Gel Balls
The most essential accessory for any gel blaster is the gel balls you use!
Here at Tactical Edge, we have beginner gel blaster balls which are softer, as well as harder styles for upgraded and high-velocity gel blasters. We also have tracer rounds available for players using tracer units.
Safe and easy to use, without leaving a mark on the environment, gel blaster balls still provide a realistic experience for modern tactical gaming. Get all of your supplies at Tactical Edge Hobbies.
Follow our Youtube channel for a full instructional on how to grow your gels and store them - CLICK HERE
When soaking the gels, they need to be soaked fully submerged in plenty of water from the tap for a minimum of 4-6 hours.
A bucket or large bottle is recommended for soaking the gels as they will grow from 1-2mm to 7-8mm in size.
Once they have fully grown you can leave them in the water and keep them in or out of the refrigerator.
When you are ready to use them just drain off any excess water with a strainer before you feed them into the mag but do not dry them as they need to be lubricated to work properly.
Gel Balls - FAQs
Are gel blaster balls toxic to dogs?
Don't be worried if your kids or pets swallow a gel ball by mistake. Gel balls in Australia are completely non-toxic. So, while it would be best avoided, it won't cause any harm if any gel blaster ammo is ingested.
They won't break down or clump together in the digestive tract, and none of the material of the gel blaster balls will be absorbed either.
All they do is disintegrate into tiny biodegradable fragments - meaning they are environmentally friendly to use as well.
How are gel balls made?
You'll notice that the dehydrated gel ball blaster ammo that comes out of the packet are tiny - much smaller than their final size. The gel ball absorbs so much water that, once hydrated, water makes up about 95% of the mass of the aqua gel balls.
The best gel balls need very little of this polymer material, so they are cheap to purchase, and can be used after just hydrating them in a container for a few hours, so they are also very easy to use.
Combined with the fact that they are made of a biodegradable material that won't impact the environment, gel blaster balls are the ideal material for all forms of tactical gaming.
How to store gel balls
If you had a bunch of hydrated gel balls ready for a game but never got through all of them, you can always save them for another day.
First, strain any excess water off the gel blaster balls, then pour them all into a container. Any plastic container will do the job - water bottle, ice cream tub, you name it.
You can keep gel balls in Australia in the pantry, or if you're worried about how they'll maintain integrity in a warm climate, pop them into the fridge.
Your gel blaster ammo will last about a couple of weeks, so make sure you have another game before the time is up!
Having said that, avoid putting them in the freezer, which can destroy the structure of the aqua gel balls so that you can't use them in your gel blaster anymore.
Are gel balls biodegradable
Even the hardest gel balls are biodegradable. Gel blaster ammo in Australia is made of a simple polymer material, usually sodium polyacrylate. Because the polymer is so absorbent, the vast majority of the volume of a hydrated gel ball is just water.
When the gel ball blaster ammo is fired, it will explode on impact, with the water dispersing. The remaining polymer material will naturally degrade, so it's an environmentally friendly form of gel blaster ammo.
How much water for 500 gel balls?
Wondering how to harden gel balls? For a pack of 500 gel balls, use 200 mL of water, and scale up proportionally from there.
Simply soak the gel blaster balls in a container of water, for at least four hours before you start your game. You can leave the gel blaster ammo to soak overnight, but make sure to leave enough spare space in the container - the aqua gel balls will swell up to far larger than their original size.