BR Blaster Targeting Device

[Delmustator]

I'm researching what it would take to insert a MicroGreen 5.6mm laser into the targeting device on the BR blaster. I want a real green laser coming out of the targeting device onto the target.

This is a picture of the worlds smallest laser.


At a cost of $215 each for the diode alone. It's going to take some creative thinking to get is all setup.

Thoughts? Comments?
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-Del

[Helder22]

Its pretty small, but its still too big to fit in the right place. Whats your plan?

[Delmustator]

I was thinking about hollowing out or using a custom aluminum targeter. I possible could trim down the header of the diode flush with the barrel. Then it would be only 5mm.

I'm going to get some 6mm bar stock and play some to see just how much larger it would have to be to work. If it's only slightly larger then great, if it's a lot larger, then it's a bust.
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-Del

[steevy]

I've been waiting for someone to try this.Someone other than me!Good luck and keep us posted.

[doc3d]

Cool laser. But if you really want to stick it into that "laser" gizmo on the left side, the only way I think you can stabilize its aimpoint is to mount the tube *on the Steyr receiver* just above the Steyr cylinder shroud, not on the shroud itself as is done with the movie prop. You'll never be able to get consistent targeting with it on that thin metal shroud. If your top Steyr receiver is secure-- e.g. you machined it out of steel, and securely attached it to the Bulldog frame strap, you've got a shot *if* you attach the laser thing to the receiver. If your gun is pewter, the snap and transmission of energy through the frame will very likely move the laser's target point each time you pull the trigger. If it's pot metal, you've exchanged soft for brittle-- but it's certainly more dimensionally stable-- might get lucky. If it's resin, you're on the wrong page. It will never work if attached to the left cylinder shroud no matter what it's made of. Every time that gun fires, it "inflates" the cylinder shrouds with gas blown out between the cylinder and barrel. Get it? Pewter guns are common, so let's briefly look at that material. "Pewter" has a lot of formulations, but these guns seems to be the lead and tin variety. It's easy to cast and form, but not that stable. Upper class Romans-- who weren't all that stable either-- used to store acidic wine in pewter, allowing one to guzzle lead along with the wine and become drunk and insane in half the time. (This could very well account for the reason the Emperor Caligula was such a fruitcake.)

Check out the pics of my PKD (having sent three 200 grain chunks of lead down its pipe, it's a You Tube verified shooter). If I didn't tell you the laser thing was attached to the receiver, you'd probably never notice. My gun has a lot of other cosmetic problems, but it's still a work in progress. I also committed the sacrilege of shortening the gun by half an inch so I could stick with a factory barrel (4" as opposed to aprx. 4.5 breech to muzzle on the movie prop). The PKD laser is held in with two 4-40 steel screws with the heads mostly filed down, and also soldered.



Now, Plan B. Since you have enough room to swim in under the Steyr receiver shroud-- I suppose depending upon how you machined it-- with that $200 green micro laser all you'd need to do is drill a hole in the center of the thing that sticks out of the front receiver barrel plug large enough to clear the beam, and mount the laser to the barrel via your custom machined laser adjustment housing. That will definitely work, assuming your laser is rated for the high impact it's gonna get from a .44 round, and you make a good solid barrel mount for the laser.

What I'm going to do on my funky gun is stick a small 2nd generation Laserlyte FSM (1.75" x .55", .9 oz, designed for guns and costs fifty bucks new if you shop around) on the top rail of the 4" Bulldog barrel, and aim it through the middle of that center hole I mentioned previously. I probably won't bother to install the center thing (it may be part of the real Steyr's firing pin assembly-- dunno for sure) in the receiver plug. This leave a nice large hole that will accommodate any wiggle of the pewter Steyr receiver shroud I used to build this less than $700 gun (used Bulldog and extra barrel included!)

So endeth another installment of doc's gonzo yammering.

doc

[Delmustator]

I'm leaning more to putting it in the breech of the Steyr as you indicated in plan B. But this could be a cheaper laser since size is not a real concern in that position. I can go much higher with the laser output also.

I'd love to seen the green laser been in darkness..
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-Del

[doc3d]

The one I'm using is a Laserlyte Classic Universal Laser System FSM-OPLW-140. By shopping around you can get it down to bit over fifty dollars, tax free and postpaid. Cheaper Than Dirt has them for about $70, plus post. There's a list that has many gun related things, including guns, at good prices called gunbroker.com. I don't know what color the laser in the Laserlyte is, but I have to assume red. However there actually are green firearm rated lasers, but none of the green ones I know about are small enough. If the green one you have will take a beating, then seems fine to make a mount, or modify an existing mount and use it. Green would be a nice touch... BTW unless the area is full of smoke, you won't really see the color of the beam except on the target. If you can see the green visible on the gun, then you just dusted a few rods and cones in your eyeball.

doc

[Crowley]

This thread is making me think that having a good and affordable green laser aiming module that small by 2019 is the most realistic aspect of the blaster design.

[Delmustator]

Well 5mm is as small as they get currently. I spoke to the manufacturer and his main concern with my application was putting too much pressure on the barrel of the laser. It could break if too much is put on it.

