Board Thread:General Nerf discussion/@comment-27306930-20180909005505/@comment-27306930-20180910070902

What an interesting day ! I finished this mod and I'm happy to report this is now the loudest blaster in my arsenal. Blame it on the flywheel cage. In fact, let's blame a lot of today's problems on the flywheel cage.

First off, torque. As you can see above, I soldered a pair of wires across the cage to connect the motor's plus and minus contacts. However, the startup torque on these motors is so high it flexed the flywheel cage and ripped one of the terminals off the motor. Oh joy.

Problem number two had to do with polarity. Usually, the same kind of motor rotates in the same direction. The wiring shown above is typical for identical motors. But not so for these 4MUs. After I fixed the broken contact I had to rewire the flywheel cage to compensate for motors that ran in different directions. Oh joy.

Problem three - the Glass Ceiling. Despite the fact that these 4MUs run 50% faster than most motors, the actual observed dart speed isn't very impressive. I was clocking darts from 70 to 101 FPS despite all the whirring and droning. This all relates to the Glass Ceiling effect that occurs in high RPM scenarios. Anybody remember those Green Monster commercials ? Oh joy.

Bottom line, I'm not sure I like these Artifact 4MU motors. They are indeed wicked fast. The sound alone will scare off many opponents. But the effective FPS and range are typical. Unless you invest in high crush cages and 2S LiPos, or use these in an afterburner stage, this is probably a downgrade.

Sorry guys. Two thumbs down. For now ...