Keeping your paintball gun clean and well lubricated is on of the most important things you can do to protect it. Cleaning and lubricating your paintball gun rarely takes more than few minutes of your free time.

You must remember that a well maintained paintball gun has great difference with a not so maintained one, especially when it comes to playing paintball.

There are ten very easy basic steps in cleaning and lubing your paintball gun. But first, there are lots of different brands paintball gun available in the market today.

If instructions in the owner’s manual differ from what is mentioned below, always follow the product’s manual. Make sure that you have a “parts kits” available and all the other cleaning rudiments. Always place an old newspaper on your worktable to make cleanup easier.

• The first thing that you must do is to remove the air source of your paintball gun. Working on a paintball gun with the air source still connected is a mortal sin in cleaning the paintball marker.

Paintball marker is the most important piece of equipment in playing the game of paintball. Paintball markers or also called as “paintball guns” are used to mark an opposing player with paint or what most paintball players would call a “hit”.

Paintball markers are powered by a rapidly expanding gas, usually carbon dioxide or compressed air.

The carbon dioxide or compressed air forces a paintball (the ammunition) through the barrel at a very high velocity sufficient enough for the paintball to break upon impact but not enough velocity to cause serious tissue damages.

Paintball markers have evolved rapidly. From a single shot, hand held, manually cocked pistol that was primarily used for marking cattle and trees to an electronically controlled, pneumatically cocked, full ranged firing modes markers.

Early paintball guns were manufacture for the Forestry Service for marking trees. Most of the early paintball markers have identical functions and features. Paintball markers have four chief components.

These are the body, hopper, tank and the barrel. More known as loaders, hoppers holds the paintball (ammunition) for the paintball marker. Hoppers have lots of different variants.

The hoppers principal methods of feeding the paintballs into the paintball markers are gravity, force feed and agitate feeding.

Before you go out and play paintball, you must first have the proper paintball equipment. There are various paintball equipments that you must first have before going out on the field.

You can either rent them or it is much advisable that you buy your own paintball equipment. Here are some of the basic paintball equipments that you should know.

Paintball equipments

Paintmask

Don’t ever go out into the battlefield without a paintmask. Paintmask are also known as “goggles”.  They are safety headgear device that every paintball player is required to wear.

Paintmask protects the eyes, mouth, nose and ears of the wearer. Some masks also have throat guards. The lenses of paintmask are engineered to stop paintballs; however one must remember that these lenses are not intended to resist impacts of paintballs traveling at enormously great speeds.

Remember that permanent blindness or impairment in the vision can be a result if you are hit in the eye if you don’t wear your protective paintmask.

Paintball Marker or Gun

Paintball marker is also known as paintball gun. This is the primary device used in this game. Paintball gun marks an opposing player when the opponent is hit by its paint ball.

The game paintball can either be played indoors or outdoors. Some paintball players like to play scenario games some like to play on tournaments. One of the most appealing features of playing paintball is the places where paintball is played or the paintball fields.

Outdoor paintball fields are very abundant; however there are also lots of paintball fields on cities and towns. A lot of commercial paintball fields features fast paced indoor game plays that sometimes has lots of rooms for a player to explore.

There are many kinds of outdoor paintball fields. These types of paintball fields are usually located on a wooden area. Some outdoor paintball fields even have special props (like fake buildings, bunkers, castles, towers, old cars, etc.) to simulate an urban warfare scenario.

A “Woodsball” type of paintball game for most paintball players is the most authentic form of the game paintball. When out on the woods, paintball players get to know the feel of a jungle warfare kind of game.

When playing on a wooden paintball field, you need to have lots and lots of jungle skills. Stealth is the key with these types of paintball fields. On the other hand, team work and knowing when to take cover or fire is also important when playing on a wooded paintball field.

What is Paintball?

It is a competitive game wherein you get to shoot other people and get shot at. More like playing war games in your early childhood without the use of a real gun.

Paintball is more like a sport that uses compressed air guns (which is called “markers”) that shoots “paintballs”. The bullets are marble sized gelatin capsules that are filled with colored polyethylene glycol paint, hence, the name paintball.

The game is usually played outdoors but sometimes indoors (depends on the objective of the game).

History of Paintball

Markers or paintball guns were used in the earlier times by the farming and forestry industries to mark cattle and trees. Early paintball guns are very similar to the paintball guns of today.

Early markers are powered by carbon dioxide cartridges but they had poor range and run of the mill accuracy. The first name to this sort of sport was “The National Survival Game”.

