2017 Nerf Round-Up

Yearly thing where I look at the stuff Nerf (officially) released throughout the year.

Quick Review: Lightake/NFstrike 18 Dart Mags

Lightake contacted me, offering to send some products for me to review. I requested their 15 dart banana and straight/angled mags, as well as their 18 dart straight mag. I actually ended up purchasing the aforementioned 15 dart mags anyway, and those arrived before this review package did. This post therefore will just cover the 18 dart mag.

Disclaimer: These mags were sent to me for review by Lightake. Despite their contribution, I will do my best to ensure that this review remains as objective and unbiased as possible.

Review: Buzz Bee Rail Raider (15m) [Monorail Blaster]

The Rail Raider (aka Monorail Blaster) is a rather unique blaster, fed by an internal tube magazine loaded from the rear. This is a feeding mechanism that is near non-existant in foam blasters, with the only comparable blaster that comes to mind being the disc-firing Fusefire. Naturally the reveal of this blaster was met with much hype and anticipation.

Disclaimer: This blaster was sent to me for review by Buzz Bee Toys. Despite their contribution, I will do my best to ensure that this review remains as objective and unbiased as possible.

Review: Lightake/NFstrike 15-Dart Mags

With the recent rise of Lightake/NFstrike, there is yet another way to source various aftermarket Nerf parts from China. On top of reselling many products from other manufacturers (including Worker and Artifact), Lightake/NFstrike also produce their own Nerf-compatible mags. This review will be covering their two 15-dart mags.
Disclaimer: Lightake has sent me a package of products to review, however the mags in this review were purchased with my own money.

Mod: Flat Top Cam ECS with Artifact Cage

A continuation of my Cam mods. I didn't like the bulky top section that was vacated as I removed the camera system, and I don't like stock flywheel cages.

Review: Worker Retaliator Bolt

I'm not sure when Worker released these, but I only became aware of their existence fairly recently. As someone who (currently) exclusively uses full length darts and doesn't do much high velocity stuff, these interest me far more than short dart breeches and mags, expanded plunger tubes and so on. I ordered three of them from Lightake for about 4USD each, including postage.

Mod: MTB Neo Hellcats in my Bullpup RS

The wait is finally over, Neo Hellcats have arrived.

Game Report: MHvZ 4/11/17

Another month, another Melbourne HvZ event. A variety of reasons resulted in a reduced amount of enjoyment for me personally, but the event overall went quite well otherwise.
This game report has been delayed significantly by my Uni exams, which are now over.

Mod: Knock-off Stryfe with Blade 180s

With the relative scarcity of Stryfes in Australia since Kmart stopped stocking them, I wanted to try out other options. This knock-off Stryfe, sourced from Aliexpress, cost me about 25AUD shipped, about the same as the Stryfe when it was still available at retail here.
I was initially saving this post until after I completed the review, but honestly I might never get around to that. This post is a lot easier, and also a lot more relevant for all my intentions with it.

Mod: Cam ECS with Neo Rhinos

The Cam ECS is a blaster I've always had my eye on, as its shell is quite nice, and as far as I'm aware it is also compatible with Stryfe flywheel cages. My problem was of course waiting for it to drop to a not-awful price, which I never saw when it was in stores. I jumped at the opportunity to acquire one for a more reasonable price second hand.

Review: Buzz Bee Thermal Hunter (15m)

The Thermal Hunter was one of the most anticipated of Buzz Bee's new releases, with the promise of the Sentinel's raw power and mod potential, in a more practical pump action rifle form. It also includes a unique attachment, a sight with basic thermal detection capabilities. Needless to say, I was very excited at the prospect of toying around with the blaster and its fancy scope.

Disclaimer: This blaster was sent to me for review by Buzz Bee Toys. Despite their contribution, I will do my best to ensure that this review remains as objective and unbiased as possible.

Game Report: MHvZ 14/10/17

We had a really good turnout for this month's MHvZ event, which allowed for some good games. There was also quite a variety of different blasters present at this event.

All in-game photos courtesy of Dylan McDylan.

Review: Nerf Mega Hotshock

The Hotshock is one of the smallest and simplest additions to the Mega line, being of the classic pull-back single shot format that sees an incarnation in almost every Nerf line. As someone not very interested in the Mega line or single shot blasters, I gave it a pass until MHvZ introduced Mega zombies. As they are a rare, special unit, I only needed a basic Mega blaster to combat them, so I picked up a Hotshock from BigW.

