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Bottle Blows Up

Biscuit

Well-Known Member
Mar 21, 2006
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wakey
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Carbon Fibre Bottles and filling them
Have heard there has been some report (which I am being sent) about the filling of Carbon Fibre bottles.

Carbon Fibre bottles have different heat characteristics to fibre wrapped bottles which makes them more prone to bottle fires (The bottle in Madrid was a carbon fibre bottle)

Have yet to see the recommendations on filling them, but have heard that a maximum of around 120 litres per minute for filling is recommended.

The only carbon fibre bottles that I am aware of are the Stako bottles.

I will make some ammendments to the UKPSF air fill policy which will read as follows until more information is forthcoming.

1) Advise all players that carbon fibre bottles have more of a risk when it comes to bottle fires.
2) Have a seperate fill point for carbon fibre bottles with a flow rate less than 120 litres per minute.
3) If no specific fill point is available, advise users of carbon fibre bottles, to fill in stages of 1000psi per stage. ie. fill to 1000psi, then stop and wait 60 seconds, fill to 2000psi and stop for 60 seconds, then fill to 3000psi.

It should also be remembered that flow rates for filling of any air bottle should be regulated. As a guide, it should take around 45 seconds to fill a 0.8L steel bottle from empty to 3000psi. In practice, sites usually top up from around 2000psi to 3000psi which only takes around 15 seconds.

If you have an unregulated fill rig (ie a dinn or A clamp fitted to a dive bottle), please be aware of the above. food for thought guys just read this on www.talkpaintball.co.uk
__________________
 

Kitch

Super'5ives'Man
Jul 10, 2001
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Sorry for being late in responding to this guys, but I have not been at home long and as you can understand I haven't been off of the phone much.

Firstly and formostly Nigel is fine a couple of cuts on his hands and face, but to be honest pretty superficial stuff, I am not trying to downplay the seriousness of this incident as I know this could have been much much worse. After spending all afternoon in A&E with Nige the most upsetting thing for him was the lack of food and bed bath, Nige has been a close personal friend of mine for years he is understandibly shaken but in his usual 'is everyone else alright' mode.

The incident did involve a stako bottle, but as like most people on here I am not qualified to give a reason as to why this incident occured and to be honest I dont think speculation will help either.

Needless to say with something of this magnitiude a full and thorough investigation will take place, I have already been on the phone putting these measures into place. Until this issue has been resolved 100%, then a ban of all stako bottles has been put in place at our site.

I have tried to contact all of the team captains from today to inform them of Niges progress, I would like to extend my thanks and gratitude to everyone today with the calmness and business like response to this incident.

I was honestly taken aback with the amount of help and kind words from today I wish to thankyou all you are true gentlemen (and ladies).

Kitch
 

Erb man

IMPACT UK
Oct 30, 2006
32
0
16
Kent
Glad your ok Nige, possibly the most scary thing i have seen in paintball, hopefully i'll never see it again!
This was a freek (excuse the pun) accident and in no way was this Niges or the sites fault. IF it was the stako bottle i think i can say that those people at the site today, having seen it first hand, will not use them again!
Anyway, thankful that neither Nige or anyone else was not seriously hurt

Micky, Debbie and the rest of IMPACT UK
 

bizy43

Active Member
Jun 25, 2006
76
5
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basingstoke
glad yr ok nige

hope it was'nt your coffeeee hand

the bang made all the horses in the other field go crasy
i was having a p$$s and thought someone had fired some artillery

hope you can get back on the curciut soon so we can admire the scars

also everyone on the site was very sensible today it was good to see well done to us all
but mostly bluey & kitch heros of the day

see you at the next gig nige
with obviously a nice new shiney kit
cheers martyn
 

Lucky_Tech

Platinum Member
Aug 24, 2006
306
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www.luckyeurope.co.uk
Why?

The bottle never failed - any bottle that had a flash fire inside (as it seems this did) would have had the same result.
It would be more sensible to say let us review how much magnesium content is in the regulators because once that has ignited it self sustains.

This occurrence has the potential ability to cause an awful lot of problems to paintball that I suspect most people do not comprehend.
When accidents happen abroad we just think we are lucky and carry on as normal, the simple fact is now it has happened in the UK at some point the Dept of transport will become involved and this little insignificant sport will come under the magnifying glass from people who can stop it overnight if they think the safety risks are unacceptable.


Russ
Russ hit the nail on the head it is not the stako that is failing if it was it would have left the reg alone, to many companies are turning to china to make cheep regs to keep cost down, everyone is moaning about the price of equipment do they not understand quality equipment costs more.

There is more and more magnesium being added to the aluminum to make it easier and cheaper to make. in all the pictures i have seen of regs going off they have ended up looking like molten metal.....

we need tighter restrictions on the elements of the gun that work with hi pressure air including the fill stations... this will get worse before it gets better.

Stop being cheep asses you will be sorry when someone is seriously hurt or killed .


Hope you are ok Nige