Understanding Paintball Guns

A paintball gun, or paintball “marker,” is a device that uses compressed air or carbon dioxide from canisters to propel a paintball through a barrel.

The Barrel

The barrel of a paintball gun has a big effect on its range, accuracy, and firing noise. Paintball barrels are made to a variety of different calibers to match up with differently sized paintballs. There are three basic types of barrels: one-piece, two-piece, and three-piece. One-piece barrels are the easiest to install on paintball guns, the least expensive, and the least complex to build and use, but this ease and low cost are at a tradeoff in versatility.

If you want to switch to a different caliber paintball, you will need to buy an entirely new barrel. By contrast, two-piece and three-piece barrels can have interchangeable parts that allow you to change the bore without replacing the entire barrel; in the case of two-parters, the back end of the barrel can be switched out, with the front end having a larger bore and serving mainly as a silencer. Three-part barrels have a full-length sleeve inside that determines the bore and allows a great deal of versatility.

Longer barrels, and barrels that are ported, or vented, near the tip are quieter than short and un-ported barrels, because they allow some of the gas to escape slowly as the ball leaves the barrel, or gives it more room to expand before the ball leaves the barrel and releases the pressure.

The Gas

The gas is what powers the paintball gun. Paintball guns can be powered by CO2 canisters or compressed air; CO2 is very convenient and portable, but it is more expensive, whereas paintball guns powered by compressed air are more expensive initially, but their air tanks can be refilled for only a few dollars, making them less expensive in the long run.

The Hopper

The last part of paintball guns is the hopper and feed system, the devices that actually carry your paintball ammunition and load it into the back of the barrel to prepare it for firing. Low-grade hoppers are usually gravity fed, while more advanced hoppers that are powered either by residual air pressure from firing, such as the Tippmann Cyclone mechanism, or electromechanical hoppers with motorized loading features, are popular with advanced paintball players due to their ability to sustain very high rates of fire. A good, fast hopper is the key to many players’ paintball game.