Paintball Magazine, June 2020 June 2020 | Page 55

and rate of fire that you are not allowed to shoot above for safeties sake. In a nutshell, any paintball gun from the last 15 years, if properly maintained is just as effective as something new. That means buy used right? Wrong. The key words of that last sentence were “properly maintained.” Take the autococker for example. Arguably the best paintball marker ever made. It is also probably the single hardest paintball gun to maintain with so many moving parts that need constant upkeep. How good are you at paintball gun maintenance? Personally, I love getting an older gun, tearing it apart and making it sing again. I enjoy that almost as much as playing itself. It is a lot of work though. New guns while not much of an upgrade on performance are a huge upgrade on maintenance requirements. They are designed to be taken apart quickly and easily without tools. Field stripped without having springs and screws launching across the parking lot. They have also been designed to be more air efficient and work at lower operating pressures so that they are much nicer on todays newer, more fragile paints. So, we are now back to the question of should we buy new or used? My response is why are you asking me? Do I look like a magic 8 ball?