[Andrew Wyatt]

I noticed some 6mm paintballs (intended for airsoft guns) on sale, and was wondering about loading these into shotgun rounds.


with a styrofoam wad, a really light dose of powder, and shredded styrofoam filler, would these be workable? how light a charge is the minimum for a 12 gauge hull?

[TrapperReady]

What would you be using them for? Even if you were EXTREMELY careful, I would never advocate shooting them at another person. Too much potential for injury, either from the paintball or other expended debris. Not to mention the tragic consequences if you were to "mix up" your shells with some other reloads.

[Al Thompson]

Andrew, if it's a pump, charge is immaterial. :)

[Andrew Wyatt]

i mostly want to see if i can get the velocity down low enough that the paintballs don't break. if i can do that, perhaps with more r&D, and added design elements, like a short hull and chamber spacer so you don't end up mixing up paint rounds with real rounds, i could come up with a decent force on force training tool.


that'll be aways in the future, though.

[Badger Arms]

Shotgun powder burns too fast. I'd imagine that you'd get too sharp a push that would break them all before they even got halfway down the barrel. You'd do better using pneumatics such as compressed air and PVC pipe. A few hours, a hacksaw, and a little ingenuity and you could adapt the 'potato cannon' concept to act as paintball grapeshot.

[Andrew Wyatt]

that would defeat the purpose of haing it as a force on forse tool, though.

...unless i made the ammo such that the firing pin hit opened a valve on a compressed air canister or something.

[uabfan]

During the police academy "simunition" training I got tagged in the head with a 12g paintball and it hurt like a &%#$@*....took 2 weeks for that welt to go away. They were using a Rem870, not sure if stock barrel or specific to the application. The simunition rounds were tapered down to about 2/3 the size of normal 12g shell. I know the military uses similar simunition training...must be a company on the 'net selling simunition, barrels, accessories, etc.

Even if you don't buy from them, could give you some ideas on how to make it work.

[Andrew Wyatt]

i looked at their stuff and found it lacking. no multiple projectiles.


the 12 gauge simunitions are just sleeves for the 9mm ammo to adapt them to bore size. also, simuniton is expensive and unavailable, except to LE and trainers.

[Nippy]

I think the paintballs would have to be encapsulated in something during the duration while they are in the barrel. You’d also want to minimize movement of the balls inside the munitions during discharge so they won’t bang against the rear during the initial acceleration and break. I guess the load would have to be pretty darn light and you can use this in a pump because the semi won’t cycle by itself with a light load. This sounds cool, hope you don’t give up on this too easily.
I dunno what you’re load would be like but I guess if you’re a ME you can try to calculate how hot you’re load should be to attain a muzzle velocity of about 300ft/s. That’s how fast a paintball gun will shoot.

[Andrew Wyatt]

I'm plannning on using a really cushy wad that is full length, and shredded styrene as buffer material.

[Poodleshooter]

Regular paintball= .68". Most 12 gauge slugs= .68-.69"
Of course acceleration is the killer. A magnum primer + plastic wad and a paintball fired through a cylinder bore would be interesting.
I still would never shoot it at a person. I've got this hangup with pointing guns at folks.

[SDC]

You might be able to load these rounds with primers only, provided you modify the cases so you don't have to crimp them, and the pellets are held in friction-tight; primers have a lot more OOOMPH than most people give them credit for. If you have to fold the cases over to crimp them, I think you'd end up breaking more of the pellets inside the shell than would ever get out the barrel in one piece. You're also going to have to make sure that none of your packing material is going to penetrate vents, etc. on the eye and face protection you'll be wearing. Lastly, if you're thinking about using these on a real paintball field, I can imagine most field operators telling you to take a long walk on a short pier before they'd let you use that on their customers (liability, dontcha know).

[CWL]

I'm not convinced that you will be able to simulate buckshot loads using paintball rounds. It would be pretty dangerous to rely on the performance of underloaded paintball shells to the performance of real 00 buck shells.

There are already simunitions for this purpose.

[Andrew Wyatt]

they're single projectile rounds, though.


i'll look into it further. perhaps it can be made to work. perhaps not.

[rebbryan]

i think you may be somewhat confused, your first post goes from airsoft pellets to paintball. two totally different things. paintballs can break from being shot at around 400 fps by air, i doubt you'll be able to get the speed down to that or lower, they'll break in your barrell. the airsoft pellets are just plastic rounds, no paint inside, those you could conceivably do.

[Andrew Wyatt]

6mm paintballs (intended for airsoft guns)

[zahc]

the airsoft pellets are just plastic rounds, no paint inside, those you could conceivably do.

They do make airsoft paintballs. They are terribly bad though.



You'd do better using pneumatics such as compressed air and PVC pipe. A few hours, a hacksaw, and a little ingenuity and you could adapt the 'potato cannon' concept to act as paintball grapeshot.

Or just play paintball.

FWIW I've experimented a bit with my spudgun, using cheap paintballs I needed to dispose of and shot cups made of styrofoam cups. 20 brass eagle paintballs made a heck of a 2 foot pattern on the barn from about 15 yds:D :D

It is un-cronoable though (think major pain and suffering), so I'd have to make a pnematic spudgun (nothing new BTW) with an air guage, so that the velocity could be consistant.

