First Look - CYP Nemesis

This past Febraury, I came across the website of CYP, a Taiwanese manufacturer of paintball guns.  What caught my eye was their product lineup - several blowbacks with cocker threaded barrels, and the Anubis, a gun that was the spitting image of an STO cocker.  After talking with the sales and marketing manager of the company's foreign trade department, I found that the Anubis was indeed a fully licensed version of the venerable Autococker.  Even more interesting, CYP had a new electronic gun that they were going to be releasing, and would I be interested in having a look at it?  Well, I couldn't reply fast enough with an enthusiastic YES!

On July 3rd, the Nemesis (one of the first batch of 45 guns) arrived in my hands.  Unlike almost every other new gun I see, CYP has thoughtfully packaged the Nemesis not in a cardboard box, but in a custom fitted carrying case.  What a fantastic touch - a package that is actually useful!  Inside is the gun itself, two-piece cocker threaded barrel, and the manual.  While it doesn't show well in the photo, the case cutout for the regulator can also accomodate a 15 degree ASA, so perhaps we'll see this gun feature in the future.



The gun design is obviously influenced by the Intimidator, but it's not a carbon copy clone - there are a number of small differences.  The most notable is the lack of an LCD display and buttons.  Instead, a tri-color LED is located on the right side of the gun and a bank of 5 DIP switches is used for configuration.  Fit and finish on the gun is great - most people think 'crap' when they hear that something is Taiwanese in manufacture, but CYP has gone to great lengths to ensure that they maintain the level of quality you'd expect to find in a high-end gun (you won't find cheap pot metal or a plastic frame on the Nemesis).  Oddly, a male-to-male fitting is used on the elbow of the inline reg rather than just leaving a female port.  I replaced it with a microline elbow to connect to my air system.



The inline reg has standard ASA threads, and the LPR threads right out of the vertical adapter (which has a 0-300psi gauge attached).  Grips are good old .45 wraparounds and the power switch is located on the rear of the decorative silver plate (which is machined and chromed aluminum and not a stamping).



2 sets of bottomline holes - nice touch.



Both the LPR and inline reg are standard piston/fill pin style regulators, with pressure adjustment made by spring pressure via a set screw.



The vertical feed is a 2-piece collet design - no more electrical tape on hopper necks!



Unscrewing the rear cap allows the ram shaft to be pulled out.  The bolt pull pin and the ram shaft are titanium nitride coated (the gold color) for wear resistance, another nice touch.



Here the left clamshell of the frame has been removed and the two frame screws have been removed to detach the body from the frame.  The hoses then get removed from the ram and ASA. Note that all the fasteners are metric.



The aluminum eye cover keeps the nubbin style detent and photoeye compnents in place.  The photoeye system is of the transmissive variety (i.e. 'break beam').



Removing the ASA requires that the ASA hose barb be removed first (the barb is off center, but not quite far enough to get a hex wrench into the ASA screw).  A 5mm socket is used here.



The ASA comes out as shown.  The valve stem is also TiN coated.



After removing the locking screw and the hose barbs from the ram body, the ram body can be pulled out.  The white washer serves as the cup seal.



Back to the frame - the trigger is hinged with a shoulder screw, and the board attaches to the frame with a single screw.  The window in the frame visible just above the battery is where the DIP switches can be accessed (through the right side of the frame).  The microcontroller used is an Atmel AT89C2051 running at 12MHz.  You'll note that the backstrap is contoured differently than an Intimidator due to needing clearance for the SMC valve - I thought the large radius would be uncomfortable, but with the loose grip position that players use, it's not an issue.  Trigger is a little small for a double trigger, and it takes some getting used to.



The solenoid is a 5vdc SMC unit (SYJ3120-SLO-M3 to be exact), and the tubing is 2mm ID.  The solenoid leads attach to the coil section with a clip - it's unlikely that you'd ever have to replace the solenoid, but if you do, this makes it easy.

So that's the internals, but you're probably wondering how well it shoots.  Well, I headed out to the field the other day and slapped on a Halo and a 68/45 Apocalypse.  I blew through some 6 month old Big Ball without a hitch and was impressed to find that the velocity was holding to +/- 5fps.  Not only that, but assuming that the stock gauge is accurate, the gun was running at only 100 psi! (I've since been informed that Intimidator gauges show the LPR pressure, not the inline reg pressure  - I assume this is how the Nemesis is set up as well - I knew a 100psi Sheridan valvetrain was too good to be true).  I had only a single chop, and that was the very last ball in the hopper (after I had turned it off), and I had the eye holdoff set to the minimum.



My teammate Max blazes away at BFG's chrono range.  I forgot to take note of how fast the chrono listed the BPS as, but suffice to say that the gun is no slouch - my teammates and I were giggling like schoolgirls while emptying hopper after hopper - it's as fast as any other high end electro I've handled.  The stock electronics allow the gun to shoot at up to 14 bps with the eye disabled and up to 30 bps with the eye enabled.

So at this point, you're probably wondering how much one of these will cost you.  Recommended retail is around $800-$900, though I'm sure street prices will be even lower once they get into the distribution channels.  CYP is currently selling the gun in Europe through Paintball Xpress in Germany, and is looking for US distributors and dealers.  The gun is certainly impressive - while I'm not a fan of the Intimidator's design (I think the primary goal of reusing Spyder bodies resulted in too many design compromises), the Nemesis provides the same layout for considerably less.  CYP is eager to make a name for itself in the paintball industry, and the Nemesis will certainly get them noticed.

- HB