There are a lot of cool paintball guns out there.  One of them happens to be a MiniMag (AutoMag) pump.  The AutoMag Pump Kit was produced and sold in 1994.  A bunch of the AGD main-bodies and rails being sold at the time came pre-milled for a pump kit, although the kit was sold completely separately.  I don't know if anyone has actually figured out the marketing strategy that AGD was going for, but it certainly made for a super-sweet addition!  This pump kit kind of has 'function through disfunction' as a friend of mine once put it.  I'll try to explain.

Automags are a 'blow-forward' open-bolt paintball marker.  At rest, the bolt sits in the rear position and the chamber is open, allowing a paintball to rest in there.  On most other semi-auto markers, like Spyders, Infernos, VM68s, etc. the mechanism is 'blow-back.'  It goes like this:

Blow-back:  Pull trigger; Hammer is pushed forward by spring; Hammer strikes valve releasing air into the bolt and firing paintball; At the same time, pressure from the valve also pushes the hammer back; So-much-so that the hammer re-catches on the trigger sear, waiting for you to pull it again.  The air actually blows the hammer 'back' against the force of the main spring.
Blow-forward:  Pull trigger; Air is released and pushes bolt forward (against spring pressure, versus being pushed 'by' the spring); At its forwardmost point of travel, air is released through the bolt to fire the paintball; The spring is compressed at this point, and pushes the bolt backward, resetting it on the sear, since the air pressure has been exhausted for that cycle.

Here's an animated diagram to show you how the AutoMag A.I.R. valve itself works.  Pictures speak louder (and often clearer) than words:

source: http://www.zdspb.com/tech/misc/animations.html

See the difference?  Blow-back is pushed forward by the spring, and then back by the air.  Blow-forward is pushed forward by air, and then back by the spring.  In the AutoMag, there is a blue washer, or bumper, that rests just behind the bolt, and cushions it against the valve body so that it doesn't do damage.  The Pump Kit included a smaller bumper and 'wave spring' which made a bigger gap in-between the bolt and valve body.  This gap prevents the bolt from re-catching on the sear.  So, you need to manually use the pump arm to push the bolt backward a little harder and re-catch on the sear.  So you see, instead of actually working like a conventional pump marker, where there is no force driving the bolt backward, this setup merely causes the bolt to move back 'near' the point of re-catching on the sear, and you finish it on your own.  The setup is a little funky, but man it makes for a simple pump and really easy pump stroke!  Here I'll relay the steps for setting a Pump Kit up on your AGD AutoMag.

Step 1: Acquire Pump Kit.  This can be much harder than it seems.  These kits are extremely rare, especially in complete condition.  They can fetch upwards of $250 on eBay!  A complete kit includes: Pump, pump rod, attachment rod (with mini o-ring), pump spring, ASA mounting adapter (2-pieces with 2 different screws and a threaded nut), wave spring, and the elusive 'black bumper.'

Step 2: Get an AGD Spacer kit.  These kits help adjust the depth and position of the bolt to ensure that it seals correctly against that o-ring under the spacer (since it will be pushed forward by the wave spring).

Step 3: Insert the o-ring, then the spacer, then re-cap it with the brass slotted-piece (order shown in the picture above).  The picture below shows how inside of the bolt (R) has a stem which reaches down into the valve (L).  You should be able to put the wave spring on, and test the seal by hand.  If your MiniMag leaks down the barrel when you air it up (with the pump kit on), then this is likely the problem.  Try a different spacer.  A leak down the barrel usually indicates you need a smaller spacer, which allows the bolt to push in and seal further.  If the bolt doesn't move forward when you activate the trigger, then you might need a larger spacer, so that the air can flow freely through the bolt area.

Step 4: Attach the pump and rod to the rail, ready the valve for installation.  The pump kit manual should have detailed instructions on how to install the pump and rod, depending on if you use a vertical ASA or a back-bottle.  As for the valve, you must use a stock AutoMag 68 or MiniMag 68 valve.  This kit will not work with Lvl 10 or with the ULT trigger kit.  Since these kits attempt to prevent chopped balls through lower pressure on the bolt, and also soften the trigger pull, you will have to make-do with the older valve.  However, if you use HPA, you shouldn't have a problem breaking paintballs.  I have had horrible luck trying CO2, so my biggest advice for using these valves is to use HPA!

