Anyone remember v-balls? They were .68 cal velcro balls for use in indoor fields that had issues cleaning paint. At the end of the day the staff could vacuum up the v-balls and reuse them.

Loved seeing the 50 cal pinokio hopper!!! Thanks for featuring me in your video! I got a secret for you, if you look carefully at the Pinokio hopper we used, we used an insert from another 50 cal loader, inside the clear pinokio to make the 50 cal balls line up and feed properly. We cut it with a hacksaw and slid it inside the loader! You can use ANY clips from ANY of my videos whenever you want! - TechPB-Mike

I remember when the c3 came out. A guy I used to play with bought one and after a day of rec ball we busted out the grill and used the c3's propane tank to grill hot dogs lol.

All I know is we definitely need better paintballs...round, heavy fill, no seams, consistently sized, and larger like .690... Like how they used to be made

I know that how the C3 used the propane was different from Airsoft, but it is slightly ironic that that in airsoft Propane is widely used (under the name green gas) but it isnt at all in paintball. Also you can get those 1lb propane tanks everywhere for a few buck. Walmart, tractor supply, Lowes, Home depot, etc. Tons of things use them. You can also refilll them off the big 50lb tanks pretty cheap.

The humidity in florida alone is a good reason for the hydrotech balls. Its murder on paint shell integrity!

Best "paintball graveyard" product was the Crossfire RAMROD barrel. During the peak barrel nonsense times of the late 90s, this barrel promised to "shoot clean" by simply... not having much barrel there. It was 4" of real barrel, followed by 8-10" of thin rods held in place by two rings. If you're having trouble visualizing that, think "skeleton barrel." The idea was that the real barrel would accelerate the paint, and the rods would "guide" it for long enough to stabilize it. Or something. It simply didn't work. It was not manufactured well enough to really be accurate, and while the skeleton design did let broken paint out... it also let grass, etc in, and the poor construction broke way more paint than it was worth. Terrible product, but endlessly hilarious as everyone yelled "RAMROD" over and over.

Who remembers the airgun designs warp feed?

PBRML Is so underrated it makes me sad 😭 GIVE THIS MAN MORE SUBS

People in my area seriously thought the C3 was going to be the future and only option for paintball. My local field didn't have an air compressor and shipped in industrial Nitrogen and Co2 tanks. Suddenly they couldn't get Nitrogen because "Hospitals needed it more and there's a shortage because of all the street racing" lol, and then suddenly Co2 started getting hard to get. Before you could literally go to Canadian Tire and get Co2 and it was now gone. People were panicking and I started to see a few C3's on the field.

I really liked the look of that Angel eye mask. I love sci-fi looking stuff. I wish more companies would at least try making different styles so every mask doesn't look exactly the same.

That JT impulse comment hurty soul. It was the smart parts 09 impulse that had a 50 cal version. The 09 impulse is the one that was shown.

Dude, the Metadyne Thumper! If you've never held one, you don't know what you're missing. The machining/mechanical quality feel is on a whole other level. If they could have gotten their off the shelf valve sorted out/refined/improved, it would have been a classic.

The Draxxus Pulse. The first paintball hopper that could connect to the motherboard of electronic guns either by wire or by bluetooth. It was originally advertised to have a shell strong enough to nail a board into wood. When i bought one it crumbled on my third day with it. Apparently they stole patent techonology from Halo/Empire at the time and the company went to exclusively selling paintballs after that. It was WICKED fast. I was scaring all the kids at the chronograph when i was dumping old paint at 25bps.

The price of paintballs is the number one thing holding paintball back. Imagine how popular paintball would be if you could get a case for like $20. Airsoft is way lamer but it's basically free to play once you have a gun because you can buy airsoft bbs so cheap.

I still got my Tippmann C3... Thing was a cannon and not very practical... But it looks great on the wall!

I had the pleasure of playing with some HydroTec.. It all went downhill when Paul went out and got a new business partner. At that point, production was rushed, and HydroTec flopped.

i was stationed in germany from 97-00 and helped run the Griesheim paintball field for the rod and gun club. we used to have the Ugly ducklings practice there all the time. from what i remember the tourneys needed to drop there FPS in germany. the law was 210 fps and then they wanted 180 fps for any marker. we got around that as our field was on US military property and did not have to do that but we did keep it to 210. when there was talk of going to the 50 cal and drop the fps all the teams came together and told them to kick rocks if they did put that rule in the teams would have disbanded and all the sponsors would pull out of germany too. this is why you dont hear about it german laws can squash press about it and at that time it would have been bad press. but if i remember right they wanted to test it in the Frankfurt event in 99.

