Nerf Recon Transformed Into "Aliens" M41A Pulse Rifle

This is a project i started at the beginning of summer 2010. The goal is to modify the Nerf Recon CS-6 and various parts of other nerf guns into the M41A Pulse Rifle from the movie "Aliens".
The 3rd picture shows a photoshoped version of the gun and 4 pieces combined to create the pulse rifle, this is what i used as a base for making the gun.

                                                                                                      !!!WARNING!!!

Read all of the guide before attempting to use it. several design changes occur during the progression of the blaster. pieces and techniques used at the beginning are replaced for better ones later.  

This is the 1st step, I made a super clip out of 2 standard nerf clips.
(This term "clip" may confuse you, nerf calls their "magazines" clips) So technically this is a "magazine". 
You will notice that the main part of this project is missing. I have taken this picture before I acquired the recon. 
The Parts for the gun (from stock nerf guns) are a Recon, Raider stock, Longshot frontgun, longshot rail, Vulcan rail and 2 clips.

Still missing the recon in this picture. The clip is now black and works well, even works fine in a raider using the slam fire.
1. I made the clip by cutting two standard clips,
2. Taking out springs,
3. Connecting springs,
4. Gluing, adding side supports,
5. Paint!
I used a hand saw and Krylon fusion black paint and just some random super glue that works well on plastics, just use a super glue or something.

As you can see i finally got the recon so this project was ready to get under way.
This also shows you what the whole body of the gun looks like.
The stock is not any weaker with the piece sliced off.
All i did was get a very small handsaw and start cutting from the inner part out.
It took me about 5 minutes to do.

1st. i put on bondo, the quart version of the "all purpose putty" type to fill in the holes from the cutting, then i used a plastic primer and painted black on top, i haven't decided if i need to paint the front part of the stock yet.

Man i really liked how this came out.
i painted:
1. the two shroud pieces,
2. most of the top barrel,
3. the top piece which a strap can attach to,
4. the back piece at the top,
5. and the last was the ring that connects it to the front of the longshot.
What i will do next is take the primer handle of the recon, cut it, paint it and attach it in the place of the yellow handle.

NOTE: This bolt piece did NOT work out very well for me, if you want to see what I did to fix it go to step 11

I took the recon primer bar and cut it in half. I used a hack saw (i have been using it for everything)
1. the 1st half is used still on the recon
2. the 2nd half is used as a pump on the Longshot front gun
this was a bit of a tricky cut, it wasn't like it was going to crack or anything but i cut it so i still had the lock piece on the pump end of the bar so i can attach pieces onto the pump like a grip or light/laser but i needed the 2 bars on the inside of the priming bar to use for the recon and cutting strait down and keeping them on separate pieces is a hard thing, they are really close so i actually ended up cutting some of the 2 inside bar hooks.

Then i went outside and sanded down the lip of the pump and i tried to flatten the whole thing, not fun. the pump is hard to do, you need to do these:
1. cut it away from the other half
2. sand it down (enough)
3. make sure it fits right (on the LSFG)
4. find the right places in the 2 parts to drill a hole for the prime bar in the LSFG
5. Drill!
6. test, if it fits on, you put in the screw and if all is good you have your self a LSFG pump which can hold any NERF's tactical rail attachments.

NOTE: This bolt piece did NOT work out very well for me, if you want to see what I did to fix it go to step 11

I took the front part of the maverick barrel rotating piece, it should be gray, and used my cold weld to fuse it to my remaining part of the recon handle.
I would say i didn't like quite how it came out, it tries to bend and makes priming using only one side rather hard and slow.
It the future i am probably use a different piece, what i am thinking of using is a metal piece.

I cut the pump so i matches the pump from the gun, it is a bit hard to get to cutting it at the angle needed but it isn't hard once done.

the last picture is what i may use instead for the bolt.

Ok, you will notice i skipped a little and put a few steps into one.

1st: I cut the bottom front of the recon with a band saw. I also cut the lower piece of the LSFG, be careful, i got it close enough that you can see the spring for the inner trigger catch (don't want to cut that off) 

2nd: I cut the LSFG handle into just enough to hold the trigger.

