Man, old paint has gotten NASTY.

[Drunkscriblerian]

So I went to my local field a couple of months back and ended up with spare paint. Said paint sat in my pods for again, a couple of months because I forgot it was there. I was cleaning out my gear bag in anticipation of playing again, found it and expected it to be dimpled, broken and/or worthless. Instead I found a collection of rubbery, mostly-round rock-type objects I would hesitate to fire at my worst enemy.

Seriously y'all, what the hell? I'm used to paint going bad if it sits in a pod for a few weeks...but I am not used to it turning into a legit missile weapon. This stuff was so rubbery, I had to take it outside and smack it against the pavement to break it...and even then, it just sort of sprung a leak, it didn't actually shatter. When I showed it to my SO her comment was "holy shit, this is like the rubber rounds cops use!" And she wasn't wrong...I definitely wouldn't want to get shot with this stuff.

I'm curious...does all "Field Grade" paint age this way these days? And if so, how long does that take? I like to not waste paint but I sure as shit don't want to shoot a fellow player with what amounts to a riot-control round...

[DocsMachine]

I cracked open my last case of Valken, I think it was, from a local field that closed a couple of years ago. Stored warm, low humidity, indoors, unopened bags.

All four bags were each, one solid block of paint. They had adhered together as if they'd been dipped in superglue. You could not pull off an intact ball.

Doc.

[JeeperCreeper]

I recently found a pod of Graffiti that's 2 years old. It didn't stick together, but it got oily and smelled like hot garbage.

[TF_Aloha]

Paint manufacturers are working HARD to cut costs on ingredients in any way that they can. One of these ways is increasing the amount of recycled gelatin that they use in the shell. Its a practically free waste product from pharmaceutical companies (when you encapsulate capsules, the gel ribbon turn into something that looks like swiss cheese). This recycled gelatin is weaker than virgin gelatin, so they have to get real thick with the shells. When this gelatin absorbs moisture, it gets even thicker and amplifies the rubberiness.

Paint companies also want shelf life since they, and their customers, often store paint way longer than they should, and in bad conditions. This works well for them because a swollen tiny ball (less material with smaller balls) will swell up to medium size and still be shootable through a stock barrel. It does mean though that they want shell hardness at all costs. Many of their customers (bad fields) are hooked on rental money and they don't care if people get nasty wounds from painful paint, they just don't want the paint breaking in barrels, since even noobs will complain about that. Bounces in play are actually preferable, since that means people shoot more.

[SignOfZeta]

I have Graffiti that’s four years old and it’s…totally fine. I also have three year old and two year old Graffiti that is fine. I pretty much only buy Graffiti and I always have some left over. I like how the colors change from year to year. Last year I didn’t buy any since I had so much left over.

Is this like a Supersize Me situation here? Are you omitting that you put left it in the sun for a day? Stuff in pods doesn’t count but still in the bag paint should last much longer before totally dissolving into a brick.

I guess rotating the box REALLY helps?

[Tracker]

I live in the land that rust forgot.. so old paint never gets stuck together or swells, but it will get brittle as hell.. I have multi year old paint that's still round..but I don't dare drop it even on carpet

[drewkroeker]

I had a case of GI 3-star from last year that was stored properly in a climate-controlled storage unit. It was way more brittle than I expected. I was getting barrel breaks out of my emeks and geo. The worst was trying it in my x1-p, which is a pain to disassemble. On the plus side it was breaking very easy on my opponents.

[Frmrspec]

The only paint I’ve had with TERRIBLE shelf life is APX… I’ve got pre-pandemic ultra evil that still shoots amazing and is brittle (got a little oily but I cleaned it with towels). I don’t buy lower end paint because I play so infrequently that I prefer to splurge to guarantee (hopefully) a better experience. I tend to store my paint in air tight containers (1-gallon freezer bags) if they ever get opened