The long awaited (about 2 years) Macdev paintball barrel kits have finally arrived. Macdev is a small manufacturing firm based out of Austraila. They made their claim to fame by developing the Cyborg paintball marker and then the Conquest Air System. The Macdev has enjoyed an ever growing “cult” following by producing very high end paintball products at a midlevel price.

In 2005 they came out with their Matchstik barrel kits which was top grade barrel kit at an entry level price. Due to machine time limitation they finally, after about a year of not making any, redesigned and released the Matchstik kits for 2007. MSRP is $140 on these kits. You can check them out here http://www.sakworldpaintball.com/matchstik.html

What’s the difference between n2 (nitrogen) and
Compressed Air (aka High Pressure Air -H.P.A.). Well simply put in paintball we
use these terms interchangeably. N2 and High Pressure Air have the similar
characteristics while under pressure which is why we can use either gas in our
N2/HPA tanks.  We are going to call the paintball tanks that carry Nitrogen or
Air “Air Tanks”.

Back in the late 1990’s while this technology was first being introduced in
paintball, paintball was a much smaller sport than it is today. Paintball fields
were few and very far from each other and paintball participation rate was 25%
of what it is today. During this time it was cheaper (and less of a risk)  for
paintball fields to lease big tanks filled with Nitrogen to fill the new
Nitrogen Paintball tanks, than it was to go out and buy their own $10,000 Air
Compressor Set Up. Players and fields stated to call these the fill for these
tanks Nitro Fills and the tanks themselves N2 tanks.

As this technology advanced in the early 2000’s the cost of the paintball N2/Air
tanks dropped dramatically, and these paintball tanks became more affordable. 
Paintball player participation also sharply increased which means more people
were showing up to the field with N2 tanks.  Field owners soon realized that it
was much more cost effective for them to own their own Air Compressor System to
fill these paintball tanks on site, and on demand with Compressed Air then to
continue renting N2 tanks.   Its because of this change over in the past 5 years
from Nitrogen to Compress air in paintball the Terms “Air” and “HPA” exist. 
Nitrogen in paintball has been phased out, but the term Nitrogen and Nitro still
live on.
 
So what should I call my N2/Air Tank to stop me
from looking like a newb? I would call it a “Air Tank”. Nitrogen in paintball is
dead.

Please Note: Air is different than CO2. Which is another story.

Presently there is a wide selection of paintball air tanks out their. Ranging
from $69-$300 depending on a number of features. There are Steel (not
recommend), Aluminum, Glass Wrapped, Fiber Wrapped and Carbon Fiber Wrapped
paintball air tanks. These materials basically dictate how light your tank will
be. On the tank will be a regulator which will lower the internal storage
pressure of the tank to a usable pressure your paintball gun can use. You can
find a very wide selection of tanks here
http://www.sakworldpaintball.com/nitrogen.html

We just got some new Tech T Tippmann A5 Lighting Rods and more of their Vortex Cyclone feed upgrades in today.  There great upgrades for your Tippman A5 paintball gun becuase they replace parts that fail constantly in the cyclone feed system and, they can increase your Rate of fire to 25+ BPS which is really needed to take advantage of the Eframes and aftermarket boards out for the A5.

Regardless of the pending “patent infringements” the Draxxus Pulse paintball hopper faces, its a pretty cool hopper.  The way the motor slides out of the body to make for easy body cleaning is a great idea.  Instead of taking 15 min to unscrew all the screws on a halo, pull the shells apart, wipe everything then then re assemble the halo, the Pulse hopper can do it in about 1 min total including cleaning.  It saves time and frustration so you can go back to filling your pods.

The RF chip (optional) for the Draxxus Pulse is also pretty cool.  Its a kick back to the old Angel Intellifeed system to where the the hoper would sense when the gun shot and would feed at the same time.  The Pulse took this concept a little further but getting rid of the wire that connected the Angel and the Hopper and replacing it with RF (Radio Frequency aka Blue Tooth Technology).  The RF chip is a universal transmitter which taps into your solenoid’s power leads.  When you shoot power is sent to your solenoid the RF chip will sense the gun being fired and send a wireless signal to the hopper to feed.

The Draxxus Pulse also claims to have shatter proof shells, we didn’t test that, nor do we put much faith in that but they offer a warranty to back the shells up.  Shells aside, the Draxxus Pulse is a pretty cool paintball hopper.

Please note: The RF chip currently does not work with the WDP ANGEL 1 Paintball Marker.  Its solenoid is so efficient the voltage needed to activate the solenoid is too low for the Draxxus RF chip to sense.

If you haven’t heard already National Paintball Supply (now KEE Action Sports) slapped Pro Caps the maker of the Pulse Paintball Hopper with a Temporary Restraining Order preventing them from manufacturing, selling, distributing, or advertising the PULSE paintball loader. KEE Action Sports is claiming the Pulse infringes on a number of their patents for the HALO Paintball hopper.

You have to wonder what PROCAPS was thinking. I am not a patent attorney, however the Pulse looks exactly the same as the HALO and has a few other similar characteristics.