Making the ULTIMATE Nerf Dart? (An Adventure in Foam & Silicone Casting)

We thought Nerf darts were designed to be safe and we could easily make them better with 3D printing, casting, silicone, and foam… but were surprised by the results! 👇 materials & links below! 👇

Punished Prop’s YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/punishedprops

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TOOLS / MATERIALS (affiliate)
■ Formlabs form 2 SLA printer https://amzn.to/2vCXiqH
■ Peopoly Moai (cheaper SLA printer) https://goo.gl/kKuTqz
■ Mold Star 20T Silicone https://amzn.to/2OZGwtY
■ Flex Foam-iT! 17 https://amzn.to/2B5Gez7
(we did 10, then 25... 17 might be just right)
■ Nerf strongarm blaster https://amzn.to/2MI0pnN
(great budget blaster)
■ Mold release https://amzn.to/2J3QQwT

FILMING GEAR (affiliate)
■ Fujifilm X-T10 http://amzn.to/2pblgac (main camera)
■ 35mm F 1.4 lens http://amzn.to/2whwP0N (makes things look fancy)
■ Sony Cybershot DSC-RX100 V http://amzn.to/2DJTHJF (slow-mo camera)
■ Drone https://amzn.to/2IIF4YG
■ Main tripod http://amzn.to/2whGqED
■ Pan head for tripod http://amzn.to/2fhX3wh
■ Lighting kit http://amzn.to/2vs5sDB
■ Wireless lav mics http://amzn.to/2BCqtKQ

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MUSIC
Bits by David Cutter
Cha Cha by David Cutter

THANK YOU TOP PATREON SUPPORTERS!
■ Katelyn’s Mom
■ Brandon’s Bees https://goo.gl/XP93pp
■ Bruce A. Ulrich https://goo.gl/wqixxp
■ Kit Low
■ Infinite Craftsman https://goo.gl/hsj5S6
■ Zach and Jazz https://goo.gl/bmqvxi
■ Corey Ward
■ Figments Made https://goo.gl/CbBRX1
■ Vincent Ferrari https://goo.gl/myFzcE
■ Scooter’s Workbench https://goo.gl/sP7b9W
■ Corso Systems
■ Brett Hollifield
■ Matt Knopp
■ George Partin
■ Level52 Studios https://goo.gl/dmdrSq
■ David Ingram
■ Brooke Boen
■ Matt Baker
■ Jason Kaczmarsky
■ Cameron Dorsey
■ David Granz
■ Elliot Iddon
■ Maxine Denis
■ Francisco Peebles
■ OmSweetOhm https://goo.gl/5Ue3ka
■ Southern Style DIY https://goo.gl/r5PL2c
■ James Allen
■ Kyle C
■ Legacy Creations https://goo.gl/LZVeMV
■ Joe Verstegen https://goo.gl/nyix5C

This was an adventure in prototyping! It may not have turned out like we hoped, but we learned a lot about molding and casting, foam, silicone, 3D printing, mold making, and Nerf! I’ll briefly walk through what we tried for each of the 4 versions.

In all 4 versions, Bill’s dart had a shorter tip, Evan’s dart had a longer tip, they both incorporated some rifling, and we used the same silicone type (Mold Star 20T) each time. In version 1, we used a less dense foam (Flex Foam-iT! 10). Even though feeling the large foam samples in the store made us think that 10 was the right density, turns out when it’s much smaller, like a nerf dart, it wasn’t nearly dense enough. In version 2 we tried the same foam but capped the mold so it would be compressed (and more dense) and added a rod to mimic the hole in a typical Nerf dart. This got closer but upon further inspection, it was still less dense than a Nerf dart. However, the hole did seem to make a positive difference! In version 3, we got a denser foam (Flex Foam-iT! 25) but still capped it to compress it and added the hole. This one ended up MUCH too dense. So for the last version, we used the more dense foam but didn’t cap it (and kept the hole). It was our closest dart by far!

The thing is, by that point we were just trying to mimic a Nerf dart haha. With more time to try different molds, silicones, and foams, I still think we could come up with something awesome! But since this was a collaboration trip, simply being able to hit a target was good enough for us haha. So curious to hear if you guys have any ideas for dart designs!

Видео Making the ULTIMATE Nerf Dart? (An Adventure in Foam & Silicone Casting) канала Evan and Katelyn