Spent today hanging with Tim Firpo aka Mr. Paintball Tek dot com in Vacaville and finally arrived in Sonoma County tonight around 11pm.
Tim and I looked over a ton of paintguns, he taught me some stuff about new paintguns and I told him the stories on the 100 different guns in my car as I traveled to Northern California. We talked tools (Tim has a bunch of really neat stuff, such as digital pressure gauges), we sonic bathed a classic Carter Comp body and then Luke, Pakalolo and the Icon joined us for lunch.
Luke also showed us the sleekest Palmer’s Pyre I’ve seen, Ted and Pat were getting really hyped up about Bacci Mountain 2014 and we recorded a few videos.
After that we filled some Scuba tanks at Sport Chalet in Vacaville and picked up some tanks from Hydro. Everyone knows Tim and even as we were driving on the freeway some guy started yelling at Tim he needed his tank hydrotested?
Later Luke and Tim cycled a few paintguns and we recorded some more baccipaintballshorts (unedited quick videos).
Luke shot some paint through the Carterized VM-68 I purchased last year from Gaston Nogues, and Tim blasted some air through a partially complete Tippmann FA that David Kermode received from Dennis Tippmann Jr for testing K-C No Hot Shots Regs.
Eventually I arrived at my family’s place in Sonoma County and these two paintguns were waiting here, unfortunately the steel barrel of the Tippmann SMG-60 was partially protruding from the packaging but the steel barrel seemed to be unscathed.
What looks like a Long Barrel Nightmare missing a pump is actually Brass Eagle’s first semi Automatic, the Eagle. This looks to be one of the best shape Eagle I’ve come across (out of the 7 I’ve seen).
The rumor with the Eagle which I’ve heard over and over but I doubt is true, is that Brass Eagle prematurely released 100 of the Eagles. Built on long barrel Nightmares, they never really worked and the trigger is actually worse then their double actions they were currently producing. The Eagle was recalled and all but 20 made it back which were converted back into long barrel Nightmares, removing the semi mechanisms. Over the years 9 more came back and 11 remained in existence.
Finding 7 of those 11 Eagles remaining in existence seems unlikely considering the Eagle is regarded as one of the worst paintguns of all time. Based on the 7 I’ve seen, I would guess more like 30-40 exist.
The 7 that I’ve seen have all come from notable owners and collections so it could be that the owners that kept them were people who didn’t care if the paintgun worked anyway because they weren’t going to use it anyways.
I’ll be testing the Eagle with a 12 gram tomorrow and see if it holds air.
