Chock

They're not the best it has to be said, however, they are correct in stating that they do need sufficient evidence that you are from a post production company or similar in order for the sale to be legal (typically a letter on the company stationery detailing the production the thing is for) and it does say that on their checkout page as far as I'm aware. I work for a post production company too, and even though that means I could certainly use that status to purchase realistic imitation firearms for the special effects I produce, I know that it is a pain in the ass to provide that info, so I instead use my UKARA registration number. Frankly however, I would have just bought an orange BB gun, sprayed it matt black and then done all the other necessary visuals in After Effects if I were you.

Unfortunately, there are some tools who do airsoft, as there are in any endeavour. Just ignore them if they are acting like pricks, it's only a problem if you let it be one for you. Fortunately the vast majority who do airlifting are okay, in my experience.

Cool, hopefully here in time for next skirmish. Can't wait for someone to complain about it.

I'll be there Thursday too, just decided. No point moping about feeling sorry for myself, I'll shoot some people in the face instead lol I'll be wearing a black PASGT helmet with black combat gear and will have my name tag Bradbury on my OD tactical vest and an AFUK patch as well. Gonna try out my new MP5K

It's basically twenty quid to play and another twenty if you are hiring gear. Price drops a bit when you are a member, and you become a member automatically when you've been there once. Might tip up for that one on Sunday, see how I feel, life's been a bit crap for me recently with girlfriend cheating on me and my dad having died, so don't take it personally if I don't show up.

Hi, and welcome aboard. You are pretty close to me, I live in Stockport and go to Trojan’s Wear Mill site fairly regularly and occasionally to their woodland site too. Other sites reasonably local to you are some of the First and Only ones, one of which is near Manchester City Centre, so take a look on bogle for F&O. Trojan’s CQB site at Stockport is very big, with combat taking place across six floors of the very large mill, it has two stairwells (these stairwells are often choke points where battles can get quite fierce). They often have weekend games and also do a lot of evening games (typically on a Wednesday). There actually is a shop at Trojan in Stockport, which sells eye protection, masks, guns, ammo and other bits of kit. It’s not huge, and it was broken into a few weeks ago, so is currently being restocked back to is former glory, although there is lots of stuff there now, since they’ve had a few weeks to sort things. It’s worth a visit if you are nearby, especially if you wanted to ‘try before you buy’ although I would give them a call before you set off, as it can be closed some days. Nevertheless, it is very easy to get to, being literally a thirty second walk from Stockport bus station, which you can get to straight from Tameside easily enough (just go out of Stockport bus station along the River Mersey side of it, under the railway viaduct, turn right, and you are there), it’s about a five minute walk from the train station if you got there by train, the train literally goes over the mill before it stops at the station, since the mill is partially under a viaduct arch. If you are driving, you can park in the mill yard, although you should note that there’s a bit of a weird one way system to actually get to where you turn into the mill yard, which has you skirting around one of the bus garages. The proprietor of Trojan (Ben Franklin) is a very nice and helpful guy (you can find him on Facebook if you search for Trojan Airsoft), and he will probably be worth having a chat to, as he will be able to answer any questions you might have and can sort out UKARA and all that stuff. You can hire equipment from there for skirmishes, typically this will be a G36 assault rifle, a mask and a tactical vest. The staf there are very friendly, many of them are ex-Polish special forces guys, so they really know their stuff. As far as skirmishes at Trojan go, there are some things to consider: It’s a very big site and can be a bit confusing when you are new to it (you really could get lost in the place as it is very labyrinthine in places). Week night battles make this a bit tougher too, since it is dark on many floors and stairwells (and by dark, I mean literally pitch black), so you might wish to consider going on a weekend in the daytime for your first visit, to make life a bit easier. But, if you went on a week night, it would be okay so long as you had a torch. Everyone who goes there has a tactical light on their weapon, almost everyone has a pistol as well as a main weapon, and many people also have a knife too (you can buy them from there for a tenner btw, wire mesh goggle eye protection is about a tenner in their shop too incidentally). The reason everyone gets tooled up with pistols and knives as well as a main weapon, is that you can only fire on semi auto at the site (since it is CQB) and you can only use grenades and main weapons on the level floors, not on the stairs. When fighting your way up and down the stairs, you can only use pistols and knives, so if you don’t have those, you would be at a disadvantage, although this needn’t mean spending a lot of money, I’ve used a cheap springer pistol on the stair loads of times (cost me fifteen quid), and you can simply use your hand as a knife if you want to, although of course that means you cannot throw your ‘knife’. I would seriously recommend covering up your neck with a scarf, wearing a helmet or baseball cap, covering your arms, wearing thin gloves and having some decent high-ankle trainers or boots when going to Trojan’s mill site, as at the kind or ranges battles occur, those BBs can really hurt and will draw blood from bare skin. Make sure you have a torch too. Oh, and a bottle of water is a good idea as well, it can get really hot in there. Since I go there quite a lot, gimme a shout if you are going to be there and I’ll bob down and you can team up with me and a few others if you like.