Putting a tactile button switch someplace in the grip that is not readily seen is another issue.
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-Del

[doc3d]

Amen to that (re Crowley's comment about small green lasers). I mean really, while it won't look like it externally, this gun is essentially a Saturday Night Special with some dressup. Not only that, it's infamous. Guess what Son of Sam's weapon of choice was?

doc

[doc3d]

Now here's one hell of a fine job attaching the PKD laser sight to the swingout cylinder shroud. Rock solid. However you do need to know that on this gun all the steel is either custom machined or modified from an actual Steyr rifle receiver. The parts fitting is superb, the gun is as solid as a rock with a very innovative front cylinder lock system that allows you to remove most of the ejector rod and swing out the cylinder just using the Bulldog cylinder release (and you don't need to remove the Steyr magazine.)

But does the above contradict my opinions on putting a real laser on the swing out shroud? No. The sight on this gun is decorative. No real laser inside. Still, it's true to the prop design, which didn't have a real laser either.

Sorry I don't want to post info re the owner, who has enough things to do already as opposed dealing with that great thief of time, email.

doc

[Delmustator]

I think the only reason no laser was used in the movie was a limitation on the technology of the day. I'll bet if small green lasers were available to the prop makers back then, they would have added one.
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-Del

[doc3d]

I agree. Only they wouldn't mount it on the cylinder swing arm of a revolver.

doc

[phase pistol]

Why not embed the laser any old where, and pipe the laser light out through a fiber optic cable?

[doc3d]

Re fiberoptic to laser linking, you out of my league on that one. Have you seen a gun system that uses this technology? I haven't and would really appreciate some links you'd recommend for looking into it.

But the key thing with a gun laser is to have a good stable mount, because if you don't, it will quickly drift off the aimpoint from the recoil impact. Which is why the the left side cylinder is a poor choice. But then, all you have to do is hide it under the Steyr receiver shell securly mounted to the barrel, and drill a small hole so the beam can pass through to the target.

Doc

[andy]

Since we are talking about a futuristic gun that would have been meant to have some new technology we are making too many assumptions based on the actual prop as opposed to what the prop was supposed to represent. It is very likely the gun was never meant to be a revolver. A revolver was just the base prop used to fire the blanks. Many movie prop guns have real guns at the center, but are supposed to be non existing technology. As in the Vector that is at the center of the Corban Dallas gun from 5th Element. Remember this gun also had a clip and ejection chamber.

Also the laser rod itself was probably like Doc said before just used as decoration, just meant to look cool and futuristic. but if it was meant to be a laser sight, it would have theoretically been attached to the gun in a stable point, not an openable cylinder.

I would love to see someone do a Fantasy version of the gun with cutaway, but the idea is to make the gun "real". But we don't have to trap ourselves into following the prop as that basis.

I guess it all depends on what we want with the end product. Something that we can use as a prop or imagine as the movie concept in reality.

Just some thoughts to break us from narrow path we have put ourselves down on this gun.

Andy

[doc3d]

I'm working on a deal for a Hartford kit, and if it comes through, the first gun I made will be radically modified if I don't sell it or something. Not like the Hartford snub, but something far more radical.

Most of my posts relate to bragging rights, but more importantly, safety issues. I'm surprised someone hasn't dinged me for being a nervous Norvis.

Anyway as andy implies, the whole thing is to have a little fun within a community that has some of the same values.

Another Doc once said, "When the going gets tough, the tough turn pro." As this Doc says, "When the going gets tough, the tough turn weird."

And if I feel confident about building a second gun, the first one will set new standards for weird before I'm through with it. Trust me.

BTW if you want to read a good book about strange guns and projectiles, give K.W. Jeter's "Death Arms" a shot. I wasn't too jazzed by his BR sequels, but DA is terrific.

Doc

[phase pistol]

Keeping in mind that I have no idea what I'm talking about I was just blue-skying that it might be possible to use fiber optics to "bend" the laser light from wherever you need to put it, and pipe it out thru the jeweler's screwdriver.

I have no practical knowledge about whether that would actually work or not.

I do see there's a company called "TruGlo" that combines a tritium light source with fiber optics.

http://www.truglosights.com/content/products/firearm/handgun_sights/handgun_sights.asp

[clutch]

I think lasers sound cool, but they aren't very pretty. I mean if you got one on there, all you would see is a dot on the wall and not a very bright light on the gun. Unless you were in a smoke-filled room.

[Delmustator]

I guess I'm mainly looking at what the intent of everything on the blaster was according to the movie.

Sure the blaster is based on a revolver. But is it too far fetched to think that future weapons will not also? I think not. The revolver has been around for decades and is still used by law enforcement. 2019 is not that far off so I see revolvers being around still. Sure it may use smart ammunition rather than just firing a slug of lead.

I seem to remember an article I read that the concept of the blaster was different specifically because they didn't want it to be like all the other Sci-Fi weapons that were appearing in movies (i.e. lasers, phasers, etc).

As for the real deal. I'd love to built a real M2019. I think I would want it to be a 10mm revolver with all the current bells and whistles. But I would want it to retain the same current design. The bolt action portion would need to be functional as well. If only to fire taser darts or some sort of other non-lethal ammunition.
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-Del