June 12, 2015

Ultra Tek Modding - Good And Bad News

Experiments with the Ultra Tek Champion have been rather fruitful! I've been adding and removing things, in different combinations, to see the effects on performance. First, the good news on the effects of modding!

For spring additions, you need some kind of washer to serve as support. This is limited by the 5/8" diameter of the stock spring rest and the 1.125" ID of the sliding plunger tube. The easiest thing to do is slice the ridge off of a 3/4" x 1/2" CPVC bushing and place it over the stock spring rest.


I've found that springs from Recons, Raiders, and similar N-Strike blasters are a perfect candidate for addition - they fit in with a little pre-compression, and they have sufficient clearance from both the plunger tube wall and the stock spring.

For removing the air restrictor, you simply need to punch out these three plastic supports inside the plunger tube.


It should come out pretty easily. If it doesn't, then you're doing it wrong.


Now, here were the chronograph readings for each separate modification.

  • Stock: 77 fps
  • Spring addition: 84 fps
  • AR removal: 79 fps
  • Both AR removal and spring addition: 86 fps
Here's where we hit the bad news. Either mod by itself noticeably improves performance, but there is minimal benefit from doing both. That means the stock barrel/breech is far too short under those circumstances, requiring a sealed breech a la most Longshots. Simple solution, right?

Wrong. The draw on this blaster (and presumably the other Ultra Tek blasters with clips and 72' range claims) is 3", but the minimum required for clearing the magazine and preventing dart jams is 3.25". As such, the plunger tube's forward position will need to increase by 1/4", shell adjustments will be needed, etc. On the bright side, it will leave less dead space!

I'll end this on a positive note. For the hell of it, I temporarily singled the blaster, with 7" of 9/16" brass tubing (with tightening rings) as a barrel. Chrony readings jumped to the 120s, now that a longer barrel was attached! So, at least when I'm done with a new breech, I can expect pretty good things to happen!


2 comments:

  1. I was wondering if anyone had success modding this blaster.

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