proffrink

Stock meteor

IMG_9600.mov  

my mod’ed base
 

IMG_9601.mov    

Scran
 
What to eat and drink?
 
Instant soup and drink mixers are the simplest and quickest. They are warming and provide energy. 


 
Screach can be consumed hot but it doesn’t isn’t any better. Although the sugar rush is as addictive.
 

 
  I tend not to brew up using tea bags. They just bring back too many bad memories… especially in the woods at night.
  

  In most situations snacks can be stored in spare corners of your kit.
  The traditional military biscuit will also help you by avoid the need to go to the toilet for then next day or too. 😉 
  
  A good filling and light weight option is instant porridge. 
 

 
  If you are an athlete then performance gels might be your thing.
 

 
 
  If you do want something more filling then the options can be summarised as:
 
1a) Self heating meals (as CannonFodder mentions). You can  sometimes find inexpensive ones in the supermarket. The are quite a few adventure travel ones, bit pricier.
 

 
1b) Or the military MRE heaters but I find them a faff as they don’t really work for a hot drink so you might as well use a stove. They are a lightweight back up if you
carry ration packs.
 

 
The above are flame less so some situations they maybe useful.

However if you are carrying a canteen cup and stove might as well use it.
 
2) “Dry” dehydrated meals. These are very light. And could be anything from a pot noodle 😱 to a mountain meal. Generally just add hot/boiling water and eat from bag.
 

 
3) “Wet” meal ration packs and boil in the bag. Heavier but pre-cooked so they can be rated cold if needed. If cost is a factor just make bolognaise and put it in freezer bags, ones you can cook in are available. Cooking time generally 8-10 minutes.
 
4) Cooking direct in cup. Certainly do able but then you need preparation time and clean space. People may get upset at you catching and gutting the local coneys however. 
 
  Options 3 & 4 are more suitable for use with a mess tins. But if you are in a team at a base camp you can more readily cook for the group in one go.
 
 

Water
 
Most sites should be able to provide potable drinking water. 
 
If not there is the option to treat it yourself. But this is really outside the ideal of what we want for a game.
 
If there is no supply on-site get a big bottle to keep in the car.
 

 
For those considering some sort of Bambi goes Rambo themed survival game here is a summary of options:
 
• Bringing water to the boil will kill bugs. Ideally with pre-filtering (with a millbank bag* for example) but this takes times.



• You can mechanically filter. But takes time and filters are pricey.
 
• Chemical treat in a canteen. Pop in tablet and go and play. Most water purification tablets were calibrated for military canteen volumes. Again ideally pre-filtered, which is time consuming.
There can be health issues with using chemical tablets over time but a weekend shouldn’t be an issue.
 

 
* Surplus millbank filters may have been used for liquids other than water and contain contamination. New ones can be had cheap these days.

Time for pyromania! The real reason anyone goes airsofting….


 
  You’ve got your stove but now need to light it.
 
Left to right:
 
• Magnesium block and striker. Takes quite a while to get a decent number of shavings, best dropped on to duct tape to avoid them blowing away. 👎
• Fire steel/ferro rod. Pretty unbreakable but work best with processed tinder. Readily light gas and alcohol but easy to knock over the stove with cold hands. 👎
• Bic lighter with o-ring or cable tie to stop gas leaking. Handy for various jobs and pyro. 👍
• Windproof matches. Very useful as they can be inserted into most stoves without burning your fingers. Especially the UCO hurricane matches, bigger am better… 👍👍
 
The latter two are simple. But do practice stetting up and using your stove before trying it out and about.
 
Solid fuel blocks such as Esbit can take a bit to get going so a flame held under them usually get the best result. One reason matches get issued in kits, plus they are light cheap and store for ages.
 
Alcohol fuel blocks will light from a spark even when completely soaked, just tip water out and they will go.
 
Other methods.

• Wire wool plus battery. Just take a lighter.
• Fire by friction. Good luck with that Bear Argyll’s. 😁
 
https://www.facebook.com/share/v/SzRzbCJEGo6DxwoP/?mibextid=KsPBc6

For cheapness option 2. The very robust solid fuel “Tommy” cooker style stove and cup.


 
The hardware in this is £20-30 including enough fuel for half a dozen brews.
 
• BCB Metal Crusader mug.
• Highlander army stove.
• Fuel tabs.
• Windproof matches.
• Soldering mat to protect the grass
• Long spoon,  for eating directly from food packets.
• Plastic fold-a-cup. Nicer to drink from and you can make a brew/soup in this while still cooking in the metal cup.
• Gloves. The metal mug handles get very very hot when the fuel initially flares up.
 

