ESB DD E-11 Build WIP

[ShavedWookie[501st]]

Firstly my apologies for no brown box photo - I know how much everyone seems to love those!

 

I do have the also required layout photo, though mine is not really in any sort of order. Also some extra SW stuff that arrived in the mail the same day.

 

Down to business.

 

This will not be the thread to end all threads, nor will it be the ultimate E-11 build. I don't have the skills for that, and there are many better builds out there already. I feel as if I have read all of them (and certainly have many bookmarked). For me the one I have gone back to most often is Dark CMF, I have certainly been inspired by others but this is my primary source (except for the folding stock).

 

As this is an ESB I have given the power cylinders & hengstler counter to a local trooper in need.

 

When I ordered the kit my intention was kit + glue + paint = blaster. Now I have decided to do more, but I don't know quite how much more ... yet.

I do have one mod planned that I haven't seen before, but I'm not going to let slip any little secrets until some parts arrive that should make it work. Sorry for the cryptic tease, but it really is a cunning idea almost weasle like - just needs a tail pinned

 

First thing done was the sight, getting to use my new rotary cutting tool. I'm really loving the flexible entension thingee, it's much lighter and therefore easier to control than the main body.

 

 

I also decided to drill out the extra holes at the bottom of the barrel where the stock goes, I started with small guide holes before bringing in the big bit.

 

 

As late as this morning I had no intention of installing an inner barrel, but then (while cleaning) I found these metal things. I'm not completely sure what they are (were), but the size is almost perfect for a DD. The shorter one had a handle looking thing on the end - but it lost in a fight with my hacksaw.

 

 

 

I think they look pretty good at the front on the blaster.

 

 

 

At this stage I am not sure whether I am going to run them all the way through, what I consider the "Blaster" look. Or if I am going to make a spring to attach to it, the "Converted Sterling" look. If I do the spring the longer tube seems to position itself pretty well for the blue bit to be the basis of a bolt. Still undecided on this one.

 

 

I have drilled out the bit at the front of the folding stock (sorry, don't know what it's called), it needs a bit of a tidy up but I am pretty happy with how it went.

  

 

I have decided to use guide pin's to locate the major parts correctly, and drew a template of the grip to make sure the holes line up as well as the parts need to (definitely a stolen idea - thanks).

 

 

I'm quite happy with this for a first day, I'll post more when I do more.

[I'm Batman[501st]]

Great start Wookie, er Sam. We love Doopy build threads here

[usaeatt2]

Excellent start, Sam!  I'm a Dark CMF fan as well - there's an alluring quality to his build thread which makes things seem deceptively simple.  I really like your inner barrel, especially the blue bit as a basis for the rear of the bolt.  Nice job with your machine work too - I'm going to have to get one of those rotary tool extensions...it really does look like it would be easier to control.

[Dark PWF[Staff]]

Thanks for the shout-out, Sam. (You too, Aaron!) My build was heavily influenced by so many of the others that you've probably got bookmarked.

 

You're off to a great start! I really am impressed with the job you did on that stock cutout. Having done that one, I know that it is a serious pain to get it done, and yours looks marvelous! I'll be watching your build, even if you didn't have a brown box photos!

 

Can't wait to see what your secret innovation is. I'm a big fan of those. They're exciting! Keep it up!

Edited May 23, 2014 by Dark CMF

[Dark PWF[Staff]]

Looking good, Sam. I came to figure out (as a first time builder myself) that much of this seemed far more difficult in principle than in practice when it came time to do it. Much of it was simply deciding that a: It had to be done, and b: I could do it.

 

Off to a great start, and seriously can't wait for the secret project's reveal!

[ShavedWookie[501st]]

On 5/27/2014 at 5:27 AM, Dark CMF said:

Much of it was simply deciding that a: It had to be done, and b: I could do it.

 

c: Other 1st timers had done it & I can shamelessly copy them!

Thanks

 

Some more progress.

 

I have continued to place pins for easy (easier??) assembly, today was the stock.

 

The right pin still to be cut to length.

 

 

Almost looks like a proper folding stock [no it doesn't & I have no intention of letting it move]

 

 

Pin in the front of the stock, as far as I can tell there is not a lot of contact area at the front for the glue to hold too, thus pin.

