airsoft gun

6 Articles

Building A Smart Airsoft Gun With Open Source Hardware

July 10, 2017 by 10 Comments

[matt8588] designed a smartgun rig for his Airsoft shotgun (YouTube, embedded below). He has a Rasperry Pi 3 mounted inside a PEQ box connected to an infrared camera with an IR tac light helping with illumination. A series of buttons control a crosshair pattern superimposed on the camera image, which is displayed on a tablet. You can also reposition the crosshairs to shoot further away. One of the buttons triggers a signal on the transmitter, for setting off Airsoft claymores during battle. A second Pi, a Zero, connects to an BerryIMU sensor that controls a “traffic light” arrangement of 12mm LEDs that warn him when he’s moving the gun too much to be accurate.

If you want to check out [Matt’s] progress, he’s posted videos of him showing off the gun’s accuracy, including one after the break in which he shoots accurately from a standing position while looking down at the tablet. You can find code for both Pi’s on his GitHub repository.

We suppose it goes without saying that Hackaday has a plethora of Airsoft projects. We especially love the Airsoft sentry gun, the rover-mounted Airsoft gun, and the drone-mounted POV Airsoft turret we published.

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Open-Source Laser Shooting Simulator

November 20, 2014 by 43 Comments

Looking to practice your marksmanship skills at home? Check out the homeLESS (Home LasEr Shooting Simulator), an open-source tool for marksmanship practice. [Laabicz] developed this system as a cheaper alternative to commercial laser shooting simulators, which are just as simple but very expensive.

[Laabicz]’s simulator primarily uses modified airsoft pistols that are fitted with batteries (installed in the magazine) and a laser in the chamber. Any gun can be used with the system as long as you can figure out how to attach a laser and trigger switch. To power the laser, a small capacitor is charged from batteries when the trigger switch is off. Once the trigger is pressed, the capacitor discharges through the laser and makes a short pulse of light.

The simulator is written in Processing and requires a projector and a webcam. The Processing sketch projects configurable moving targets on a screen or wall, and the webcam detects when a laser is triggered over any of the targets. The software supports multiple target types (including moving targets) and is quite configurable. Check out the video after the break to see the system in use.

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The Counter-Strike Airsoft Robot

August 24, 2014 by 10 Comments

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[Jon] and his brother converted an RC car into a robot that can fire airsoft pellets into the air. The little motorized vehicle was disassembled and a handheld was attached to the top. A pulling mechanism was put in place and a safety procedure was added to make sure no accidents occurred.

The chassis stand was created to hold the handle. The setup was then tested at this point, and a Raspberry Pi server was configured to have a camera that would act as the eyes for the robot. Once everything was in place, the wheels hit the ground and the vehicle was able to move around, positioning itself to aim the servos at a designated target. Footage was transmitted via the web showing what the robot was looking at.

A video of the remote-controlled counter-strike robot can be seen after the break. You could consider this your toy army. That makes this one your toy air force.

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POV Airsoft Turret On A RC Plane

October 16, 2013 by 28 Comments

To be honest, we’re surprised this hasn’t been tried before — then again, maybe it has! But what we do know is that the folks over at Flite Test have rigged up an electric Airsoft gun to a large RC airplane, aptly called The Kracken.

The planes are a scaled up version of their own FT Versa Wing, which feature two props, giving them the ability of differential thrust. Not only were they able to strap a semi-automatic Airsoft pistol on top, they also have two GoPros filming the action and giving the gunner a POV for shooting down the enemy plane! Don’t worry though, the enemy plane features its own weapon — A permanent marker! This hardly seems fair though, as the closer the marker gets, the easier shooting down the plane will be!

Don’t take our word for it though, check out the awesome video for yourself, after the break.

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Airsoft Turret 2.0

January 14, 2007 by 15 Comments


[Jared] posted the latest version of his remote control airsoft gun. The new one allows USB and R/C control. It’s got four seperate firing mechanisms, a laser and uses a pair of servos for motion… and lots of ammo. Whatever you do, don’t make fun of [Jared]. They’ll have video up on the site after a couple of days to save bandwidth.

(Just a note: embed youtube or netscape videos and you’ll have video and save your bandwidth.)

Crazy Holidays Extra

November 27, 2006 by 8 Comments


After sushi-thanksgiving at my house, I’m beat – but you guys have been busy on the tips line.

In one of those special moments of vengance, the ‘real’ ps3 grill was created. (It’s been built, don’t be fooled by the fund raising graphic they were too lazy to remove.)

In another moment of consumer electronics death, a 25mw 405nm laser was obtained from a blu-ray DVD burner and turned into the closest thing to a light saber I’ve seen.

[James Coxon] sent in his autonomous RC car project (link dead, try Internet Archive). I found his Pegasus high altitude balloon project even more interesting.

If you haven’t already heard about it, if you can hack this ps3, you’ll actually get to own it. Thanks [good4me] and [wierdguy].

[Chris_rybitski] sent in his music syncro’d christmas light control – he runs the AC audio into diode rectifier to drive a SSR.

If you really hate squirells, [Alexiy] thinkgs you might find a remote controlled airsoft gun handy.

Don’t forget to check out the Hack-A-Day Design Challenge. I already announced the iPod, the MAKE controller and Daisy MP3 player kit, but look for another prize announcement soon.

Let the holiday geekery continue!