The year of 1988 began the water weaponry revolution. Before, water gun companies such as Entertech(tm) ruled the water fight scene with their advances in battery-powered motorized water guns. However, the motorized blasters did not offer much soaking power and batteries to keep these water guns working proved to be costly. In 1988, the Power Drencher (eventually renamed as the Super Soaker) was unleashed onto the water blaster market, still in its infancy.
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The Power Drencher was a water blaster based on a concept by Lonnie Johnson, an aerospace engineer from Los Angeles, California. The idea behind the Power Drencher was actually derived from some work he was doing on a heat pump which used water as opposed to freon. He hooked up the model of the pump to his bathroom sink at his home. "I turned around and I was shooting this thing across the bathroom into the tub and the stream of water was so powerful that the curtains were swirling in the breeze it sent out," he said. "I thought, 'This would make a great water gun.'" (Quote from a Weekend Edition interview between Lonnie Johnson and Liane. Click here for more information.) However, due to his own limited resources at the time, the cost for him to manufacture the blaster was rather steep. Thus, he approached Larami Ltd. with his concept toy water blaster and, after a simple demonstration of the blasters effectiveness, basically had a done deal with them on the spot. Unlike its motorized predacessors, the Power Drencher relied on air pressure and arm pumping for pressurizing the firing chamber. The end result was a water blaster capable of delivering more water farther and faster than any other water gun on the market. The brand name, Super Soaker, was introduced nation-wide in 1991 through a series of TV-advertisements. |
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Lonnie Johnson is also responsible for a lot of other developments, both toy and non-toy related. He is pictured to the right with some of the items which would simply not exist were it not for his visions. iSoaker.com owes a good part of its own existence to the success, reliability, and performance of the SuperSoaker series of water blasters. We would also like to thank Lonnie for not just bring the world the SuperSoaker, but also continuing pushing the envelope with further design enhancements and developments.
Water blaster technology has not stagnated in the hands of Larami Ltd., makers of the Super Soaker(tm). In 1990, the SS 100 was released, offering the first of the Super Soakers(tm) to have a separate pressurized firing chamber. This allowed the user to refill the primary reservoir at any time since the primary reservoir did not need to be pressurized for the blaster to shoot. As well, the blaster required fewer pumps in order to build up enough pressure to fire.
In 1992, Larami Ltd. toyed with varieties based on the pressurized reservoir and separate pressurized firing chamber models. One of the interesting variants which was released was known as the SS MDS (Multi-Directional Soaker) which featured a nozzle which could be point straight, directly left, directly right, and all angles in between.
In 1993, the first XP-rated Super Soakers(tm) were released. XP (Xtra Power) Super Soakers(tm) used the same technology as the original series, but featured larger nozzles in order to deliver more water at a quicker rate. The XP-generation went through various design mutations culminating in the first two double-barrelled (XXP 175 and XXP 275) and the first triple-barrelled (XP 85) Super Soakers (tm).
However, as the blasters continued to get larger and carry more waters, there was no significant increase in output due to the limitations of the pressurized water system and safety concerns. However, in 1996, the CPS 2000 (Constant Pressure System) was unleashed, once again changing the face of the water war field.
Unlike all its predacessors, the CPS 2000 employed a revolutionary firing chamber system which relied on the elastic properties of a rubber-like substance to pressurize the water. The CPS-technology allowed even more water to be unleashed at a faster rate than the XP-series could. As well, unlike air-pressure-based blasters which tended to trickle as their pressure dropped during firing, CPS-based blasters suffered virtually no change in pressure due to the nature of the elastic chamber used. As such, virtually all water could be dispensed at top pressure and travel the complete firing range.
However, the CPS system was not without its fault. Rumour has it that the CPS 2000 was removed from the market simply due to its sheer power. Anyone who has experienced a direct blast from a CPS 2000 can tell you that the stream packs more punch than most garden hoses. All future models based on the CPS systems appear to have been toned-down in order to meet some forms of safety criteria. Also, due to the nature of the firing chamber, several people have reported firing chamber ruptures during use, turning a power blaster into a dribbling mess. After prolonged use, it appears that the rubber in the firing chamber can lose its elasticity and break. Problems aside, the CPS-based blasters remain top of the power and range categories.
However, firing chamber technology is not the only facet of the Super Soaker(tm) which has evolved over the years. Reservoir and filling technology has also undergone many variations. The original Super Soakers(tm) used screw-on bottles with tubing which sat in the bottle to allow water to be drawn from the reservoir. However, this reservoir design had three major short-comings: the O-Rings where the bottle met the blaster tended to wear down quickly, especially if the reservoir needed to be pressurized for the blaster to shoot; the reservoir could usually not make full use of its contents has there was always some water remaining due to the design of the tubing; and the reservoir took a while to remove, fill, then reattach.
From the original designs, Larami Ltd. seemed to have experimented for a while with half-twist and quarter-twist on reservoirs as seen on blasters such as the XP75, XP105, XP150. The angle of the bottle opening was altered such that water drained via gravity directly into the pump intake instead of needing to be draw in by a hose. However, these reservoirs had problems mainly due to the tab construction. The tabs which held the reservoir in place tended to wear quickly after multiple attachments and removals. This proved rather frightening for users of worn down XP75s which uses the pressurized reservoir method for firing. Worn out tabs in the XP75 can result in a sudden launch of the reservoir upwards from the blaster, showering the user and launching the reservoir several feet into the air. With some luck, no one will be hit by the reservoir when this occurs. The half and quarter-twist reservoirs still took some time to refill as well.
The more user-friendly reservoir improvement was first seen with blasters like the XP250 and XXP275. These blasters had a simple screw-on cap to seal closed an otherwise fully-weapon mounted reservoir. This meant that only the cap needed to be removed to fill the reservoir instead of having to remove the reservoir. However, this also made it impossible for small sinks to be used to fill since the entire blaster would need to be positioned properly beneath the water source. Thankfully, most water wars occur where hoses or larger taps are available, making this not such a major issue. The capped-reservoir has become the most prevalent reservoir system currently used. However, unlike the original designs, the caps not include a tether-anchor system to prevent the cap from wandering far from the blaster.
Not to be outdone by a rival company manufacturing blasters known as SpeedLoaders(tm), Larami Ltd. introduced its own hose-based refill system in 1999 and termed it Super Charger (tm). With the aid of the Q.F.D. (Quick-Fill Device), blasters capable of Super Charging could be refilled simple by inserting the SuperCharger nozzle into an active Q.F.D. The Q.F.D. relies on the water pressure from the hose it is attached to to force water into the SC-based blaster. Along with the SuperCharger(tm) technology, Larami Ltd. introduced its first pumpless blaster known as the SC:Power Pak. The Power Pak relied on an active Q.F.D. to be refilled and was basically three CPS-based reservoirs mounted on the innards of a plastic backpack with a nozzle-blaster mounted at the end of the attached hose. The blaster part had four nozzle settings and the Pak, itself, held a good amount of water. Best of all, no pumping was required. Unfortunately, without an active Q.F.D., the SC:Power Pak was basically useless.
In 2000, Larami Ltd. introduced the smaller brother of the SC:Power Pak known as the SC:Big Trouble. The SC:Big Trouble also has four nozzle settings, but its capacity was only about half that of the SC:Power Pak.
With the exception of the pumpless SC:Power Pak and SC:Big Trouble, all other SC-enabled blasters allowed the user to choose between filling at an available Q.F.D. or filling from a tap or hose. This sort of flexibiliy makes the SC-based blasters quite useful on the field. However, the SC-based blasters still appear to take second when it comes to sheer-soaking power when compared to the CPS-series.
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