3rd: I attached the trigger to the bottom front of the recon using bondo and plastic super glue
   (note, this step takes time and is a very delicate operation, you must take it slow and be careful.)

4th: I made a extended trigger catch for the LSFG out of a large golden paper clip, this is a huge one that i used, i also had to cut it. I also then attached the LSFG to the recon.
    (Note: be careful, i used a cold weld and mistakenly glued the outer attachment ring on the LSFG to the left side of the LSFG which i was able to fix it but be careful when gluing because the ring is very close the sides of the LSFG.)

5th: most recognizable step is painting everything black, i painted the pump, bolt, recon, trigger, and repainted over the clip, stock and LSFG.

Just to let you know, all parts of the gun still work, the trigger to the LSFG works with the extended trigger catch, the recon still works, you can attach rail pieces onto the pump and you can attach stocks on the back.
Beware, the paint will make some moving parts hard to move like the bolt of the clip release. 

The 2 things which are new for this step is that you will see the Strap and a piece at the bottom which covers the trigger catch.

The strap i made before I even began working on the gun. I just used some spare strap pieces from the US army store. all that it really has to look like is this: http://www.danajan.com/blog/2008/05_May/m41a_019.jpg

The 2nd thing was covering up the trigger catch and giving the user a place to rest their hand and not get in the way of the trigger catch. I took a piece of 2 inch PVC, cut it to the right length and cut it in half. I glued it onto the right side only of the gun using a cold weld.

The strap hooks are metal and scratchs the gun a little so i put  on two metal rings, one at the front and one on the stock.

In this step I begin making the rail, enhancing the pump and painting the scope for the Pulse Rifle.

SCOPE
The scope is fairly easy to make, just take a LS scope and paint it with a Krylon olive green then cover the places you want to keep green with tape and paper then go over it with flat black paint. It doesn't matter exactly what paint you use but I for this used a velspar plastic primer, camo olive green Krylom fusion and a velspar flat black.

PUMP (Outdated)
I cut off the back part of the original pump and glued it on with some smaller pieces to fill in holes. then i painted it black again.

RAIL
This wasn't the easiest part, I cut off 2 LS rails, cut the back of one and the front of the other, glued them together and attached plastic on the bottom for support. I also trimmed down the little notches on the rails that stop a piece from sliding back or forwards so i can  put an attachment on the front and slide it to the very back.

My previous bolt was slow, annoying and broke, so..... I have replicated the bolt piece used in the other nerf Pulse rifle on my page by my friend. 

I completely took off my old bolt pieces and sanded the slits in the side of the recon to be large enough for the new bolt pieces.
The new pieces are 2 screws with nuts and I have put groves into the holes of the recon bolt slide so the screws will rotate in and stay. The bolt pieces are much better than the older ones.

I painted my top rail olive green. 

NOTE: do not paint the accessory lock pieces which are orange and make sure you sand down the rail pretty well before painting. 

The last picture of the rail shows that it still has the back part of the rail still on it. I took it off and glued the front piece on the back. So the rail is made up of 2 longshot rails minus the back parts where a strap can attach to. I also noticed that the rail was strong so I cut some metal dowels and used bondo to hold them in and over all make the rail stronger. 

 

While making this project it kind of stalled and just sat around for awhile and I finally felt the motivation to reboot it.

I replaced the main blaster recon with it's direct plunger counterpart the retaliator to give it more range and I replaced the super clip with the nerf made 12 dart clip and painted that.
I disliked the bolt system I had previously and will change it.
I cut off a portion of the front gun.
I transplanted the forward trigger from the recon to the retaliator.
I did a whole new paint over and sanded the pieces more.
The new trigger has yet to be painted. 
The 12 dart clip feeds darts better than the super clip.

The old pump I used for the front gun just wasn't working out that well for me so I am replacing it.
I took a PVC pipe and attached that on the underside of the front gun, filled inside of it with hot glue and cut it down the middle.
Note: I needed to drill a hole for one of the screw ports, make sure not to cover it with hot glue.

For the new pump I cut the according PVC pipe coupler with another piece and glued them together. The coupler needs to be sanded down in the middle section. It takes a long time to sand it down.

