Vike's Proto Rail Review

[vikingshadow]

Ok, first official day of playing with it, so I figured I'd continue the review to include actual play. Not that it matters, but I played both woods and speedball today. It was pretty windy today - 15-30 mph with strong gusts all afternoon. Temperature at around 62 degrees, sunny and paint was relatively new.

I can tell you that I chrono'd a little low, but it was a bad ball to barrel match so I just adjusted the reg. Chrono was +/- 5 (300, 301, 301, 302, 297, 297, 301). Remember though, the reg still isn't broken in yet. I have probably finally shoot 2000 balls through it. I was using Nightmare (or Midnight, can't really remember as I traded it later on in the day), at PSP ramping at 20 bps for the gits and shiggles of it.

For some reason, there is just some paint that my particular Rail can't shoot. I was using old Nelsplatt before and it was exploding (I've come to the conclusion it wasn't chopping, but just exploding paint - not even barrel breaks). Same thing with the Nighmare I was using today. I would try to get off a string of paint, and it would just blow up. However, I threw some Scorch I had in laying around and didn't experience a single chop, barrel break or exploding ball. So, I traded for some Heat and sure enough, my breaking paint problem was solved!

I ended up using my stock Proto one piece barrel because the Un1tec was a bit small for the Heat. I have always said this and believe it even more today - this barrel is a great barrel! None of this "It's a decent stock barrel" business - it's a good barrel period. Nice placement of shots and though not necessarily "ball on ball" I was glad I used it because I know my shooting, and it couldn't all be me, that's for sure!

My field owner wasn't prepared today so he only had 2000 psi fills. Even so, I was shooting 2 pods and a loader per 1000 psi (I never allowed it to go below 500 psi, so it never leaked on me.) If you figure the math, at 2 pods (180 balls each approx.) and a full loader (another 180 approx.), that's approx. 530-560 shots per 1000 fill. So, in a perfect world, that would be 2000 + shots on a 4500 fill. I know it really doesn't work that way, but it would be close! Not bad at all.

I've heard stories of inaccuracy and shoot down in the Rail, both of which I saw neither of today. I was ripping strings of 20 bps all afternoon and never saw shoot down one single time and most shots were very close to each other - not going to say ball on ball, but it's as close as any shooting I've done before. Didn't feel a bit of kick, and didn't experience much barrel rise either, but in the heat of the moment, I tend not to think of that stuff!

My overall thoughts on this gun is that it is an amazing gun for the price I paid, and probably would be amazing at more than that as well. I had several people asking me about it today and wanting to play with it, but I wouldn't let them because I like being the only guy at the field with a particular gun!

For the price, the ease of maintenance, the looks, the feel of the gun, the board, and the quality - I give it an 8.5 out of 10, but only because I think it's priced too low.

[HelpDeskHustler]

The bft (boost forward technology) is actually really interesting to me, i know this probably isn't possible for anyone here, but a High speed camera of a dm or pm(non r) lpr driven bolt, side by side with the proto bolt would be interesting.

I'm just wondering if the rail seems to make up for its slow start by an exponential speed increase, or if the BFT design is crippled to a lower(no matter how much) cps by the slow start

[vikingshadow]

I think of the Boost Forward Technology like the Level 10 bolt in the mag series of guns. The bolt cycle starts out somewhat slowly, but by the end of it's cycle it's a full force.

The solenoid is capped at 30 bps, and I do know for sure that it's capable of reachinig 26 bps without breaks or chops (with a properly sized barrel) without shootdown - I've seen a video that's floating around that shows that. There's another one where the owner lowered the dwell and shot 30 bps (with a pulse loader and RF chip, eyes off) but had a few blown up balls. I don't think the gun is handicapped at all by the BFT, at least in my opinion, of course!

I would also like to see a BFT bolt compared to a regular bolt video, but alas, my camera is barely digital let alone High Speed! Maybe it would quiet all the people saying the gun just CAN'T be any good without an LPR. Personally, I like the idea of not having to twiddle with an LPR - just one less thing to mess with on a gun.

