My First Sprinkler Valved Cannon "Airpress's Style"

[airpress]

Hi folks!

It's winter time here so it's time to build a new cannon.
I will use something that I never used before, a sprinkler valve.
Offcourse it will be modified for pneumatic piloting.

A found a sprinkler valve in the Netherlands (online shop).

Some little specs:

Chamber: 20cm 2 1/2" steel pipe (with fittings its a bit longer)
Valve: 1" sprinkler valve rainbird
Barrel: probably 50mm pvc pipe (pressure rated 16 bar, PN16) perfect fit for golfballs
Piloting: european style blowgun

Here some pics.

sprinkler valve taked apart, covered some tiny holes with epoxy, there where 3 of them, solenoid hole, vent hole en bleed hole


blowgun mounted on the valve




filling valve on the left side


More coming soon!

Greetz Airpress

[Gun Freak]

Cool, but why a low pressure valve on a high-pressure-capable tank? Put a piston valve on there and crank it up to 600 psi or you're not using your gun to its full potential!

[airpress]

All my cannons I make are for recreational tennisball/golfball shooting.
I never use my cannons for destruction.
Thats why I choose for this valve.
Maximum pressure I will be using is 8 bar.

[jackssmirkingrevenge]

Cool, but why a low pressure valve on a high-pressure-capable tank? Put a piston valve on there and crank it up to 600 psi or you're not using your gun to its full potential!

My thoughts exactly, it seems a shame to have such heavy metal fittings for such a low rated valve. Still, to each his own - definitely one of the safest sprinkler valve cannons ever made! Looks great and I would be surprised if it recoils at all hehe

[PeteS]

Cool, but why a low pressure valve on a high-pressure-capable tank? Put a piston valve on there and crank it up to 600 psi or you're not using your gun to its full potential!

My thoughts exactly, it seems a shame to have such heavy metal fittings for such a low rated valve. Still, to each his own - definitely one of the safest sprinkler valve cannons ever made! Looks great and I would be surprised if it recoils at all hehe

My thoughts as well. I figured that even on my PVC launchers the sprinkler valve is probably the weakest link where I used one.

Not knocking it though. Nothing wrong with over building if that is what you want. The problem for me would be that I'd be tempted to go way beyond what the valve should be used at. Heck I have already done that with pvc guns when I used a sprinkler valve as a pilot at 250 PSI. That does kind of make me wonder what it takes to blow up a sprinkler valve. I figured that the diaphragm would blow out first, but it probably isn't wise to count on that.

BTW: Nice looking gun.

[airpress]

I'm proud off my paintjob.
Before I painted it, i've done some rework on the trigger. The trigger was mounted on the outlet, since it was leaking at around 4 bar I replaced it on the inlet line. Problem solved.
I tie wrapped the trigger so it's holded tightly to the fitting/pipe.

Here some pics when painted.







A little video.



More is coming. Fridag I go to the Ardennes in the Southern part of Belgium and I will make photos and movie.

Airpress

[Biopyro]

Looks really nice painted, nice neat construction too.

How much were those big metal fittings though?!

[airpress]

Thanx!

The fittings are priced around 5euro for 2 1/2".

[jackssmirkingrevenge]

Friday I go to the Ardennes

Take a metal detector



The colour scheme is slightly toy-like but I like it