There’s a substantial price discrepancy between paintball pistols and paintball sniper rifles. So the [Fresh-Prints-of-3D] chose to print himself an sniper upgrade kit.
He started with the classic Tippman 98 Custom pistol , which is a tried and true industry conventional when it concerns reputable paintball guns. using Sketchup he developed a side loading hopper adapter, a fixed stock, a magazine adapter, various brackets, and even a bipod fore-grip. He then printed the parts out at his local hackerspace; Innovatrix Labs, which is in Northeastern Pennsylvania. A Portabee 3D printer was used for some of the first prototypes but the final parts were all printed on a large MendleMax2 which has a build area large enough for the entire fixed stock!
The best part? He’s only been using SketchUp for a few months. once the design and build is completely finalized he might release it under a CC license.
It just goes to show that 3D printers are really breaking down various markets of overpriced plastic components — 3D printers only print trinkets? Pfft.
[Via Reddit]