Hi Simon.
Sorry to hear about the bad experience you had at DF some time ago. I worked at DF at the Shoreham site, from the second week it opened for about 2 years, marshalling most saturdays and when i wasn't playing a tourney, on sundays too. When i worked there i was a senior marshal/gun tech & gas filler. In all the time i worked there we never charged anyone for a co2 fill, not while i was onsite, anyway! Co2 fills are included in the price of the ticket as you say. Were you the only person paying for fills? I assume you took the marshals name and phoned DF the next day to complain, or saw the manager in the centre shop? What was their response?
Re the paint being crap at that time, we're talking about 3 yrs ago - I guess so as the Shoreham centre moved about then. I won't deny that poor quality paint was a possibility!! In those days we had very little in the way of quality control/selection process for our paint, and proper storage was an issue. However, we've come a long way since then
Before we buy any paint now, each batch is tested by me, or by another DF paint tester, at the suppliers premises. This often takes a full day every week. We test for fragility/shape/size/fill and, where possible, we test fire a hopper from each batch through a site gun. The paint is tested again, when it arrives at the centres, and any poor paint that slips through (and there's very little, despite the huge quantities we buy in) is swapped out from the surplus we hold at our main warehouses. Also we now have greatly improved the paint storage conditions, with heated storerooms at each centre and in the offsite stores too.
Paint prices in those days were the pretty much the same as they are now as far as i recall... £5 per 100 if bought by the box, or £6 per 100 bought in small quantities. This is standard for rental days - i'm not talking about walk on days as we don't offer those yet. This is mainly because we don't offer compressed air fills, but we are looking into air and into offering a DF membership, where repeat rental or own gunner customers can play for less.
The reason you were refused the use of your own Co2 bottle is because DF don't know how well your valve has been fitted to your cylinder. Other paintball operators have followed us in this decision since then, and i applaud them for it. In the past we had occasions where players bought co2 cylinders and valves seperately off the internet, and not knowing any better, they screwed the valve on by hand and assumed this was sufficient! I'm sure you can appreciate this put our customers and staff in considerable danger, so the blanket ban on players own bottles was brought in. In contrast, all DF Co2 bottles have the valves fitted in our workshop according to manufacturers recommendations for valve fitting. Every bottle and valve is checked for +/- thread tolerance and loctited into place using a fully calibrated torque wrench. We never re-fit a co2 valve. We acknowledge they are a one-fit item only. It may surprise readers to hear that many other paintball games operators don't even own a torque wrench, something that was pointed out to me by Trev & Tim of H-PAC who visited us recently and commented on how impressed they were by our safety practice. Our co2 safety is extended by inspecting every DF cylinder monthly, applying the rejection criteria in BSEN1802 for gouges, dents and other damage. We withdraw all cylinders from use after 5 years, even tho they have a 10 year test. Our oldest bottle is currently 2003 and all cylinders are pi marked. Additionally, all valves we use comform to TPED and the design/make we use (Powerball/Arrow) has since gained the pi approval. I firmly believe this is way beyond what any other rental paintball company in the UK does to ensure players' and staff safety. And before anyone says it, we don't do this because of any accident we've had (we haven't) or because H & S etc have told us to,(they haven't). We do it because we believe this makes DF a very safe place to play paintball.
Some questions for you marshals out there: How many of you are working at sites with old DOT and expired Co2 cylinders? (i know of a few already
) Does your centre manager check every bottle every month? Has the company you work for got calibrated micrometers to measure the exact depth of a gouge? If you fill gas, do you know what markings you are looking for to allow you to fill that bottle, or what the damage rejection criteria are, because you have an obligation under current legislation to inspect bottles before filling them.
Sermon over
(TFFT)!
