User blog:Death By Foam/Nerf N-Strike Elite Strongarm review

The N-Strike Maverick is still (to date) the best selling nerf blaster of all time, but it shows its age. A combination of price, dart capacity and ease of use (not to mention the manly feel of a six-shooter in your hand) led to the success of the Maverick.

Then Elite happened and it spawned the Strongarm. This slick looking six-shooter features a direct plunger, tac rail, 2  anchor points for a shoulder strap and the good ole 6 dart capacity we've come to love, with slam-fire :)

The blaster is about the same size as the Maverick and about the same weight. it is about 20mm shorter in hight compared to the Maverick due to a smaller grip.

The tac-rail moved from the primer to the spine of the blaster which is good because the Maverick was very difficult to use witch an accessory mounted. The cylinder now drops out almost all the way making reloading a lot easier compared to the Maverick where the cylinder would only drop out enough for two darts to be loaded at a time. The grip on the Stongarm is a bit smaller than the Maverick and as a result is not quite as comfortable. The Elite livery looks good on this blaster too.

It fires Elite darts (6 included with blaster) and is not able to use the orange streamine darts with out modifications. The Strongarm is quite powerful and accurate (slam-fire will decrease accuracy though), and the 15-20 metre range is easily achieved. There is an achor point on the butt of the grip and on the primer, I'm not too fond of the anchor on the primer, anchors should be on something static.

The cylinder rotation clockwork is different from the Maverick's too. With the Maverick, the cylinder rotated with a trigger squeeze, this caused problems when firing rapidly as it would often skip a tooth. The mechanism In the Strongarm however, rotates the cylinder as the plunger returns to its resting position. This almost eliminates jams, any jams you do experience with the Strongarm are usually the result of a misfired dart.

An interesting feature with this blaster is how the plunger tube shots forward against the cylinder, making a seal to shoot the dart. This means there is no drag on the cylinder when it rotates.

In all, this is a very good blaster. It is an ideal candidate for a sidearm and is better than the Maverick in every aspect. Price for a Strongarm varies from $10 to $15, but on sale, might go for as little as $8.