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 The Tank Story

This is the Story that appeared in the November 2000 edition of

Action Pursuit Games

It all started around November of 1997.  I was sitting in my 1983 chevy S-10 pickup, at the back of a long line of cars waiting for a red light to change.  A man driving a full size ford f-350 van ran into me doing around 50 to 60 miles an hour.  This catapulted my little truck into the back of the 4-door S-10 Blazer in front of me.  Which in turn pushed our combined trucks into the back of the 4-door Jeep Cherokee that was in front of the blazer.  There was still enough force to push the three of us so that the Jeep bumped the car in front of her.  Although I managed to escape the accident with hardly a scratch my little pickup was totaled.  The insurance company deemed it not worth salvage and left it’s disposal to me allowing me to retain ownership.

At this time I had been refereeing at Paint Ball Long Island for a few years and had the desire to build a paintball tank for their annual big game.  My friend George allowed me to store the wreck at his garage until we were able to begin construction of the tank.  Due to financial limitations we were unable to begin work until two days before the big game.  This craze of two days (almost straight through both nights) of construction brought about the birth of what we now consider the proto-type tank.  This looked like a camouflage version of the death mobile from the movie ‘Animal House’.  Unfortunately we finished and transported the tank to the field just in time for the final whistle to blow and completely miss the entire game.  Needless to say this was a disappointment.  The only good thing about this was we had used Plexiglas for the windows.  Which we found out would not withstand the force of being shot by paintballs.  That year we were able to store the tank at the field and although it was vandalized the damage was minor compared to what we did to it for it’s next incarnation.

The next year in the spring of 1999 we towed the tank back to Georges house, which is conveniently close to the field and began again.  We also had the help of George’s neighbors Jim and Rob.  This time we started about a month before the game.  We completely stripped the entire shell off of the pickup trucks frame and started from scratch.  We built a flat bed across the rear frame using 4x4s and 2x4s with a layer of ¾” ply-wood and worked our way up from there.  After going back and forth about the design we settled on a box with a nose.  There was enough to shape to us to suggest a World War II German tiger tank that we patterned the rest after the tiger as best we could.  It’s designed for 4 to 6 gunners.  Two in the rear, while the former front passenger seat can squeeze two and so can the turret.  The driver is armed only with the P.A. system so that driving has his full attention.  It was powered by the stock Isuzu 4 cylinder engine with a 4-speed manual transmission with a skull shifter of course.  The final touch was the 4 twelve inch sub woofers powered by a 1000 watt stereo system.  Although we had wanted to arrive a week early that year we managed to get there late the Friday night before, giving us time show off in the parking lot all day Saturday while the novice tournament ran.  George spent a lot of time talking to John the owner and driver of the other tank, which was an actual armored jeep that carried two.  It had one gunner who had the misfortune of needing to stand out of their tanks turret exposed from the waist up in order to fire.  We thought that John’s vision was to restricted since he only had a one foot square window to see out of that didn’t have any protective netting.  The two tank crews together though didn’t think much of the third tank though.  The third tank was one of those 6 wheel ATVs that was constantly breaking down and was unable to make left turns.  It only carried a single man who had to stop and pop out of his turret if he wanted to fire in any direction other than forward.  All in all even though we loved the armored jeep we thought our tank was better.  We had more gunners who didn’t get shot up while shooting along with a kick ass sound system, plus we had the only rotating turret.  At the end of the day we still had enough time to make one run through the woods that evening and clear some of the road way. 