Here's another closeup picture of the wave spring installed:

Step 5: Install the sear assembly and valve onto the rail:

Step 6: Ensure the pump and rod work correctly!  When in the forward position, the rod should lay low in the rail:

When pumping, the rod should push up out of the channel and the tip should push against the edge of the bolt, like so:

Here's one more closeup of the rod pushing the bolt back as well as the sear catching (look in-close between the bolt and body, and you'll see the sear engaged:

That's it!  Your pump kit is installed, now it's time to go to the chronograph range and test and tune it.  You'll find the Mag pump kit to be unlike any other kit out there!  The pump stroke is a breeze, and the only action you accomplish is in the last 1/16" of the pump stroke, resetting the sear.  It's a pretty unique system, as Mags were designed as a semi-automatic from the beginning (versus the AutoCocker, which started out as a Sniper pump and was later automated).  Using HPA and a Dye Ultralite barrel, I find my MiniMag pump to be incredibly accurate.  One shot, one elimination is its hallmark!  I'd like to show some videos of this pump functioning.  The first video is of the pumping sequence.  Pay close attention to the sear (little silver thing just behind the trigger) and how it resets at the very end of the pump stroke:

Check the videos section for the OTHER VIDEO, of me actually firing it.  It works very well and you can achieve pretty quick firing speeds.  It's still a pump, and a challenging way to play, but it's a heck of a lot of fun!

In this How-To, I'll show you how to repair a 'blown solenoid.'  This term refers to -a loud 'pop' followed by a rush of air from the gripframe- heard in some electronic markers when the solenoid malfunctions.  This happened to me recently, and I was unsure of how to fix it at first.  I used some of my favorite Internet forums, posted questions, and used the responses to diagnose and then fix the problem.  If you have an electronic marker with one of these solenoids inside, and it doesn't work, you may be able to fix yours as well.
Often times, a solenoid that vents air is not really broken, or 'blown out,' it just needs some TLC!  Usually, an o-ring inside the solenoid has slipped out of place.  The solenoid I'm showing here is the Humphrey H040-4E1-49W.  These solenoids were specifically contracted by the paintball companies (in this case AKALMP, or AKA) to perform differently than the stock models.  These solenoids cycle at 30, 40, or more cycles per second (cps), whereas a stock H040 solenoid from Humphrey will only cycle at 5 cps.  The cause of failure in my solenoid was a slip of one of the o-rings on the main shaft.  A solenoid is an electromagnetic transducer that converts electrical energy into linear motion.  In simple terms, it allows electricity to physically move something, in this case a shaft sealing an air valve.  It releases a specific amount of air each cycle, allowing the paintball marker to fire.  Follow along as I describe the repair process:

Step 1: Disassemble the marker.  This AKA Viking has the gripframe removed and the electrical leads removed (the solenoid is the green/black wire, the eyes are the red/white and black/white wires).  The leads normally connect to the electronic board that controls the marker.  You'll notice that there are three small screws holding the solenoid in place.  The one on the upper part (clamping the silver part down) holds the solenoid to the body, although it does not go 'through' the body of the solenoid.  The other two screws (lower part) go through the solenoid casing and hold the external o-rings sealed against the inside of the body.  When air flows through the solenoid, it passes through these o-rings into the marker itself, preventing leaks into the frame:

Step 2: Remove the solenoid from the marker body:  This is the underside of the solenoid.  You will notice 2 o-rings at the top of the casing, and the 2 large holes next to them (where the screws went in picture 1).  There is a 3rd o-ring located in the middle of the silver part.  The electrical leads run off the left-hand side:

Step 3: Remove the head of the solenoid.  Using a small Philips-head screwdriver, remove the plastic casing over the head of the solenoid  You will now see the head of the shaft exposed.  Also, be sure that the miniature o-ring under the cap is in -place (shown in (R) picture, on left side of the open cap):

Step 4: Remove the silver piece from around the shaft.  This is just a simple covering to make sure the shaft guide o-ring doesn't pop out:

