Element piston gaurder piston head NOT IMPRESSED recommendations please

[Genesius]

I fitted an Element full metal toothed piston, Gaurder piston head, Gaurder cylinder head to my ICS upper gearbox today. It skirmished fine for the whole day.

However I came home and was shooting some targets in the garden and it stopped cycling, after opening up the top box, the Element piston had snapped at the end, the gaurder piston head has come off and the screw has bend and the bearings were rattling about in the top.

So I don't know whether the head got stuck or bend and caused the piston to snap, or the piston snapped and caused the gaurder head to break but 1 day out is not on!

So what I want to know is what people opinions are on whats happened and what they should be replaced with?

I can't believe that they just broke like that, and it's no good going to the seller as it may be a one off and I have no way of proving that I'm not a noob whole spent the whole day unloading high caps with my finger held on fully auto!

Just 3 round burst off of my new MOSFET. (love that thing)

Anyway, opinions please.

KTMF

[badger906]

Re: Element piston gaurder piston head NOT IMPRESSED recommendations please

firstly id never use a full metal tooth piston, unless i was going for a crazy powerful gun. the gear box needs a breaking point, and that is usually the piston. if you put everything metal inside it will just move the breaking point to the next weakest part.

did you thread lock the screw into the piston? as the vibration and spinning motion of the head could cause it to come undone. which could have cause the piston to jam backwards and get its teeth ripped off by the gears.

Also check your lower gearboxes bearings, as a worn bearing could cause gear wobble that will cause damage. It did in the gun i built my brother for the weekend so he could run a 11.1v lipo with mosfet.
A bearing collapsed and stripped teeth off all of his gears. wasnt a good mess..

[seansamurai1]

Re: Element piston gaurder piston head NOT IMPRESSED recommendations please

I've had element pistons shatter in the past. I've been using guarder cylinder kit including piston for 3 years and no issue at all. Sounds like you didn't do the screw up tight enough or thread lock it. That's not the components fault.

[Genesius]

Re: Element piston gaurder piston head NOT IMPRESSED recommendations please

Your right I didn't thread lock it but I did tighter the crap out of it. The original ICS piston head isn't thread locked and neither is the one in my friends G&P as we had it out few weeks ago to change it to a deep fire one.

I've never used thread lock on cars or anything else with moving parts or vibrations as it has never been needed as screws bed in an (usually in this case) stay well in place.

Maybe I should get some, but I still maintain that screws don't need them. In fact even when I have installed metal parts like heavy use flooring I have never used it.

I just think I was unlucky with one of the parts.

The teeth didn't strip at all, in fact it looks brand new because it it. I will use metal teeth in future but I do understand what your saying about the weakest part failing, better it the piston than anything else.n however the entire lower gearbox is metal on metal and as soon as there is even the slightest issue I stop and strip it down.

I just went for metal for there wear factor, I have now put the original ics bits back in and the gun spfunctions, it's just annoying thats all.

I will get thread lock and use it in the aeg in future, but can anyone recommend a good fpmetal toothed piston and a head? Or should I try element and guarded again?

[Darkmikey22]

Re: Element piston gaurder piston head NOT IMPRESSED recommendations please

ive never used thread lock either, never had an issue. but you say you tightend the crap out of it, could you have tightend it too much and weakend the thread in the head and enough so that the bearings couldnt turn so when it came under stress it stripped the thread and the head came off?

[Genesius]

Re: Element piston gaurder piston head NOT IMPRESSED recommendations please

Possibly, but the screw and thread are fine. I push the bearings back in and other than the head of the screw being at an angle now as it bent at the very top, it still screws in and holds.

It looks like the front of the piston snapped off and then on the first pull on the trigger the rest of the piston smashed into the head and bent it.

It may well have just been a faulty piston and I am in no way bad mouthing element or guarder, I just wanted opinions really.

I think I'll get another guarder head and a cheap fully plastic piston until I send the gun away to be shimmed and aoe adjusted. On that note can anyone one recommend someone or somewhere that can do that for me on an ICS. I had some pistols repaired by one place but they don't stock ics so I'm unsure on how well they can work on that manufacturer, or does it not really matter?

[Darkmikey22]

Re: Element piston gaurder piston head NOT IMPRESSED recommendations please

you can send them off to most well know shops and you know they would be done right. ok may cost u a bit in shipping and labour but u can always garentee the work.

[seansamurai1]

Re: Element piston gaurder piston head NOT IMPRESSED recommendations please

The problem with these is you cant tighten the crap out of them, the plastic bit that the screw goes through that the bearing sits on (inside the piston at the head end) splits, Thats where the lock tight comes in.
Oh and by the way Im a heavy diesel fitter and Marine Engineer by trade and I use lock tight on a lot of things, but then again the last thing I want is a small bolt going through a multimillion pound gas turbine and causing it to throw blades through the case when it could have been locktighted in place (the ones that arent wire locked anyway).

[Genesius]

Re: Element piston gaurder piston head NOT IMPRESSED recommendations please

Yeah no one wants a multimillion £ bill! I have just never used it.

The piston didn't snap where the screw goes through. If you look at a piston side on then imagine coming back from the piston head 4mm then a 45 degree angle backwards. If the screw had been fitted too tight I would have expected it to stress the piston around the screw and cause a fracture from there but it didn't.
As I mentioned we replaced the piston in my friends gun a while ago and his went like that in sort of the same place and angle but that was through old age and the gun being stored for years without use.
Even if the bearings couldn't rotate then it would have acted like a normal piston that doesn't have bearings.
The face of the piston is perfect and so are all the teeth, there's just a 45 degrees fracture and now it's in 2 bits. The break is so clean that I have pushed it back together and you can barely see the crack (don't worry I'm not going to use it)

Maybe it could be the aoe being wrong and the lower gearbox shoving the teeth so far one way that they caused the piston to snap?

Either way it's not good, but I will use the original one until I send if off to spbe shimmed and the angle set, then I will go all metal.

[Genesius]

Re: Element piston gaurder piston head NOT IMPRESSED recommendations please

Cant I buy piston head screws anywhere?