Milsig 2012 Interview

The CEO of Milsig, Nelson Lau, was once again kind enough to answer some of my questions concerning Milsig in 2012.

The last time we had an interview, you spoke of internal restructuring and improvements within Milsig to meet the increasing volume of customer service requests. How did the execution of your plans go? 

The DSG Strikes Again

That's right! Dukie is making a 4th run of the DSG! Perhaps one of the more boner-inducing paintball markers, I managed to sneak in on the first run of the marker, and haven't looked back since. Click here for my full review, which I should update at some point, given I've had it for over 2 years and have upgraded it with new gen. DSG parts. Don't miss out, when they're gone they're gone, and very few people sell their DSGs (except for the typical MCB marker whores). The price this time around is $785 CAD.

Jonathan Idema Dead?

News is rolling in that the infamous Jonathan Idema is dead due to AIDS complications as of a few days ago in Mexico. Most of you will have two questions, the first being, "Who the hell was Jonathan Idema?"

This guy.

Well, Jonathan Idema was a... troubled individual. I'm not going to discuss the grey areas of his backstory, as they are quite numerous and very confusing. What we do know is that Idema became (in)famous for trekking over to Afghanistan, and attempting to secure bounty booty by kidnapping and torturing Afghans for the whereabouts of Taliban insurgents.

A-TACS FG Unis Pre-Orderable

The folks at Predator BDU now have A-TACS FG gear up for pre-order, and anticipate an arrival of late February to early March. You can read a full release from their media arm on Predator Intelligence right here. While you're there, be sure to check out the frequent articles they publish, most recently including some Shot Show coverage. Grey Ops didn't get to attend this year, hoping to make next year happen (Ontario Shot Show Posse anyone?).

Mag-Fed Paintball Surge Down South

The introduction of PsiOps, inexpensive RAP4 conversion kits and a change in the economic climate for paintballers seem to finally have acted as a catalysts towards mag-fed play in the United States. Perhaps this year will be the year we see a large surge towards the adoption of magazine fed markers, or limited play in general in major venues/markets of the states.

Cerakote Update + Paintball Marker Cerakoting

2 Augusts ago, I posted a small blurb about a process called Cerakote, which coats firearms with a small layer of ceramic spray to make for a great looking and extremely durable finish. I've found this cool video depicting the Cerakote process:



What's more, there's somebody on MCB offering Cerakote services for paintball markers (at what appears to be a pretty affordable price, ~$100). Here are a couple examples of some of their work:

China Lake Airsoft/Paintball 40mm Launcher

Youtuber Morisato54 has made an awesome airsoft/paintball version of the China Lake Grenade Launcher. While not so useful for firing Nerf Vortices (or vortexes, if you so prefer), it would certainly be a fun bb/paintball scatter gun.

Grey Ops Gets a Facelift

Unless you're reading this as an RSS feed or email, you've probably already noticed that Grey Ops has undergone a facelift of sorts. It was a struggle, but I think I managed to maintain the previous aesthetic feel of Grey Ops, while making it a bit more streamlined and in some ways more spartan.

All the content previously on Grey Ops has been transferred over (with some of the videos not filling the entire post section, but that doesn't really affect anything), including the 3000ish Disqus comments. While it would appear that the column containing the post content has shrunk, it hasn't. It actually increased in size, but the sidebar increased considerably more in size so I can take advantage of some new content. In particular, I migrated a mirror of the chat gadget into the sidebar (with sound automatically off so nobody gets annoyed), so people can leave shoutouts or chat it up on the main page after having read an article.

Also, sharing and "liking" whatever post/page you're on has gotten a lot easier with the integration of a floating sharing object to the left of the blog. It took about an hour of fiddling with positioning to get it working well for every platform I had access to, but if it looks like junk on your end (ie overlapping into the middle, which it never should) please let me know!

Another  cool feature that is now possible is that I can now set up image backgrounds on the blog very easily (static ones). So what I may do in the near future is have a Grey Ops photo contest, with the winner having their photo act as the background for a period of a month or something.

If there is a feature people would like to see added, now's the time! I'm still in blog makeover mode so it would be very easy to integrate something new. And please, let me know what you think in general!

Allen Paintball Jerry Can

Allen Paintball is famous for their sturdy plastic offerings, and their new Paintball Jerry Can is a very welcome pandering move towards milsim paintballers. Perfect for toting extra paintballs on and off the field without carrying a typical pod, the Jerry Can includes the following features:

Grey Ops Speedball Gear Trade-In Program

Well I don't know about the rest of my fellow Canadians, but Ottawa is looking pretty crappy today. In the past hour I've walked throw snow, rain, freezing rain, and hail. So why not get yourself a comfy Grey Ops fleece hat? Fo' free!