For thirty quid, it may be worth having it and just cobbling up a solution for the rear butt plate which costs nothing, then using it until it dies or you get something better. But spending anything on attempting to improve it is really going to be pretty much a waste of money, since for the same 75 quid you’d spend on sticking a metal gearbox in the thing and getting a new buttplate, plus the thirty quid you spent on acquiring the thing, you could have something which is okay in the first place, such as a Galaxy G5 MP5K or a G&G M4 or some such. Even if you did tart it up, it’s still the equivalent of a cheap car with a fancy spoiler pop riveted onto the boot. It is what it is unfortunately, a decent airsoft gun is basically going to cost 100 quid upwards.

To be honest, I think what is missing from that loadout is a bit of restraint more than anything. It looks like it might be practical if you were in a post-apocalyptic world where you had to scavenge to survive the roaming bands of rogue hunters, but as far as airsoft is concerned it's a bit over the top. I have a lot of that kind of stuff that I take to a skirmish, but it remains in my bag in the safe zone because it's simply not practical to be clanking about with all that stuff, it prevents you from diving about, hugging cover and it makes a lot of noise, not to mention the fact that those scissors could be dangerous when leaping around as others have pointed out too. About the only thing I do actually carry out of all that stuff, is some gaffer tape for running repairs should they prove necessary, and that is a worthwhile thing to do. Note to that the tape you should carry for that is duct/gaffer tape, not electrical pvc tape, because the pvc tape stiffens when cold and will be hard to use in cold weather.

Technically, the answer is yes, BBguns4less is a good site to buy from, because they will process your order quickly, will contact you if there is a problem, and prices and delivery cost are often quite good etc. I've bought a few things from them, so I know this to be true. The problem is that a large proportion of the stock they sell, is not the kind of stuff you would use for airsoft skirmishing of the kind that most people who are members of this site indulge in. The upshot of that is that it is okay to buy stuff from there, providing you know the good from the bad, but the problem with that, is that you can't rely on the reviews/product overviews on the site itself, either the videos or the text ones which people post on product pages, because a good proportion of those reviews are from people who either don't know any better, or don't know what they are talking about, or are trying to get you to buy the thing, and possibly all three. Such BB gun sites profit from the lack of knowledge of many buyers, and that is the main reason why they are held in low esteem by most members of this forum, as opposed to it simply being because they sell cheap and cheerful backyard plinking guns, which there is nothing wrong with doing, providing you make it clear that this is what the things are, most BB gun sites do not make that very clear at all. Thus much of what they actually sell, is therefore, disappointment. When you know what you are looking for, and know a particular product is good, then BB gun sites are as good a place as any to buy from, but only when that is the case, because there is a lot of sorting the wheat from the chaff to be done to find the decent products in amongst all the crappy stuff, and that is a minefield for someone who is new to the hobby of airsoft. I've bought stuff from bbguns4less, bbguns365 and onlybbguns, and they have all delivered exactly what I ordered in good time and good condition, but I knew what i was after product-wise, and simply went with those guys because they were cheaper, not because they were the place above all to buy things from. So yeah, go ahead and use them to buy stuff, but you'd better be sure that what you are buying is something decent, and you can't do that by believing the information and reviews on their product pages, because many of those are at best misleading and on occasion downright false.

