Okay, so I got this idea buzzing around in my head – a battery powered water gun. Got tired of the old pump-action ones, you know? Takes forever, hand gets sore. Saw some fancy electric ones online, cost a bomb though. Figured, why not try building one myself? Seemed like a fun little project.

Getting Started - The Parts Hunt

First thing was figuring out what I actually needed. The core bits seemed obvious:

• A small electric water pump. Found a little diaphragm pump online, looked about right.
• A battery pack. Scavenged one from an old RC car, figured it had enough juice.
• Some tubing. Just basic clear plastic stuff.
• A switch. A simple push-button type.
• Wires, connectors, solder (though my soldering is messy, haha).
• Something to hold the water and house the electronics. An old plastic container and maybe parts from a broken toy gun?

Ordering the pump and switch was easy enough. Dug through my junk box for the rest. Always keep old electronics around, you never know!

Putting it Together - Attempt One

Alright, parts arrived. Time to make this thing work. First step: connect the pump to the battery through the switch. Simple circuit, right? Twisted the wires together first, just to test. Hit the switch...success! The pump whirred to life. Sounded a bit weak, but it worked.

Next: hooking up the plumbing. Stuck one tube into a cup of water (my fancy reservoir for testing) and connected it to the pump's 'in' side. Connected another tube to the 'out' side to act as the nozzle. Held it over the sink, hit the switch again.

Water sputtered out. Not exactly a powerful stream, more like a weak dribble. Okay, maybe that RC car battery wasn't cutting it, or the pump was just underpowered for what I wanted.

Troubleshooting and Making it Better

Back to the drawing board. The pump seemed to be the main issue. It was running, but just didn't have the oomph. Found a slightly beefier pump online, rated for a higher flow. Waited for that to arrive.

Also reconsidered the battery. Charged the RC pack fully, but decided maybe a dedicated LiPo battery with a bit more voltage would be better. Ordered one of those too, along with a proper charger. More waiting.

New pump and battery finally showed up. Hooked everything up again. This time, much better! Hit the switch, and a decent stream shot across the sink. Not gonna knock anyone over, but definitely way better than the first attempt. Progress!

Now, making it actually look like a gun. This was tricky. I took an old, broken super-soaker knockoff I had. Gutted the inside, kept the shell and the trigger mechanism. Had to cut away quite a bit of plastic inside to make room for the new pump, the battery pack, and the wiring. Used a Dremel tool, made a huge mess.

Managed to rig the trigger to press the electric switch. Mounted the pump inside, ran the intake tube down into the gun's original water tank. Ran the output tube up to the original nozzle hole. Stuffed the battery in wherever it fit. Used a ton of hot glue and some zip ties to hold everything in place. Looked pretty rough inside, but the shell closed up okay.

The Final Test (Sort Of)

Filled the tank with water. Felt heavier now with the battery and pump. Went outside. Took aim at a bush, pulled the trigger... YES! A solid stream of water shot out, maybe 15-20 feet? Way better than manual pumping. Held the trigger down, it kept shooting consistently until the tank ran low. No leaks yet, surprisingly.

It's not perfect. The battery life isn't amazing, maybe 15 minutes of continuous use? And it's definitely heavier than a normal water gun. But hey, I built it! It actually works. No more pumping, just point and shoot. Felt pretty good seeing that stream fly out after all the tinkering.