The nature of paintball was first played “every man for himself” and it was sometimes played as teams who play each other. The game became more sophisticated because more individuals were playing.

Not all paintball barrels are the same. Some paintball barrels may have the same appearance but their characteristics are very different. In general, paintball barrels come in twelve, fourteen, sixteen, eighteen and twenty inches.

However, some paintball players have their barrels customized and may even reach a whooping forty eight inches. The length of a paintball barrel has no effect on the paintball markers accuracy.

On the other hand, longer paintball barrels tend to make less noise than short barrels. This is because long paintball barrels allow the excess gas to escape slower than short barrels.

With this, it allows the shooter to “sight in” faster by which would eventually lead to the perception that longer barrels are more accurate than short barrels. Long paintball barrels also require more boost in order for the paintball to travel at the required velocity.

Most paintball markers have ports. Ports are the holes on the end of the barrels. Ports allow the air thrust to scatter hence decreasing the sound of the paintball marker.

On the other hand, too much porting on the paintball barrel minimizes the efficiency of the paintball marker because it allows the air thrust to scatter more easily.

There are lots of cheap paintball guns available now on the market. Although most of the cheap paintball guns are not as effective as the expensive paintball guns, some of them may perform astonishingly well on the battlefield.

Here are some tips on how to buy cheap paintball guns that would give you more quality than what you paid for.

Tips of How to buy cheap paintball guns

Action

Action is what happens in the battle field. There are three kinds of actions for cheap paintball guns; these are pump action, open bolt semi automatic or semi automatic blow back, and the paintball guns that comes with electronic trigger frames or the hybrid blow back guns.

Each of these paintball guns differ from one another. Choose the type of paintball guns that would fit your way of shooting your opponents and on how much time you would spend on your paintball marker just to make it fire.

Performance

Good firing rate, range or accuracy; performance must also be considered in buying cheap paintball guns.

Some cheap paintball guns perform great one day and totally opposite the next. Reliability must also be considered. Buy a paintball gun that has the consistency of working the way it should be.

Professional paintball players agree that other than pure luck, having properly executed paintball tactics and strategies are essential in winning the game. But if you are a newbie to in the sport paintball, here are some general paintball tactics that may come useful.

Shooting Tactics

The most frequently used technique in hitting the opponent is to pepper your opponent with shots while advancing steadily to your opponent’s position.

With this technique you will “pin” your opponent. This technique will eventually encourage your opponent to hide behind their cover allowing you to go for a closer kill.

Cover Tactics

Covering is the most important part in the game paintball. Covering is one of the defensive paintball tactics. Every structure in the paintball field is used for covering (tree, bunker bags, etc.).

Standing while under cover is the most mobile and the most silent way of sneaking to your opponent. However, standing has the least coverage or visual suppression. It also increases your risk of being hit.

Kneeling crouch has low mobility but is excellent for covering because it gives the player good amount of physical coverage and at the same time stability.

Having the proper paintball gear does not limit to paintball markers, hopper, tank and paintball mask alone. You should also consider having those little paintball gear stuffs that you think is not important.

Extra safety paintball gear and equipments can mean a lot of difference between enjoying the day and not getting to play because of injury or defective equipments.

You should always bring your gun manual and gun schematics along whenever you go out to play. You will never know when you’re going to dismantle or disassemble your paintball markers.

But remember that manuals and schematics are useless without those allen wrenches right? You must have one set handy available at all times. Don’t forget to bring spare batteries with you.

Don’t let small things like a dead battery ruin your fun in the battlefield. Neck guards are good protection from painful shots in the neck. Opt for a lightweight wrap around strap for comfort. Wearing thigh cups is also a good idea.

You will never know where you’re going to be shot at with all the action in the field. Shin guards, gloves and elbow pads are also handy when it comes to running, dodging and crawling in the field.

The game paintball is not for guys alone. A lot of girls play paintball. Females are slowly but surely making their presence felt in the paintball world. In every major paintball tournament held there is always an all female team.

Some men tend to belittle paintball girls. Just because they are females it does not mean that they are not as formidable as any male opponent may be.

Although there are quite a few paintball girls in every paintball tournament or paintball competition, some of these paintball girls team are very good.

Some say that female paintball players have an advantage over men in the game of paintball. Some men profess that these paintball girls are very patient in the field; they tend to wait for their opponents to show themselves.

Some say that women are small and can hide more easily on a bunker and some would say that women in the paintball field communicate more with each other than men.

An all female paintball team have better bonding and chemistry than an all male paintball team. Female paintball players like to compete with their male counterparts in the paintball field.