Invert Mini low velocity

[punkncat]

Help me out a bit, brothers, it's been a while since I have troubleshot one of these.

I believe this to be a first gen Mini. It's one of the Chrome ones, which I cannot recall them making too long. At some point the detents were changed from the "flats" to the rounded detents, so it could be second gen, I guess. It is outfitted with a Tech T delrin bolt, has a "Shockwave Control Board V1.1" and is otherwise stock.

A buddy of mine bought this second hand off another friend 3-4 years ago. It has been being used with a high pressure output Ninja and a gravity hopper by Proto that had the ramps in it. The inside of the marker was about as full of paint as it possibly could have been. It was apparent that they eyes had a good deal of paint leak through/down. I picked the marker up from him to use for myself and took it down to the field today. I completely took the marker down, cleaned out all the paint, wiped it down, greased it, fixed the reg screws so the bottomline was tight. I set the main reg for 180, which is what I used when using the Tech T bolt (but with a Virtue board) years ago.
Upon taking it over the chrono the marker wouldn't originally fire correctly, just doing that half shooting mess that some of the early ones with the 'noid issue did. I went and changed out the battery for another battery and it started shooting correctly, however I cannot make velocity. I am bore matching, I have set the pressure between the 180-200 threshold, have turned the back cap nearly to the point of coming out. I adjusted dwell to the top of the range and also defaulted the board.
I took it back apart and changed all of the friction o-rings, I don't currently have a whole kit, and was able to get it to the 260 range with the reg at 200 and the back cap about half a dime in from flush...this is also with "stock" dwell on the Shockwave board "11 clicks" which I think is around 8 dwell.

What am I missing here?

I have available the stock bolt and the stock Optimus board in unknown condition. I don't have the range of springs that came with the Tech T to try. I don't currently have an HPA tank to use for it, so will have to try any suggestions at the field tomorrow or next weekend (or so). Give me some thoughts.

[WORR13]

i would try the stock bolt and see what happens. do you have the stock bolt spring to go with it? and set the dwell to factory stock, looks like u have already

[WORR13]

from what ive seen and read the stock bolt is the best option for these and most other space dildos

[punkncat]

i would try the stock bolt and see what happens. do you have the stock bolt spring to go with it? and set the dwell to factory stock, looks like u have already

Yes, I found that several settings within the board were off default, so defaulted and got the best velocity with that. I have the stock bolt and spring, and the Tech T delrin bolt. I suspect the aftermarket bolt is too light for the spring. I went ahead and ordered the Tech T spring kit for cheap.

I am having issue finding a good quality ring replacement kit for this. I assume that the Empire GS and Invert Mini, along with the Empire Axe are the same for the bolt rings and such?
I was advised not to get the Capt. O Ring kits. The only other thing I have been able to find so far is the GS stock part kit which is just over $50. Is that the best way to go on this?

[Jordan]

Usually when mine does that I need to grease the poppet.

They're fussy about what orings are used and there's a mix of standard and metric seals inside.

[punkncat]

Usually when mine does that I need to grease the poppet.

They're fussy about what orings are used and there's a mix of standard and metric seals inside.

Thanks. I just went in and took it apart and cleaned everything up more thoroughly. I am checking with the field owner who uses paint from the company that owns Empire now, so will see if he can find me an "official" kit for less than $50.

[WORR13]

ive found oringsonline.net to be pretty good. just dont buy those colored orings. there are a couple orings that are diff. between empire and invert. (for the most part the same though). like jordan said- did u take the poppet out and oring, clean, and lube?

[punkncat]

Nice, thanks for that link. Less than $10 for 4X rebuilds, in spite of all buna.

I did not swap that ring as I don't have a 'good' one on hand. I did check and clean it, so for what that is worth.

[punkncat]

Just wanted to update the thread and resolution in case anyone else needs to know.

I changed the orings with a kit from o ring online and could not make velocity. It shot fine but really had to work to get above 250. I ended up sourcing a NOS mini kit and the poppit o ring within that kit fell apart. The ring for the poppit is a clear urethane ring and is just a smidge small and very hard durometer. The kit that I purchased had two of them and each one broke as I was pulling it over the poppit. A guy at the field luckily had a master kit from Empire for the Axe/Mini, and also had the "o ring monkey" kit. Both the o ring online and monkey kit had buna style rings meant to be on the poppit and both of them created drag that would not allow for velocity. I actually tried one of the urethane rings from an Automag kit I had on hand but it was either just slightly different size or from what I could feel was too soft durometer, so that didn't work beyond cycling.
I dropped the clear ring in from the master kit and after airing and testing could just tell that it was shooting right.

In spite of having a tech t bolt (and I tried the stock bolt) and regardless of what I tried with dwell and so forth, this marker will not run on less than 200 PSI indicated on the gauge. I attempted several other things and even tried the gimmicky waste of money that the tech t mrt springs are. The marker got worse with those.
Best setting was 200 PSI in, dwell at stock 11, back screw just under flush with the back cap and she was nailing 277-281 every shot. Did very well, finally.

I am going to look and see if I can source some of the OE poppit rings or a proper replacement for it. I have no idea how old that master kit was, but the ring didn't break, so good sign.

Thanks for the suggestions fellas.

[Jordan]

I wouldn't fret too much about OP, those gauges were known for being off as much as 10% "back in the day".

[punkncat]

My only concern in that aspect is that it is fairly common knowledge that very little above 200 PSI blows out the 'noid on these. Have to be very careful when you get up to that range. The other thing they tend to do, and if you are lucky, is just to break the "cup" seal on the poppit which is an immediate barrel dump of air.