I recall wdp and evil pushing for 5K psi tanks in the early 2000's. Never caught on. Also angel air with its digital malarkey.

I was so amped for Hydrotec paintballs. Actually revolutionary and a great fit for paintball. No swelling from humidity and becoming bouncy are HUGE advantages/improvements over PEG. Allegedly the consistency or the roundness was much better. That and no dimples would improve accuracy

Never mind that the 'burning of a propellant to propel a projectile' made the C3 an actual firearm under federal law.....

I love imagining a world where a revolutionary new paintball comes out that is cheaper to produce, and thus cheaper to buy. Me and my buddies switched over to airsoft for the past 4 years because of how cheap it is to play, especially with all of us being broke in college. I can't wait to eventually be able to get back into paintball though.

I feel like I’m taking crazy pills, because nobody remembers the yellow JT seamless paintballs.

Glad youtube recommended this channel to me. I havent played paintball since 2009 but I have always been interested in the sport since the 90s. For years my hobby was watching people on youtube enjoy their hobby of paintball (Mike Phillips, Webdog radio, Borg (rest in peace), etc...) but it seemed like the sport kinda died off like 8 years ago but lately I have been seeing more about it and hearing about friends going and playing again. Anyways I remember all of these especially the hydreotec paintballs. I remember the double color paint and thought it was the coolest thing.

THANKS for all the work you do for the paintball community

The E-volt. With battery tech getting better, I wonder how long it could be before we see something like that again. You should interview Simon, honestly.

The Ol' Tippman SMG was .60 Cal I believe. We used to call it the :Stitcher" be you could get lit up in one trigger pull. LOL

Thanks for doing all the research putting these out bro

Im just glad the propane gun from bass warehouse never blew up on anyone... or did it? But 30,000 shots is insane. Great video Brad.

I have a C3. Had high hopes on the propane front. It wasn't perfect but great when CO2 and high air compressors weren't around. My understanding was that because the propane is ignited in the marker, it was considered a firearm by the government and that's what killed it.

I need to go through my old gear. In the early 2000's I played in several big games that had industry reps and vendors. I've bought a bunch of stuff from small companies that never became successful.

I know very little about current paintball Tech- but back in the 1990s, a bunch of us in rural, Central Pa, did a lot of research into trying to create paint balls that could be fired through existing muzzle loading weapons. Using freshly cleaned weapons with very low powder loads (2-3 gr), we experimented with various paintball makes and mods. Tried making thicker balls, chilled balls,etc.The problem was always the pressure in the barrel broke the ball. We got a few to fire well, but they had to be so thick that they were potentially fatal.

Should have covered the attempted tv paintballs. The ones that were supposed to be brighter with a camera filter so that espn could track shots. Cover this story!!

Playing since 2004, I remember the "Vapor-Ware" of the BPS wars during 2007-2009 with the Draxxus DXS Pulse & NXe JRNY hoppers trying to dethrone the Halo.

7:37 Just call it a Helldivers paintball mask and it will sell like Hot Cakes 👍

The machine Vapor. That gun looked so cool, but then it ended up being a piece of junk.

I really wanted to get a Tippmann C3, I still do TBH. It's a cool concept where you can go to some of the most remote locations and still play paintball.

This history video was awesome, I’d love to see more content like it

I was out at a flea market 4-5 years ago and missed a chance to get the tippmann c3 working for 50$

GREAT RESEARCH! thanks so much

Didn't Rp scherer (Marbeliser) have a starch shell for a little while? seems that i remember they did. Always held its shape well, no dimples and had a powdery coating.

I had no idea any actually used propane combustion in something like that! Crazy! Green gas is propane but it’s not burning!

@9:30 the C3 would have been awesome. you could technically use a large propane tank with a filler attachment to fill those smaller propane tanks too, which would only add to the convenience.

I loved the old jt pants they had to ban because balls just bounced off the pants . The spyder rocking trigger that was awsome …

this channel is the best upcoming og channel on youtube, this is S+ tier content, thank you homie

The double color fill is a sick concept. As well as the idea of a waterproof paintball.

I remember the C3 having some legal issues because of how some states defined firearms.

I used to play tournaments in the UK in the EARLY 90's. Cracked me up to see the JT mask is still out there! Loved my no-fog JT!

