FS Shelf Life

[Nish]

Pretty straight forward I suppose. We all know paintballs are only going to store for so long and shipping be decent.

How long can you keep your opened bag of zoom bots before they are no good to use?

[netsurferdude2]

No official answer here, just anecdotal, but the zoom dots I use for testing shoot just as well as new ones and they are going on 3-4 years old now.

[JeepDVLZ45]

I also used up an opened back a couple months ago, it was open in my basement for…at least 2 years. No issues with it whatsoever.

i guess they’re “non-perishables”

[SniperPedik]

I'd do the same thing as regular paint, keep them cool and rotate them every so often and they last

[Jonnydread]

Same. I find the paint can "pool" if they're stored on one side for too long. I keep them in 10rd tubes and flip the orientation every few weeks.

[XEMON]

I keep mine nose down in 10rd tubes

[uv_halo]

Sunlight is their major enemy, their shells should become more fragile with more exposure but, we're talking years before anything visibly different appears.

The fill seperates, pretty quickly into an oily substance and, a thicker filler material (insepcting with a high power LED shining through it, I've also noticed a slightly smaller than BB-sized air bubble). I've found shaking them gets them back up to an even mix (and the air bubble remains). Even if they are evenly mixed while in the bag, as soon as you load them into magazines, the fill will start to settle to the bottom (one side if your rounds are facing horizontally),

This is another reason why I suspect rifling is a benefit. If they leave the barrel with the denser material less evenly spread around in the payload section, that would change the center of gravity, and spinning them in the open air would make them behavve like an out of round tire until the fill evened out. If they are spinning in the barrel, this gives them time for the fill to spread out while stabilized by the barrel. Of course, there's really no practical way to confirm this.

I've not seen any evidence of biological activity (spoiling), or polymerization in the fill. So, I suspect that they can just be shaken. If any turned out to be particularly stubborn, those little nail polish / hobby paint vibrational mixers (where you push the bottle down to activate the vibration) would work fine.

[uv_halo]

I've noticed a couple times now where folks are asking in the Ask The Experts section like they should but, in the long run, it would make sense to move topics like this to the First Strike section for 'archiving' and discovery. Is it possible for a mod to move threads these days?

[Carp]

Yep, we need to do it at least weekly, more often daily. I'll let Nish decide when/where he wants this one. But, if you can identify some of the others you would like moved... Just let one of the mods know which they are. 😉

[Jimmydee]

Better not risk it. Shoot me a pm and sell em to me for a reduced, been sitting and old, price lol

[Nish]

Be more fun to meet up, split them and shoot them at each other

[Jimmydee]

That’s very true Nish

[Frmrspec]

I used a bunch of the OG silver first strikes (sold by the tube) a couple years ago with no ill consequence.... my current lot is from Pre-covid and still shooting great...