New Nerf Havok Fire (Vulcan) Review - Orange and White Paintjob

This our first review of the new Nerf Havok Fire (or Vulcan if you’re outside the UK) complete with firing videos and comparisons with its yellow predecessor. As far as we can tell, this is the first time one of these has been opened for the NIC (though correct me if I’m wrong.)

It’s not strictly an Elite blaster once you look at the box artwork, it’s just a Vulcan (Havok Fire) that is compatible with Elite streamlines. It took us a while to work that one out in the excitement of getting something new and shiny but there’s no Elite logo on the box!

Regards the blaster, it’s a lovely paint job. The clean white, orange and grey gives a really nice impression but is going to be a bugger to keep clean.

The blaster takes 6 x D-cells as per its yellow predecessor and there are few other changes externally. The belt has only been slightly modified to take Elite darts and is a slightly lighter colour to the old belts that came with the yellow Vulcan. The green cap is here to stay, too, it would seem.

There is a slight incompatibility between old and new ammo boxes. The old yellow boxes appear to fit the new white blasters fine but vice versa there are a few changes that make backwards compatibility awkward but not impossible. This could just be this specific model, of course. :)

External functionality is roughly equivalent, the old bolt action is still there though the rate of fire is supposed to be slightly higher. Our firing videos below will show if that’s true or just confirmation bias on our part.

Yellow Vulcan firing new Nerf belt

New orange and white Vulcan firing the same belt and set of darts

Now to the internals. They’re essentially identical to the old version. We have the same old under-specified switches, the same motor and the same coils. As far as we can tell, there’s no change in the plunger or the plunger volume. It isn’t really worth the extra £20 you pay while the old yellow Vulcans are still around here in the UK.

In all, it’s great to see new life being breathed into an iconic Nerf blaster. The Vulcan is an amazing piece of kit, a staple of foamy suppressing fire. The new clean lines are lovely, it’s just a shame it’s £54.99 while the old yellow version is ~£32. You’re paying £20 for what is essentially a re-shell. Available from Argos here in the UK, I don’t have information about availability globally.

My advice is to wait for the old yellow versions to sell out and then buy one of these. As for the fate of this one, we’re just about getting started on what mods we’re going to do to it but given the number of micro-controllers we have laying about the place… :D