 
This set up is very simple and very robust. Even if you some how broke the stove you could still run it. Alternatively just use 3-4 big nails jammed in the ground or rocks as a stove. 
 

 
The old issue stoves with a holder for the Crusader mug are a bit more stable.
 
Heximine and Esbit are a bit toxic and leave a residue on the outside of your pot. Rubbing them in the soil or sand is enough to get this off.
 
If you are using alcohol based fuel blocks or gel, then a bit of foil folded to make a tray or stove specific works better.



  The fire dragon stoves are also cheap. The fuel is a bit pricier than hexi, but legal for sale! Supposedly non-toxic and less odour.
 
 As it’s alcohol based the flame is clearer so it’s difficult to see it’s lit in daylight. It leaves less sticky residue on your pot, just soot. The stove tray will get a crust in it, but this doesn’t effect function.

  Extra kit may be a:
 
• pot scourer or tissues to clean up.
• Pot/mug lid, metal ones are best or tin foil. Retains some heat and keeps out bugs.
• Heavy foil wind shield. But this is then an extra faff to set up.


 
  These types of stoves are usually cool to the touch by the time you have had your brew.

  As a side note round pots are a bit more fuel efficient and boil quicker due to better heat distribution, or something.
 
 So if you don’t need a metal mug to stack with an issue canteen they are a good alternative.  They can be a little less convenient  for boil in the bag though.
 

 
  There is no issue with using aluminium cook ware, steel is obviously very strong. Titanium is lightest but most expensive and if actually cooking can burn things more easily.
 
  However my focus for this cheap. 😉

The brew kit
 
Many militaries issue some system to let individual soldiers make hot drinks and heat up rations in the field.


 
Few airsoft events involve living in the wilderness for any length of time but being able to get a hot drink is very useful for morale and we are here to enjoy ourselves, allegedly.
 


For the more involved events you may be expected to provide your own catering, so a little more capacity to cook is useful.

Some brew kit options:
 

 
1) Hot drink in an insulated container.
 
Possible but it’s limited how long it will stay warm. Maybe useful for winter day game but bulky. Immediately ready to use.
 
2) Gas canister stoves and Jetboils.
 
Jetboil & Fire Maple type flux ring heating systems are fast and originally intended to fit in an issue utility pouch. Great for boiling drinking water. Expensive and some breakable parts.
 
Compact canister stoves are cheaper and can be very compact. Like jet boils there are parts that can break. Also light & fast.
 
All gas stoves can be noisy and it is possible to mishandle and ignite the can if you are a knob head.
 
3) Military style solid fuel coolers. The old “Hexi TV”.
 
In the UK HEXAMINE is now band and like US trioxane not healthy to breath the fumes in an enclosed spaces. Esbit also smells a bit. BCB fire dragon gel/blocks is a bit more eco and lights very easily. Solid fuel stoves are very cheap and robust but can take a while to get a full boil depending on conditions. Quiet and May or May not smell.
 
4) Liquid fuel cooking systems. 
 
Pressurised systems like the MSR whisperlite light take time to set up an prime. Are often expensive and commonly flare up more than other devices on ignition. Often sound like a rocket launch when running. As quick as gas once going, breakable and the most complex to operate.
 
Traditional systems like the Trangia are very robust but you need to take care with loose liquid fuel. Take a few minutes to prime but very hot once running. Quiet when running and usually not smells. 
 
5) Wood burners.
 
Good luck with this, way too much work.
 
Options 2 & 3 are popular with soldiers for a reason. Either speed (2) or simplicity (3) and possibly the hexi fumes. 

I'm not looking for a reason to moan, I'll be honest & say I have no interest in hpa, feels like a step backwards in airsoft when aeg's can easily achieve the required UK power levels & rate of fire commensurate with the real steel models they're copies of. 
BUT
This forum is well known for not only freedom of speech (within reason), at its core are a lot of members commited to keeping the game going, for decades in some cases.
it also pushes for a positive sensible stance to all aspects of Airsoft in all it's varieties, & keeping their availability to those who want to play. 
While that doesn't necessarily correlate with your weirdly biased stance on hpa, it kinda feels like giving hpa users a lower fps might actually encourage some to try to cheat the system, if for example, they're playing your site but they're playing shite, will they blame it on your lower power requirements, & then fiddle with their kit to match, or even scarily surpass those limits. 
Personally, if I found myself in your position & mindset, I'd be more inclined to exclude hpa entirely if I felt some couldn't be trusted to adhere to the rules. 
So while you may have felt this is a personal attack, it's more a criticism of the information provided & how it's provided, if that makes sense. 

