How to make a Rubberband shotgun (18 shots)

Step 5 Making the grooves on the barrel and cutting them out

Making the grooves on the barrel

Okay so now take your barrel, a pencil and ruler.

We are going to make grooves on the barrel with dimension 1 x 0,5 cm / 0.39 x 0.2 inch. Each groove will hold one rubberband. So for this barrel we will make a total of 18 grooves. Drawing and cutting out these grooves is probably the longest and most boring part but if you make one mistake the barrel is ruined so take your time.

Now about the places of the grooves. You are probably looking at the picture and going "but there's so much more place available? why can't we make more grooves there?" Well I will tell you.

• The first 4 cm / 1.6 inch of your barrel that starts from the gun (so the hidden 2 cm / 0.7 inch doesn't count) should be open for your shooting flippers to go when all rubberbands are shot
•  The 13 cm / 5.1 inch of the end or tip of your barrel should be left open for the first rubberband to have enough strength to fly away (if you don't do this the first 3 or 4 will just fly away and immediately fall on the ground or even not fly away at all)

So everything between those 4 and 13 cm is available for grooves. the grooves have a space of 1 cm / 0.39 inch left between them. This will provide enough strength to hold the rubberband without breaking the wood or the wood breaking during construction.

For the measurements you need to draw on your wood, look at the first and second picture. It's a drawing of the grooves plan you should use (there are only 12 grooves on the plan but it's just to show the measurements. We are making 18 of these so draw 18 grooves on your barrel.)

The first picture is the measurements in cm and the second picture in inch.

Cutting out the grooves on the barrel

Now you are ready to cut out the grooves on the barrel. I suggest you mark the grooves that need to be cut out by colouring them in with your pencil. This way you'll avoid cutting away the wrong pieces.

Start by taking a small drill that is the same diameter or smaller then 0,5 cm / 0.2 inch and drill a hole on the bottom of the groove (making sure you do not drill to far down). By doing this you'll make it easier to have a nice rectangular groove. When you have drilled a hole in each groove, just cut out the grooves with a jigsaw (power tool). Then file away excessive wood untill you have rectangular grooves. You can ignore drilling the small holes part but It'll probably end in chipped away pieces of wood and you angry because it looks nothing like a rectangular. So although it's boring just do it, it pays off in the end.

Also don't forget to cut out the small groove in the front where your rubberbands will be shot away from. The measurements for this are also placed on the plan.