Shroud
I previously made shroud pieces from a sheet of polycarb and cut out the pieces with a hand saw. I have heard using a dremel is a lot easier to use. I glued the pieces together using super glue and cold bond and then cut down the middle of the main shroud piece. 
I then glued the pieces to the bottom of the blaster and made sure they were straight on and then used a piece that I cut off earlier from the retaliator to hold the 2 pieces together by a screw which I drilled a hole for in the side of the shroud.

Pump
I took the pump from the last step and glued on 4 clear plastic support pieces then glued on 2 instamorph pieces.
Note: the instamorph pieces are not identical on both sides.
For the attachment of the pump I carefully drilled out holes on each side for the rod and the easiest way to attach it is to insert the rod into the blaster and catch the spring then push it almost to the other side and slide the pump on and push the rod back through to get the other side on.

Magazine Shroud
All that was down for the bottom of the shroud on the magazine is putting the mag in the blaster, attaching hot instamorph to the bottom and gluing on the shroud piece.
Then I filled most of it with hot glue and used instamoph to finish the top of it.

Priming slide
I sliced off the bottom priming slide and added instamorph to provide more support when the bolt pieces are attached so the plastic doesn't crack.

I then just took some instamorph to fill in some details on the body.

This is a very painful step in using instamorph. I first added to pieces on the top/side to get the frame and make sure they don't contact the stock.
Note: When using instamorph make sure to get it as smooth as possible and not bumpy or it will be very difficult to fix it. 
I built the back shroud piece to go completely over the stock so the stock can be easily removed to open the blaster at anytime.
However the back screws become difficult to get at.

I also cut out some of the plastic under the barrel on the front gun and added some instamorph.

This step is very simple. I made one piece for the bottom shroud to connect to the front gun.
Note: these pieces are right shell sided meaning they do not split apart but are only on the right side of the shell. Make sure to not attach to the left side of the shell.
I cut a bit off of the priming slide and added the instamorph all over the place.
Note: be careful for screw holes and make sure the instamorph is smoothed out.

Dealing with screw holes.
One technique I found useful is taking a piece of drinking straw and cutting it then gluing it so it sticks out of the hole to give you a frame to build the instamorph around.

I also added another screw support for the mag shroud like before.

Carry handle
I made the angle of the ends of the carry handle steeper and added instamoprh pieces, do not let the other sides touch or they will glue to each other and I built up the sides for detail.

Shroud
For this step I recommend that all instamorph pieces should be molded then glued on to avoid imperfections and bumpiness, also the side panels are hard to keep flat when they are hot.

Bolt
The bolt isn't that hard. I took 2 dowels of wood and cut them down then drilled into them so you can later screw into them. I drilled in the selected parts of the priming slide and rotated screws into them and the dowels then glued them into place. Using a clamp will help.
This part is based off of Brit Nerf's recon bolt mod: http://britnerf.myfreeforum.org/sutra3366.php
The bolt is super strong and easy to one handed prime the blaster. I isn't quite as smooth as the prime on a longshot/strike etc...

Note: I extended the back shroud part a little.

These are the barrel grill pieces and not very easy to make.
The technique I used was making 2 long pieces, a flat piece and several smaller thin pieces and built it like a ladder. It came out a bit sloppy but works. They are on there a bit delicately so can break of if the blaster is impacted in anyway hard enough. I also made a piece at the front of the barrel on both sides. It is a bit sloppy but easy to make.

This part is kind of short on step pictures so pat attention to the description.

What you what to do on this part is glue both of the part of the carry handle on and make sure the handle is perfectly straight not crooked. 
I added instamorph on the front attachment point for detail and to add strength.
The back I added some instamorph for strength too but also detail. I made 2 slanted pieces at the back of the priming draw and added 2 panels to fill in the gaps.

The carry handle is very strong and you can carry the blaster with it without worry even with the amount of weight added by the hot glue in the magazine. 

I used krylon camo olive green and valspar flat black with a valspar plastic primer. I have been told in the future to use vinyl dyes for the moving sections like the handle, priming slide, pump slide so they aren't sticky and interfere with operation.
The blaster works perfectly, can use 6 dart, 12, dart and 18 dart clips and tactical attachments on the carry handle.

I will add in an ammo counter later.