This was abused by spammers and removed as a result. Sorry about that.

How cool is this?
 
 
Wrong section, sry admin.

Just to follow up on this, my wishlist grows ever larger, and more cluttered... So my requests are (in priority order)
 
1.  By choice or default, please allow filtering out (exclusion) of 'completed' ads
 
2. Add the wishlist option to the mobile view menu
 
3. Improve the look of the mobile view listing
 
Cheers!

At least on desktop the 'remove from wishlist' button vanishes on any completed listing, meaning we can't remove items that are no longer available - only remove items that are still available.  A fix for this would be lovely.

@proffrink One for you

That's great thanks @TacticalWaifu
 
So, feedback to the forum developer is:
 
1. Please add a link to the wishlist that is easily discoverable from the classifieds menu, or from the top level page
 
2.  Please give an option to filter out completed listings (in fact best to default the filter to exclude, rather than leave them included), or a method to easily delete all completed listings from the wishlist. (I've got 6 pages of ads I'm stuck with forever at the moment)
 
3. Please improve the page layout for mobile portrait mode.  And the landscape mode could do with a tweak too.

Talking about the Tutorial subboard specifically, but every pinned thread on the forum could probably do with some going over to see if they're really relevant, or needed, anymore. e.g. Some pinned threads in "Tutorials" are essentially just links to a long defunct website (mechbox.com - which in itself I always thought was just trying to make the word "mechbox" a thing, but that's beside the point.)
 
Clearing out old and worth-less pinned threads can make room for our contemporaries to recreate the same content, but better and more up to date.

I'm getting email notifications again now. Thanks for fixing this 😀

Thought I would check out the forum as I plan on getting back into airsoft, can't believe people are still arguing about joule creep. 
 
Nice to see nothing changes, bloody airsofters will argue about anything.
 
 

So uh... some you of guys may remember this: 
 
Or this:
 
And maybe this:
 
Well, I'm glad you're back! Because here comes the fourth iteration which combines the strengths of each previous model.
 

 

 
I'll keep this short and sweet.
 
As per usual, the MOSQUITO is a 3D printed, open-source airsoft kit that is super compact and lightweight. This newest iteration now only requires an AK-style V3 gearbox as there is now a custom 3D printed hop-up chamber. In addition, from the above images, there is now a front and rear wired battery solution so that you don't have to get angry at me anymore for having to rewire your gearbox.
 
You can find the STL and STEP files on the Printables page here: MOSQUITO Airsoft Kit (Open Beta 2) by HYBRID AIRSOFT | Download free STL model | Printables.com
 
There is also an 86 page handbook that I wrote up which details the 3D printing and assembly steps (have fun with that). I hope you guys with a 3D printer can try it out. If you get stuck or want to discuss anything, the easiest way to get help is to join the discord server (1500+ members), linked at the bottom of the Printables page, and there will be people more than willing to answer your questions about the kit.
 
This test will now run indefinitely until I release a final version of it (whenever that happens).
 
Thank you for reading and have fun printing

Wow you really wished you'd seen that one yesterday eh

I'd also be interested to know what the backlog / action time is atm (little point rushing to order if patch orders from 6 months ago haven't been fulfilled yet...)
 
Paging @proffrink to this thread... This thread, @proffrink, thank you! 😄

I've made some changes that I won't go in to in case one of the spammers bothers to read this thread. There are now some spam moderators too. Thank you to everyone who is going to help with flagging and appreciate those of you who flag these normally through the report system as it does help us react to them more quickly.

Registrations will reopen at 20:00CST tomorrow.

Just report those kind of posts please. The flagging is purely for the kind of obvious botting that we've been sustaining (all of the vice-y stuff).

Now all the sensible stuff is out of the way I can post this

I've made some changes that I won't go in to in case one of the spammers bothers to read this thread. There are now some spam moderators too. Thank you to everyone who is going to help with flagging and appreciate those of you who flag these normally through the report system as it does help us react to them more quickly.

Registrations will reopen at 20:00CST tomorrow.

I've made some changes that I won't go in to in case one of the spammers bothers to read this thread. There are now some spam moderators too. Thank you to everyone who is going to help with flagging and appreciate those of you who flag these normally through the report system as it does help us react to them more quickly.

Registrations will reopen at 20:00CST tomorrow.

I've made some changes that I won't go in to in case one of the spammers bothers to read this thread. There are now some spam moderators too. Thank you to everyone who is going to help with flagging and appreciate those of you who flag these normally through the report system as it does help us react to them more quickly.

Registrations will reopen at 20:00CST tomorrow.