Sunday rolled around finally the big game was upon us.  We pulled the tank onto the field early in the morning before many of the players saw us.  We made several runs throughout the morning session and made quite a hit with the players especially the ones that didn’t know we were there at first.  The 5 minute warning was given and the tank promptly stalled.  Jimmy rushed to the engine compartment to find the ignition system had come loose.  The whistle blew and there we were just a sitting duck.  Luckily a third of the red army was starting in the same staging area.  They provided cover fire while some referees jumped in with their shields to protect Jimmy’s rear as he had it stuck high in the air.  Unfortunately for Jimmy’s sake one shot snaked giving him an extremely tender spot to sit on for the rest of the day.  So as the tank roared to life (as best as a little four cylinder can anyway) George popped in the Ozzy’s ‘Bark at the Moon’ and we thundered off to battle.  The first half of the day went very well.  We made several sorties announcing our presence by the music and sheer size of the tank.  Unfortunately as lunch rolled along we discovered a serious design flaw.  Although we had checked the clearance of the trucks new bed when we first built it we neglected to check it with a full load of gunners.  The bottom of the tank had been rubbing on the rear tires the entire morning acting as though the brakes were on.  The clutch couldn’t take the strain and so we were pushed off the field and had to wait another year.

Spring of 2000, as tank fever came upon us we were determined that we would not break down no matter what.  Last year we felt that we had perfected the body this year we would prefect the drive train.  Jimmy got hold of a chevy 305 V8 from a friend who had upgraded to a 350.  This was quickly sent off to Medford Machine to be checked, cleaned and prepped for re-building.  We then turned to acquiring everything needed to small block a S-10 pickup.  The motor mount kit was ordered along with the engine rebuild kit while the drive shaft was sent to L.I. Drive shaft in Patchogue.  Along the way many trips to Trade Auto Wreckers in Medford were made, for every other piece of hardware that we didn’t have.  Jimmy set about rebuilding the engine while George and I went about fixing anything else we could find.  New front springs and shocks were added along with the 4 core radiator from George’s corvette.  A word of advice to anyone who wants to small block a S-10, it’s not as easy you might think at first.  Other improvements were the automatic transmission (which cost us our skull shifter) a dual exhaust system and a new 1200 watt amplifier along with tweeters for the front two speakers.  Three scuba tanks were borrowed for onboard re-fills and finally rear wheel wells and spring stiffeners for the rear.  Twenty five hundred dollars was the final tally to insure that our fears of breaking down would not come to pass.

Once again we were at the Big Game.  This time we grabbed about six referees along with George the driver and two of us gunners to test the clearance of the rear wheels.  Even though it was close we were good to go.  And once again we were not the only tank, although the armored jeep was gone the 6 wheel ATV showed up.  It also had been upgraded, it had a new shell that looked really sharp and could now carry three.  They did away with the turret altogether and didn’t have even a mock cannon giving it a striking resemblance to the APC from the video game C&C.  It had had it’s little 12-15 hp motor tuned but it still could not make left turns.  Sadly they were in the parking lot frantically making repairs while we just drove in. This year as the whistle started the game there was no hesitation from our tank, it roared to life and we promptly sat there under orders to give the two armies 15 minutes to mix it up before we rolled off into battle.  This time George selected ‘The ride of the Valkeries’ for our opening number. We started the game as a neutral force being the only tank at the time but since we started in the same staging area as the red army we left them alone.  We planned to get out into the woods before firing upon all who came across our path.  Our first encounter was with almost all of the blue army as we drove by their command post with the music blaring followed closely by the red army.  The combined force dealt them a devastating blow.  Maybe it was the music but they didn’t seem to believe their eyes as we appeared out of the woods.  The red army took full advantage of the many of the blue army as they just stood there looking at us in stunned amazement.  After that the other tanks repairs were finished and they were assigned to the red army.  We were assigned to the blue army much to the dismay of the red army, our size and sound system along with our greater fire power made us the cool tank.  The most common question we received all morning was “Can you give me a ride?”  Almost everyone wanted to take at least one spin in the woods with us.  We spent the rest of the morning trying to help the blue army recover from their morning misfortune.

