You must know how to clean a paintball gun if you own even one marker, a collection of markers, or gear in general, otherwise, it could be expensive to invest in the new part, and let the paintball fields maintain and clean your marker for you.
Paintball may be the most thrilling outdoor shooting game to pass time with friends, and most pros have their collection of paintball guns and gear in particular including me.
Cleaning and maintaining a paintball gun is essential to ensure durability and constant performance over time. If you don’t clean or maintain your marker for many days, debrief and paint inside the gun may cause internal problems.
You would need a cleaning kit, a squeeze, paintball gun oil, a soft brush, warm water, and a pipe cleaner.
Know your Gun before Cleaning
Different brands have internal settings but a lot of the same cleaning principles are going to be applied.
That being said, know your gun, see the manual and check where the solenoid is, are the eye covers external or internal, where batteries are, which type of bolt is being used, and stuff like that.
If you don’t know how to dismantle your paintball gun, or where the sensitive parts are located, you can always check YouTube videos about that. And also read more about how to play and how to use a paintball gun.
Let’s get to it.
How to Clean a Paintball Gun
First and foremost, break it down. Remove the barrel, hopper, and tank. I have seen newbies cleaning their guns with an air tank and hopper. It can cause accidental shooting. You may hurt someone. Safety is the key here.
Avoid any potential disaster and be disciplined with cleaning and maintenance. Organize everything.
First of all, check which parts of your gun are dirty. Parts like eyes covers, grips, and bolts are always dirty, apart from that, check if you need to completely dismantle the gun or not.
Use the right Allen keys to remove the grips and other stuff. Be gentle, don’t push it otherwise you will pinch a wire or leave a scratch on the body.
The owner’s manual guide is the safest way to dismantle the marker. If you want to completely clean out the gun, you might want to open the shell (body) of the marker very carefully.
Get a barrel swab, insert into through the barrel. Double-check if the barrel is clean or not. If the barrel is still not neat, run a squeegee through it. Give it a good tight tug. It should clean out the barrel.
Clean out any visible dirt or paint break from the body of the hopper, tank, and the body of the marker. Rubbing alcohol is the best because it evaporates quickly.
Use a piece of cloth and rubbing alcohol to clean the body. A toothbrush or Q-tip would be suited to clean out the crevices or places where your fingers can’t reach.
Take your time and clean out the chocked areas.
For the spool valve gun, take the bolt out however your manufacturer guide says. Check if there is any paint inside of the gun where the bolt was placed.
Depending on the manufacturer, the cleaning of the bolt depends on the brand. Gamma cores are different from Luxe X and Dye cores, but the basic principle is the same.
Unscrew or dismantle the bolt as much as you can. Take a paper towel and clean out the old lube. Replace the O-ring if any is damaged. Now lube the core where it was lubed before. Place some extra lube on the O-rings and bolt itself.
While you are at it, check if any O-ring is missing or damaged. Replace the damaged ones immediately. Don’t be clumsy.
Clean the entire body with the rubbing alcohol once again. Use a Q-tip or small brush to clean crevices once again.
Replace any damaged or dysfunctional part. If one part is not functioning properly, then the entire marker can be compromised because the entire system is linked together like a chain.
Use the right type of oil that is made for guns. Lubricate only those parts which were already been lubricate. Don’t just spill the oil here and there.
Only oil the parts that needed to be oiled. Lubricate the O-rings, and metal to metal especially.
It would be best if you check your manufacturer’s manual for assembly and disassembly. Assembling is the most difficult part because most newbies don’t organize screws and stuff during dismantling.
One wrong move can damage your marker. You might cause a leak too so always make sure to check the manual or record a video when you dismantle the marker so it might come in handy when assembling the marker.
How Often to Clean Paintball Gun
It is pain in the ass to clean a paintball marker after a long day’s game. I don’t prefer it either. I always delay the cleaning for tomorrow but that tomorrow never comes and many of the markers never work properly due to less cleaning.
The best practice is to move your ass and clean your marker after the game when you reach home.
It is not necessary to dismantle the marker and barrel daily. Just clean the visible paint and dirt using warm water, rubbing alcohol occasionally, and paper cloth.
You may want to clean the barrel as well using a swab or squeegee. Don’t oil the marker daily, 2 or 3 times a week is more than enough.
Cleaning largely depends on the condition you play in. If I play woodsball in a muddy area, I will clean my marker completely just to be safe. I would also oil it.
Ideally, cleaning 4 – 5 times a week including occasionally dismantling is fine if you play paintball 7 days a week.
How To Store Paintball Gun
When I started paintballing as a newbie, I never stored my markers properly which was not cool at all. A lot of entry-level markers were damaged due to clumsy handling and storage.
Paintball markers are not cheap, you should take care of them for safety purposes too.
Following are some of the paintball gun storing tips.
- First of all, dismantle the marker. Remove the tank, hopper, and barrel.
- You might want to degas the air tank for safety purposes.
- Make sure safety is on. You never know.
- Keep your hoppers and tanks separately.
- If you are going to store the marker for some time, then lubricate the marker before storing it.
- Keep the marker away from the reach of children.
- I have stored my markers behind glass so that no debrief or dirt can enter.
Conclusion
If you use a rental marker to play paintball occasionally then you don’t need to learn about cleaning and maintaining, but if you own even 1 paintball gun, you better learn about cleaning and maintenance to makes sure your gun works properly.
If you don’t know how to clean a paintball gun, just read our guide step by step. I have tried to make it as much precise as possible for you guys.
Share it if you think it helped you.
