The importance of foamy...

Ok, I know the foamy will help prevent ball breaks but what other effects may it have?

Since I finally got my tanks rehydroed I've been doing a bit of practice shooting and not having much luck with it. I noticed it first on the emag and figured it was probably just shooting hot so I put it aside but after shooting the pneumag today I notice it's doing the same exact thing. I also noticed both are missing the foamy today.

Whats happening? The paintballs are going anywhere BUT straight out of the barrel. Some bank down sharply to hit the chain link fence 15 feet in front of me, some sail out 200+ feet to hit the trees in the distance. I get bank shots to the left and right, spiral shots down the middle, or some that I swear are participating in a space launch program.

Can the foamy affect the trajectory of the paintball like that?

Only issue I ever noticed when the foamy came out was smashing paint. The issues you are having I typically only see with crappy paint. But if your regulator seat is bad your pressure in the dump chamber can change. Causing hot shots and other issues with non constant FPS.

Brand new Marballizer paint, so I wouldn't think it was just crappy paint. At least I've never considered marballizer bad and have never had this kind of trouble before... it's annoying to say the least.

I've never thought that to be bad paint. Have you tried replacing the foamy to check? Anything could happen. And it could be causing it. Odder things have happened.

Brand new doesn't mean its good. Check the shape of the balls. If they aren't consistently round and the same size, then the shot consistency and accuracy will be erratic.

The foamy helps to keep the balls from rolling back into the front of the bolt. When this happens, the next ball in the stack gets clipped when the gun fires, which can cause a barrel break when it is finally shot out.

1) check the reg. spikes and creep will cause changes in how the ball shoots.

2) check the breech and bolt. i've shot my mag without a foamy for years. i shot it out and never replaced it. but you want to check for anything in there that could effect the ball. glue, pieces of foamy, dirt. check the detent as well. since it touches the ball, it could be dirty and effect it.

3) check your barrel. clean it, squeegee it and then look at it from both ends.

4) check your hopper. again, a broke ball will spill out paint causing problems. they may go in clean, but come out dirty.

since this is on 2 guns, look at the common parts. hopper, barrel and tank(assuming of course).

Paint is fine, one of the first things I looked at carefully.

It's two different valves. Same tank though with a barely used ninja reg on it, strike that... I've used both tanks on it. One with 1100psi output one with 950psi output. Same hopper, but on the emag it's fed through a warp after the hopper. I've used two different barrels as well, one a freaked apex (lowest setting) and a deadly wind carbon fiber barrel. I used the same insert in both barrels, cleaned the barrel after seeing breaks cause I figured the paint in the barrel was probably the cause of the problem but it made no difference. Given that it's on two different mags as well, that eliminates pretty much everything in common except for the foamy being missing or the insert I was using. The insert looks to be in perfect condition though so... hmm.. I'll clean up the bolts and put some new foamies in and see if that settles down the problem.

How is the paint-barrel size? Overbore gives the best average shot consistency for paint that is not perfect. Underbore gives the best shot efficiency. I never had any luck with accuracy using underbore so I stay away from them. If you can size the paint to the barrel it is the best option for accuracy and consistency, but will be more affected by ball inconsistencies than overbore.

Velocity has a big effect on shot accuracy if there are any imperfections in your system. I tend to adjust my velocity down if I find my shot accuracy going out the window due to some unseen issue. There's usually some underlying reason that is not readily apparent, such as paint that has settled in the shell. Start lowering your velocity while shooting a few shots. Once the shot grouping reaches a comfortable value, check your velocity. You'll be surprised to find that it won't be as low as you think when the accuracy straightens out.