SpudFiles

This is the first mini I have ever built. It is kind of ghetto, seeing as how it cost me nothing to build. Also, it was built and tested in about an hour.

The chamber is made from a 12 oz Gatorade bottle. The barrel, butane injection, and piezo came from a grill lighter. The black stuff is electrical tape.

I tested it with toothpick ammo and was actually impressed by the power of this little thing. I still need to work on the proper injection to get the maximum effectiveness out of it. So far, it has been tested with 4 second, 5 second, and 6 second bursts of butane.

Edit: I forgot to mention. I am looking to upgrade this to make an "advanced combustion" mini, just to see if it can be done. I plan installing a spark strip. The spark strip is constructed but I did not install it because it would only fire once out of every 5 or 6 tries. I also want to add some type of fuel / air mixing devcice. A mini fan would be cool but I haven't seen a brushless fan that would fit in this. I may go with a chain to mix the fuel better. I'll post the upgrades when they are added.

Nice! How big is the flash when it is ignited? I was gonna build a clear mini soon. Also, does the butane light reliably?

The butane has not misfired once, however, I have noticed significant difference in the power at different injection times. That's why I need to find the sweet spot with this mini.

As far as the flash, that was the reason I chose the clear bottle. It was tested at night (which was sweet!). Inside the chamber, the flame was a deep blue with a hint of some white. It would flash about the same length as the barrel. My 2 year old son really got a kick out of it too.

Hubb, you have a nice mini there, maybe a longer barrel could help but you did a sweet job- i'm glad to hear your son likes it!!

Ooh a George Foreman grill (halleluja chorus)

Why do people go through so much trouble with minis what will eventually fall apart/be stepped on? You could just spend more time shooting it, cuz mixing the fuel in a chamber so small won't do much. I'm not saying I don't like it, its better than mine (but my paper mache mini is still my favorite) but maybe you could invest mini time in something more timely...

screw it, I'm going to bed

Okay. This mini was built because I had an itch to shoot small projectiles at (cats?) stuff. It wasn't like I put two months and several dollars into it.

Screw it, I think I'll go to bed too (after I grill a steak).

@Nova: The barrel come from the long nose lighter. I thought about upgrading this little beast but I decided last night to go ahead and begin construction on an advanced combustion.