" when the tripod is articulated. Steps are as follows, pictures below. The one big downside I've found to this is that it seems to induce lots of play in the vertical pivot axis. I think it's not that it so much induces play as that the spring-loaded clip "pushes" some of the play out of the assembly, by holding it tightly to one end of the available movement. Either way, it seems to be not too much of a downside...

1. Remove 4 screws holding the "clip shoe" to the pivot assembly and set the clip shoe aside.
2. Remove 4 screws securing the plate retaining the pivot assembly to the base
3. Lift the pivot assembly, with the retaining plate still attached
4. Remove and discard two white catches and their associated spring
5. Reassemble remaining parts in reverse order.

Belt Extension

This mod is exactly what it sounds like. Take two standard belts (25 rounds each) and stick them together for double the firepower before reloading. Two main problems exist with this mod:

1. The 50-round belt doesn't fit in the provided ammo box. You can leave the lid open and "pile it" on top, but this makes the gun heavy and off balance.
2. If you don't support the belt on the outfeed side, it eventually becomes too heavy and the weight will advance the cylinder a bit too far and cause jamming.