Adventure Force Tactical Strike Accelerator Partial Teardown and Overview

Today we’ll be looking at the eagerly anticipated Adventure Force Tactical Strike Accelerator, produced by Prime Time Toys for Wal-Mart.

Last year, Prime Time Toys surprised more than a few folks with their initial entry into the squishy foam orb launcher realm with the Ballistix Ops  Powerball blaster in their Dart Zone branding exclusively at Target. This blaster is also available, in Canadian Wal-Marts. This solid and affordable HIR springer picked up a lot of praise once it made it into players hands. When word appeared that we would soon be seeing another springer and a flywheel blaster for what looked to be a very solid price, some of us got a wee bit excited. Competition is good. Affordable competition is even better.

As of this writing, neither is available online at Wal-Mart and is slowly working its way onto shelves as part of the mid-January toy refresh. Consult your local BrickSeek results for the Accelerator and Titanium to see what’s made it to your area.

The Accelerator retails at 27.88 and includes the following: The blaster itself, a 25 round hopper, a tactical rail mountable sight, and 25 Tactical Strike rounds.

Like the Ballistix Ops Powerball, the Accelerator uses a hopper style ammunition container rather than the stick mag or agitation hoppers used by Rival blasters. Due to their design, the hoppers are removable and can be replaced with any of the other Tactical Strike hoppers or any of the Rival stick magazines. This is easily released by a slide on top of the nose of the blaster. As a result of this system, it is a bit difficult to aim traditionally.  The design compensates for this by providing a tactical rail sight instead of a built-in and by placing the tactical rails on the side at a shallower angle. This allows for aiming with the blaster slightly tilted rather than turned a full 90 degrees.

The is roughly the same size and weight as the Zeus, with the handle about as far on the backside of center as the Zeus’ is in front of it. The plastic is solid and slightly thicker than we were, until recently, accustomed to with second-tier blaster companies. The trigger pull is nice and smooth with a relatively short pull with next to no resistance. What I found most interesting here was the rev trigger. It is mounted as a pivot rather than a perpendicular squeeze with a nice chunky click when the switch is triggered.  The handle is good sized for average adult hands – I found no part of it cumbersome or in the way.

HIR games are ultimately team-oriented, requiring a need to identify players sides. Adventure force chose to tackle this by providing swappable team plates for either side of the blaster. The accelerator is shipped with two plates matching the primary shell color installed. It includes primary Red and Blue that can be swapped out without tools.

The shell has a moderate level of sculpted details, providing good tactile feel where needed but not getting hugely busy. It is even decorated underneath the pop-out plates. That was not expected. The dominant color is the green you’ll know if you own any number of the Adventureforce blaster. The handle and branding plates are molded in a dark grey with the muzzle, triggers, and trigger lock in traditional toy-safety orange.  The hopper is a smoked translucent plastic of slightly lighter plastic with an orange rubberized cap and decorative shield.

Adventure Force green is either an issue or a non-issue.

I found two small issue in the design. The first, no sling mounts. As a likely primary, this probably is minor. The screw and screw port used to secure the battery cover are deep and narrow enough that a typical PC case thumbscrew won’t do the job. A little hunting will be required.

It also suffers from the common issue of all hopper feed systems in the potential for feeder jams. As this can be mitigated with a stick mag or an agitator system and is solved with a little shake, I don’t consider this so much as design flaw as a deliberate decision.

Light Teardown

The construction of the blaster is more robust than any I have taken apart. The wiring is a much heavier gauge than typical, as you can see from these shots of the motor wiring.

Flywheel cage inverted.

Flywheel cage, a smidge closer.

squishy little suckers.

The round feeding “tube” prevents rounds from hitting the flywheels prematurely by having the bottom of the tube slightly overshoot the centerline of the flywheels and also uses a pair of rollers to stop the round from working into the flywheels if the blaster is pointed down. Only with the pusher rod pressure will the round compress enough to squeeze through the rollers and into the flywheels.

cage side of the feeding tube with the pusher in place.

The flywheels are slightly concave and ribbed perpendicularly. This is visible in the above photo if you look closely at the lower flywheel. I wasn’t able to get a clean shot – I’ll attempt to do so on a more complete teardown.

You might notice the clear epoxy over the soldering on the switches. Every bit of wiring in this blaster is tacked down in more than one place to prevent walking and breakage.

A closer look at the jam door and hopper/magazine switches.

Switches are used for the jam door ( closed if the door is closed ) and the feeding tube ( closed if occupied. ) The jam door switch is activated by a mechanical finger on the opposite side of the shell that locks in place with the jam door is secured.

Mechanical locks are used for the safety and to prevent a trigger pull if the flywheel switch is not also engaged.

the white sliding piece prevents a trigger pull

No solvent weld was found taking this blaster apart. It uses a combination of pot and screw assembly and clip-in panels for all of the pieces, making this very easily disassemblable for painting.

the barrel sits nicely on the four screw posts.

And yes, as it has been confirmed elsewhere, it takes the Rival battery pack like a champ.

an easy fit – woohoo.

Modification Potential

The two most obvious modifications for this blaster are performance oriented. The back end design of the Accelerator screams “I should hold an extended length hopper!” Such an addition could use the rails or an alternative battery tray cover for back-end stability and reach a hopper size approaching that of the Nemesis.  The shell internals looks to have space for an automatic pusher, though it’ll take a little bit of cleverness or shell hacking to work around the mechanical trigger pull. It looks to me like you could use the existing mechanicals to activate a switch.

As noted before, the shell comes apart completely, so painting or dying should be about as easy as can be. One could even print full replacement handles or a new barrel and easily swap them in without a need for shell cutting or heavy epoxy work. 

The last option may be more challenging. That is the lack of a shoulder stock or a good place to place one. I am unsure that it is possible to create a stock mount point without shell cutting unless you’re able to be VERY clever and somehow redesign the battery cover and/or the handle to make use of their attachment points for stability.

I also have to wonder if, given the heavy grade of wiring, if a lipo battery tray mod is a sane possibility.

Resulting Opinion

This looks to be a solid entry into the HIR flinging lineup. It isn’t perfect, suffering most from the lack of a stock or stock attachment point and the usual foibles of a hopper based feed system. If you’re just getting started in flywheel HIR or want a less expensive additional blaster, this is for you. That it takes the Rival NiMH rechargeable battery pack is quite the bonus.

Other Reviews

BloNo Nerf

BlasterHub
Lord Draconical
Out of Darts #1
Out of Darts #2
Out of Darts Mod Guide
Vlad the Nerf Neko

more as they go online.