 

 

Pin for placement of the front sight - will also be the front sight, two birds one stone pin

 

 

 

In addition to pins, I finished my spring! Yet another thing I wasn't planning on doing at the beginning of the build, but now I'm really happy how it turned out. I made the spring by wrapping 1.5mm wire around a 12mm aluminium pole. This left the spring too narrow to fill the space in the DD for it (and way too short). I stretched the spring by twisting around increasingly larger metal cylinders (in this case drill bits), it has resuled in very evenly spaced coils. After placing it with my inner barrel into the DD I trimmed the end so only 1 1/2 coils stick out, the end cap locks into place with a bit of tension, but not enough to allow it to pop out.

 

 

 

Finally the blaster in all it's current glory - pinned only, no glue yet.

 

 

The rest of the day I battled a scratch build of a M19 scope, some parts have gone well others not so much. I'll post up more about that when it's sort of complete.

 

Quick question about the trigger guard: Is it supposed to touch the trigger? Mine seems very tight, especially with a spring trigger, is it meant to be like this or is it a doopydoos thing?

 

Thanks for reading!

[The5thHorseman[TK]]

It should be some space between the trigger and the trigger guard, even though with the Doopy the space is often very narrow.

Pic courtesy of Aaron aka usaeatt2

 

When i look at your trigger it seems to me that your spring is too long, which makes it pushing the trigger out and touching the trigger guard. Compress your spring or shorten it and you should be better.

[Dark PWF[Staff]]

"c: Other 1st timers had done it & I can shamelessly copy them!

Thanks ;)"

 

There you go, Sam!  There isn't much that happens that is actually a truly original idea with the DoopyDoos kits.  It does seem as though there have been a massive influx of new mods to them in recent months though.  Your special project very well may be the newest awesome addition!  Once something has been done and documented at FISD, all you've got to do is shamelessly copy them! 

 

Just to add on to what Germain said above, take a look at the angle of your spring also.  While working on mine, I realized that the angle that the spring was drilled into the trigger could have an impact on the appearance/position of the trigger also.

 

For example, if the spring is parallelling the barrel itself, it could cause the situation that you have, and looking at your spring's angle, that might be a part of the issue.  If it is too perpendicular to the barrel, it would have a hard time staying in place.  There is a "sweet spot" for the angle of the spring which - if the other end is in the center of the trigger - will cause it to sit just about right.

 

In thinking about this, it dawns on me that it might be a good idea to put the pivot pin in the middle, and put a small spring at each end (larger one in the back though) to keep some cushion and equilibrium in the trigger.  Hmmmmm...  Food for thought.  Worth checking out perhaps.

[ShavedWookie[501st]]

Thanks Germain & Tim, I think the problem lies with the length of the spring rather than the position, I have it on about a 45 degree angle - easy fix, I'll get onto that & post pics in the weekend.

 

In thinking about this, it dawns on me that it might be a good idea to put the pivot pin in the middle, and put a small spring at each end (larger one in the back though) to keep some cushion and equilibrium in the trigger.  Hmmmmm...  Food for thought.  Worth checking out perhaps.

One spring good, two spring bad cause head to hurt. Maybe on my next build, or the one after that

[ShavedWookie[501st]]

If we titled individual posts rather than whole threads this would be called:

 

A litany of failures.

or

So close and yet...

or

How to overcome those little things in life.

or

Wookies secret project - revealed!

 

Some of the things in here are a warning to future builders, some are just me being honest, most aren't a big deal in the long run.

 

D-Ring

 

Although the DD comes with a D-ring now, I though it looked a bit small / pathetic so I purchased a screw clip and cut off the screw. Unfortunatley it leaves the gap off-centre & it looks not good on the back of the blaster. Next time I go shopping, I'll try and find some chain with correct size links & cut one of them.

 

 

Scope rail

 

I was slightly dreading this part of the build, metalwork is another skill to learn and as such I was planning on putting it off until the last. But, I happened to see a piece of aluminium while shopping for something else, so I grabbed it. It is 20mm x 3mm. I decided to put the front bend in first, as I thought it would be the more difficult task. I reasoned that once the front was bent I could measure back to where the sight was and cut the length correctly. I also chose to bend a longer piece that I needed & cut it back.