Pretty much every AEG will do semi-auto, and even the ones that don't can be altered so that they will, by fitting after market bits. The only really widely used one I know which does not do semi out of the box, is the ASG Sten gun. There are some fancier rifles which will do three round bursts and such, but any modern rifle will at least do semi and full auto.

Welcome aboard

Sounds like an AK is the way to go, so, AKM, AK74, AK47 or Type 56, all of which can be found with either full wooden furniture and metal on all the other bits, or a metal folding stock. You should look for one with a standard AK side rail attachment on the left side of the lower receiver, so that it will be easy to mount a sight. There are quite a few decent AEG AKs with wooden furniture out there, and most of them are okay, but I'd probably say go for the higher end CYMA one unless you want to spend a lot more on it, then you can look at some of the other more flashy brands, although the price difference won't actually mean that one which is twice the price is twice as good. Best outdoor weight BB for a bit of range and accuracy in an AEG would likely be 0.25g, which will still be pretty high fps if your AEG shoots 0.20g BBs at say, 330-340. The extra bit of mass in a 0.25g will make it fly a bit more true over the longer range, although the difference is fairly small, since we are only talking about .05g difference.

Oh it's only one of those thirty quid non blowback HFC ones from some ropey BB site. Nothing to get excited about, although they are actually not that bad, I've fired one that belonged to someone else a few times and thought it was okay.

Agreed, you can always get your teeth fixed I guess, I just prefer not to have to, so I cover the lot. But as far as eye protection goes you only get issued with one set of eyes, so it's wire mesh all the way for me. I don't trust those dinky little glasses to stop stuff coming in sideways and I also suspect they could get shot off your head by a full auto burst taking the hinge or side piece out.

Yup, that would be piss poor face protection even if the glass had held up. Even regardless of the fact that it offers no tooth protection, there are loads of gaps where a BB can come in from above, below, off to the side, and they don't even look like they would stay on too well either. I know it's a pain in the ass wearing full face pro, but it's the sensible thing to do.

Sounds like you are good to go to me, the original box is ideal to transport it in if it's in the boot of a car. Enjoy the skirmish, you'll love it. TM G3 is not a bad weapon, bit on the long side for CQB, but not impossible and ideal for woodland if it has the bipod (which is removable by the way in case you were unsure), although make sure you have enough magazine capacity or spare mags, I think they only come with a low capacity magazine (might be wrong about that though), if it's a high cap it'll have a winding wheel on the bottom of the mag, also, see if there's a decent speed loader, they originally came with one of the older tube type loaders, which are okay but not ideal. Also check the battery charges okay if it's not been used for a while. Make sure you've got some decent eye and lower face protection, you might find your brother's stuff does not fit you or you don't like it or whatever if you are borrowing gear, and you don't want to find that out right before you are due to start getting shot at, so check that, you want a good snug fit and no fogging up of any transparent lenses. If what you have does not suit, many skirmish sites sell that kind of gear, or you can find it for sale online, but don't get any cheap sh*t for eye protection, that's one thing where you want to know for sure that the things are going to stop BBs and not break when they take a hit.

