Tommikka

We don’t know what we don’t know, and the wise man knows that he doesn’t know what he doesn’t know You’ve started well having identified a potential flaw and then thinking about how that is resolved The first time we ran an airsoft game I knew nothing about how airsoft actually runs. I was sat at the safe zone entry waiting for all players to return before resetting props & pyro for the next mission. The players didn’t know why I was there, the first player through showed me his empty magwell - then everyone in turn showed they were safe & clear or stopped to remove magazine and fire off the last BB in the chamber - and then due to my presence a few remembered they had a holstered pistol to clear as well In just a few minutes I learned the airsoft method for clearing before exit, and some of the peculiarities of different RIF types * we always run events in in collaboration with sites so did have real marshals to do that side - not only because we have a paintball background vs airsoft specifics, but I prefer a clear distinction on the primary roles - everyone should be looking out for safety but I feel that the game marshal should be focused safety first that rather than us who are running the flow of an event and hopefully spotting safety issues

A barrel blocker / barrel condom (properly fitted) will prevent accidental discharge Removing the magazine and firing to ensure there’s nothing left in there will mean there’s nothing to be shot

Correct Regulator fill nipples have an internal valve which will not open until the fill station pressure exceeds the bottle pressure A compressor or dive cylinder based fill station will exceed your cylinders pressure and open the valve. A stirrup pump fill will need some pumps to get started Note that there will be a small amount of air lost when purging the fill line after filling, but the cylinder will not bleed back when connected

That will do the job When you fit it don’t use any products such a thread sealant, loctite etc, and don’t use any tools to screw it on - do so by hand - and ideally finally tighten it with a torque wrench If instructions are included consult them, otherwise use the Ninja standard instruction https://www.ninjapaintball.com/_files/ugd/3e81ed_faa639e0b9a94c5f93bd5a509d26cea8.pdf If you can use a regulator tool to safely grip the regulator and aid with tightening Many different designs are available - some with and without the ability to use with a torque wrench Ask at your local site and someone may have one

In principle, any HPA bottle regulator will do. However they do come designed for use with either a 3000psi or 4500psi source cylinder - the obvious difference being the burst disk fitted, you have a 4500psi capable cylinder so you should use a regulator designed for 4500psi cylinders As airsoft gets governed by a subsequent inline regulator you can worry less about the specifications of the cylinder regulator. The cylinder you have bought is supplied without a regulator as that lets the owner choose their own, which is common in paintball to meet personal needs (It also means that the seller isn’t posting a pressure vessel) Here the Cat 5 is designed to accept an input pressure of 300psi to 1000psi: https://www.wolverineairsoft.com/files/documentation/STORM Category 5 Owner's Manual.pdf Feed it over 1000psi and things are going to fail, feed it below 300psi, and though the output is 80psi to 180psi you could experience refresh problems This is a basic 4500psi regulator, with a designed output of 900psi. But take note that even though the Storm could take that, the retailer doesn’t recommend it for most airsofters. (These days most paintballers would avoid such a high pressure) But It is cheap and cheerful (If you don’t want to spend much more at the moment you could call to check it would be OK https://shop.super5ives.com/shop/item/113567/standard-bottle-regulator-rated-45k.html For not much more £ there’s the Dye throttle, though these a typically still high in output around 850psi https://shop.super5ives.com/shop/item/100493/dye-lt-throttle-regulator-4500psi300bar.html Put up the budget a bit and you can get regulators designed to be adjusted, not only changing shims for the output pressure but also potentially adjust the position that the fill nipple sits (if using as a bottle on configuration to avoid stabbing wrists) Check the capabilities as that SHPs default would probaly blow your inline regulator, but the SLP would be the low end pressure for your inline https://shop.super5ives.com/shop/item/14010/ninja-pro-reg-v2-slp.html https://shop.super5ives.com/shop/item/12922/ninja-pro-reg-v2-shp.html

