MiniShooter

This is a functional mini-shooter that can be mounted on anything, including the wrist. It is similar to a web-shooter straight out of Spiderman, but it has no strings attached to it, allowing it to fly further. The best part is that it is made out of a pen!

Materials Needed:

• Popsicle Stick
• Pen
• Tape
• Lollipop / cake pop stick

Tools Needed:

• Scissors
• X-acto knife
• Hot glue gun
• You might need a small, handheld saw, such as a coping saw

You need to start by preparing your pen. Image 1 is a disassembled pen, and Image 2 is the pieces you need to keep. Next, you need to make the mouth a little bigger in order to pull the bullet back. Using the X-acto knife, cut angled chunks off one at a time, going around in a circle. After completing one rotation, drop the spring into the barrel to check how much more you can cut off. Do a couple rotations, I went until 0.1 inches in diameter. Just don't take off too much material, as you don't want the spring to fall out of the barrel. You can always remove more if needed later on. This process is demonstrated by images 3, 4, 5, and 6.

1. Start by cutting a circle around your lollipop stick about 1/8" down from the top. Don't make it too deep. (Image 1 & 2)
2. Cut the lollipop stick to about 2" long (Image 3)
3. Try to cut away layers one by one, then peeling them off (Image 4 & 5)
4. Continue the process until the entire section under the head is about half the diameter of the head (Image 6)

The bullet may have a lip on the main body from where you cut the paper. This is shown in image 1. To fix this, simply wrap tape around it several times at different spots to hold it down. Make sure to keep it really tight, as to not add too much diameter onto the bullet. The finished bullet is shown in image 3.

Now, you need to attach the spring to the bullet. Add a dot of hot glue at the top, right under the lip. Slide the spring up and let it dry. After it is dry, use your X-acto knife to cut the excess glue off, so that the bullet still slides freely through the barrel. At this point, you want to cut the barrel to size. Measure the barrel compared to the bullet fully pulled back, and cut there. I used a saw for this, but you can probably use a sharp knife. (Image 6 & 7)

Glue the finished barrel to the end of a popsicle stick. Cut the stick to size. You are finished!!! I Then glued it to and old broken watch so that it could be wrist mounted.

This turned out pretty cool. One improvement could be to make it easier to shoot, but this was a good first version / prototype. You are probably wondering how to shoot it. Load the bullet into the barrel. Pull the back of the bullet all the way back. Let go and watch it fly!!!