Yes, you are okay to use a RIF at an airsoft skirmish, it isn't illegal to own one (or as many as you like in fact), but bizarrely, it is illegal for someone to supply one to you if you are not going to use it for airsoft skirmishing at a recognised airsoft skirmish site which has insurance for that purpose (which you are going to do, so that's fine and perfectly legal). In practice however, even if you were not gonna go skirmishing with it, who would ever know where you got it from? In other words, don't worry about that too much, there is no such thing as a licence for an airsoft weapon, they don't require one. So... The golden rule here, is basically don't be a dick with the thing. Cover it up when transporting it to and from the airsoft skirmish, and make sure it is unloaded and any battery or other power source it uses is not fitted when you do transport it, so it can't actually be fired whilst you are in the process of going to and from the airsoft site. If you drive, stick it in the boot of your car, or if it is a hatchback or whatever, with no boot, then cover it up when it is in the back of the car. If you don't drive, and are going on a bus or a train or walking any appreciable distance with it, then put it in either a box or a bag of some kind, and the less this looks like a rifle case, the better (soft material electric guitar cases are good for that purpose, and most guitar shops will have them for about a tenner). As long as you don't behave like a dick with an airsoft weapon, firing it over a neighbours fence or waving it about in the street or other stupid things like that, and only use it for skirmishing at an airsoft site, then you are fine. It's worth anyone who is into airsofting to get familiar with the laws on having, owning, making, modifying and using airsoft weapons. Most people on here won't steer you wrong if you ask about that stuff, but don't rely on 'this bloke on such and such a forum told me the law said, this was okay...' know the law for yourself, do a search on google for the VCR Act and look at Sections 36 and 37 of it, which are the bits pertaining to airsoft. You will see that you are fine, but more importantly, you will actually know that you are fine.

I'm guessing you mean that the place won't sell you an airsoft weapon because it is a RIF (Realistic Imitation Firearm), i.e. it is black or some other realistic looking colour and could be mistaken for a real gun, so they want some confirmation that you are going to use it for a legitimate purpose. So, unless you can provide them with evidence that you are either using it for airsoft skirmishing at a registered airsoft skirmish site which has third part insurance, or for an historical e-enactment, or for use in a museum, or for use in a TV, film or theatre production, or you are using it in the service of the Queen, these being the only excuses allowed for it to be legal for them to sell it to you, then it would be illegal for them to sell it to you. And by law, they need to make such a check to ensure this is the case. There is no getting around that, they could be closed down as a business, sent to jail and fined if they sold you one without confirming that information, so you can understand why they would not want to do so. Most airsoft enthusiasts therefore join the United Kingsom Airsoft Retailer's Association (UKARA) list of registered airsoft players, which then gives them a registration number they can quote when ordering RIFs from websites, to allow the retailer to check that they are genuinely playing airsoft at a skirmish site which has third party insurance for that activity, thus making it legal for them to sell it to that person. Gaining such a UKARA registration number requires you to have attended three skirmishes over a period of at least two months, after which, you fill out a form and send it off, whereupon you get your UKARA number sent to you via email. The UKARA site, if you want information about that: http://www.ukara.org.uk/ The only other way you can purchase an airsoft weapon in the UK, is if it has been 'two toned', i.e. it has at least 51 percent of it in an unrealistic colour, such as orange, blue, red, yellow, pink, green etc, or is made from a transparent plastic material. Any airsoft weapon which complies with that two tone colouration (either by having been painted that way, or molded in coloured material) is exempt from the need for the retailer to check what it will be used for, but you will need to be eighteen years of age to buy it, so they will ask you to confirm that by ticking a box on the order (some sites will check the legitimacy of this, by seeing who any credit card you use to make the payment is registered to, some apparently don't bother to check, since if you tick the box and aren't eighteen, then it is you and not them who would be breaking the law). Some online retailers will offer to paint guns in those colours so that you can legally purchase them; a service for which they will probably charge you about twenty quid (some places do so for free), some online retailers will specialise in selling guns which are that colour already, so the cost of buying those is the price you see on the product page. What many people therefore do, is attend the required three skirmishes for a UKARA application to be made, and use the skirmish site's own hire guns for those three skirmishes, thereafter purchasing a RIF by using their newly acquired UKARA registration number. So if you want to do that, get down to a skirmish site, ask them about UKARA and play three games over more than one month. If on the other hand, you prefer to buy a two tone weapon, then you can go ahead and do that right now providing you are eighteen years of age or over. But be aware that many of the very cheap two tone airsoft guns you can find for sale online are not very good, so do some research into the one you fancy buying before going ahead. Expect to pay just over one hundred quid for something which is decent, but just because something is that price, does not mean it definitely will be worth having, so look at some reviews of the product (and not the ones on the site selling it, look at some independent reviews). If in doubt about whether something is worth buying, ask on here and most people will be happy to tell you whether or not it is a good choice or a piece of crap.

