Chris Schneck

If playing paintball in the woods is your thing, you undoubtedly own something in olive drab or some other easily available camouflage pattern. Camouflage has been evolving since the beginning of the predator prey relationship, with survival being its only purpose. Human adorned military camouflage and the science of visual acuity have only been around since the mid 19th century, but our big human brains have learned much.

The sole purpose of camouflage is to break up and conceal the recognizable geometric shape of an object with its surrounding environment. Camouflage makes an object difficult to detect by emulating the immediate visual background. The colouring, size and distribution of pattern elements must necessarily be in aspects pertinent to the visual system of the observer.

So literally the best camouflage is one that looks as similar as possible in all aspects to your immediate surroundings in both colour and pattern.

There are all kinds of terrains and climates with their own flora and fauna, it will be nearly impossible for you to own the perfect camouflage for every event and locale. Even if you do own a pattern that matches the surroundings that you normally play on, are you using your camouflage in such a way that it breaks up the recognizable geometric outline of the human body? Regardless of your body being covered in a sufficient visually disruptive pattern, what about your mask and marker? If anything is going to give you away while playing woodsball its going to be thundering around like a fool, the silhouette of the visor on your mask, the mask itself or the silhouette of your marker.

Movement, or lack of movement, is very much a part of effective camouflage. You’ve most likely seen pictures that demonstrate a particular camouflage patterns capabilities and there’s one thing that all these pictures have in common. The concealed subject isn’t moving! On top of a still picture not recreating the movement of a natural environment the concealed subject in the demonstration pictures is, 90% of the time, not carrying any paintball gear! As long as you remain motionless, theres less of a chance your mask or marker will give you concealed position away, but as soon as you raise your marker to take aim, or poke your head up to see whats going on, its pretty much all over.

There is one expensive solution that might be practical depending on your style of play, the ghillie suit, aka the ‘yowie suit’. This form of camouflage first made an appearance in 1916 during the second Boer War and is named after a type of tree spirit that is supposed to disguise itself in leaves and vegetation. A ghillie suit is often comprised of several pounds of jute thread, and is incredibly hot to wear. Since these suits take a considerable amount of time to manufacture, they are often also expensive. Although highly effective, the ghillie is only as capable as its wearer, again movement will give you away even if you are head to toe looking like a mossy swamp thing.

So which easily available camouflage pattern is the best? How much do I have to pay and who do I have to go to, to get the best camouflage?

It’s been my experience that as long as you are wearing a natural and abundant colour, like the very common olive drab, and you pay attention to how you move and your position in your surroundings in relation to potential objectives you’ll regularly surprise people. Stay low, move cautiously and with intent, crawl often as people aren’t expecting that. Don’t second guess yourself, once you’ve decided to move, commit to the movement. Use brush as cover, as long as there is 2 or 3 inches of foliage between you and a potential hotspot you are less likely to be seen, natural cover is the best!

Sound is also an integral part to camouflage, shut the hell up and remember to practice and use your hand signals or invest in some radios and headset / mic combos. Combat boots are nice, I wear them, but running shoes are quieter and should be considered as an alternative.

In the end the camouflage is only as good as the person wearing it, very much like a paintball marker is only as good as the person operating it.

If you’ve ever played a large enough game to warrant the use of radios you already know how just plain awesome and genuinely useful they can be. Just as anything else in paintball, or any other hobby actually, there are a few expensive mistakes you can make a long the way before you find the perfect practical working combination between cost and functionality. The radios featured in this article are admittedly a couple years old, but no less effective or relevant.

The Motorola T6500 FRS/GMRS radios have stood up well to plenty of outdoor abuse. I’ve used these in all weather conditions and only once when there was 4 inches of snow on the ground and it was raining and muddy did they have a hiccup, but that very well could have been the headset getting damp. A rugged radio like this model is ideal for the beating that comes with playing woodsball. The T6500’s come with rechargeable battery packs and a charging stand, but I would ditch the battery packs and go straight to consuming straight up AA’s. Each T6500 takes 3 AA batteries and battery life is quite good, I’ve never had to panic and swap out during a days play. The complete list of features is quite impressive: 22 channels, PTT, VOX, pad lockout, etc. check out the main product page here. They’ve been shot, dived on, dropped and stepped on and Motorola T6500’s get an overwhelming thumbs up.

A good radio in pair with a good headset & microphone combo increase the advantage you have over your opponents. If you have only 2 radios in a squad of 8, you can maneuver 2 groups of 4 people in and out of danger without the other team knowing what really just happened. At the end of the day they will most definitely be asking themselves how you always seemed to pop up out of nowhere with such a showing of force.