…. Cue me checking my Vinted listings …. Turns out that I have only put assault vests etc on eBay, but I do have uniform hats/peaked caps listed on Vinted - and a check of the rules does say they aren’t allowed It’s possible to get away with rule breaches, but you may or may not get listings pulled. On listing it depends on any key words or AI recognition of images, and then subsequently can be reported by other users (especially other sellers) I listed some disposable coats, but these weren’t the typical festival smock type but a hoodless button up lab coat - and immediately rejected due to the laboratory / medical words I did use Vinted as my default for selling clothing and some of the few other categories that they allow as the different way they do postage meant I may make more of the sale rather than full eBay fees. But then fortnightly fee discounts, and currently zero fees made ebay the better option I don’t tend to bother with Vinted now, just leaving existing items there if I can’t be bothered to relist on eBay - and there’s a couple of things that I have a few of so I keep a listing on both eBay and Vinted Vinted does annoy me with their ‘will you sell it for £x’ process which doesn’t result in sales when I accept someone’s ‘offer’ - and people want to heavily under cut the asking price Premium stuff from UTG I sold my old UTG urban MOLLE for about £15

Wittering is a ‘well found centre of specialism’ as a ‘support enabler’ to the RAF and Defence objectives, that’s why it still exists and presumably will continue to do so ……. Either that, or due to potential military ground contamination, land value (or lack of land value), potential/lack of potential for housing/commerical development and the very important thing that ruins plans to dispose is as you have pointed out the terms under which sites went to government. Under BDES, which I have thumbed through in hard copy and electronic copy many times ….. https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5f6344b18fa8f5106b23aa86/Better_Defence_Estate_Dec16_Amends_Web.pdf ….. Defence have two key targets to dispose of 30% of the estate and in doing so to facilitate the enabling of land release for housing development of 55,000 new homes. They go hand in hand, except that sites no longer required for modern defence needs aren’t necessarily where people will want to live - especially if the site that would be closed is the main employer in the area. That’s before someone confirms whether or not government can sell the land, so the valuable land turns out to be required to be given back to the previous landowner rather than being used to facilitate the replacement site development Or the environmental cleanup Or the local MP complains about losses of employment Or the planning of expanding site B to rationalise what was in site A to close down won’t pass planning because that means putting buildings onto the open green land next door to site B Next let’s wait for someone to have the idea again of selling off the lovely Wiltshire land at Porton Down

They valued it that much? Gone are the days of Chinese packages worth 1p

With Brexit it’s now quite clear that everything crossing the border is an import so there’s much less chance of something just slipping through, and certainly a decent sized box as a RIF There is now the potential that an overseas retailer can register with the destination tax office to pre-process VAT (Highly unlikely for the nature of our hobbies as it is not worth the registration costs and administrative work for the small amount of business) If they did then you would see UK VAT being charged on checkout, they declare on the package declaration documentation with their registration details and it flies through the customs element. (A VCRA RIF defence would still be required) But in practice you will get assessed for VAT on arrival. Starting with the customs declared value & invoice, including the postage cost - in the overseas currency They may reassess the value based on a UK market equivalent so don’t count on it and allow for a higher charge (They might not include the postage cost in the valuation, but are permitted to do so - and by including that in your calculations you are preparing for worst case scenarios) Take the total amount you paid including postage, convert that to £s (at the current rate which may differ from the rate at the time of payment. Work out VAT at 20% Then add on a carrier handling charge, which varies between carriers - it may be fixed at £8, £20 etc or it may be a percentage of the total On $294.70 I was charged £45.73 VAT (20% of £228.65) sent by USPS from the US and handled by Parcel Force here, for which they took a £12 handling fee Ask your local / preferred retailer and even for items not stocked they may import on your behalf. You would pay a UK retail price, but would have a better idea on the final cost rather than waiting for an extra bill

