Heavily Modified Super Soaker Thunderstorm

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devnoel
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Heavily Modified Super Soaker Thunderstorm

Post by devnoel » Tue Sep 08, 2015 3:29 pm

Hacked a Super Soaker Thunderstorm into a 180 degree rotating water cannon that can be controlled with a BLE (Bluetooth low-energy) client (phone, laptop..etc.). RF range is around 60ft. Firing range seems to be about the same. Water supply is limitless if connected to a water hose. :D

I built the device in around ~12hrs for the Dallas AT&T IoT Hackathon and will be writing up the build in a blog post soon.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IoFBmvjTIZI

jja
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Re: Heavily Modified Super Soaker Thunderstorm

Post by jja » Tue Sep 08, 2015 5:17 pm

great project!well done. the controls seem very well implemented, and the turret rotates beautifully

are there any modifications to the thunderstorm pump itself? you seem to be running stock voltage, increasing the voltage should increase performance, perhaps some IMR cells or a LIPO pack might work, like how the NIC mods flywheel Nerf Blasters.

devnoel
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Re: Heavily Modified Super Soaker Thunderstorm

Post by devnoel » Wed Sep 09, 2015 8:32 am

Thanks!

I really wanted to use a LIPO and throw on a Micro USB charging port, but I didn't have one handy. Do you know what DC motor (and the specs are) of the one it's using?

jja
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Re: Heavily Modified Super Soaker Thunderstorm

Post by jja » Wed Sep 09, 2015 11:41 am

i am not familiar with the motor in a Tstorm - i have used one but never opened one up personally, so i don't know what sort of voltage it can handle. I believe Nerf Youtuber Drac test fired his Tstorm with trustfire batteries during his review, but i don't know if the system can handle this with prolonged use. Most people on this forum regard Tstorms as useless and as such there has been limited work in modifying them.

devnoel
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Re: Heavily Modified Super Soaker Thunderstorm

Post by devnoel » Wed Sep 09, 2015 10:44 pm

Thanks! I just borrowed it from the kids collection of unused toys. I have another gun idea that I may try build later this year. If I do, I'll post it.

HBWW
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Re: Heavily Modified Super Soaker Thunderstorm

Post by HBWW » Thu Sep 10, 2015 2:06 am

jja wrote:Most people on this forum regard Tstorms as useless and as such there has been limited work in modifying them.
Indeed, we put as much work into modifying these as Hasbro did into making them useful for water wars. :lol: If I find the time, I'll short the thermistor and throw all 4 Ultrafires at mine since it's destined to become a shell for an NIC airblaster anyway. It'd be a fun thing to waste a few hours on.

Anyway, there's been little experimentation with electronics here, but if you're hooking it up to a hose, wouldn't you just skip the middle man (the Thunderstorm) and use a solenoid valve triggered by a board instead? Any hose will certainly be capable of throwing out a lot more water than any Nerf Thunderstorm could hope to.
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TheSoaker
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Re: Heavily Modified Super Soaker Thunderstorm

Post by TheSoaker » Thu Sep 10, 2015 6:43 pm

Think you could cram this into it?: http://www.ebay.com/itm/12V-Micro-hot-w ... 43c9b1523b
I've calculated the output of the pump to be over 9X

And now a video of said pump. See as it shoots water over 10 feet into the air and hitting the ceiling of a room.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u9NWU1PuhCA
super soaker cps 2000......SUPER SOAKER CPS 2000!!!!!!!!!1!!!1!!one

devnoel
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Re: Heavily Modified Super Soaker Thunderstorm

Post by devnoel » Thu Sep 10, 2015 10:18 pm

HBWW wrote:
jja wrote:Most people on this forum regard Tstorms as useless and as such there has been limited work in modifying them.
Indeed, we put as much work into modifying these as Hasbro did into making them useful for water wars. :lol: If I find the time, I'll short the thermistor and throw all 4 Ultrafires at mine since it's destined to become a shell for an NIC airblaster anyway. It'd be a fun thing to waste a few hours on.

Anyway, there's been little experimentation with electronics here, but if you're hooking it up to a hose, wouldn't you just skip the middle man (the Thunderstorm) and use a solenoid valve triggered by a board instead? Any hose will certainly be capable of throwing out a lot more water than any Nerf Thunderstorm could hope to.
Yeah my plans are to skip the thunderstorm altogether. This was made for/during a 24hr hackathon, so I didn't have much time to plan or source material.

jja
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Re: Heavily Modified Super Soaker Thunderstorm

Post by jja » Fri Sep 11, 2015 4:53 am

HBWW wrote:
Indeed, we put as much work into modifying these as Hasbro did into making them useful for water wars. :lol: If I find the time, I'll short the thermistor and throw all 4 Ultrafires at mine since it's destined to become a shell for an NIC airblaster anyway. It'd be a fun thing to waste a few hours on.
id be very interested to see what happen if you try this, self destruction seems likely, but there is always chance it can handle the power and might be improved sufficiently to be usable in a war where most players are using modern blasters and the battles have a close quarters focus. At least we can say we tried to make it work.

