I think I'm missing something about the Beer Gun -- is it really this simple?

I know a lot of folks say the Blichmann Beer Gun "isn't as easy as it looks," but in the Youtube videos I've looked up, and at the brewery last week watching them fill with one, it looks like a dead easy solution -- no foaming, even if the bottles and gun aren't kept perfectly chilled. Meanwhile, I've been futzing around with my picnic tap/air needle/bottling wand contraption for a few months, and I find it a bit irritating; I've now had three picnic taps from two different stores start leaking after a use or two, making it impossible to use for bottling -- the small leak keeps letting pressure into the bottle, and you just can't get a "perfect" fill. Makes bottling for a comp frustrating.

As far as I can tell, if you omit the CO2 aspect of the beer gun, it's just a bottling wand with a trigger valve. I already flush my bottles with CO2 and a spare air line, so would a racking cane, valve contraption and disconnect not do more or less the same thing?

Or, should I just pony up to $100 and buy the Beer Gun?

If your only filling a couple of bottle, then use BM's beer gun. If your doing several sixers or more of bottles. Pony up for the beer gun. The thing is easy to use, just a slight pain in the arse to set up and dissasemble.

I used our clubs the blichman a few weeks ago to free up a few kegs. After about 3 cases worth of bottles. I'm sold and will likely buy my own. Dead simple, easy to setup and clean, and I get excellent bottle conditions and no loss of carbonation!

I borrowed a friends Beer Gun a couple months ago. I was only filling 10 bottles, but the BG worked amazingly well. I already have a spare gas line that was easy to hook up to. I'll definitely be getting my own in the near future.