6 Player Paintball Gun and Mask Rack

I play for the scenario paintball team Pub Crawling. We have more than 20 members on the team and over the years we have come up with ideas to make keeping the staging area better organized. One of the items we get asked about a lot is the paintball gun and mask rack. We are currently on version 5 or 6 of the rack and have made many improvements along the way.

Requirements for the rack would have to be: holds as much gear as possible, hold the gear neatly and safely, break down for travel into as small a size as possible, easy to put back together and be light for travel purposes. Each rack is designed to fit on 1/2 of a 6 foot table so we can put 12 guns and masks per table. We currently have four of these racks for all the players on the team to use. 

This version of the rack we will be building was built and designed by Chuck "Chucky Cheese"  Canesi. I just reverse engineered it and posted it here.

You can find out more about the paintball team Pub Crawling at www.PubCrawling.Org.

Step 1: Material List

6 Player Paintball Gun Rack
32 1/2 inches Tall
16 3/4 inches deep
36 inches wide

Material List
3/4 inch schedule 40 pvc pipe Approximately 24 feet
(8) T connectors
(6) 90 degree elbows
(3) Crosses
(6) pipe Caps
(6) 9/16 nuts
(6) Barrel Holders
(6) Tank holders
(12) 3/4 inch screws
60 inches of weather stripping
(1) 5/8 inch dowel rod 30 inches long

Comments

[iandouglas]

Thanks for the great, detailed plans. With some slight modifications, I made one for about $26 in parts from Home Depot and several hours of labor (most of it measuring/cutting the PVC tubing).

The few notes I'd make on the process:

I used two 10' PVC tubes. The vertical bars were only 29 inches, and the mask holders were slighly shorter (maybe by an inch or so) but in the end I had literally a one-inch piece of tubing left over. Not sure where you'd use the extra 4' of PVC tubing your instructions called for, but happy I decided to chance it and only get 20 feet.

For tank holders, I got two 4" PVC coupling sections, and cut them down the middle horizontall and vertically, giving me 8 possible tank holders. I drilled out three holes like you did to attach them to the PVC/dowel combo (nice trick with the dowel btw, very clever!), and after leaving just the two outer screws in (not the third), the 4" diameter spread out slightly wider, since 68ci/4000psi compressed air tanks are 4.3" in diameter. 

I picked up some pipe clamps which came in 4 pieces (two sets, top/bottom), and folded the 'flaps' over. I used a steel drill bit to drill out a single hole, put a nut/bolt combination on them, and fastened everything tightly. I bought a bottle of "liquid electrical tape" but decided against it and just covered them with the same 3/4" weather stripping I used on the tank holders. I had seen some plastic-coated tool clips for about $2 each for hanging tools on a wall, but decided they were too expensive.

The weather stripping is nice and padded, though the 4" PVC was slightly wider (almost 2" wide) than two strips of the 3/4" stripping I bought (should have bought 1" stripping).

The only addition I'm going to make is to pick up something to cap the ends of the mask bars. Either 6 more caps, or 30-degree elbows for a 'hook' so masks don't slide off since the bars are slightly shorter than the instructions called for.

Can't wait to try it out this weekend.

Full-size image

[Byoung4now]

Thanks for the feed back, Looks great. Since writing the original instructions I have since made two more racks and offered suggestions for alternate parts from the original. See customizing step. :-) I added caps to the ends of the mask holders as well since I noticed the masks fell of too easily. The original estimate for how much pipe to get was just a guess since not everyone will cut the parts from the right length of pipe and could run short. :-) Good luck with your gun\mask rack and hope to see you in the field someday.

[Byoung4now]

If you check out Step 8 where I make some mods to the design. Those tank holders don't fit the tank snug. Basically the rubberized coating holds the tank in place. It works better when they have a tank cover on the HPA bottle but good enough grip for when they don't. Most player are running a 68/4500 tank so they are all about the same size. The CO2 tanks if they are 20oz tanks fit in there because they are smaller than the HPA tanks. This rack works with most paintball guns. There are some Milsim ones out there that won't fit but that is more about the length and shape of the marker than the tank. HTH.

[iandouglas]

I had started making notes on how to cut the 10' lengths to where I literally ended up with 1" left over from two 10' pipes. I'll see if I can find that and post it up here as a reply. If I have some free time, I'll see if I can go make a list of which areas I found everything, actual costs, etc.

In general, Home Depot staff were insanely helpful to find parts once I described what it was I was trying to build. A few of the older guys looked at me funny about how to find something to hold the tanks. They sell strips of sheet metal which you could bend, but that would require (a) bending the steel, (b) not slicing your fingers in the process, and (c) maintaining the shape.

I also recommend picking up the 20' of PVC tubing LAST so you have have to wheel that stuff all over the store.

[iandouglas]

Quick follow-up ... the instructions called for a 5/8" dowel rod, but I used a 3/4" dowel rod which fit way more snugly within the 3/4" PVC tube. Less sliding around while getting things screwed in where they belonged, etc.