What marker should I buy for my kid?

[Chuck E Ducky]

Depending on your budget but I think a 18OR / 170R and a LTR with an exalt speed feed HK 36/45 Tank would be a nice short reliable setup. (They are all aluminum)

ETHA 3 would be another great option with a similar setup. (Bottom half is plastic)

Probably better deals in the used market especially if you can refinish one.

[murderbymodem]

If that's true then it's even worse because it means someone intimately familiar with paintball made the choices to design things like a non serviceable regulator

The regulator is serviceable according to Simon. There is a breakdown video of the original Axe from Simon (2011) still up on the Empire YouTube channel, he mentions it at 11:00.

[JohnB]

If you don’t mind getting a special tool or cutting a channel in a flat head if I remember correctly

[RPP]

One option is getting an eNMey because you can add a drop forward do it. Light, cheap and pretty durable. Makes it a little more manageable for shorter armed humans.

[flyweightnate]

Here's a contrarian opinion. Whatever you get, also get him a Pirhana or Spyder, just so he has something to tinker with on the cheap.

Make sure he not only can have fun playing, but also have fun teching. Try different valve pins, springs, hammer weights, etc.

I think I enjoy tinkering more than playing at this point, partially due to bad weather and a bad knee.

[Rainmaker]

My son is 13, and i'm hoping to get him out on the field a few times this year. I've got a couple 98s to start with before I pull out something nicer. I kinda want him to appreciate the contrast if I can. Also, that's a good point about teching/tinkering with something simple and cheap. He loves taking stuff apart, and the 98 or one of the Azodins will be less intimidating (and cheaper if he loses/breaks something). But I do also want to hand him something that RIPS soon afterwards so I can see the look on his face when it's shooting faster than he can pull the trigger

[SockeyeSteve]

I've had my son (11) shooting trees for years using older markers, autocockers, Shockers, really anything I've had that I've tinkered with. Took him out for the first time this year and a member here let him use an Emek. He was hooked but I got him an Etha 2. He was taking heads off last weekend he could shoot so fast. I think he and I blew through 2 cases in like 3 hours😂

[SockeyeSteve]

I blame Super Nova for letting him hold an ID emek after using the stock one and want to give a huge thank you to Maxwell for this trade because I think I've officially added another lifelong baller to our ranks

[Trbo323]

The regulator is serviceable according to Simon. There is a breakdown video of the original Axe from Simon (2011) still up on the Empire YouTube channel, he mentions it at 11:00.

"we still don't recommend if you don't know what you are doing taking the regulator apart"

You'll notice he doesn't take it apart and then says

"That is the complete disassembly that we recommend"

It was never designed to be end user serviced. That doesn't mean it absolutely can not be. Technically, crimped cocker rams CAN be serviced as well. That doesn't mean they were ever intended to be. But last I looked empire doesn't even put the internal parts of the regulator in the manual. The whole regulator is listed as one part. You need to buy a few non standard tools and basically figure it out on your own because empire sure isn't doing anything to help you. Considering they are ok with a o ring cross section difference of 0.1mm elsewhere on the marker you better have high confidence you can measure the rings correctly or wherever you get the sizes from has a way to do it correctly.

The mini+variants are one of the only designs I typically tell people that if they suspect something is wrong with the regulator, rebuilding is risky and replacing it is a decent option

Sent from my motorola edge 2024 using Tapatalk

[William the Third]

The JBS King Cobra is where the design for the Mini/Axe came from, and was refined by Simon.