The typical minimum age for both airsoft and paintball is 12 This is mostly in relation to insurance against the wider risks of controlling younger children - previously the limit dictated by paintball insurers was 13, but as much of rental paintball is for organised groups, and for children that was birthday parties sites were being asked to let in 12 year olds for their classmates 13th birthday and site insurance dropped a year to cater for those. The introduction of .50” paintballs (or more precisely reintroduction of .50”) was due to industry marketing to sites as low impact paintball. The smaller size and lower mass had some marketing to permit higher velocities still within legislations energy levels, but it was the low impact that won sites over (and to a degree the smaller boxes which caused quite a few sites to fully convert their rental equipment to .50” This low impact version of paintball brings me to the relevant point - insurers will allow cover for sites to reduce age limits to 8+ For general impact, airsoft BBs are smaller and have less energy in them, which means they have less impact when hit. But they aren’t designed to break on impact, which with paintball absorbs some of the energy Rental paintballs tend to be a lower quality than those used in tournaments and larger events. This is a deliberate design choice for rental sites as it prolongs the life in storage and simplifies storage requirements but makes a rental / recreational paintball hit harder than a fragile tournament grade paintball Keep skin covered to absorb the initial point of impact whether it’s a BB or a paintball For venues general woodland is better for young and new players with the openness rather than the up close environment of CQB & urban Ground is rough and uneven, but if you are lacking awareness of woodland surfaces then indoors is less forgiving - not only likely to be concrete floor or at least hard floor but the random things around the old buildings used for urban / CQB Then add slippery paintball gel or lots of BBs luring around on a hard floor (I played the infamous paintball game in the Reading Mall which left slippery residue for weeks/months - when ‘cleared’ the walls and ceilngs bled out some more BBs and paintball shells can be swept away, but the gelatine will remain - it’s going to need washing down, ideally by pressure washer I recommend a 10 year old waits, but low impact .50” will satisfy the itch for a year or two - and ensure that they are addicted if they continue to upgrade at 12

…. You weren’t meant to mention it

((Thanks for the informative background message))

Then I would say that we are talking in cross purposes on the term ‘guarding’ and ‘sensitive sites’ I would guess that you were not under a Defence contract, and I’m unaware of what I would consider sensitive sites that don’t use the other guarding arrangements (Genuinely interested if you’d be willing to PM what sort of place this was / type of contract)

Carillion were a construction and facilities management company, not security / guarding When they collapsed they were part of consortium a providing a number of government contracts, including infrastructure facilities management on the defence estates (less the training estate) Their success in securing all contract regions plus national housing was their failure, they bit off too much by underbidding every contract to the tiniest margin and then not being able to sustain all of them - when they failed it wasn’t the civil service suddenly getting things done quickly, but it was the consortium partner Amey (and other partners in PFI contracts) that stood up underwriting the Carillion gap Guarding isn’t / wasn’t part of the FM contracts - parts of the admin such as a clerk handing out car passes is part of the FM in some sites. ….. and as a direct result of the Carillion situation, both as a consideration of the risk when the CarillionAmey consortium were successful in all tenders and on the subsequent impact of their collapse, the next round of regional infrastructure tenders included provision that a national award of so many regions could not take place

I had one delivery (not a RIF) that took two weeks to clear the charges process - it took one week to assess a charge, then a second week to reassess the charge and release for payment Potentially add on time for a VCRA RIF declaration…… and if things don’t appear to be moving keep checking emails and spam, possibly call to check that they have your email address For fee charges add up the full purchase costs including postage. Then calculate import VAT at 20% of the total (allow for currency conversation rate changes as the assessment will be initially based on the declared total in the sellers currency - but be ready for a revaluation as it could get valued on an assessed equivalent UK price) Then add on the handling fee which can vary between the different carriers - a fixed price or a percentage of the total

Triggers broom trigger

It took me about a decade to realise the opposite - I’m there to get shot My preferred world is scenario paintball, but I had already worked out that I was getting as much or more fun running events (both paintball & airsoft) and watching people work out ways to play my missions, but it took until I was photographing tournaments that I didn’t actually care what flavour it was or what I was doing on field but that it was the being there in the middle of a game and the chances of being shot. Being an official event photographer was pretty much the best - I didn’t need to take my hits and could choose where I go to hunt the shots.

It was only the import VAT & fees, no declarations …. but not your normal belt & mag pouches, overpriced paintball pod belt style mag sleeves/pouches

As it arrived yesterday, don’t worry about the worst case circumstances that you see on here There could be some more delay due to the season with lots coming in and things being slow The first thing is that it will stop and sit for someone to look ‘looking’ will mostly involve getting to that entry on the system and checking declarations When checking the first question is whether it’s legal to import (ignore that under the VCRA it’s illegal to import RIFs, but defences exist allowing import - so for theses purposes we’ll just say RIFs are legal to import They may consider joule limits - that it is a UK legal airsoft RIF Next - are there controls on its import - yes there are. Your UKARA details will pass that - either on the face of it or with checking your details match Declarations may suffice from the retailer, but you are the importer so you will probably get a declaration form to complete (Respond with yes it’s a RIF, yes I have a defence - here it is, and if applicable yes it is within joules etc) Once happy with the item being suitable for import it is considered for charges The retailers customs declaration may be used for values or they may reassess value (my recalculated charges reflected the declared value so I don’t know the reasoning for the change - perhaps error correction, perhaps currency conversion) You get sent a bill (perhaps the same time as the RIF declaration) These may be by post, email or you may be able to identify them in the tracking and phone (the declaration has to be filled in so try phoning to check if they have details to email it) Payment may be doable on the phone - I was not able to pay mine on the phone, they wanted me to pay via a card sent to me, but in fact I went in person to the regional depot before the card got to me Once any declarations and payments are cleared it is fully released - either for delivery or you can collect if at a convenient depot (don’t pay online or by phone if you intend to collect as they will dispatch it)