Mod: LiPo'd Jyn Erso Blaster with Lights and Sounds

Some time ago I rewired and remotored my Jyn Erso blaster. However, I removed the lights and sounds system because I had fears that the increased voltage would fry the circuit. It's taken a while, but I finally acquired a suitable voltage regulator and the time necessary to complete this mod.

Review: Buzz Bee Double Drum (15m) [Barbarian]

The Double Drum is a slight reshell of the Buzz Bee Barbarian, formerly Blizzard, a new blaster fed from two 20-dart cylinders. It is a pump action, pump-to-fire blaster, which has drawn criticism as pump-to-fire is pretty much universally inferior to a triggered system. Regardless, having been pleasantly surprised by the very similar Buzz Bee Sidewinder, I had some hope that the Double Drum wouldn't be terrible.

Disclaimer: This blaster was sent to me for review by Buzz Bee Toys. Despite their contribution, I will do my best to ensure that this review remains as objective and unbiased as possible.

Quick Mod: NerfTurf 10kg Thermal Hunter Spring

As mentioned in my previous game report, a 5.5kg Elite Upgrade Spring was not enough to push the Thermal Hunter to an acceptable muzzle velocity range (that spring has since been moved to my Tri-Strike). For a stronger main spring, I looked to NerfTurf, an Australian based spring seller. I ordered their 10kg Thermal Hunter spring.

Quick Mod: Titan Hyperions in a Stryfe

Flywheel motors are moving almost entirely towards 3S, which is a little unfortunate for me as much of my gear is set up for 2S. This includes my Stryfe, which was previously running on Blade 180s/-3240s. I was finding their torque to be just a little low, so wanted to pick up a 2S flywheel motor with more torque that wasn't the expensive and now discontinued XP180. The next best 2S flywheel motor on the market is the Titan Hyperion, so I picked up a pair of those.

MHvZ Game Report 2/9/17

Today at MHvZ we introduced a new zombie, the Mega zombie, and spent much of the day play-testing it.

Review: Buzz Bee Eradicator (15m) [Tactical Storm]

The Buzz Bee Eradicator is a recolouring of the new and primarily blue Tactical Storm, a modular mag fed blaster very similar to the Champion/Ultra Tek 8. As part of Buzz Bee's new releases, it includes some of Buzz Bee's new darts, in this case some Long Distance darts. Given how good so many of Buzz Bee's recent mag fed blasters have been, I was rather excited to try this one out.

Disclaimer: This blaster was sent to me for review by Buzz Bee Toys. Despite their contribution, I will do my best to ensure that this review remains as objective and unbiased as possible.

Mod: Thermal Hunter Handle Replacement and Lever Mag Release

While the Thermal Hunter has a fair few things going for it, there are a couple of standout issues ergonomically. The handle and stock are very short, and the mag release is rather poor. Furthermore, the magwell and pump are quite far away from the handle. Initially, I had planned on straight replacing the handle and stock attachment point with that from a Retaliator, but after seeing John Yechan Seung's take, decided to copy that instead.

Quick Review: Artifact Gen 2 Plastic Flywheels

Some time back, Artifact released a new wave of plastic flywheels. As I missed my chance to get more flywheels the previous time they were available, I quickly jumped on getting four pairs this time around. Shortly afterwards they ran out of stock, however they are currently available from Monkee Mods. Given I quite liked the previous Artifact plastic flywheels even with all their flaws, I was very much looking forward to receiving these Gen 2 wheels to test out.
Note that while the G1 wheels were available in both "full" and "truncated" forms, the G2 wheels were only ever available in this particular shape.

Review: Buzz Bee Stryker Force (15m) [Zenith]

The Stryker Force is the smallest new blaster in Buzz Bee's latest wave of releases. It is a manual action revolver somewhat reminiscent of the older Air Max 6, though of course being a conventional springer rather than an air blaster. In particular, this wave of releases also contains Buzz Bee's brand new darts. I will be reviewing Buzz Bee's new darts in a separate post. The Stryker Force includes 6 PrecisePro (PP) darts and 2 Long Distance (LD) darts.
Note that while the Stryker Force is not identical to the Zenith, they are very similar, both physically and functionally.
Disclaimer: This blaster was sent to me for review by Buzz Bee Toys. Despite their contribution, I will do my best to ensure that this review remains as objective and unbiased as possible.

MHvZ Game Report 5/8/17

Another game at Melbourne HvZ. We had some pretty good games and a solid turnout, and I had an opportunity to give some of the new Buzz Bee blasters a go in combat.

