Warren | February 14, 2012
Our friend Datamancer is at it again! This new endeavour looks fantastic. I for one can’t wait until it’s complete!
For those of you in need of a new keyboard, he’s also currently offering 20% off his Aviator keyboard, a particular favourite of mine!
Datamancer | September 3, 2011
If you happen to be at DragonCon this weekend in Atlanta, be sure to stop by Brute Force Studio’s booths, 309-311 and see one of my “Sojourner” model keyboards on display. This is the same model keyboard as the one that appears in SyFy Channel’s Warehouse13 show.
-~Doc~-
Datamancer | May 22, 2011
I took the Mosin Scout and the 10-round Mosin mag out to the range today and beat on them a little bit. Aside from the inevitable “sticky bolt syndrome” after about 75 rounds, the rifle and mag performed very well. Here’s a short video of me firing 10 rounds through the mag (maybe the first time in 70 years that someone has fired a 6th round from a Mosin!).
If you are just discovering this post randomly, this is a 10-round mosin mag that I invented, patented, and hope to bring to market in the coming year. Please feel free to join the mailing list for this product at www.Datamancer.net/mosinmags/and I will post updates as they occur.
-~D~-
Datamancer | April 28, 2011
Well, I couldn’t leave well enough alone so I started building a bipod for my mosin scout. This one is a little different because it folds completely away into the stock when not in use. It is also completely integrated into the stock and doesn’t touch the barrel at all, so everything is still free-floated. I had to dust off my old auto-body shop skills for this one and do a lot of welding, sanding, and bondo-work, but I think it was worth it. For the sake of simplicity and shared parts, I made the sling swivel stud double as the retainer mechanism for the bipod. You just spin the quick-connect clip sideways, spin the retainer latch 90 degrees, and the bipod pops out a little bit so you can grab it, swing it down, and lock it into the upright position.
Click “READ MORE” for more pics
Well, I think I can finally say that I’m basically done with this rifle mod. I still need to Duracoat the entire thing, but that’s a minor mod that I probably won’t even bother posting it. Now to focus on my “Mosunov” rifle!
-~D~-
Datamancer | April 28, 2011
Well, I couldn’t leave well enough alone so I started building a bipod for my mosin scout. This one is a little different because it folds completely away into the stock when not in use. It is also completely integrated into the stock and doesn’t touch the barrel at all, so everything is still free-floated. I had to dust off my old auto-body shop skills for this one and do a lot of welding, sanding, and bondo-work, but I think it was worth it. For the sake of simplicity and shared parts, I made the sling swivel stud double as the retainer mechanism for the bipod. You just spin the quick-connect clip sideways, spin the retainer latch 90 degrees, and the bipod pops out a little bit so you can grab it, swing it down, and lock it into the upright position.
Click “READ MORE” for more pics
Well, I think I can finally say that I’m basically done with this rifle mod. I still need to Duracoat the entire thing, but that’s a minor mod that I probably won’t even bother posting it. Now to focus on my “Mosunov” rifle!
-~D~-
Datamancer | March 15, 2011
I finally got around to taking some pics of the Mosunov with the 8x POSP scope on it. I bought a POSP SVD-style side mount that was made for the Mosin, drilled and tapped the receiver and mounted it to the M39 action (I had to fight a little twinge of guilt while making that first hole in the Finn receiver, but hopefully this will be a little better than your average “Bubba” hackjob rifle).
The scope sits WAAAAY off to the left in this configuration, which is actually perfect for me because I’m right-handed, yet left-eye-dominant, but I’m confused as to how your average right-right shooter is supposed to use the scope in this configuration.
*shrug*
It works for me though so I guess that’s all that matters here.
-~D~-
Datamancer | November 17, 2010
I’ve always loved the styling of the Dragunov and PSL-54C rifles, So I thought it would be a fun project to integrate some of those styling details into a custom rifle stock for the Mosin-Nagant. I’ll be calling this rifle my “Mosunov”. I had the M44 stock left over from my previous Scout Mod, so I hacked off the original stock butt and grafted a Romanian PSL stock onto the back. I have also started collecting materials to build myself a “copy carver”, which will let me directly copy an existing rifle design and cut it into a laminate rifle stock blank. Originally, I was just going to whip this stock together quickly and sloppily to merely act as the master shape to be traced by the copy-carver, but once I stated building it, I figured I might as well put in the extra effort to make it a usable stock so I can play with it in the meantime and test out the design. The butt stock joint is seam-notched and triple-pinned with dowels, then all glued together with Mighty Putty (I really can’t say enough about that stuff…it’s like Bondo that dries into steel!).
Here’s where I’m at so far…
Looks awesome with my 10 round extension mag (after which I can now proudly blurt, “Patent Pending!”).
And now for the ugly pic of what’s underneath that paint…
I decided to try and fix the one major flaw of the PSL Dragunov stock which is that it’s just too damned short. I added 2 stacked slices of 3/4″ oak plank to the back of the stock which makes it a much more comfortable length, but still allows a decent cheek weld on the integrated cheek rest. I also carved a thumb groove on one side of the handle, and a trigger finger groove on the other to make the handle grip a little more ergonomic. Not too ergonomic though- I don’t want to lose the “milsurp” look of the rifle. I also had to fill in the M44’s bayonet notch on the right side of the stock near the front.
Datamancer | October 1, 2010
For the removable lid on this Reliquary keyboard, the client wanted something interesting to put on his desk, rather than just setting the lid aside on a shelf somewhere. We kicked around a few ideas and eventually decided on building an array of gears that could spin with the use of an antique clock-winding key.
-~D~-
Datamancer | October 1, 2010
I recently built a Reliquary keyboard for an employee of Blizzard (creators of Starcraft and Wow) and he was nice enough to offer me a tour of the facilities. I also brought my friend Rahbi along because I know he’s also a HUGE Blizzard fan (note the Starcraft 2 shirt in the pics). The whole experience was very amusing to me because it almost felt like I was on one of those Discovery Channel builder shows like American Chopper- “Since we’re assembling the Blizzard keyboard, we thought we’d go take a tour of Blizzard H.Q. and get some inspiration for the build….” It seems like a really cool place to work, and we had the unique opportunity to hear the insider perspective (he’s been in Blizzard over a decade) on a lot of company history and they seem like a surprisingly conscientious corporation who never lost the core values they established when they were a 4-man operation, practically working out of a garage (as Silicon and Synapse). That’s a rare and pleasant thing to see these days when so many other companies who grow to the size of Blizzard treat their employees and products as disposable and interchangeable. Blizzard has a history of “missing” release date projections on games because they absolutely refuse to compromise on the quality and artistic vision of the games, and judging from the INSANE AND ALMOST UNSETTLING impact that games like Diablo, Starcraft and WoW have had on gaming culture, it’s obviously working for them (Google South Korea’s relationship with Starcraft some time).
Now for some pics…
Here’s a shot of the 12 foot bronze Orc Wolfrider statue (built by WETA) in the center of the building complex.
Click “READ MORE” for a lot more pics…
Here’s a life-size statue of a Ghost character. The whole thing pulsed slowly with blue LED lighting. She’s hot, too!
I’d hit it….with a Zergrush.
Some Protoss concept art. I loved this particular image. There’s a whole museum there full of this stuff, but I didn’t want to take up too much of our guide’s time, so I just took a few select shots.
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