[PoFF]

Well, ad many may know, I've had for years a big piston stripping problem on my M249, mainly due to the fact that I'm pushing the machine too hard for high-ROF.

My first config was HighSpeed Motor, Highspeed Gears and 12 volts battery, on stock spring, result, 5 stripped pistons.

After that, I switched to a high power spring (PDI150% IIRC), 4 stripped pistons.

After that I tamed down the battery to 9.6Volts, result, 3 stripped pistons.

After that, I totally rebuilt the gearbox with a Super Torque-Up motor (RPM slightly lower than HighSpeed), Hi-Speed gears, same PDI150% spring and a Prometheus piston which, I was told, was supposidely unstrippable. All that ran by a 9.6V battery. Result... yeah, you guessed it, a stripped Prometheus piston. But at least, the gun worked for a while before sending the piston to hell.

Now the big dillema, what do I do to to reduce the ROF to a sane level...

First step, stronger spring. Higher force required should slow down the mechanism along with increasing the piston return speed. Would that be enough...

If not, i guess the second step would be to switch to regular ratio gears, or to make the battery 8.4V, what would be the best bet, that I don't know, hence my question...

Any comments will be appreciated.