But of course, there's a caveat. Because of the ads Grey Ops has on the main page, I sometimes have some money to waste (because I still put everything I gain from ads back into the blog/you guys) and in this case I am actually giving the hats away for free. But only to the first 5 Canadians that do the following...

4 Finalists for the Camouflage Improvement Effort

Soldier Systems has announced the 4 companies selected by the US Army as finalists in their camouflage improvement effort. Click here for the full article.

Guy Cramer is on the list (if one of his CUEPAT design goes into production, and he's awarded a contract with the US Army, I may very well just stop blogging), as is Crye Precision (not a huge surprise there), and two companies I had not heard of until now: "Brookwood Companies" and "Kryptek". I'm very interested to see what the two latter selections have produced, as one would appear to me a garment manufacturer with no previously publicized camouflage designs, and the other seems to be a primarily hunting camouflage-oriented designer.

This announcement does mean bad news for another one of my favourite camouflage manufacturers, Hyde Definition. Sorry that you were passed over guys!

U.S. Army Branded Videogame Controllers

As many paintballers will know, the US Army branding already has its hands in the paintball market, with an entire line of Tippmann-produced markers bearing their label. Now, this branding has extended into semi-realistic videogame peripherals, as produced by a company called CTA Digital. As seen in the pictures below, this ranges from rifles used to aim/shoot to throat microphones used to communicate during online gaming sessions.

I Remember When Toy Guns Were for Shooting Aliens

Call me weird for running a milsim paintball website, and still thinking that giving a child a light up MP7 is... odd. A recent product added to Deal Extreme (a freaking awesome website for cheap chinese made stuff by the way) is a light up MP7 toy, advertised as having: "infrared light / vibration[WTF?] / colorful lights & sound effect".

I'd be interested to hear from parents that play paintball on the subject of when (what age) they think it's appropriate to give their children realistic toy firearms, and where they draw the line (as far as realism etc.).

G.I. Joe Eh?

Ever wonder where the Canadian Forces action figures were? Me neither, but now that I've seen them it blows my mind nobody's done it before! Now the 3 branches of the Canadian military come in action figure format, as designed by a fellow named Shannon Thibodeau. They haven't found their way on to major retail shelves yet, but you can see where to purchase them on the Heroes Force (the name of the figures) website.

Hydrotec "We're Sorry" Video

Worst Product of 2011 Award

Welcome to the inaugural (and probably last, knowing me) annual Worst Product of the Year Award! The winner for 2011 is...

RAP4 Lok-Bolt Released

The RAP4 Lok-Bolt has been released, retailing at a price of $70 UDS, functioning as a drop-in part for the RAP4 T68 system. Omar Macy of RAP4 has released a (decidedly better looking than most RAP4 videos) video showing off the product:

Carnage Paintball Road Trip Round 2

Got the Winter paintball blues? Carnage is making another trip to Montreal via bus, so all Ottawa area paintballers can get a good deal on a trip and late night of play at Arnold's indoor field in Lasalle.

The specifics:

All night paintball trip to Arnold Paintball in Montreal.
Bus leaves from Carnage Paintball at 8 PM on Saturday Feb 4, 2012.
Play paintball all night at a great facility for a great price.

Killjoy Industries Brainstorming T8 Compensators

Looks like a reputable company is finally making a compensator for the T8 without directly knocking off the UMS compensator!  Killjoy Industries is brainstorming for ideas for a future compensator on their Facebook page, showing the following options:

STKR Knives

While a bit off base of Grey Ops' typical content offerings, many paintballers/milsimers/camouflage aficionados are interested in knives, and this article has a particular local interest at heart.

Canadian Paintball Importation/Shipping Info Project

There are always lots of questions floating around about what is and isn't kosher when it comes to importing paintball markers into Canada, and plenty others probably assume they know what's right and wrong and end up in hot water (legal or otherwise). It's no wonder that these questions abound, given that the ins and outs of importation into Canada are a headache waiting to happen.

See Mike's post on RAP4 and Canada Customs for some great insight into importing milsim markers.

Milsim Empire Gets a New Year's Revamp

Milsim Empire has gotten a facelift! Be sure to head on over and check it out, and please go and register if you're into or getting into milsim paintball.

Markers from the Milsim Empire Hall of Fame