Put a 2 Fast 2 Furious DVD in, let's do a history lesson

[dartamon]

As we all remember, the golden age of the BE semi would likely be 1998-2000. Pre 9/11, Raptor/Rainmaker era. The Raptors were starting to become outmoded by shinier new blowbacks. At the same time, BE had a partnership with WDP to distribute Angels, which ended and Rainmakers didn't take off en masse the same way (in part because the Impulse and Matrix had already showed up and weren't that much more expensive). BE decided to release a new line of markers in 2001 (shortly before 9/11), which included the cheaper BE Avenger (targeted at the regular Spyder/Piranha and VL Genesis targeted at the Spyder TL.

Some time later, I want to say late 2003 to early 2004, the Genesis Surge appeared. Similar to the Raptor Xtreme, it came with custom anodizing. The Surge also had the dropforword regulator options, the "df", kinda like the Spyder Shutter from 5 years earlier. While dramatically less known because of the time period, to me the Surge df represents the finest in blowback tech that came straight out of the factory from BE and still had a manual trigger.

Black, not chrome.

[ReconSWS]

1v1 for pink slips

[dartamon]

Looking back at the press releases on Warpig, the Surge also came out in 2001. That must have been later in the year or maybe I'm confusing with Surge II being 2003-2004.

[glaman5266]

I've worked on standard Surges for other people, but I wasn't aware a "Surge DF" existed.

[infamoussmiley]

"the finest in blowback tech".... ;-P

[dartamon]

The df was short lived, IIRC there was a sizable premium and by that time people would put a stabilizer on instead anyway.

[Brokeass_baller]

I've always loved the look of the Surge. Never owned one, so I can't say much about it's quality, but damn, they got the look right.

[Pumpytrilly1]

Wow that actually looks really nice.

[glaman5266]

I've always loved the look of the Surge. Never owned one, so I can't say much about it's quality, but damn, they got the look right.

All those BE/VL blowbacks are pretty much the same. Same hammers, valves, bolts (same functional geometry, cocking method may differ), etc. In my experience, they all shoot very similarly. And honestly, they're not bad paintguns. I've owned several of them and they shoot better than pretty much any other absolute-bottom-of-the-barrel paintgun. With a different barrel, maybe a loop cut off the hammer spring, and a little tape to keep the hopper in, they work well. And they're cheap enough to buy a bunch of them for spare parts!

The only ones that REALLY stand out from the rest (in my mind) are the Maxis, Prodigy, and the Surge.

-The Maxis had a few different models, with the highest-end one having a regulator, drop-forward, and something else (maybe bolt?), all from Pro-Team Products. They actually had a parts line dedicated to the VL/BE STBBs back in the day!
-The Surge had it's own front block, which allows for different foregrips, drilling, etc. And that damn nice anno.
-The Prodigy was their electronic marker. The electronic trigger wasn't great- not the most walkable, board was capped at 7 BPS. But I've heard that battery life was INSANE. Like, well over a year on a battery. You could also throw universal boards in it to give it some more juice.

There was one other electro VL- the Charger. Had a better board with a higher cap and (I think) firing modes. Functionally better than the Prodigy, but not as pretty IMO.

The VL/BE markers are also great modding fodder. If you wanna learn without breaking the bank, get a bunch of these & hack 'em up, drill 'em, just try stuff.

[Fubarius]

The one issue with the Genesis (most varieties) is that it wasn't actually anodized. It's actually a coating, sort of a hydrodip. And if you leave paint splatter on the thing for an extended time the coating would start to peal off. My personal early series Genesis body is sitting it a box somewhere in the shed with some rather nasty pealing around the barrel porting, feedneck, and by the grip area. Haven't done much with it after some initial modding back in the day once I realized that rear cocking blowbacks just weren't my thing. The side cocking and later top cocking Avenger became my BE/VL tinker fodder of choice.

Every so often on ebay and the like you might come across an all black Genesis. This isn't some limited edition, this is a blue speckled or green camo one where the coating as been completely removed. The logo engraving was done after coating and went down into the bare metal, so after the coating was removed the engraving still looked correct.

[The Inflicted]

The Raptors were starting to become outmoded by shinier new blowbacks.

Possibly a controversial opinion, but the Raptor was obsolete from day one.

[dartamon]

If we go back to 98-99, I don't see the Spyder being that much more of a winner. These are Silver Eagle years and I'd like to remind everyone that shiny was good at the time. I even knew a guy who wanted a completely chrome Cocker. My brother bought a Compact 2000 and he didn't even get a bottomline for the money. Did I mention the Silver Eagle was shiny? Spyders didn't really get more appealing until 00 with the Shutter in red/blue and this is the sunset year for the Raptor. I agree on the quality part, in particular the pin between the hammer and bolt - it was completely redesigned for the Aegis markers.

The Shutter also upped the ante with the factory reg (commonly claimed to be useless) on a dropforward plus some custom milling up top. That may seem trivial today, but mounting regs/dropforwards/cutout milling was the bread and butter of a lot of customizers at the time.

[The Inflicted]

The Spyder was always considerably lighter and much less annoying to take apart than the Raptor. The Silver Eagle didn't come out until 2000 and hadn't really improved anything while the contemporary Spyders like the TL and TL Plus had gone to the fatter strikers and quick-release pull pins for the moving parts.

The one nice thing about the Raptor was that it came with a .45 frame that used the standard AGD/WGP bottomline spacing, but this wasn't a good tradeoff for weighing nearly a full pound more than any similar stacked-tube blowback made before or since.

[glaman5266]

The Inflicted I agree with ya. The only real problem with Spyders was that damn bottomline hole spacing. I mean, WHY???

Though I somewhat disagree that they were obsolete. In terms of tech/design? Yes, they absolutely were. In terms of usefulness to the Wal-Mart masses & getting people into the sport for a decent price? No, I disagree. Even the cheap plastic BE stuff got a lot of people into the game, myself included. It definitely had it's place in the market.