This year although we were missing Jim and Rob we had two new converts with Kristian and Butch.  Now one of the main reasons our tank was designed the way it is, is so that we can not be shot by the players Kristian or rather “General Fitz – there’s something wrong with that guy” enjoyed opening the forward hatch popping out and letting the rounds fly.  He always popped back down with three or four splats on his goggles.  To George’s amazement he kept popping up out the hatch.  I was up in the turret and didn’t really notice until Jimmy came forward and joined me up in the turret.  He then proceeded to yell at ‘General Fitz’ that he was in the way and that if he didn’t get back down Jimmy would shoot him.  I didn’t understand this since Jimmy had at least a 120 degrees of fire not occupied by Kristian.  When I was on that side of the turret I had no problem shooting at some of the other few hundred players not hiding behind General Fitz, must be Jimmy.  As lunch came around the four gunners in our tank had not even gone through two 2000 round cases of paint.  Looking at the scoring board we saw the blue team was down a few hundred points and had lost their command post to the reds.  We had five minutes to change that before the lunch whistle blew so we all ran to the tank.  As I scrambled up the tank to climb in through the turret hatch Julio one of our friends from the vendor tent jumped out from inside the monstrous tent and threw a paintball grenade across 50 feet and over the 20-25 foot boundary netting.  It bounced off of my arm as I was climbing in and exploded all over the inside of the turret and much of the inside of the tank.  We later blamed the incident on our buddy Justin since he was the one who taught Julio how to really play basketball.  We didn’t do much for the points but blue did get their command post back.

The afternoon went even better than the morning we kept staying out longer and longer as our faith in the tanks new drive train increased. We also went deep in the fields and bulled our way up all the hills that had given us trouble last year.  We found out later that the other tank didn’t have enough power to climb the hills and even if it did they were afraid that it was too top heavy and might tip over.  Our only mechanical problem was the loss of our exhaust system, half of which was recovered by a player who brought it into the scoring table to see if it was worth any points.  We also found out that the other tank didn’t learn our Plexiglas lesson from two years ago.  We came head to head against the other tank and we both pulled to the right enough so that we could pass each other.  Butch was the rear left gunner and didn’t notice the other tank coming abreast of us.  As it drove into his stream of paint I happened to be looking down at it as one of their windows had a sudden hole appear in it as it took on point blank fire.  Luckily for them one of the shield carrying referees were nearby and gave up his shield for them and nobody was hurt.  We did one spectacular run with the blue army after they found the ‘nuclear missile’ and we rallied dozens of them with the P.A. system and stormed across the field to the target site of the red army and scored a bunch more points. Fifteen minutes before the end of the game we were called in as the powers that be decided that the two armies would finish the game without any tanks.

We sat back at the staging area and were ecstatic that we made the entire day without breaking down.  Even the other tank made it to the end without breaking down, a first for both of us.  Although we lost our exhaust and the pull cord on their motor snapped when they went to leave we both made it through the entire game.  We had the pleasure of driving off the field past the other tank waiting for their trailer.  They did yell out that they were going to get a bigger motor and were going all the way up to 18 horsepower.  We didn’t have the heart to tell them that we were running a V8 that has at least 180 horsepower.

We’re already planning for next year.  We want a working cannon along with an improved rotation system for the turret.  Jimmy wants to install an additional 1200 watt amplifier, four more speakers and power steering.  George wants a lift kit and I want to toss in a computer so George can have his wav files from South Park.  We even went as far as discussing heat and air conditioning.  Right now though we only want to finish cleaning and repainting it before we store it.

We would really like to participate in more scenario events.  If you know any body who might be interested my e-mail address is tj03@earthlink.net.  I try to post pictures of the tank on a regular basis on my web page at http://home.earthlink.net/~tj03.  As for our current firepower Jimmy is using an Automag R/T, I use a tricked out Autococker, Butch was using my Tippman carbine and Kristian borrowed an Automag.  George doesn’t only weapon is the P.A. system, all of his attention goes to driving.  Next year I’m hoping to have an Angel.  Butch and Kristian are thinking of getting their own guns, probably Tippman ‘98s with the flatline setup