 

I started by cutting a groove with a hacksaw about 1/3 of the way through.

 

 

I gripped with a pair of pliers, and bent.

 

 

Then this happened

 

 

As you can see something went wrong. I think I tried to bend it too far, or didn't cut deep enough. So I tried again, ending up with this.

 

 

My secret project.

 

I promise there will be pics. Just wait (or skip all the writing).

This has not gone as well as I'd hoped. But it is on the right track. I'd appreciate any feedback, positive or otherwise that could help me move to the next stage.

 

While researching through the forums I saw a couple of people had hollowed out the DD supplied scope & installed monocular lenses. While reading, I thought this was awesome, you could get a working sight! However, due to the stepped shape of the scope, it appears as though light would pass through but you couldn't see an image.

(Idea v1.0) This is where I had my flash of inspiration, and thought to put lenses / mirrors inside the scope to get an image. I even started the maths on this, but it got really complicated really quickly. The biggest problem being the tolerances when placing the lenses was minute.

(v1.1) I thought for a bit and came up with the idea of stripping down a microscope. It already has an eyepiece that is bigger than object lens, and should work with our 'backwards' mounted scopes. Unfortunately the focal length is so small you wouldn't see anything at a distance.

(v2.0) My next idea was to mount a digital camera & screen in the scope. I started by researching the smallest screen I could find. I intended to still hollow out the scope and needed a tiny screen to fit in the end. This is what I found (and bought).

 

 

If you think it doesn't look that small, the following image isn't in great focus but the height of the screen is visible as 11mm (less than 1/2 inch)

 

 

So it is small, and it works! You can see the screen glow when hooked up to a battery.

 

 

This had me thinking happy thoughts! So I purchased a small camera, with screen, from work (I sell these things). I picked one with a screen already attached, thinking that I could just swap out the screens.

 

For the record - you can't (not at my skill level anyway). I am keeping it though, I am considering using it inside my helmet with a small downwards pointing camera, hopefully giving me a better view of what is in front of me.

 

Back to this build.

 

I forgot to take a picture of the camera as purchased, but here it is after I voided the warranty.

 

 

I picked the cheapest one we had in stock, without measuring it or thinking how the circuitboard was set up. At this point I nearly binned the whole project, but talked myself around in the end.

 

(v2.1) For a short time I considered removing some of the components from the circuit board & cutting it down in size. The camera was originally an in-car event recorder co it has an accelerometer or g-metre; low light sensor; microphone & speaker and probably some other stuff I don't need. This idea was short lived as I feared removing too many items would render the whole camera inoperable.

 

I did remove the IR LED's next to the lens though.

 

 

I am keeping the LED's as they look like they could be nice greeblies.

 

(v2.2) I was talking about this project with a local TK (the one that got me involved in all of this - thanks Hads!), and he pointed me in the direction of a tutorial to scratch build a M19 scope (this is supposed to be an ESB build after all). With a scratch build there would be more space inside the scope to fit stuff. Maybe.

I took this idea a little further & thought that if I could build a scope that was scaled up a bit, it might work.

 

So I put this together, it still needs a few parts but is moving in the right direction. For all the critics this is not going to be a scope that I apply for EI with, this would be a trooping scope only, I am trying to get a basic profile of a M19 scope - not perfection (which would be an original).

 

 

(v2.3) Despite the bigger scope, the camera parts still won't fit inside. At this point, slightly frustrated, I put what I had together and I have this

 

 

 

 

I was a little bit amzed at how good it looked. Obviously it needs glue & paint, and something to hold the circuit board, but I think it might work (again as a trooping scope only). I would leave the connections from the camera & screen as is - mush like the wires on an ANH blaster. This is a working camera, it has a micro SD card slot & can take video or stills. If I were to troop in a location that does not allow photography, the card can be removed yet the screen will still work.

 

(v2.4) I will still be using the inside of the scope, the battery that comes with the camera is pretty useless. Only 250mAh for a device that uses 800mA. I will be installing a 2500mAh battery, giving me approx 3 hours use.

 

 

What I would need to make this project work properly would be a smaller donor camera. I haven't ruled that out & am still hunting for the perfect piece.

 

Please feel free to offer up suggestions that may make this look / work better.

[I'm Batman[501st]]

Any progress Sam?