The Q loader…. The most expensive pods that had a mechanical tornado inside. Now its competitors were a giant egg and a Pinocchio. So everyone was trying new stuff. Atleast good hoppers came from them though. The hk speed and the velocity jr. The Qloader was just a great ad in a paintball mag

I got to try on the C2 Eyon prototypes that the Angel Eye became, they were super uncomfortable specially due to the weird cheek foam configuration and the fact that the foam was mounted with Velcro allowing it to have its position adjusted, but instead Velcro was just scratching my skin. Tiberius had some story about an Italian company and motorcycle helmets having a trade dress conflict with the mask or something, but it sounded fishy to me. I loved how it looked but it was not a good design. Thanks for the info on hydrotech! I never had those details and I had always wanted to know more about it!

Solid vid, I remember when the propane one was coming out, such an interesting concept, but also kind of scary. I wonder if there was ever any incidents.

The Evs HUD

Oh man C-3 tippman. So awesome!

I own a C3. I loved pump guns and the weirder they got the more I wanted them. The C3's propane system is really quite safe, propane only ignites at the correct fuel/air ratio and the combustion chamber only allows for a teeny amount of fuel. In my experience the biggest problem was getting reliable ignition as temperature and humidity changed. The spark ignition meant you often experienced a lag between pulling the trigger and getting the paintball downrange; not great when split-seconds matter.

There was the company that made the finned paintballs made for converted PMI and Bushmaster sniper paintball rifles. Another was the XL Tippman Squadbuster that was twice the size and was like throwing an oversized wet noodle

8:01 I heard that On a side note, the torque loader. Our team used them in 08 and they were really cool for the time. You could take them apart without tools and it was very efficient on batteries. The only problem is that the motor would be running the whole time. I still have it as a backup loader.

Made my night when he stopped to think Bass Pro Wear house, fisherman’s wear house! Haha I love this channel

I never got to shoot hydrotec but I heard from someone it shot squirrely from being light. The person I talked to gave me a handful of them and I just kind of kept them around in the top pouch of my eclipse backpack. I finally threw them away prob 2 yrs ago. The shell was weird you could push it in and dent it and itd pop itself out. It felt kind of like those cheap plastic coffee lids that go on like styrofoam cups.

Oh man we got a deal on a bunch of polar ice from our pmi sponsor and it was basically like rubber bc it was designed to work in cold climates, not 105 degrees temps in Texas. We all got hurt in those practices.

Back in the day when I played, I had an all metal mask. It was heavy and I had to rig a top strap to keep in on but it was but more breathable which was great for an out of shape man like myself.

Amazing Thanks!! Do an Icon Paintball thing, I like those Spyder Clones, had a blast.

I’ve been out of the game since 2012. These videos are making me wanna get back in.

AKA "Dissolved Animals" would be a bomb-ass paintball team name.

I haven't searched to see if it still exists but I used to get cases of big ball seconds. Loved those. Waxy and hard for the other player to cheat wipe their hits. It also caked as it dried because it was so thick and waxy.

I miss RP Scherer Marballizer and AllStars. Great thick fill you werent wiping, bit heavier so flew great, and the shells were brittle but tough enough, didnt swell, rarely barrel broke but easily broke on impact. Great stuff. That GAP scented paint was fun too 😂

I would have definitely loved to use those paintballs, I feel like if they'd made a FS round with that tech, it would have been game-changing.

Great video! 👌

Bought a C3 used off eBay to try out back when they were still being sold new. Played one day with it. I was using a Tippmann Sl-68 as my primary at the time. By comparison, the C3 felt huge in the hands. Also shot consistently seemed off, again in comparison. I remember having high hopes for it, but it felt really weird compared to the SL-68. I'd guess it'd feel downright clunky now, after having shot much better pumps since.

LET'S GOOOOO, HE IS BACK

You got the non-newtonian fluid backwards if used as a paintball fill. It's going to be liquid when it's at rest, but when it hits something it's going to become a solid. That's probably the problem with them breaking on impact. I do remember a company in the late '90s, maybe really early '00s (before 2002 for sure) coming out with a shell I was told was starch-based. The surface wasn't smooth; it had a lot of "tooth". And they seemed to be really hard to break. I remember when the Pro Flex came out. We started getting bounces off masks and it was all anybody would wear. One thing to remember about the foam around the goggles is that it's there to keep stuff from sneaking in behind the goggles and into your eyes.

