Rayven Tenets

[Vigilante]

Well in other news, it just got a lot harder to get our dirt cheap Li-Ion batteries:

http://news.cnet.com/8301-1023_3-57432323-93/usps-to-ban-overseas-shipments-on-tablets-smartphones-more


Important part:

So Dealextreme is going to be not an option, in 5 days.  Considering DX takes a week to even process an order, its already too late.  Which means prices on domestic cells is going to spike, because they know they have less competition, and they have trouble getting their own supply.

I ordered some yesterday, any chance that i'll get them? 

[torukmakto4]

I see a few possible mistakes here:

- That article doesn't actually mention inbound shipments to the US, it specifically mentions outbound.

- This is a USPS issue. USPS is not the only game in town. I don't know dealextreme very well, but even if they do not ship any way but USPS, I am sure they are not the only source for low-end cells like the *fire variety.

Plus, they will continue to get into the US somehow or another; Li-ion cells are not contraband, just a commodity that is somewhat hazardous, like a million other things that are shipped internationally and vital to the economy. If we (the US) restricted the shipment of them so severely as to make them difficult to obtain at all, there would be a serious effect on the electronics market that would have a major economic impact.

[Vigilante]

Oh hey, I ended up getting my batteries. I have seen the light, and my does the Rayven go far.

I did a decent firing test, going through 3 18 dart clips (54 darts) with the Recon barrel and then with the Spectre barrel on. The Recon barrel is a little longer and thinner then the Spectre. You got a noticeable better grouping and "accuracy" with the Recon barrel on. What I mean by accuracy is the Recon barrel's center where the most of the darts landed was about 60 feet out there, pretty much in a straight path. When I fired from the Spectre, some of the darts went farther (in their awesome Streamline flying path) more of the time. BUT the majority of the dart's center was about 60 feet out, two steps to my right.

So it looks like I'll be rocking a Recon barrel for my future Rayven usage. Is there anyway to make it not look so lame, is it possible to remove the shell over the barrel and still use it reliably?

[SpookyLucaZ]

You say you're getting the same range with the recon barrel just as much as the spectres? Weird, every time I tried the recons, it cut my range down to RP blaster status...
As for the barrel without the covering, I agree with you. The pukey green(as much as I like it) just doesn't clad well with the old n-strike banana shade. I would go about removing all the yellow parts of the barrel with a hacksaw, then cleaning it up and securing it in place. Another thing I'd try would be to take the longshots barrel extension and do pretty much the same thing.

[Vigilante]

You say you're getting the same range with the recon barrel just as much as the spectres? Weird, every time I tried the recons, it cut my range down to RP blaster status...
As for the barrel without the covering, I agree with you. The pukey green(as much as I like it) just doesn't clad well with the old n-strike banana shade. I would go about removing all the yellow parts of the barrel with a hacksaw, then cleaning it up and securing it in place. Another thing I'd try would be to take the longshots barrel extension and do pretty much the same thing.

Whats "RP blaster status"?

And the Spectre barrel pretty much gets the same ranges, 5 more feet a good amount of time. But you get a lot more flying, curving, streamline shots with it on.

[SpookyLucaZ]

RP=reverse plunger tube.
Usually around 30-35'.

[Vigilante]

Really? Shoot, I'll double check those ranges again then. I'll bust out a tape measure for it this time.

[SpookyLucaZ]

Maybe its just my rayven... the only things done to mine performance wise besides the batteries, was just a realignment of the motor cage.

[Vigilante]

Maybe its just my rayven... the only things done to mine performance wise besides the batteries, was just a realignment of the motor cage.

I went out for another firing test at a park, and went through 4 18 dart clips with the Recon barrel on, and 4 18 clips with the Spectre barrel on. I over exaggerated the 60 feet ranges. A decent amount actually land in the 50-60 feet area, and some do get 60 or more.

I kept using the same White steamlines for the test, and they seems to be more and more iffy with their path and ranges as the tests went on. Gotta love Streamlines and their strangeness.

EDIT: Also for some reason my Recon barrels were giving off a cracking sound when I tried to take them off the Rayven. a lot of the time, their very tough to take off. So I opened it up and took out the dot towards the bottom where the barrels touch. The barrel moves fine now, and there shouldn't be any problems with it falling off.

Also, when I opened it up there was a plate around the barrel that went into a slit to help keep the barrel straight. I decided to keep the barrel intact in order not to mess with it's design, but man it still looks ugly.

[torukmakto4]

EDIT: Also for some reason my Recon barrels were giving off a cracking sound when I tried to take them off the Rayven. a lot of the time, their very tough to take off. So I opened it up and took out the dot towards the bottom where the barrels touch. The barrel moves fine now, and there shouldn't be any problems with it falling off.