More importantly then what brand I would recommend is of course the technical information. The most important tidbit is the difference between FRS and GMRS.

FRS stands for Family Radio Service. Radios that are only FRS compatible will be limited to 500 milliwatts of power. Unfortunately for Americans the FCC has regulated that to use anything more powerful you have to pay a licensing fee, currently at $85USD. FRS radios are just fine for short range use and are very often affordable to anyone!

GMRS stands for General Mobile Radio Service. In the United States, licensed GMRS operators are permitted to transmit at up to 50 Watts of power It’s more likely that the GMRS radios you buy will be powered at the same level as my T6500 radios, outputting a blistering 1 watt and providing you with ample range in which to communicate with.

PTT stands for Push To Talk. Either the button on the body of the radio or the button on the cable that leads to the plugged in microphone can be pushed to initiate a transmission. Having a boom mic under your mask is an enormous advantage, you can literally whisper and be heard by the person on the other end. Excellent for directing movement or fire from a concealed position.

VOX stands for Voice Operated Transmission/Transmitter. So why isn’t the acronym VOT? I have no idea. Although I HIGHLY recommend you don’t use this feature. With all the running, gunning and shouting you’re going to be doing it will sound more like a violent obscene phone call then anything tactically useful.

VOX = *pant*pant*pant*oh crap*pop*pop*pant*pop*IM HIT IM HIT*

c02 is not at all a stable propellant, your 20oz c02 tank can have a theoretical output of anywhere from 0psi to 3000psi. 0psi being empty and 3000psi being the limit of the burst disk on the valve of your c02 tank. c02 in its liquid form can escape from the tank and make its way into your marker causing velocity spikes, catastrophic valve or oring damage and internal freezing & binding of moving parts. Ambient temperature can also increase ( hot weather ) or reduce ( cold weather ) the output pressure of your c02 source.

Also read : Anti-Syphon Tubes and c02

So if c02 is so temperamental why do so many people use it?

It’s cheap and easily available. Every paintball store carries and fills c02 tanks, all paintball fields offer c02 fills and smaller sized c02 tanks have an infinite working life. For the volume or size you can expect to get far more shots from a c02 tank then a HPA tank of comparable physical size.

Also read : How many shots will I get out of my tank?

I’ve never noticed a problem with my paintball marker before, can I really improve any aspect of my paintball markers performance or reliability?

Absolutely, as long as you stick to the smart upgrades and not something that just looks good. Which brings me to the massive and very essential difference between regulators & expansion chambers and pressure & volume.

A regulators primary function is to regulate pressure. I personally run a Palmers Pursuit stabilizer on my Tippmann A5 and with the turn of an allen key I can increase or decrease the pressure I want to operate my paintball marker at to anywhere from 0psi - 900psi. The normal operating pressure of a Tippmann A5 is approximately 800psi, but with lots of love and care ( and upgrades ) I can run at 400psi.

Why is a consistent pressure desirable?

The velocity at which the paintball leaves your marker will be more consistent. How the paintball travels down the barrel of your marker and travels in flight will also be more consistent. I didn’t say accurate there, because accuracy is a combination of mechanics and skill, consistency is purely mechanical.

Why is a lower pressure desirable?

Lower operating pressure :

• will reduces the kick back of your marker, making it easier to place paint on paint
• is more gentle on the orings, springs and other internals of your marker. Elongating the life of your marker and its precious internals
• in some cases can reduces the audible report of your marker

Are there any drawbacks to a lower operating pressure?

Not really, but you have to consider that you still need to apply the same amount of force to a paintball to get it to travel at an optimal 300fps. So when you reduce the pressure of the propellant you have to increase the volume of the propellant. This now will introduce you to a new term known as dwell. Dwell is the length of time your markers valve will stay open, an open valve releases a volume of air. On lower end mechanical markers, like Tippmann and BT markers, there is no way to adjust the dwell without buying aftermarket parts or manually modifying the rear hammer spring. Tweaking your operating pressure in conjunction with your dwell will produce the highest efficiency possible.

An expansion chambers primary function is to provide liquid c02 with extra space in which to expand into a gas state. Expansion chambers are especially useful in colder climates or on c02 powered markers that need to sustain a higher rate of fire.

Also read : Winter performance with c02 powered markers

Unfortunately although expansion chambers will provide a high volume of propellant, they have no form of regulating your operating pressure, you will still be at the mercy of c02’s temperamental nature.