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Paintball Loaders
Gravity Feed Gravity feed is the simplest and cheapest form of hoppers available. Gravity feed hoppers consist of a large container and a feed tube attached to the marker. Paintballs roll down the sloped sides, through the tube, and into the marker. These hoppers are limited to reliably feeding only eight balls per second. Gravity feed hoppers are very cheap, since they are made of only a shell and a lid, but they can become jammed easily as paintballs pile up above the tube. Occasionally, rocking the marker and hopper can keep the paintballs from jamming at the feed neck. This problem is made worse when using a modern fully-electronic marker. Most economical and mechanical markers use either a blowback system for re-cocking or other methods where a large reciprocating mass is involved. This shakes the balls in the hopper slightly, facilitating gravity feed. A marker with both electronically controlled re-cocking and firing will often exhibit no shake whatsoever while operating. Because of this, small packs in the hopper are not broken up, and feeding problems develop. Agitating Loaders Agitating hoppers use a propeller spinning inside the container to agitate, or stir up, the paintballs. This prevents them from jamming at the feed neck and also feeds them more rapidly than equivalent gravity feeds. Older tournament-level hoppers are of the agitating type, since the higher rate of fire requires a more advanced and consistently-loading hopper.  Optical Activation Unlike the previous types of hoppers, there are many types of agitating hoppers. A common type is an optically activated loader with 'eyes'. These eyes consist of a LED (light emitting diode) and a photodetector (typically a phototransistor or photodiode, which is sensitive to light) inside the neck (tube) of the hopper. Eyes are used to detect whether a ball is present or not. In a marker, the eyes will keep the gun from shooting until a ball is fully loaded into the chamber. If a ball is not detected, the internal mechanism will began to turn, shifting a ball into place. Agitating hoppers without eyes will run down batteries and may bend or dent paintballs that will in turn cause a shorter, less air efficient, and skewed, shot. Agitating hoppers with eyes will only spin when there is not a ball in place, which causes less damage and longer battery life. Sound Activation Sound activation loaders use a microphone to sense when a marker has fired, and instantly loads a new ball. Unlike an optical activation loader, sound loaders don't wait for a misfeed before activating. Instead, they load a ball every time the marker is fired. Force Feed Force-feed hoppers utilize an impeller to capture paintballs and force them into the marker. The impeller is either spring-loaded or powered by a belt system, allowing it to maintain constant pressure on the stack of paintballs in the feed tube. This allows force-feed hoppers to feed paintballs at 22 balls per second since the mechanism does not rely on gravity. Force-feed hoppers are the dominant form of hopper in tournament play, as they are the only loader capable of keeping up with the high rate of fire found in electropneumatic markers. Some markers use force-feed loaders shaped as firearm's magazines. These are preferred when a low profile is required.  Radio Link The newest type of force-feed hoppers communicate wirelessly with the marker's electronics via radio frequency. This allows the hopper to begin feeding paintballs before the pneumatic system of the marker has even begun cycling the next shot. Not only does this system almost totally eliminate misfeeds, it greatly increases the speed of the loader and battery life due to the loader only being in operation when the marker is preparing to fire, as opposed to the continuous operation of many other loaders. Use of this feature requires that a chip be soldered to the electronics board inside the marker. Many new marker manufacturers and aftermarket electronics companies have announced that their markers/boards will support this new technology. Warp Feed The Warp Feed drive is one of the first and most progressive force feed loaders. The Warp does not hold paintballs. Instead it attaches to a normal gravity loader and provides a friction-drive system utilizing soft urethane disks in a feed wheel. The disks actually grip the paintballs on their sides and will allow the balls to slip when they are finished feeding a ball. In this way the system can not jam or crush paint. The mounting bracket provides bolts to the bottom of the grip frame and allows the Warp to swivel to the most comfortable position. The Warp can be activated by the adjustable vibration sensor when the marker fires, or it can be directly interfaced to your Emag or other electronic marker. Instead of sticking out of the top of a gun like other loaders, the Warp can be attached to the side, providing a huge advantage by making your profile smaller to other players. QLoaders Qloaders use a helical drive loading system to load paintballs at 30+ balls per second. They can be mounted at any angle on the marker, allowing players to position it discretely parallel to their barrel. It also uses 'clip' technology, allowing special pods full of paintballs to be detached when empty and a new one quickly snapped in place, ready to fire. This is one of the most reliable types of loaders.  Stick Feed Stick feeds are primarily used on pump and stock-class markers. They consist of simple tubes that hold between 10 and 20 paintballs. Stick feeds are usually parallel to the barrel and the player must tip (or rock, leading to the term "rock n'cock") the marker to load the next paintball. Some stick feeds are vertical, or at an incline to facilitate gravity feeding, though this contravenes accepted stock-class guidelines. Stick feed loaders are the least popular and are the slowest type of loader. |
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