True, but there are many exceptions to that, such as ones with curved blades over 50 centimeters in length, i.e. Talwars, Cavalry Swords and quite a few Japanese 'samurai' swords (all that was brought in as law in 2008 to stop dickheads buying cheap knock off Samurai swords for gang fights and the like). There are some exemptions, such as re-enacting, or if you are a Sikh, or if the sword is traditionally forged, if it is made before 1954 etc, but the actual ins and outs of all that would take too long to list in full. Genuine Japanese samurai swords are bloody expensive, I know because I have a mate who is an ex RAF armourer who collects and refurbishes them, and he pays craploads of money for even very battered WW2 ones that he repolishes with freaky (and expensive) specialised polishing stone sets. Perhaps more to the point (geddit?), swords are not that easy to use and most people would not know how to do so properly. Yeah alright, just brandishing it would be pretty scary, and you can certainly do some damage with one without being D'Artagnan (who was a musketeer anyway) but in fact it would be kind of hard to swing a sword in many homes (most of mine are way longer than an M16, try swinging something that long around on your stairs in the dark and you'll hit the wall and look like an incompetent tw*t), so you'd need a thrusting sword like a toledo or rapier or some such, and would have to learn how to thrust and lunge it properly to have any hope of doing damage to someone, and of course how to parry in quarters, in case someone else was armed with a big stick or whatever. When you learn to use a sword, you learn how to defend yourself with it first! I've fenced against members of the British Olympic Team (got my arse kicked and rarely even scored a hit, cos I'm fairly sh*t at fencing), so I can promise you that it's a crapload harder than it looks to look even reasonably competent with a sword! I also do a bit of Tai Chi (as a contact martial art, not that poncing about in the park malarkey), which means I do in fact have quite a few swords on the wall in my bedroom, mostly Leon Paul fencing foils, plus some Chinese daos and jians in alloy, low grade steel, or wood for the Tai Chi, but there is no way I'd pick one of them off the wall if I thought there was an intruder in my house, for a start none of them have a proper edge and would probably fall to bits if you really tried to tw*t someone with one of them - the Chinese ones are for Tai Chi, not for going all Akira Kurosawa on someone's ass, and the fencing foils have either a safety tip on them or an electric sensor for competition hit detection - I'd just make some noise and put the light on, then call the fuzz. You can pretty much guarantee most burglars would feck off the moment that started occurring, they are burglars, hoping not to disturb you, not a SWAT team coming to grab you and take you prisoner. To be honest though, the fact that I have six big dogs, including a big daft German Shepherd with a scary sounding bark, is more of a deterrent than I'd ever be with some toy gun or a plastic Excalibur. In addition to which, if you attacked someone with a sword in your house, I can pretty much guarantee you would be going to jail, I know that too, because a guy I knew a few years ago (used to be a doorman on a pub I go to, nice guy too) was upset about not seeing his kids, and being affected by the body building drugs he took, mixed with alcohol, and obviously against his better normal judgement, went round to her house with a samurai sword and threatened her, when the police showed up, he attacked them, badly injuring one of the officers when he stabbed the sword through the windscreen of their patrol car. He was sentenced to 16 years in prison and lost his appeal against the sentence too, which means he'll probably be sixty when he gets out of jail, and it's a real shame too, because anyone who knows him will tell you what a top bloke he is, someone who actually cares deeply about the well being of others, and how out of character that act was, but that's what love can do to you, and more to the point, what one reckless moment can do to your life. Use of swords belongs in movies and sport, and that's it.