Step 5: Finally, using a small dental pic or knife-edge remove the black o-ring from around the shaft, being extremely cautious not to cut it!  Carefully remove the shaft itself with a needle-nose pliers.  You will see a series of o-rings.  In the picture, note how there is an extra little metal 'channel' that doesn't have anything in it.  This is where the o-ring should be!  The red arrow shows where the o-ring was removed from, and the green arrow shows where I moved it to.  That's it!  Re-assemble everything in reverse order, and re-connect your electrical wires:

When I tested the marker I left the grip frame off so that I could see if the solenoid held air.  This is possible because the Viking holds the solenoid in the upper part of the marker body, without any connecting hoses to the gripframe.  However, this would be considerably more challenging (and probably more dangerous) to do with something like an Intimidator marker.  Please do not try this if you don't know what you are doing.  All in all, it worked the first time I put it back together.  It's amazing that high pressure air can move an o-ring and pop it over the shaft channels like that!  It goes to show you how powerful high pressure air is.  I wish you luck if you need to perform this repair, hopefully this sheds some light on the subject!

Yesterday (2 Jan 07), I played all day at Hollywood Sports Park in Bellflower, CA (East Los Angeles, essentially) with my Q-Hurc.  I've owned this Hurricane since Feb '06 and have played ~3-4 times, including Oklahoma D-Day 2006.  Besides the initial trial/error of getting the Hurc working upon delivery (which I wasn't too happy about), it's been an awesome performer!  My newest venture was to attach a Q-Loader to the Hurc, instead of using a conventional hopper.  The idea came from PoisonPill's Hurricane, and I really liked the low-profile and more sinister look that it provided (http://asdf.gs/gallery2/Jeff/album04/album07/album27/)

caption: 

For starters, I tried out the setup at home without air.  I set up the hose connections and elbows and Custom-Mounting System (CMS) <-- this is essential for a Hurc as the standard mounting bracket will NOT be sufficient.  If you want to know more about that I'll send you pictures.  Then I loaded some Q-pods and attempted to install and them remove a pod in both fully-loaded and empty form.  I did this multiple times to ensure I didn't break paintballs.  I did break one once and the following sentences will explain that there are two things that I found to be of crucial importance with the setup:  First, you need to ensure that you pre-load balls into the feed hose, as if you plug in a fresh Q-pod with nothing in the feed hose, the balls will rush out at ~50bps-rate and smash into the feedneck, causing a big messy pile of goo (I didn't actually do this, as I was pre-warned by several users).  And second, you absolutely must measure the feed hose length and ensure that when paintballs are stacked in there, they come completely to the end of the tube.  I even have them pushing out ever-so slightly into the Q-pod feed area.  The reason for this is that when you attach a Q-pod and pressure is applied to the balls in the feed hose, you need to ensure that they are not caught halfway in-between the Q-pod and feed hose, because when you remove a Q-pod, you will crack the paintball in half if this is not the case.  For a better explanation, watch the "Adjust" video on the Q-loader website (http://www.qloader.com/supportmovies.html).

Then it was time to play on the field.  Hollywood Sports Park has a shooting/chrono range and 4 main rec-fields, as well as 2-3 airball fields.  I generally stay away from the airball fields as the only people that seem to hang out there are the 12-yr olds with ghee-wiz super-blaster electros that spit 'agg-sauce' terminology and sport pink Empire hoppers with "Gucci" stickers on them.  The scenario fields are set up with movie-prop quality sets (Hollywood's in the field name...), and have several themes (Mad Max [set up looking like the town in "Beyond Thunderdome"], Forbidden City [looks like sunken Atlantis with pillars, hills, tunnels, etc.], Apocalypse [city with rubble, crumbling walls, broken down buses, and even a fake F-16 fighter jet on the field!], and finally Lunar Wars [looks like the base in Starship Troopers with landing craft and all].  I stepped up to the chrono range and had another 'bad-luck' experience similar to the ones I had been having all day with my other markers I brought to the field.  It had nothing to do with the Q-loader though...  As I was getting ready to chrono the Hurc, I was attaching my remote line, checking the safety, and loading a Q-pod.  Somehow I managed to swipe my hand from the feedneck to the tip of the barrel, snagged the ball detent and wire and sent them flying off of the Hurc.  Now, any one who has experienced this before has surely been pissed off and called PPS right away to get 2-3 replacement detents to alleviate this situation.  However, I didn't have any more, and thus was stuck scraping the ground looking for it.  However, at the chrono range the ground is covered in grass and paintballs.  I thought to myself:  "well, I'll just look for the little white BB real carefully, and find it here somewhere..."  Lo and behold I forgot that Hollywood Sports Park also hosts regular Airsoft days on the same range/fields, and there were little white 6 mm airsoft BBs EVERYWHERE!  I was distraught and searched for ~10 minutes and was about to give up.  Somehow, someway, I glanced to my right and found it on the little patch of concrete that occupies the shooting range.  Needless to say I was relieved and the rest of the day went great.  On to the review!:

