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It's a railgun.

 

Yes, I made it partly for The Ace Railgun but also partly because I already had the mechanism around, was curious as to what a railgun was (or wasn't, as I found out very shortly l405G.jpg) and discovered that my mechanism would fire like a railgun, even if not by the same mechanism.

For those who can't be bothered reading Wikipedia, a railgun works by having two rails (that's how it got its name) that a large current is stuffed through. This generates a magnetic field, yanking the projectile towards the end of the rails and after cleverly cutting off the current the projectile will zoom forward.

 

Why is it that large, you ask? Because they generally are. No offence Fushigisaur, but you simply cannot have a hand-held railgun with our current technology: heat from friction and from electricity, shocking (a big problem for hand-helds, as you need mega-amps to get the railgun firing), and the fact that railguns have a habit of breaking.

 

As for the halberds (easier to see in the picture at the bottom), that was my pathetic attempt to satisfy the "Battle-Axe" part of the railgun. Yes, they're halberds and not axes, but there's nothing wrong with a halberd is there? It's a axe that has the bonus of being able to stab. l405G.jpg

 

The railgun is made up of four parts: the base, the cannon on the left, the cockpit on the right, and of course the railgun. Here's what the raIlgun fires:

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It's the tube on the right; the stud on the left is merely for size comparison. The tubes were chosen because they can compress slightly (there are two types of tube that look exactly the same: one compresses a lot, the other only a little), allowing them to fit into the loader without jamming. (More stuff about the loader later on) Normal cylinders would squeeze against the bricks for the loader and be difficult to fire.

I'm sorry, Ace, but it doesn't fire coins. Why is that important, you ask? It's got to do with how she got her name. The reason why it doesn't fire coins is because I'm lazy and I like my current mechanism they're too thin and will get past the firing mechanism, which I'll get to later.

 

Here's the base:

 

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Even with something this large, the railgun is somewhat unstable and if it is on a lean and facing the right (or wrong, depending on your choice of words) way it will fall over. Nothing breaks, mind you, except for the railgun separating from the base which is very easy to put back on.

The railgun and armaments can rotate thanks to the turntable on the top; tilting is done by a separate mechanism per part.

 

On the left we have our cannon.

 

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It's on its own separate turntable, and consequently can rotate up/down and left/right independent of the railgun: but of course it is connected to the base, so when the railgun rotates the cannon will move.

The bars are there to connect it (dur) and also to hold onto the cockpit.

 

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Here is my minifigure model of me again, in the cockpit. I'm not going to bother to continue this description because I am not always Captain Obvious.

 

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OH WOW THIS IS TOTALLY THE GUN ITSELF OH YEAH REALLY  ROFLCOPTER LOL X D MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAH1111111
+5 SARCASM

 

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This is the mounting I've used to allow the railgun to tilt up and down to angles from -60 to +60 (approximately). Once again, I won't prolong the description.

Here's its range:

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The mechanism also allows it to move backwards and forwards slightly, but that is fairly useless.

 

As for how it works, you pull a knob backwards and let go, which is not at all how a railgun really works, but I'd like to see somebody make a Lego railgun that operates using electromagnetism. l405G.jpg Sorry about the flash, it was that or you can't see anything.

 

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As for why it doesn't fire coins, they can squeeze under the pusher to underneath the bar, which gives them a lot more space. I could rework the mechanism but a) the railgun would have to be longer and b) it would have to be twice as long as that to have my other feature.

You see the small hole at the bottom, just below where the 1x6 plate cuts across the firing mechanism? I can stuff a pin in there to hold the pusher-thingy back, allowing me to do maintenance as well as take better pictures. l405G.jpg

 

 

What's the funny bunch of bricks at the top for, you ask? It's an auto-loader.

Auto-loader you ask? This:

 

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You can't see it very well if at all, but the plate to the left of the ammo (which was wedged there) tilts downwards. That allows the ammo to slide into the path of the pusher (if you pull it back far enough), meaning you don't have to feed the ammo in via the front, as it is with nearly all other Lego weapons.

To stop the ammo from sliding out you simply shut it: yes, it does rotate, as is easily seen in the picture where I described the mechanism.

 

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However, that still leaves the pesky bit next to the railgun where the tube will slide to the side. Simple solution: stuff another tube in there, so the first one can't move out to the side. Doing so makes it fire 100% of the time unless something breaks (somewhat common but easily prevented if you know what you're doing).

 

Anyway, that's that!

 

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Black and neon green, such an awesome set of colours. Although from the photos the dominance of black kind of makes it difficult to see the detailing on the model.

 

Other than that, I think it's an ace railgun! And it doubles as one of those spinning space simulators that astronauts train in (like the one in LI2).

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Although from the photos the dominance of black kind of makes it difficult to see the detailing on the model.

 

Well there isn't much detailing on it anyway: most of the detail was in transparent neon green anyway. l405G.jpg

 

Black and neon green, such an awesome set of colours.
Aye, that's why everything I like is in black and transparent neon green. Plus I've got lots of those colours anyway. l405G.jpg
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