Those muzzle fittings are flaky. My spectre extension had a lot of play on my rayven's barrel nut and hung crooked until I CA'd a piece of scrap ABS into the bottom locking groove of the nut. If a recon extension were to be as loose as my spectre extension was, it would be possible to make it contact darts in normal use...

[Vigilante]

Questions about the Rayven.

1. Does it have a dart seal? My cousin somehow jammed 3 darts in the chamber and when shoving a paint brush down the barrel to get the darts out, I'm scared that I may have damaged the dart seal. When I looked down the barrel afterwards it looked like some of the plastic was peeling off in strands. The ranges seemed the same afterwards though.

2. Also, how does your Rayven fire with older streamlines? During this firing test a lot of my old ones wouldn't come out all the way of the chamber. The white w coded ones fired fine though. My blaster is stock, but this was my first time firing older streamlines from a 12.4v rayven. Maybe if the voltage goes down a little bit older streamlines will fire better?

[d4rk354b3r]

Questions about the Rayven.

1. Does it have a dart seal? My cousin somehow jammed 3 darts in the chamber and when shoving a paint brush down the barrel to get the darts out, I'm scared that I may have damaged the dart seal. When I looked down the barrel afterwards it looked like some of the plastic was peeling off in strands. The ranges seemed the same afterwards though.

2. Also, how does your Rayven fire with older streamlines? During this firing test a lot of my old ones wouldn't come out all the way of the chamber. The white w coded ones fired fine though. My blaster is stock, but this was my first time firing older streamlines from a 12.4v rayven. Maybe if the voltage goes down a little bit older streamlines will fire better?

The Rayven does not have a dart seal or a breech. Stick all the paintbrushes or whatever rod you want in there.

The older streamlines should shoot okay but Rayvens can be strange about production consistency, so your Rayven jamming on old Streamlines could be anything. I do not think it's got to do with the voltage though.

[Bobololo]

Questions about the Rayven.

1. Does it have a dart seal? My cousin somehow jammed 3 darts in the chamber and when shoving a paint brush down the barrel to get the darts out, I'm scared that I may have damaged the dart seal. When I looked down the barrel afterwards it looked like some of the plastic was peeling off in strands. The ranges seemed the same afterwards though.

2. Also, how does your Rayven fire with older streamlines? During this firing test a lot of my old ones wouldn't come out all the way of the chamber. The white w coded ones fired fine though. My blaster is stock, but this was my first time firing older streamlines from a 12.4v rayven. Maybe if the voltage goes down a little bit older streamlines will fire better?

There is no dart seal. It's a faux barrel just like with the AT, Longshot, and others.

Mine fires older streamlines just fine, never had a problem with them.Try putting e-tape around the wheels (cleanly and nicely) to help get a better grip on the older more flexible streamlines

[torukmakto4]

1. When I looked down the barrel afterwards it looked like some of the plastic was peeling off in strands.

2. Also, how does your Rayven fire with older streamlines? During this firing test a lot of my old ones wouldn't come out all the way of the chamber. The white w coded ones fired fine though. My blaster is stock...

1. The guide barrels often have mold flash that peels off like that. It is not a cause for concern.

2. Stock gun plus power? That would be the infamous squib issue and may or may not be corrected by W-code streamlines or certain mags. You need some sort of alignment correction to get higher velocities without reliability problems. Look in the old Rayven thread for magwell shims and flywheel cage adjustments.

Mine fires older streamlines just fine, never had a problem with them.Try putting e-tape around the wheels (cleanly and nicely) to help get a better grip on the older more flexible streamlines

There should not be a grip problem with stock flywheels on any foam that could be considered remotely serviceable. E-tape is not advised as it does not adhere well to the Delrin flywheels and can separate and shred, resulting in adhesive debris in the flywheel cage with possible associated malfunction and requiring a teardown to return the gun to service. Also, adding mass to flywheels negatively affects windup times, and decreasing flywheel gap will not increase performance with stock motors nor permanently/uniformly solve the reliability problems.

[Bobololo]

There should not be a grip problem with stock flywheels on any foam that could be considered remotely serviceable. E-tape is not advised as it does not adhere well to the Delrin flywheels and can separate and shred, resulting in adhesive debris in the flywheel cage with possible associated malfunction and requiring a teardown to return the gun to service. Also, adding mass to flywheels negatively affects windup times, and decreasing flywheel gap will not increase performance with stock motors nor permanently/uniformly solve the reliability problems.

Never had any problems with it adhering to the flywheels. Some singing of the tape into the flywheel via a soldering iron helps a lot... other than that, it's just tension. Even at 18+ volts, I've never had any problems besides the darts frictioning off some of the tape over time. I don't think 1-2 wraps of etape increases the weight that much, and the spin up time is relatively quick if not the exact same as flywheels without it.