PAINTBALL INGREDIENTS AND HOW THEY'RE MADE
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To keep paintballs environmentally safe, a polyethylene glycol shell is used to encapsulate the water soluble paint. When exposed to water, a paintball's shell will slowly decompose leaving no permanent residue. Since a paintballs' fill is water based, it begins to decompose the moment it is manufactured.
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Glycerin is another nontoxic substance used in the manufacturing of most paintballs. Glycerin is a thick liquid that is commonly used as a plasticizer in many materials. It's main function regarding paintballs is it's ability to prevent a paintball from freezing.
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Gelatin makes up the highest percentage of the fill of a paintball. Gelatin is a purified form of collagen (animal hoofs, cartilage, etc.). It keeps colorants and other ingredients from separating from the liquid fill in a paintball.
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Sorbitol is used to maintain moisture content in the fill. Other ingredients used in the manufacturing of a paintball include water, starch, and colorants. All of the above ingredients are water soluble, nontoxic, and environmentally safe.
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The very first paintballs were oil based paints used for marking trees (forestry use) and cattle. Over the next couple of years water based paints were developed for paintball use.
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Paintballs are made on a big machine called an encapsulation machine. A set of rotary dies cut out the two halves of the paintball shell and then seal them together after the paint has been squirted inside. The rotary dies have holes cut into them in such a way that they act like a cookie cutter. The dies are set to cut out the shell of a paintball.
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The shell of a paintball is made of gelatin, the same type that a bath oil bead is made of. It's the stuff that makes Jello wiggly. They just don't add as much water to the mixture to make paintballs.
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First, purified water is heated in a giant boiler. The hot water is then added to the dry gelatin mix in a special heated blender that holds several hundred gallons of water. The gelatin then cools for several hours at a special temperature. After the gelatin has been cooked, it is placed into two large tanks, one tank for each side of the paintball. From the tank, the gelatin flows in its liquid form to a wide, flat nozzle that lets the gelatin flow out onto a big, fat stainless steel roller.
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When the liquid comes into contact with the steel roller, it cools down and forms a semisolid piece of gelatin that sort of looks like a long sheet of paper or really fat ribbon. One ribbon of gelatin makes one side of the paintball and the other ribbon makes the other side. The ribbons pass through the rotary dies very slowly. The dies cut out little circles from each ribbon of gelatin and at the same time seals the edge of the pieces to form a little pocket. When the pocket is formed, the encapsulation machine squirts the paint fill into the pocket. The amount of fill in a paintball is very important. Too much fill will result in a paintball that is too big or have bad seals. Too little fill will cause the paintball to look like a "milkdud". The amount of fill has to be just right! After the fill has been mixed, it must sit until it is cooled to room temperature. The fill needs to be a certain temperature before it can be used in the encapsulation machines. The gelatin fill is very sensitive to temperature changes, so the fill must be kept at a constant temperature as well as the room it's kept in.
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Each manufacture has different specifications for their own paintballs. Thickness of the shell, amount of fill, size and shape, seam formation and seam thickness and other conditions. The paintballs are examined under a microscope to ensure that they meet all of the standards.
- The paintballs drop onto a conveyor belt where they go into a dryer. The paintballs are very soft and bigger than normal size. They reach normal size when the gelatin dries. When the paintballs are dried they are scooped up and placed in special trays where the outer shell of the paintball will "cure" or harden to the proper size and consistency. When the paintballs have been cured they go through another inspection process by a team of inspectors. Any paintball that does not meet the company standards is discarded. Paintballs are checked for leakers, bad shape and proper size. They are rejected if they are too large or too small. The paintballs that make it through this inspection are than sent off to be packaged for distribution and are on the way to your local paintball supplier.