Clearance takes as long as it takes I had a belt & mag pouches take two weeks to clear customs - one week to assess charges the first time, but not release it and another week to reassess customs charges (if I recall correctly the final amount was slightly less than the first price I had been quoted on the phone)

Not quite the same, but I did something similar, asking for roughly the new price I had paid, but I had paid a much reduced sponsor / supported price It was genuinely hardly used due to the size of my armoury, and a specific limited edition colour/design and bagged in the original case that only came with a short original run. Not that any value is added, but it had only been serviced by the manufacturer tech guy, and maintained by our certified team tech guy There may have only been two in the country, and it’s the only one I had seen in the country (I say two because my team mate had put his name down for that colour version before we were offered a team deal, but couldn’t wait and took a standard - his may have sat on the shelf or I might have actually ended up with the one earmarked for him) I decided to sell due to the value and lack of use - I had used it once and loaned it out 2 or 3 times. However I wasn’t going to let it go cheaply as I didn’t need the money, otherwise I may as well hang on That meant I was in the situation of asking for X but getting low ball offers, I was open to offer but not willing to drop heavily I’d get low offers telling me that just because it’s a limited colour doesn’t mean it’s worth more (OK then - buy one of the many standard ones available), or that the colour was a little more widely available in the US (OK, go and import one then), also that there was a small rub on the barrel (OK, don’t buy it) and finally that a UK retailer was listing one from new (OK, try buying that one at full retail price - a few hundred £ more than me - until you get to the cart to be told it’s out of stock) It did take me something like a year to sell, during which time I got a couple of ‘one last time’ games with it ….. and sold it on eBay (breaching rules) at an acceptable offer and during a promotional fees discount selling a £1400 - £1500 retail gun, (I had paid nowhere near that - probably trade price) for about £50 to £100 less than I had paid and obtained some use from it, and it sold to somebody who appreciated the mainly visual limited edition elements A private sale can happily be made between two people for an agreed price, that one is willing to part for and the other is willing to pay As long as one isn’t purely ripping off newbies with exaggeration then it should be fine

Limited edition custom

This is a hobby that needs multiple people to match their leisure time, and sites open accordingly - primarily as a weekend hobby This does mean that the typical site isn’t used to its optimum at 2/7ths of time, but the customer isn’t around 7 days a week Some things can be run more if there is a customer base - but you could then be looking at the ‘experience’ area of the market and venues that can be diverse in their activities The alternative to finding an existing weekday site is to do what someone probably did in the first place at those that do have a weekday opening - gather the regulars and establish that it’s viable to open during the week This doesn’t help the lone player looking for a game that suits their free time, but it doesn’t hurt to ask local sites if they have already had some interest, or to play when you do get a weekend off and ask the regulars Sometimes it’s initiated by Marshalls to get a midweek evening as they work the site at the weekend

Ferrero Rocher works with the Foreign & Commonwealth office (Ambassador, you are spoiling us) For Border Force it’s Toblerone - there’s a clue in the duty free shop

A claim involves relevant documentation - in the case of a sale the transaction qualifies as a receipt. I have not claimed for a RIF but I have claimed for eBay and Vinted sales, Vinted wouldn’t be too applicable here as that usually includes Vinteds contracted carriers (and is passes over to Vinted to resolve in the ‘lost’ timeframe) but when Royal Mail is selected the seller deals with Royal Mail I have managed to successfully claim value based on a screenshot of the transaction payment - of course up to the insured limit. A private transaction should of course be paid via a suitable method (PayPal etc) and not tagged as friends & family money owed etc