At the chrono range the Q-loader worked flawlessy, my prep time and adjustment at home was well worth the effort.  I loaded up the remote line for air and clicked a Q-pod in place and emptied a full one to be sure that I liked its function.  Satisfied that it worked well I reloaded the pod and headed to the field.  One thing I noticed initially was that it is hard to tell when the Q-pod is empty (especially since the balls I used were black/orange in color, black is hardly visible in these smoke-colored pods!  We went out to play Lunar Wars for my first trial of this loader.  "Game On" and we began!  I chose a stationary position toward the rear of the field and proceeded to take long-range shots.  The Q-loader is nicely positioned and makes for a really tight profile.  No more hopper in the way!  It is also very well balanced on this marker.  I went through my first 100 paintballs and had to glance pretty hard at the feedtube to see if I was out.  Upon inspection I had 2 or 3 left and decided to keep shooting to see what happened.  After a couple more shots, the Hurc fired blanks (loud pops of air) and I knew I was out.  It actually fired 2 more which were balls stacked in the right-hand feed of my Hurc, so the feed hose wasn't completely full (As I mentioned earlier).  However, when I loaded a new pod, nothing bad happened.  I'm sure if the feedtube was empty, I would have had problems, but since only 2 were missing, it just loaded smoothly.  This is akin to shooting the Hurc normally, as every time you fire/load a ball, there is technically a 1-ball deficit until the Q-pod pushes the balls into place.  Since this was essentially a 2-3 ball deficit, the spring didn't accelerate all the balls to max speed and smash them.  I was really pleased that this worked out well, as now I know that I don't have to spend time during the game constantly counting paintball as I near the end of a pod.  One thing I didn't like was that the Q-pod wouldn't push out the last ~2 balls from the pod.  I didn't know why this happened but it is explained in the next paragraph:

There is one addition to the loading process that PoisonPill taught me.  He said that I should pre-wind each tube with the loading crank about 1-2 rotations BEFORE loading paintballs.  This will help ensure all the balls feed out of the tube.  The Q-loader manual says that each spring should have 12-16 "pre-winds" before loading paintballs.  This means that the spring is already tensed before you load it.  However, when the pod is empty, nothing rotates, and the only spring tension you have is what is pre-loaded.  You can put your finger in the head of the pod and feel that there isn't a great deal of spring pressure on the stack at rest (which is where the last 2-3 paintballs will get stuck).  By putting 1-2 rotational cranks in the pod BEFORE loading paintballs, you give the spring a little more tension to actually push those last few paintballs out.  I'll use this technique next time, as I didn't know how to alleviate this problem until he told me.