Oh it's been at least 30 years since I played PB. Much has happened since then. At the time automatic PB markers were not legal where I lived so it was pump action all the way. A friend had a .50 caliber revolver, but the balls were rock hard and almost never ruptured. The goto gun for most serious players were the Phantom. Personally I bought two guns. First a Razorback with the long barrel. It was pretty simple and very reliable. Then I bought a Line SI Bushmaster that had been used by a pretty highly ranked team in the UK before they switched to the Sterling. The Bushmaster were hot rodded all the way with LAPCO internals and was incredibly smooth. The most common mask used was a JC something. It had some problems as it tended to make you chew paint when hit in face so I got a Predator mask instead. It had better sight radius and would protect you from having to eat paint. Never competed, only played for fun in wood land matches. I stopped playing when most people started taking it much to serious for my idea of having fun. It may sound as only pump matches would have to be slow and simple, but some people could get about ten BPS out of a well decked out Phantom. I remember hiding behind a juniper when one of those figured out where I was. That juniper bent over more or less horizontally out of the cloud of balls hitting it and I was thoroughly drenched in paint. What exposed me was that an opposing player took cover a few meters from me behind a tree. I was totally exposed to him and yet he didn't notice and he was close enough that I felt bad about tagging him so I put a ball in his boot to his surprise. But the one then tagging me through the juniper was protecting their flag, and I was maybe ten meters from him when he saw what happened. Lots of fun memories but no chance of reviving the game. Brain damage last winter has me walking with a rollator. Taking that to the field would not be fun. At least not fun for me.

Autococker flatline barrel or slam pods

those angel eye goggles got picked up by some prop houses. i can't remember where but i saw more than few of them on screen at same time in some tv show a few years ago.

I worked at a big field and store from 2008-2015 and 50 caliber didn’t take off at all, only sold it in kids pump markers to get young people into the sport.

Dayum, the hydrotec balls sound so good Wish that powderballs were more common for fields just for the cleanliness-

I remember all the rage when hydrotech was coming out. So much promise but never heard about it again. Got to try on the angel eyes at HB2010. It wasn’t big but the lens going above the frame just didn’t look right.

LMAO the Pinokio hopper! Forgot about those

I had a Crossman pump crossover marker with an 18" microhoned barrel. I could put a ball downfield every 2 seconds. It was a much simpler sport 30 years ago. In one day I got almost 50 kills on people with shorter range and faster rate of fire.

We forgotten why we shoot under 300fps thats why 50 cal never stuck, we dont want to shot it faster and we dont know why....

man i used to love my tippmann A5 and flatline barrel

I forgot all about hydrotech and I remember being pretty excited when it was first talked about.

I have a Tipman C3 😂 it's dope.. wish they made a semi auto version. Thanks for info on 30k rounds 😂 no wonder I never used a tank

The thing about 50 caliber is I remember using it in the 50s. It did not catch on in the 50s because of the shorter range, poor accuracy, and tendency to bounce. Fast forward 30 years, and 50 caliber was "rediscovered" and was going to make paintball better.... then people realized that it still had all the same problems. The C3 was the issue that it occationally shoicked the user from its piezo trigger.

Looking at these new guns I’m thinking my Tippmann Pro-lite from 1995 would probably not be very competitive now, but it was a beast back then.

New Designz "kick" drop forward like product. It was a triangle of aluminum that angled the tank up towards the hopper by about 15 degrees. This dropped the hight of a gun (when shouldered) and took a little off of the overall length. The result was you could get really really tight. I do not get why this product didnt catch on more. My only guess was that it was theoretically harder to line up a shot, or that airball play didnt demand such tight setups. It was an absolute dream to snapshoot whith a ndz kick but it did require getting used to how the market sat when you shouldered it.

Wow I did not know the C3 existed. 30,000 shots on a tank is nuts.

I liked my c3. The only thing that killed it for me was the inability to change barrels. I would have to use big bore size paintballs to prevent role out. But a cool woodsball toy.

I wonder if there was a correlation between people reducing air pressure and the paintballs not breaking properly

ngl the C3 sounds absolutely awesome for certain specific applications.

Hey what is your GoPro setting, after seeing your video about them I bought one and it kinda looks weird

I always used Proball Paint when available...even though they were close to $80 a case in the late 90s (and came with fewer balls per case.) They just shot better than the Zap, and the Wipers HATED them because of the non-Newtonian fill.

It would be awesome to see something else that works the same or better I hope the dream doesn't die

Awesome video

I would imagine oobleck in a paintball would feel like being shot by those riot rubber balls.

For real on the paintballs. The standard of roundness is horrible and i actually think paintballs were rounder in the early 2000s. Bigger paint as well. I would sacrifice fill consistences for rounder paint any day

As a big nose guy, I can appreciate the Angel Eyes concept.

Man Im old I remember all of these haven't played since I was 23 though. Man I miss old etek 3. I also miss tech pb a little.

Question: why do you feel nervous with a CA tank? I’m just starting with paintball, got a tippmann x7 phenom that uses compressed air

Anychance someone will pick up those Hydrotech paintballs again or is paintball too small now for it?

This was super interesting