TargetTalk

Hello,
I am planing on ordering a new daisy 887 soon and i was wondering about filling up the c02 myself. Right now, none of the sporting goods stores will fill the small C02 tank and the only paintball shop is 40 minutes away. Would it be worth it for me to get a small 5lb C02 tank and filling adapter for filling my gun? Also, what kind of scale would i need to use in order to weigh it? Also, would it just be cheaper, and safer, to just order an extra C02 tank or two and get it filled at the paintball shop. Keep in mind that it is just me and I probably only shoot 50-60 pellets a day at the most. And finally, because i don't have an indoor range, I will mainly be doing dry-firing exercises until my 40H club starts back up sometime in February.
Thanks!

'Fury,

I am not sure what the rated shot capacity for the 887 on a full cylinder is but lets say it really is 300. Now you get the second cylinder and shoot 50 shots per day. This means that every 12 days you are driving 40 minutes each way to fill the cylinders. That is a lot of time on the road and gas spent filling cylincer. This also allows you no overlap, you run out of gas on your second cylinder on shot 48 of a 60 shot match for instance, now what are you going to do? If you are going into a match or practice match it is also nice to start with a full cylinder... just to be sure.

If nothing else, for the sake of convenience get the 5 lb cylinder and fill from that. I used to shoot a FWB CO2 air pistol, the filling procedure is not too tough. To weigh the cylinders I used a simple kitchen scale that went up to 1 pound but was also marked in grams. Full the max "weight" (mass actually) was 320g of CO2. Usually I would fill an then have to bleed a little off.

Are you planning on shooting 3P or just standing. If just standing you may want to consider and older single stroke air rifle.

'Dude

I shoot both. I have used an 888 before and it got about 275-300 shots per fill.

I've been shooting bulk-fill CO2 for years. Find an industrial gases supply store/welding supply/oxygen supply store in the yellow pages and talk to them about the cost of a 5 pound cylinder. You may be able to get an exchange cylinder in which you put down a deposit and then swap it for a new cylinder every time you fill, just paying for the gas.

Cylinders with dip tubes (siphons) are much more expensive than those w/o, so if you're healthy you just get the standard container and invert it to fill.

If you have an 888/887 and your club does not have a bulk tank, then yes, you should get your own.

As mentioned above ... an industrial gas supply can "long term" lease your tank ... long term meaning forever .... The ones I have gotten (20 lb tanks) cost me about $80-100 for the "lease" and then cost me about $17 to fill. Here in the US they are no more expensive to "lease" than a regular tank.

I need to fill ours about once every few months.
8 shooters, 2 practices per week.

Note: when you take a dip tube tank back for a fill, dump almost all the remaining gas and let the tank come to ambient temp. I'm told if they have to dump it at the gas place it may cause a dry ice block to form in the tank resulting in an incomplete fill.....???

You'll need:
1) A Diptube tank ... one that gets the liquid CO2 from the bottom of the tank. Don't get a regular tank and have to resort to using it upside down ... a REAL pain.
2) A fill adapter ... these are $35 I think from Daisy
3) A postal scale ... you can get these at Staples, etc for about $40.
You must be able to weigh the tank and make sure it's not overfilled. An overfill will lead to the spring/hammer not able to cycle the valve in the rifle ... very low velocity shots .... pellet ends up about 2 feet from you...

I fill to no more than 475 grams ... that's why you weigh it ... if more, hook it back up to the fill adapter and bleed a bit out.
A fill of 450 grams will easily get you thru a 3x20. If you don't shoot a boatload of sighters a good fill can get you thru 3 3x20's easy.