Equipping backyard players

[Wilfortina]

Hey guys, I’m just dipping my toe into the waters of hosting backyard play. It’s going well, no tech issues at all so far! Almost everybody is playing with Nelson style pumps. Somebody brought a tippman 98 last time.

anyway, the problem I’m having is with air. I can’t find anybody who will fill co2 tanks anymore, and the hpa tanks don’t last all that long. They will last a while with pump play…but I don’t like putting heavy tanks on the back of Trracers. 12 grams work great for adults, but my 4th grader has a birthday party coming up where he wants a bunch of 4th graders over. Maybe I can show them how to do the 12 grams changers, but I’m not sure they have the hand strength to really get them seated.

any solutions to the co2 problem? Has anyone successfully used soda stream cartridges or something similar? Should I just get the hpa tanks filled at the local field and put them on remote lines?

[Jonnydread]

You could try what SOZ suggested. Also the desktop compressors have gotten a good bit cheaper if you are patient and have lots of small HPA tanks.

[Painthappy]

I have the small desktop compressor here. It will fill a steel 3000 hpa tank in 20 minutes or something like that. Pre-fill them and you're good to go. They can be picked up cheap or honestly a lot of folks might have some older ones that they'll donate to your cause.

[Cdn_Cuda]

I use Scuba tanks as a main filler, which can get 15-20 fills per tank. They need to have hydro and Visual inspections which have a cost, but it's the most efficient and quickest way to have air for what you are looking at. Get a bunch of 13/3000 tanks and you're set!

[Chappy]

A shoebox or similar compressor plus a bunch of the $25 steelies from ANS to refill is a great start. With enough tanks no need to refill but a scuba for a game day fill station works great for me. I also have a 20 lb co2 tank as well but that’s mainly for those of us used tit he finer things in life lol.

[KMDPB]

I use a yongheng compressor to fill 2 scuba tanks that we take out to the field. Have been doing this for 10 years. Works great.

[$L!mBo]

try limited paint games.
if the nelsons all get decent efficiency, one 12g cart should get 30 good shots.
each kid each game gets a fresh 12ie and 3 tubes and run flag capture games to encourage objective>eliminations
at our outlaw games (with grown ass man children), our games almost never last long enough to require 12g changes in the middle of them if you start out with a freshie. our field is more setup like speedball/hyperball in the woods, most games not lasting longer than 5 min each. so, i guess ymmv.

[Trbo323]

I use Scuba tanks as a main filler, which can get 15-20 fills per tank. They need to have hydro and Visual inspections which have a cost, but it's the most efficient and quickest way to have air for what you are looking at. Get a bunch of 13/3000 tanks and you're set!

This is what I do as well. If people are running out of air filling tanks 1 at a time and each one taking 20 minutes doesn't help much. Scubas allow you to do all the filling before hand and then fill each paintball tank in seconds. Yeah there's visual and hydro on the tanks but no ongoing consumable parts and essentially no risk of them crapping out in the middle of play either.

But, filling at home is very situation specific. For me having a scuba shop 5 minutes down the road is a large factor, if you can't get the scubas filled then it's not a good option.

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[Wilfortina]

Great thoughts, everyone!
I think for my situation I could get an air compressor or use 12ies with limited paint games. I like that idea quite a bit actually…

[The Hobbit]

I’ve seen field compressors with a gas engine pop up for 1200 a few times. Honestly, if i were playing outlaw regularly I’d probably buy one at that price.