As for game #1, I played for about 6-7 minutes and shot approx. 120 rounds.  I made 1 or 2 eliminations, but again, I was more concerned that the Q-loader was working well.  I played one more game before going home, on Apocalypse, the burned-out city.  This is my favorite field, and I knew a few of the good places to play (the outskirts of the left and right hand sides).  It was getting dark, so the center of the field would be very challenging, and we weren't allowed to go into any enclosed structure (safety).  Upon game-start, I went to the left hand side and posted up behind a busted-up Chevy panel van.  There were 2 opponents behind a small sedan, and three more against the corner of a building to my 1-2 o'clock position.  I lit up my Adco E-dot 30mm site and proceeded to take aim.  Some of my well-placed shots eliminated both individuals at the sedan, and 2 of the 3 at the building.  At this point, I was 10 minutes into the 20-minute game.  Some of my teammates kept up the fight on the left-hand side and I ran around the back of the field to find a friend of mine who was on the right side.  I couldn't find him so I came back to the left side of the field and proceeded to eliminate another guy farther back behind the sedan.  At this point it was Jason-5, enemies-0.  Not for long though.  When I took a peek through the van windows, a pump-player hit me square in the face mask.  A great shot!  He took me out and I headed back to the chrono range to empty the Q-pod for fun.  At this point, I had shot close to 160 rounds in the 2nd game, having reloaded once.  The Q-pods take a little more thought to reload as I've never used a system like this before, and you need to line up the keyed part of the pod with the mounting socket in order to insert it.  Also, I needed to keep good track of the pods, as they are expensive, and not like normal pods!  You can't just toss them off to the side and expect to get them after, you need to keep them in your harness even when empty.  I spoke with another Q-loader user on the field, and he said that in dusty, desert environments, his Q-pods have jammed up in the mounting socket.  A word to the wise: keep these things clean and free of any dirt/debris!

All in all, I had a superb day with the Q-loader on my Hurricane.  There are certain advantages and disadvantages to this system, but overall, I will be using it on my Hurc for a long time to come!  I hope this review helped to give you all some insight to this innovative loader system and its application on our beloved Hurricane.  If you're interested in doing this, you can feel free to PM me and I'll be happy to answer any questions.  For now, here's a quick pros and cons list.  Again, in my opinion, the pros certainly outweight the cons, you just need to ensure that you get everything set up correctly before attempting to use it:

Pros:

-Low-profile, REALLY NICE to have, since you're already 'fat' in the length direction.  This helps keep you less visible to incoming paint.

-Force fed, assured feeding!

-Light-weight and well-balanced.  My Hurc balance very nicely on my sling now, as it was awkward with a Halo or Revvy on top.

-Relatively low cost (I got a used 5-pod system with the CMS for $125 including shipping)

-Looks AWESOME!

Cons:

-Takes some technical attention to detail to install/setup correctly

-Requires more care with pods

-A little more difficult to get used to

-Not as simplistic as a hopper, you need to be more cognizant of the number of balls left in the pod (as well as the fact that these only hold 100 balls!)

Many people have asked about questions about how to perform the mythical 'suction timing' that you can achieve with Autocockers. This article is an attempt to explain how I got my 99STO to perform in 'suction,' and will be the first of a few articles to share some knowledge, in my How-To series.

1) Definition
Suction Timing: The state of a paintgun where the action of firing results in a slight inward 'suction' of air. This occurs when the bolt moves backward while the air/paintball travelling down the barrel has not completely exited. The goal is to try and pull the next paintball into the chamber faster.

2) Process
The ultimate goal is to get the firing sequence and recocking sequence of the Autococker extremely close together. I find it is easily accomplished with a Hinge Frame

1. Step 1 is to time your autococker properly, you can find instructions on that all over the 'net.'
2. Step 2 is where you bring the automation sequences closer together. It's a fine-tuning process by which you:
   1. shorten your trigger pull with the internal stop on a hinge frame
   2. back out the hammer lug until the sear releases at the very beginning of your trigger pull
   3. adjust the 3-way until it performs the recocking action directly after the previous step.

3) Results
With suction timing, the most visible indicator that you have done it correctly is by firing a few shots with a piece of tissue or kleenex over the feed port and see that it is rapidly drawn into the feed port. The merits of this method are probably more myth than magic, as I don't think anyone will really see many benefits.  The only tangible benefit I can think of is experiencing less chopped paintballs and having fewer 'short-strokes' (where you don't pull the trigger enough, the autococker doesn't complete the firing cycle, and chopped paintballs result).  However, it is neat to perform and it seriously shortens your trigger pull for a nice short, quick action. For a video, click the following link. It is me shooting 3 shots on my STO, and as you can see the tissue is drawn into the feed port pretty well. It does not require any pressure of the tissue, simply the pressure difference that pulls it in. Enjoy!