my main issue with the Tstorm isn't that it cant handle CPS or larger water warriors blasters, i never expected that,but i had hoped they might be competitive vs another Nerf super Soaker say a Shotblast. In a Close quaters battle where most of the engagement occur at less than 4 or 5 meters range doesn't matter as much as normal and a Tstorm should be reasonable. But it isn't due to the slow wind up time, this is what i hope a voltage increase will fix, (along with a reasonable increase in range and output)

HBWW
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Re: Heavily Modified Super Soaker Thunderstorm

Post by HBWW » Sat Sep 12, 2015 11:46 am

jja wrote:
HBWW wrote:
Indeed, we put as much work into modifying these as Hasbro did into making them useful for water wars. :lol: If I find the time, I'll short the thermistor and throw all 4 Ultrafires at mine since it's destined to become a shell for an NIC airblaster anyway. It'd be a fun thing to waste a few hours on.
id be very interested to see what happen if you try this, self destruction seems likely, but there is always chance it can handle the power and might be improved sufficiently to be usable in a war where most players are using modern blasters and the battles have a close quarters focus. At least we can say we tried to make it work.

my main issue with the Tstorm isn't that it cant handle CPS or larger water warriors blasters, i never expected that,but i had hoped they might be competitive vs another Nerf super Soaker say a Shotblast. In a Close quaters battle where most of the engagement occur at less than 4 or 5 meters range doesn't matter as much as normal and a Tstorm should be reasonable. But it isn't due to the slow wind up time, this is what i hope a voltage increase will fix, (along with a reasonable increase in range and output)
If you want a motorized blaster to even hope to be usable in a water war, start off with the Scorpion or Tarantula. Buzz Bee was doing electronics before Hasbro made them popular again. Honestly, I'm not sure when I'd get to this, and I don't have a Tarantula to work with. The Thunderstorm was just a fun time killer to screw around with before gutting it for an NIC shell, or perhaps selling it on eBay.

A modded Tarantula might be competitive with our light primaries category and a Scorpion might hit close to mediums. Nobody in the core community seems to have either blaster though.
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jja
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Re: Heavily Modified Super Soaker Thunderstorm

Post by jja » Sat Sep 12, 2015 12:28 pm

Indeed you are right about the better choices for motorized, but neither a tarantula or scorpion is easily available. My interest in the mod was not for personal use, 2 people in the group I play with have them (but they are normally loaned out) and i am always interested in how to improve our groups blasters even slightly and even if that blaster is not a popular primary.

As I have said before, having more mods on the forum for Nerf super Soakers (and modern Water Warriors) should help attract more people to the forum. These mods would engage and be relevant to greater percentage of people who own water blasters than a mod for an older/more rare blaster (although those mods may be the more useful one for community wars).

Evidently people are searching for NSS content, case in point currently Hydrowars most popular review is the NSS barrage.

HBWW
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Re: Heavily Modified Super Soaker Thunderstorm

Post by HBWW » Sat Sep 12, 2015 1:41 pm

After some time I've spent in both NIC and superstock Nerf wars, I'm really not particularly interested in attracting certain types of crowds, particularly those who seem to only care about militaristic looks and styling over any actual functionality and quality gameplay.

That said, I don't think it's possible to mod a Thunderstorm to become a competent blaster. People are free to try, but it's not worth my time and effort. If we want to enable the mainstream to play better games, we need to point them to the Buzz Bee blasters which are more competent to start out with. (Most of them qualify for the Light Primaries class we use.) Unfortunately, the water blaster world is not one where easy mods can give useful power boosts. Ergonomic and output limitations cause most of the problems and bottleneck most mods, causing them to break the blaster more easily for only small power gains.

It's important to remember that electric mods operate much differently in Nerf than water wars, and their impact on gameplay will be much different. Even with a high voltage Thunderstorm, it's stuck to a puny pump system and a squirt gun class nozzle. Nerf does not have these types of bottlenecks because darts are compact, very light, and require a lot less power to launch at greater velocities and distances.
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marauder
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Re: Heavily Modified Super Soaker Thunderstorm

Post by marauder » Mon Sep 14, 2015 3:29 pm

HBWW wrote:After some time I've spent in both NIC and superstock Nerf wars, I'm really not particularly interested in attracting certain types of crowds, particularly those who seem to only care about militaristic looks and styling over any actual functionality and quality gameplay.
Wait, these kinds of people actually exist in the NIC? Hahaha. Are they any good at actually playing?
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HBWW
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Re: Heavily Modified Super Soaker Thunderstorm

Post by HBWW » Mon Sep 14, 2015 5:26 pm

I don't know; most of them are in countries where they can't play paintball or airsoft. In the U.S. it's mostly little kids who can't afford either of those 2 or who prefer foam darts over paintballs or BB's.
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