your views on hoppers?

[L J]

Originally posted by le-pig
what about carbon fibre,lighter than alloy and stronger,easy to cast.dearer than normal plastick but far better quality's

i thought of carbon fibre, yes its very light, but also VERY brittle

 

[Gyroscope]

I don't see why bead blasting should be all that expensive; I have the equipment in my garage and I could do the treatment in a few minutes.

 

[le-pig]

Originally posted by L J
i thought of carbon fibre, yes its very light, but also VERY brittle

ermmm no its not,if done properly it's stronger than most metals

 

[Lucky]

there are only really three options for a hopper !
Plastic, carbon fibre and aluminium, tho magnesium would work well if you could afford it, but it has loads of faults going against it.

Carbon fibre would be a superb choice but in practice the cost of manufacture would outprice the hopper, it superbly light and strong but does not like to be made into tight bends, it also needs to be baked at extreme heat and pressure in a costly to produce mould. so thats out.

Aluminium is the next choice but only if it was pressed and not machined or forged, again the tooling costs are prohibative.

Which leaves us with good old fashioned plastic, this is a superb medium for a hopper but needs to be the right type and moulded in the right way to be strong and light and production costs are cheap so thats good for the manufacturers to make vast profits.
lol

 

[wildflower1975]

what about using fibre-glass or fiber-wrap somehow?
If it was done in a mold would that be just the same as using plastic?

 

[Lucky]

a lot heavier and also fibreglass shatters well, not good for a paintball impact.