Yeah you can find decent guns cheap on occasion, but what you don't want is something which is only a cheap gun. Things to look out for, are names you will hear and see people talking about regularly and actually use, names such as: A&K, S&T, Tokyo Marui, SRC, Jing Gong, CYMA, Cybergun, DBoys, Galaxy, G&G, G&P, AGM, ASG, ICS, Classic Army, Ares, Umarex, Bolt, WE, HFC, Real Sword. Names to watch out for and usually avoid are ones such as: Double Eagle, Golden Eagle, Black Viper, Bulldog, Well, UHC, Yika. This is by no means a definitive list of names, and it's not always true that one of the more revered brand names will guarantee it's a good gun, and in fact some of the 'avoid' names can make the odd one or two guns which are decent, for example, G&G don't make especially brilliant AKs, which you might think they would do since they make very good M4s, CYMA on the other hand, make very good AKs and their M4s are not quite so good, Well make a lot of cheap and nasty guns which will break fairly quickly, but they do actually make a pretty good gas blowback MP5K and some fairly decent sniper rifles too. In fact, out of that list of names to avoid, I've got guns from five of those brands mentioned (only two of them are actually good though, the others were bought for projects where I was aware they were not good straight out of the box). In addition to that, you can occasionally find that a fairly naff gun can be tarted up into something decent when you know a bit more about how they work and what parts are available to put in the thing, so you do sometimes see people using what you might ordinarily think was a bit of a cack weapon, only to learn that they've replaced some critical parts (for example, I have a Black Viper AK12, and Black Viper is a name I would not normally recommend too highly, but my BV AK12 has a full metal CM.02 gearbox in it, instead of the plastic one it originally had - which went in the bin - so it now has the same gearbox you find in decent CYMA AK47s, which means it now shoots as good as one of those will). Moreover, there's quite a lot of 'badge engineering' going on where airsoft is concerned, with many guns being knocked up in the same Chinese or Taiwanese factories, and simply marketed under different brand names, often more than one brand name. For example, you might find that a Umarex branded airsoft Walther PPK might have genuine Walther logos on it and such and be exactly the same dimensions as a real PPK, but that is because Umarex own the Walther company which make the real PPK. However, that doesn't necessarily mean you're going to find it has the kind of 'Swiss Watch' internals that a real Walther PPK has, it could have been knocked up in China to fairly low standards, and might even be marketed under the brand name of S&T, since they are the Asian distributors for Umarex. Thus you might quite easily find the same pistol marked as an SRC, HFC, Bulldog, Black Viper or Cybergun product. So yes, use the brand names as a guide, but don't treat them as gospel.