[HelpDeskHustler]

Originally Posted by vikingshadow

I think of the Boost Forward Technology like the Level 10 bolt in the mag series of guns. The bolt cycle starts out somewhat slowly, but by the end of it's cycle it's a full force.

The solenoid is capped at 30 bps, and I do know for sure that it's capable of reachinig 26 bps without breaks or chops (with a properly sized barrel) without shootdown - I've seen a video that's floating around that shows that. There's another one where the owner lowered the dwell and shot 30 bps (with a pulse loader and RF chip, eyes off) but had a few blown up balls. I don't think the gun is handicapped at all by the BFT, at least in my opinion, of course!

I would also like to see a BFT bolt compared to a regular bolt video, but alas, my camera is barely digital let alone High Speed! Maybe it would quiet all the people saying the gun just CAN'T be any good without an LPR. Personally, I like the idea of not having to twiddle with an LPR - just one less thing to mess with on a gun.

IMO the only real way dye can make the dm8 much smaller than the dm7 (since everyone knows they want to keep souping it every year, earning them some moneys) is by removing something, if this BFT proves to be a way to be gentler on the ball while still being fast, Removing the LPR could be a good move for them to make a super small gun. The rail is probably a great learning experience for them to tweak it, add some things and add some expensive stuff to make a dm8/"dmr"

[vikingshadow]

I agree that if they get all the kinks out of it this year, then you might just see LPR'less guns replacing "outdated" models from this year. The sport is always moving forward!

Wouldn't it be funny if they did that? All the people calling the PMR a entry level gun not worthy of tournaments because of the "lack of an LPR and plastic parts" would have to find a new reason to back up their previous claims that it's not any good!

[DyNasty9]

Originally Posted by vikingshadow

I agree that if they get all the kinks out of it this year, then you might just see LPR'less guns replacing "outdated" models from this year. The sport is always moving forward!

Wouldn't it be funny if they did that? All the people calling the PMR a entry level gun not worthy of tournaments because of the "lack of an LPR and plastic parts" would have to find a new reason to back up their previous claims that it's not any good!

you mentioned exploding paint right? wouldnt that be because there is no LPR. because the LPR basically allows you to adjust how hard or soft your shooting the paint. so hence no LPR, little tuffer on paint.

maybe?

[vikingshadow]

No, I really don't think the LPR (or lack thereof) affects that in this gun at all - remember, it only has 150 psi going through it! Spyders have 850 psi and paint doesn't explode, so I think it's just the paint I was using. Lots of other people use this gun and report no chops or "exploding" paint. And since I switched the paint I was using and went to a larger bore barrel, I've had no issues with it either.

In my opinion, the LPR is a convenient excuse right now for people to cut down the PMR as an "Ion" type gun. With the way the boost forward design works and the way I understand it, the pressure on the paint is barely more than if you had to fine tune an LPR, without the hassle of messing with the LPR.

[HelpDeskHustler]

I just got mine, and so did my friend.. and WOW, just WOW its like 10x better than my Ion, and it shoots pretty well w/ stock barrel and bad paint (not chrono'd). I'll have a better review later when i go play.

[vikingshadow]

See, I wasn't lying! Not bad for any price, if you ask me. I'm actually really liking the UL frame on it now - I didn't realize it until I picked up my Shocker the other day. OMG! Huge difference in comfort and feel....

Edit - Added a couple pictures at the beginning of it with the UL frame on it....

[HelpDeskHustler]

hey, can you run a poll in here maybe? you have one in the UL frame review.

BTW dynasty 9 - the lack of the LPR is compensated by using a slow start on the bolt, and exponentially growing the bolt's speed around halfway through the cycle by introducing air behind the tail of the bolt, which is what they call the "boost forward technology" simply having the HPR too high is probably what caused exploding paint, especially if it was still on the stock setting, out of the box mine was clearly shooting >300fps, and exploding paint, but when i lowered it i got shots that didn't curve and no explosions.