I dislike the idea of pointing real guns at people as well.

[Sir Galahad]

How is this an effective tool? At given and estimated distances, if you pattern the gun, you're going to see where those pellets hit on average. I don't know, maybe it's just me and my crazy kinfolk, but my grandad said NEVER point a gun at someone unless you're aiming to kill that man. Let's see, I've patterned my street howitzer and found the loads it likes. I've shot skeet with those loads (at a safe place to do so) and gained confidence in moving targets with that buckshot. I don't know, I have the utmost confidence in my blaster and when I look at it, I can actually visualize all the things it has disintegrated. If a shotgun patterns "X" with load "Y" at a given distance, then you know to expect "X" from it at that distance with load "Y". If you want to shoot a moving human silhoutte, get some dept. store maniquins and make a pulley-and-slide where they can be pulled from a safe distance and plugged at or put the rope at an angle and let them slide down and plug away. Then you can check them out and see where the pellets from your actual real loads struck the dummy. Then you can put a spot of silicon seal in the hole and tape over it and use it again and again. When you're done, fill in the holes with silicone seal and paint. It's ready for the next time. If you can't find maniquins, use plywood cut outs of silhouttes at different angles of the torso.

[Andrew Wyatt]

1. plywood mannequins don't move.

2. I have already patterned my shotgun with a bunch of different loads and decided on both a buckshot AND a slug loading.

3. Force on force training is something that's handy, and as stated before: perhaps with more r&D, and added design elements, like a short hull and chamber spacer so you don't end up mixing up paint rounds with real rounds, i could come up with a decent force on force training tool.

[Sir Galahad]

Well, I didn't get to be 36 years old (well, ok, I'll be 36 in a couple weeks:D) by playing around with firearms or people playing around with them with me. I would guess that in things like "Simunition", it is a highly-controlled environment run by people who are trained in its use. Even so, I have heard of one accident that happened in Simunition. It's when the average joe (yes, you, and me, and lots of others whose first job is not simunition training or cop or so forth) tries to duplicate these things that tragedy happens. There, I've said my piece. I'm just an average joe, but I've seen a lot of industrial accidents caused by jerry-rigging. Jerry-rigging is like that. Know why? Because you can't predict the results and it hasn't been tested in a series of controlled experiments on machines that don't bleed to death or lose an eye if it goes wrong. Not trying to play the age card, Andrew, but seen way too many people hurt by jerry-rigging.

[Andrew Wyatt]

Who said i'd "jerry rig" anything? I'm not stupid, and I'm not going to load up some paintball rounds and run around blasting people.


I just wanted to see if i could make a shotgun round that shot the little 6mm paintballs. I asked for help on here, and got a bunch of responses basically calling me an idiot for ever thinking of trying something new.

:rolleyes:

[Nippy]

keep on keepin on Andrew, don't mind the critisism.

[arinvolvo]

Andrew, there is a lot of that around here, dont worry about it...

As for the paintballs, coming from someone who played national competitive paintball for many years, and recreationally for 8 years....I have to say, it all depends on the balls.

Some paintballs are very brittle, will break if dropped on hard ground...Some paintballs are tough, and can be bounced like a golf ball.

Sadly however, the 6mm paintballs are by nature, very brittle....I have never seen any of these that were tough enough to stand up to a shotgun blast.

I dont think....

If you were to get a very fresh batch of the 6mm balls, you might have luck...the thing is, those 6mm rounds are not popular...they are manufactured and then sit on shelves for months and months, maybe a year....before they hit the consumer.

In tournament paintball, we throw out bags of paint that has been open for more than a day...too much riding on reliability and roundness of the paint.

The geletain capsule wil suck ambient moisture out of the air....making it swell, and not uniformly...they will get out of round easily....and then if they are left to dry out again...they will stay "out of round" and get very brittle.

paintballs are a strange thing.

[c_yeager]

If you want to get this to work as a "legitimate" training device (not just for Ss&Gs) your not only going to have to get the things to work, your going to have to get the paint balls to pattern in some realistic manner. sounds like a neat challenge.

[arinvolvo]

For use as a training tool, how about just some sort of a projectile, but one that is incapable of penetrating anything....

Something like styrofoam pellets, like those used to stuff beanbag chairs.

Of course, getting something like that to pattern well might prove to be impossible.

[Andrew Wyatt]

I'm thinking of using those .40 caliber pellets. those are closer to buckshot, and i think 8 might fit in the case.

[Sir Galahad]

"Don't call me stupid!"
------Otto, from "A Fish Called Wanda"

[Cameron Lamont]

Now that is one of the funniest posts I have seen on here.

Cameron

[rebbryan]

i'm pretty sure they have airsoft shotguns, just buy one of those

[c_yeager]

rebbryan, this was a lot more fun before you introduced a perfectly simple answer that made way more sense than anything so far.

[Andrew Wyatt]

last i checked, they didn't make airsoft mossberg 500s that cost as much as a box of 12 gauge ammo.