Hand Cannon: The Build Part IV

Part III of this futuristic revolver build was my first attempt to build a shot counter into the laser-gat, here's attempt number 2.

The main change from attempt #1 to #2 was to get an electric pulse counter instead of using a combination of finger counter and solenoid. The rest of the setup is similar - a portable phone charger that powers a roller switch that, when depressed, sends an electric pulse to the counter. Below is a picture of the setup with the counter taped on top of the battery charger.

And here's how it works - I'm pressing the roller switch off camera.

This version of the round counter was much more reliable than the first one. It is also larger, at least the digital readout is. So, I had to figure out how to attach it to the Colt Single Action revolver in a way that was both secure and somewhat tucked into the gun's original shape.

This took much Dremeling, bending, wire tucking, taping etc. Below is an overview of that process.

Step 1: Cut the handguard to fit the battery and counter.

Step 2: Secure the counter setup in place with zip ties.

Step 3: Attach the roller switch inside the handguard resting against the front of the cylinder.

Step 4: Route wires and replace tape connections with heat shrink tubing.

At this point, the revolver and round counter was fully-functional. All that was left to do was permanently secure the wires, replace the front zip tie and then age the whole thing. If you recall from the Initial Design, this build is to be the hero gun in Jonathan Yanez's Infinity System series. In the story, this laser hand cannon is well-used and pieced together by a bandit in a future dystopian world. The rough construction gets at the "pieced together" part, now I need to make it look well used.

Here's a teaser of the aging, which I'll show in full in the final post. This is how I started aging the pen light. Just a bit of sand paper, some aluminum dust, and electrical tape and it looks far from brand new.

Up next: final build post and pics.