All About Paintball Barrels

Not all paintball barrels are the same. Some paintball barrels may have the same appearance but their characteristics are very different. In general, paintball barrels come in twelve, fourteen, sixteen, eighteen and twenty inches. However, some paintball players have their barrels customized and may even reach a whooping forty eight inches. The length of a paintball barrel has no effect on the paintball markers accuracy. On the other hand, longer paintball barrels tend to make less noise than short barrels.

This is because long paintball barrels allow the excess gas to escape slower than short barrels. With this, it allows the shooter to “sight in” faster by which would eventually lead to the perception that longer barrels are more accurate than short barrels. Long paintball barrels also require more boost in order for the paintball to travel at the required velocity.

Most paintball markers have ports. Ports are the holes on the end of the barrels. Ports allow the air thrust to scatter hence decreasing the sound of the paintball marker. On the other hand, too much porting on the paintball barrel minimizes the efficiency of the paintball marker because it allows the air thrust to scatter more easily. There are three variants of paintball barrels. These are the one piece, two piece and three piece variants. Almost all one piece barrels are made up of aluminum. These types of paintball barrels come in cheap and are lightweight. The advantage of these types of barrels is that they can easily be anodized with a variety of colors.

The disadvantage of aluminum barrels is that they tend to have higher friction and easily get scratched. Stainless steel paintball barrels are more durable than aluminum barrels. Stainless steel barrels also are scratch resistant and have less friction than aluminum marker barrels. However stainless steel barrels are much heavier and more expensive. Ceramic paintball barrels have lots of advantages over other types of marker barrels. Ceramic marker barrels are reasonably cheaper and low in friction. Also ceramic marker barrels are “self cleaning”. If the paintball accidentally breaks inside the barrel, all you have to do to dislodge the debris is to fire a few rounds. They are also quite durable even if they look breakable.

In the earlier paintball markers, most of its barrels are made up of brass. But now it is rarely used because it is very much heavier and can get scratched and dented easily than other materials. Although its greatest advantage is that it has very little friction. Although two piece paintball barrels are more expensive than one piece barrel types, two piece paintball barrels offer the best performance.

However the type barrel is frequently immaterial when it comes to accuracy. The quality of the barrel is more important than the type.