Welcome aboard As others have already mentioned, a GBB is indeed more realistic in terms of how it works, which is obviously appealing, but I'd agree that it is probably not a great choice for your one and only first gun. Gas blowbacks take a bit more maintenance and can be temperamental, especially in this cold weather, which is not a good thing when you are new to stuff, not to mention the fact that they have small capacity magazines and require gas (tenner for a can of it), which means you need to buy probably at least three or four spare mags. Spare mags for gas blowback rifles tend to cost 30-40 quid a pop (unless you buy them from abroad, when they are about 20 quid), so that'd be another 100 quid or so you'd be looking at to get something you could skirmish with easily, and of course it would also mean you'd need some kind of suitable tactical vest in order to carry the mags as well (cos GBB mags are heavy), so that's at least another 30 quid again. Yes it is fun and realistic to yell 'I'm out, reloading!' in mid skirmish, but it can get old soon in comparison to simply rocking a 300 round mag on an aeg, with nothing more to do than occasionally twirl the little wheel on the bottom of the mag to keep things feeding. Going with 30 round capacity gas blowback mags is only really enjoyable if you are at a military sim airsoft skirmish, where you know everyone else has the same thing to deal with, at a more typical skirmish, it'll just put you at a disadvantage. Besides which, it is possible to get 30 round aeg mags too, which are cheap, if you fancy trying a bit more realism, but I'm betting you'll be popping that high cap mag in before long when you are pinned down by someone with a high cap aeg mag! Far better to have something which just works without any worries straight out of the box, which is what electric ones will do after you've simply charged the battery up and slung it in the thing. Most of them come with a high capacity mag which can take 300-500 rounds (and between 2000-4000 rounds if you stick a drum magazine on them, which you can find for 20 quid), which is enough to last an entire skirmish if you don't spray automatic fire all over the place, but even if you do, high cap mags for AEGs are usually only 5-10 quid a pop, so the additional mag cost is negligible, they don't weigh much either, so they'll go in a pocket of some combat pants no bother and are almost disposable at that kind of money. You'll probably get a lot of recommendations for something like the Combat Machine M4 from G&G, which is an excellent choice for airsoft. I've got one myself and even though I have a lot fancier guns, that one is a firm favourite of mine, because it is reliable and fun to use. You can find 'starter deals' which include the G&G combat machine M4 and a few other necessities, so it's a good way to get started for not a lot of money. Here's a few for example: http://airsoftzone.co.uk/airsoft-zone-deals Some other decent starter guns to consider if you want to get a gun alone and get the protective gear separately (watch out for guns that don't come with a battery or a charger by the way, which some places do to keep the price down, which is a bit misleading, although the ones I've linked to usually do come with that stuff): 117 quid: http://www.zerooneairsoft.com/product_info.php?products_id=5645 139 quid: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9PMdp_l-Hv0#t=403 104 quid: http://www.onlybbguns.co.uk/g5-g5.html?filter_name=Galaxy%20G5#.VNeDli5JVhM 140 quid: http://www.patrolbase.co.uk/two-tone-airsoft/umarex-g36c-two-tone.htm#.VNeEHi5JVhM 270 quid: http://extremebbguns.co.uk/product/ares-twotone-am-013-6mm-electric-airsoft-honey-badger/ Note that some places (principally websites with BB in the name, which come in for a bit of flak on this forum) tend to sell mostly two-toned guns (this is worth knowing, because other outlets can sometimes charge you twenty quid to spray the thing two tone), which would be the only thing you could legally buy unless you could prove you were a regular skirmisher, which people invariably do by applying for a United Kingdom Airsoft Retailers Association (UKARA) registration number. A UKARA number allows a website to check up on your airsoft credentials when you are ordering stuff online, so they know you are buying it for a legitimate reason. You can get a UKARA number by having attended three skirmishes at a professional skirmishing site (ask them about it when you go). In the interim, it is often smarter to simply hire a gun from a skirmish site, then apply for a UKARA. That would enable you to order an airsoft gun from a company abroad without any hassle (since the border agency do look for UKARA numbers on packages, and can confiscate things if they think you are 'importing' an airsoft rifle without a legitimate reason). Airsoft guns are vastly cheaper from such foreign websites, so this is a good idea if you are prepared to wait before buying.. The other advantage of doing that, is you can dip your toe into the water a bit with skirmishing using a hire gun (which will most likely be a Jing Gong Heckler and Koch G36 assault rifle, which is another excellent first weapon incidentally), and get a feel for the kind of weapon you would like to buy, plus you get to see what everyone else is using too, what sights they favour on their guns, whether they also carry a pistol etc. Doing that is very useful, because if you ask nicely, most everyone at a skirmish will let you have a try out of their weapon (we are a friendly bunch with a shared interest), and that is very helpful, because you do sometimes find that something you like the look of actually does not sit well in your shoulder, or fit your hands very well, or you may not like the position of the fire selector switch or whatever when you actually hold the thing. For example, the fire selector switch is a bit tricky to reach on an AK47 if you have small hands, the fire selector switch on an M4 can easily get knocked onto a different setting when it rubs on your chest if you have it on a sling, the H&K MP5K can be tricky to point accurately if it doesn't have a shoulder stock, but it has an ambidextrous fire selector switch, the G36 has an ambidextrous fire selector switch and cocking lever, and a folding stock, so it suits left handed people and is good for CQB and long ranged fighting, and so on. There is no better way to determine if these features will suit you, than to actually hold the things. If on the other hand, you cannot wait to get something (yes that happens a lot when people are excitied and keen to get into it), and do wish to get a two toned rifle right away, then do your best to stay away from the crap stuff, by using this forum. Ask people on here about weapons you are considering purchasing. Some stuff can be had for not a lot of money from various sites such as: bbguns4less, onlybbguns, justbbguns and bbguns365, geniestuff, and that is a tempting proposition when you are new to things and not sure what is good or bad. Be aware that some of those sites are known for selling stuff which is not really up to the task of skirmishing against others at professional airsoft skirmish sites, yet claiming that they are (they tend to claim that everything they sell is awesome). Not everything they sell is crap, and they can quite often be the cheapest places to acquire a particular airsoft gun, but do not take the reviews on those sites at face value, check other sources, look for reviews on youtube and ask about things on forums before you hit that 'add to shopping cart' button, because if you buy something which sucks, you'll end up having to buy something else not long after. Many of us have been caught out that way on some occasion in the past, but you don't have to join that club! Above all, take your time before committing to spending money, the internet is your friend in this respect, and you will find a bit of research will go a long way and save you money in the long run. Oh, and don't forget to get some decent eye and lower face protection, and a decent scarf for your neck, do not go cheap on that, you only get one par of eyes, a BB can easily smash a tooth out, and a BB hit in the neck is bloody painful and will draw blood, so cover yourself up.

