History of Splash Anodizing in Paintball?

[Meleager7]

Always been curious where this Splash Anodizing love affair came from? Was splash anodizing happening in other hobbies, or was it exclusive to Paintball?

[The Last Snood]

I don't know about anodizing history in paintball but I also yoyo where we have a love for anodizing too.

I would say maybe about 10-15 years ago we really started making crazy stuff; splashes, acid washes, fades, the same stuff you see on guns.

I don't know if there that was the same time frame for paintball, but anodizing in yoyoing is big but not really for custom projects it's usually coming from the factory in these crazy colorways.

*Edit* Added a picture of some of the anno types in yoyos I have, there's more but these were a quick pull from the collection. And there are crazy anno jobs out there.

[Psycho91]

Iv always wanted one of cp's yo-yo, most players don't know thats how they started before paintball

[Chuck E Ducky]

CP use to make some sweet YoYo’s

[Ecapnation]

It all started with Pierre from PK anodizing....

Honestly I think he just was the creative type and somebody allegedly I believe from bad boys toys at the time sent them a gun to work on with a blank check and said do something interesting and creative.

If you look around 95 in magazines you'll see that a lot of the pro guys had single color markers that were very skewed to the color trends of the day teal and mauve and maroon were very prevalent colors and it wasn't anything until late 95 or 96 you started seeing splash showing up.

[the_matrix_guy]

Correct me if I am wrong, but in paintball it was popularized in the early and mid 90's by the British companies like Eclipse and Belsales. It really took off from there. I can't recall any other companies doing them as early as them. Eclipse was even splashing Spyders back then.

[Ecapnation]

Smart parts offered splash kits first

[Fossilhead]

I know it's been a popular way to camo rifles and bows for a long time.

Not anno, but paint.

Because it's easy. A couple rattle cans and some dawn liquid soap.

[Meleager7]

I think a compound bow with all the Aluminum bits and bobs professionally anodized would be pretty bad ass ! Especially the cams !

[Psycho91]

You can get some pretty crazy anodized fishing gear

[wthomas333]

I feel like forest_ptp might have some good knowledge on this topic.

[forest_ptp]

You have had some AMAZING work done over the past few years. Those Armson Semis are about as nice as anything I have ever seen - the SA Flag ano was OVER the top!!!!

[forest_ptp]

Peter Kellett (PK Anodizing) was basically an artist who used graphic anodizing as one of his mediums. He was pretty famous for high end guitars, and various artwork pieces. Being in California (San Jose) it was inevitable that he would "bump" into the paintball industry. He reached out to 6 or 7 of us (Fall '1993 I believe) and offered to do some samples, and we jumped on it, as did Smart Parts. We sent out a variety of parts (a bunch of VMX - probably the only ones that we ever did in splash) in time for the 1994 Knoxville Indoor. Smart Parts was able to get some things done as well. I have another closeup photo of our booth with splash parts (buried somewhere), but here is one with Happy Holton, and the PTP Team Armson Lola... All of our products - F/X Cockers, Micromags, Armson Barrels, accessories were all available in at least 5 patterns by 1995 (growing to about a dozen over time, with a few that were permanent, and others rotated in and out). Piers at PK (great guy from New Zealand) managed probably all of the paintball accounts and was great to work with, - knew the process inside and out. He moved back to NZ in the early 2000's after starting to feel some of the effects (unfortunately) of exposure over a number of years. In late 2005 (?) PK sent out a letter with a doubling/tripling/or more of prices literally overnight, and that put a big damper on things, to say the least. I remember that Kris from Kapp had a bunch of Flame Cockers in process, and took a huge beating (thinking he said the "revised" cost was something like $550/per - yikes!!!). We also had a company in south Florida that did our Wild Satin Iguana pattern, as well as a few real-steel rifles (because they we in-state and I could drive to them and drop/pickup). Needless to say, a fair amount of involvement in the process in the 20+/- years with tens of thousands of parts... This was the quick and dirty view from 30,000 feet...

[Ecapnation]

That iguana ar is like the only AR I would actually pay modern prices for.

[DocsMachine]

I was told- or at least strongly hinted- by PK that the famous "Mountain Dew" Shocker I built...



Was very close to the last of the individual markers- that is, one gun for one customer- that PK did. That anno job cost something like $700(!) After that, they'd only do bulk batches- like 500 or more parts- for businesses, rather than individuals. And I'm given to understand that even that didn't last long, presumably due to Piers moving away, as Forest notes above.

I'd be curious to know if PK "invented" it, or was simply the one that popularized it. We know that masked anodizing, usually for things like the lettering on gauge panels, long predates PK, and may go back as far as WW2. But I can't think of any examples of anything but solid-color anno before starting to see it in paintball. And PB was definitely the first place I ever saw 'splash'.

Doc.