Does Airsoft hurt?

A study by numbers

I always get this question and have a hard time explaining it in detail. With this many numbers, no wonder! Most of the people I talk to have played paintball so the answer is easy. No, it doesn't hurt. I use paintball as a basis of comparison because it's easy. If they liked playing paintball then obviously the displeasure of getting hit was not bothersome enough to disuade them from playing, right? Hell, I played paintball for ten years and the worst thing I ever saw was what Sydney did to Patrick. To anyone who hasn't played paintball I tell them it's like getting flicked by a pencil. While I don't have those numbers in front of me, I was able to do the basic math and physics to break down how hard the different projectiles hit on impact at various speeds.

The speeds of 260 feet per second and up are typical muzzle velocities found in Airsoft and paintball (mostly just Airsoft) and I even included the speeds of 100 and 200 fps for comparison of what it is like to be hit at range. The lower numbers are what most people experience since nobody should ever be shot from less than 10 feet away (and many many more in the case of sniper class weapons). While typical engagement ranges are beyond the scope of this page, I will go so far as to note that the numbers in blue are there purely because I'm obcessive about doing a complete project and the tables would be incomplete with blanks. That, and if you're into blood, you'll need to know these things. While paintball is regulated to 300fps and lower, it is not uncommon for people to exceed this sensible limit either by accident or on purpose. See below... ;P

The vast majority of airsofters use BBs that weigh .20 grams. In fact, it is considered the standard weight and all speed comparisons between guns are done assuming a BB of .20 grams. There are many weights of BB to choose from weighing anything from .12 grams to the all metal .43 gram BBs. By the way, these are not the same as the 4.5mm steel or copper BBs you find with the Daisy and Crossman airguns and will not work in Airsoft guns since they are way too small. While most people play with the .20 BBs, it is not uncommon for people to use the heavier BBs in their guns. They sacrifice range in favor of penetration. Heavier BBs are not as likely to let their courses be altered by wind, blades or grass, or leaves. Anything more than a twig will still deflect an Airsoft BB just as it would break a paintball but the smaller BBs are much better at finding their way through brush than the bulkier paintballs which are roughly 16.3mm compared to the 6mm Airsoft BBs. Airsoft players with heavily modified sniper weapons opt for .30 and heavier BBs but these are impractical to use in most AEGs. The average paintball weighs 3.55 grams. Almost ten times as much as the heaviest Airsoft BBs.

FPS limits, minimum engagement distances, and any number of rules vary from team to team and club to club. For example, in CQB games, guns are usually limited to stock speeds (260-300fps) and sometimes go as high as 350fps. Typical games where engagements are frequently dozens of yards apart have pretty lenient FPS rules but most consider 400fps to be a good limit for main battle rifles. Single shot sniper weapons (like bolt action rifles) are often allowed to go as high as the owner can afford. At the time of this writing the parts on the market for bolt action rifles allowed for speeds up to 550fps if you were willing to spend enough money for all the modifications. That's pretty hot. That's also why groups implement the minimum engagement distance rule. The actual limit varies but we've been playing with a 75 foot minimum for snipers and even then, a heavily modded rifle can shred a Coke can at that range so charging a sniper's position tends to get a lot of second thoughts. Many snipers drag along some form of submachine gun or pistol in case someone is able to close the gap before getting eliminated. Damn, I'm off the subject again.

On with the numbers!

Velocity	Airsoft .20g BB	Airsoft .25g BB	Airsoft .30g BB	Airsoft .36g BB	Airsoft .43g BB	Paintball 3.55g
100fps	0.06 ft/lbs	0.08	0.1	0.12	0.14	1.21
200	0.27	0.34	0.41	0.49	0.58	4.86
260	0.46	0.57	0.69	0.83	0.99	8.22
280	0.53	0.67	0.8	0.96	1.15	9.53
300	0.61	0.77	0.92	1.11	1.32	10.94
330	0.74	0.93	1.11	1.34	1.6	13.24
350	0.83	1.04	1.25	1.51	1.8	14.89
380	0.98	1.23	1.48	1.78	2.12	17.56
400	1.09	1.37	1.64	1.97	2.35	19.45
450	1.38	1.73	2.08	2.49	2.98	24.62
500	1.71	2.14	2.56	3.08	3.68	30.4
550	2.07	2.59	3.10	3.73	4.45	36.79

Note: numbers in red are improbable due mostly to weights of the BB compared to the strongest springs available.

What you should find interesting is that even at the highest levels of modification, Airsoft BBs have far less inertia than a Paintball does at all but the most extreme range.

Also note that I didn't mark any of the paintball speeds in red. I was once able to shoot a paintball at over 1000fps from a one time test through a 68 Automag using a 24oz tank of CO2 on a hot day. I had the velocity cranked up so high that the gun was spraying CO2 from every seal. Amazingly, the paintball did not break in the barrel but there was zero noticable arch as the paintball quickly zipped out of sight like a gunshot. For reference, that is over 121 ft/lbs of force. The design of a paintball may allow for it to splatter and distribute the impact over a broader area, but that only reduces the force by about half.