Yup. I mean it's really rather unlikely, but their is always the possibility of a ricocheting BB whizzing miraculously through all the gaps in a hedge and hitting someone in the eye, and if some neighbour reports you and the fuzz decide to do something about it, then they may possibly charge you with putting the general public at risk even if nobody was hit and no actual BBs even went through the hedge, since in effect, you would have been putting them at risk. I sometimes take my rifles into my garden to work on them, and have fired them in my garden too, but always into a sand trap that I made which is up against a tall brick wall with nothing beyond it that could allow someone to be hit by a stray shot, and never more than one or two shots to test stuff. Since my garden is very long and not easily overlooked if you stay up the end nearest the house, I can get away with that, but I'm aware that with things like air rifles, they do make quite a loud report, and I think a lot of people would recognise what that sound was and not exactly be thrilled at it going on next door to them, and I wouldn't blame them, because my B12 air rifle is about as close to the energy limit of a non FAC rifle as you can get, it looks like an AK and it is very loud, and they don't know I'm firing it into a sand trap. So I'm always very careful about that and especially about letting any neighbours see anything, because even though I'm perfectly entitled to do it, some of my rifles would look pretty goddam scary to the average person, after all, a lot of them are perfect lookalikes of assault rifles and such, and that alone is enough to get you into trouble if someone feels threatened by them.

Yup, I will be needing four hours notice for any burglaries, so that I can charge the batteries on my AEGs and PMR446 radios, assuming they occur in winter. In summer, I can rely on my gas blowbacks, so will only need, say, half an hour and can use hand signals instead of my radio, that should be enough time get into my SWAT gear loadout and gas my mags up. I knew there was a reason why I bought an AEG MP5K and a gas blowback one. Impromptu burglaries will have to be met with my cheap ass springer Kahr TP45 and Glock and rubber knife. Either that or I'll just have to smack em over the head with a Fender Telecaster and claim I was having a Pete Townsend moment whilst sleepwalking, and hope that when the police arrive, they do get fooled again.