Quick Mod: MTB Neo Rhino Prototypes

While visiting the guys at MTB, I was given prototypes of some new MTB motors, Neo Rhinos and Neo Hellcats. These motors have a different wind to the regular Rhinos and Hellcats, as well as fancy new motor cans and neodymium magnets. The Neo Hellcat prototypes I received are unfortunately lacking the neo magnets, however the Neo Rhinos had them so I threw that pair into my Bullpup RS to try out at yesterday's MHvZ.

MHvZ Game Report 8/7/17

We had a great turnout at MHvZ today, which resulted in some rather impressive hordes. We also tried out some new gamemodes.

Quick Mod: Jyn Erso Blaster with Meishel 2.0s

In my order from BlasterTech not long ago, I received a pair of Meishel 2.0 motors made by FoamBlast. My Jyn Erso blaster had been waiting for upgrade motors for a while since I'd actually run out of suitable 130s, so I took this opportunity to get my Jyn Erso blaster modded while also testing out these new motors.

Quick Review: BlasterTech Stryfe Motor Cover and Grip Extension

Received a package of parts from BlasterTech today, a Stryfe motor cover, a Stryfe grip extension, and two Meishel 2.0 motors. I'll be installing the Meishel 2.0s into my Jyn Erso blaster at some point, but the Stryfe parts I could install immediately.

MHvZ Game Report 6/5/17

We had some solid games today at MHvZ. The on-off rain did dirsupt play a little, however we managed to miss the majority of it.

Review: Star Wars Jyn Erso Deluxe Blaster

The release of Rogue One brought with it, among other merchandise, a new set of Star Wars Nerf blasters. The Jyn Erso blaster is the most expensive general release one, and the only one of the three that offered any practical potential use. Due to its insanely high retail price, I put off buying it until they were discounted to half price at my local BigW. Is it worth it, even at half price?

Mod: RapidPDW Overhaul

My barrelless RS, the RapidPDW, was my first Rapidstrike rewire, utilising stock motors and some stock switches off a 2S battery. Since then however, I have completed no less than four complete Rapidstrike builds (one of which was not my own), and the RapidPDW was left on my blaster rack collecting dust. I finally got around to giving it a motor upgrade.

Jase3D Parts: Thumbscrews, Flared Stryfe Magwell, RS Pusher Cover

Ordered some Jase3D stuff as well, a couple of newer parts. I ordered up some thumbscrews, a flared Stryfe magwell attachment, and an RS pusher motor cover.

MHvZ Game Report 11/3/17 - More Flywheel Saturation, Successful Husk

I hadn't attended a full Nerf event in months, so I was really excited to get back into action at this month's HvZ.

BlasterTech Parts: Rapidstrike Mag Release, 5kg Elite Spring (Updated 18/6/17)

I recently ordered a couple of things from BlasterTech (BT). Within that package was a Worker Stryfe mag release, a Hellverine (Hellcat mislabelled as Wolverine), 2 BT Rapidstrike mag releases and a BT Elite 5kg spring. I've covered the Worker mag release and Hellcats before, so this post will be focusing on the RS mag release and the Elite 5kg spring.

Mod: Artifact Motor as a Rapidstrike Pusher

The Artifact motor is the fastest motor created specifically for Nerfing purposes. It is rated to 50k RPM at 7.4V, significantly beyond the next closest of the MTB Wolverine Mk2 or Honey Badger, at around 45k RPM at 7.4V. The Artifact motor is also an odd size, being a little longer than the traditional 130 motor, but significantly shorter than the long 180 motor.

2016 Nerf Roundup

I somehow forgot to make this roundup post at the end of 2016, so here it is, two months late.
2016 was an up-and-down year for Nerf, there were some good releases, and some not-so-good releases. Non-Nerf brands had a fantastic year however, with both Buzz Bee and Dart Zone releasing some real winners.

Loadouts with MTB

MTB recently uploaded another of their loadouts vids, this time featuring my Bullpup RS (and associated other parts), as well as my Rhino-Fire. It covers all the major points and is of course a far higher quality video than anything I'd make myself.

If you're wondering about the lack of activity recently, no I'm not leaving the hobby or anything so major. It's simply a matter of not having the time to produce content, and not having any real content to actually produce. I won't be doing anything Nerf related for the next month or so, but I will be returning in time for the March Melbourne events, and hopefully by then I'll have more content to put up.

As a final note, for anyone who has posted a comment in the past ~2 months, my apologies for not approving the majority of them, a change in the Blogger UI meant that I actually don't immediately see the number of comments awaiting approval, and I only just now remembered to check them.