Chock

The cheap ass springer SKS I ordered turned up today. As expected, it is really cheap and nasty and I doubt it'd last a day if you used it, but since it is my intention only to use the shell of the thing as the basis for a project, I'm not worried about that at all, in fact haven't even bothered trying to load the thing, let alone fire it. The shell is actually a fairly decent lookalike of an SKS, not totally accurate, but pretty close, which was all I was really after. So the plan is to get an M14 gearbox and barrel into the thing, then get a genuine SKS ten round mag, or possibly one of the thirty round ones, then modify that to be the magazine for the BBs, since the magazine on it at the moment is a dummy, with the thing actually being fed from above via a hopper system which is probably culled from a cheapo shotgun or some such. I doubt there would ever be enough demand for a decent airsoft SKS or type 56, although I know a few people have wished it was so, thus sometimes you have to go the DIY route. I reckon this one might take a bit of work, but I think it'll be fun to have a semi-auto AEG SKS with a scope on it as a DMR, so I'm giving it a go.

Yeah it is basically a Butan coat, but it's in the older TTSKO (three colour) camouflage that the VDV and the Navy used and which I think Ukraine does still use. It does have the liner with it and I think it can be fastened to the similarly constructed trousers to make it into basically a double layered outfit. I found a picture of it online anyway (see below). Great coat which is very warm indeed, but it is pretty heavy and your arm movement is a bit restricted because it is so thickly layered when the liner is in. it'd be useless for airsoft, you'd never feel a 600fps hit in it at all because it is so thick:

Most Russian ex-army stuff is pretty good in my experience, in fact, I've got one of the heavily lined winter camo coats with a fur collar, which is lined with some kind of blanket-like material, and it is the warmest thing I've ever worn in my life. You can go out in sub zero temperatures wearing that thing, and you'll be sweating it's that warm. Paid sixty quid for it about 25 years ago, and it's probably the best sixty quid I've ever spent, still looks like new, which gives you some idea of how decent it is quality-wise. I don't wear it for airsoft, I wear it as my normal winter coat. Toasty warm

Yup, the moment you think your collection of shiny toys is nearing being complete, something else comes along; that's probably why my house looks like some kind of survivalist nutter's wet dream

Theoretically, an AK47 mag can fit in an AK74, but of course would not chamber the round, whereas an AK74 mag won't fit into an AK47 because the 74 magazine has a little bit up on the top of it specifically to prevent it seating in an AK47, because an AK74 round would chamber into an AK47, so they added that feature to prevent it from being done by accident. But that's in the world of the real weapons. In Stalker, it's probably just a visual error by a 3D modelling artist who thinks all AKs are cross compatible in the same way that a lot of people think that Krinkov is some kind of official designation as opposed to the truth of it being a nickname of dubious origins supposedly deriving from the Afghan war if you believe the story about it. Of course with airsoft guns it makes no difference because the calibre is always 6mm (except on those weird and rare 8mm calibre airsoft guns). So I'm guessing it probably would fit, but having said that, of all the airsoft AKs I've got, I know that some of them have magazines which, whilst they do fit into other AKs, don't feed the BBs too well. I should imagine most airsoft AKs of the same brand would play ball, but I wouldn't put money on it working across different manufacturers, and of course it's worth noting that some airsoft guns are branded under one name, but actually made by other companies, so the brand itself is no guarantee of commonality. I'd try it with someone else's gun at a skirmish rather than spending money on it and finding out that it doesn't the hard way. That said, mags are fairly easy to modify and with AKs, they all tend to lock in via the same mechanism, so providing the feed hole lines up correctly, I bet you could get most of them to work, and even if it didn't, you could indulge in a little surgery and make it so.

Figured it was probably too good to miss at that price, so I just bought one of those G&G GC16 30th anniversary limited edition AEGs with the metal receiver. Need to balance up the bias toward AKs on my wall at home. I'll be able to dual wield metal M4s now for comedy value By the Power of Grayskull!

Yeah, as you say, sometimes a show of force might not be a bad thing. If you ever go to Galway during the races (which you should, cos it's a great time, even if you don't like horse racing), you'll see the money being delivered to the town's bookies in an armoured truck (apparently it's carrying several million quid), and that thing has soldiers with rifles walking in front of it as it drives into the town, and that's Southern Ireland! Ireland's a great country, I love it, but they're as mad as a box of frogs, not as bonkers as they are in Finland (which is also a great country), but pretty close

True, that almost certainly was the intent of the British Government in deploying troops to Northern Ireland, but most people I know who actually had to walk those streets dressed like that would have preferred to be hidden! Ironically enough, everyone i know who served in NI, almost to a man, says the average person was great with them and the last thing they wanted to do was to be throwing their weight around. Having been personally threatened by the IRA back in the Seventies (long story, and water under the bridge in these more peaceful times, so I won't bore people with it), I can well understand the desire of guys with their boots on the ground to be hidden as best they can.

Yup, I'd agree with you on that one, loads of people say the AK fire selector is poor, but I think it's good; I can easily operate it with my trigger finger, which to me seems like an intelligent and natural association in terms of haptics. Vastly better than the M16's fire selector, which to me seems to be tailor-made for accidentally getting knocked onto full auto or safe when it rubs against your webbing. I've lost count of the times in the past that my M4 has let rip on full auto at sites where they only allow semi, and I've had to quickly pop it back to semi, never had that happen with any AK. In fairness, the M4's fire selector has now disciplined me to check the fire selector when an engagement is imminent, since I rarely use full auto anyway, but even so, I'd prefer to have something that stays where I'm fairly sure I left it in the first place! That said, the M4's charging handle is better than that of the AK, in being completely ambidextrous, so there are indeed some aspects of the AK which could certainly be better than they are, and which the M4 does well, though I'll admit the AK is probably my favourite assault rifle, even with its faults.

The other day I posted on this thread about blowing my thirty quid Amazon voucher that someone gave me for Christmas on this thing: http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B0041300WK?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00 Well, picked it up from the Post Office Depot on the way into work this morning and have just had a good look at the thing. Pretty impressed with it, especially for the price. It's really well made, from decent thick material, all the pouches are lined with waterproof material with drain holes, the zips, clips, press studs and velcro fasteners for the pockets and zap tags are all decent quality, the (detachable) pistol holster is good (I'd have happily paid 10 quid for that on its own to be honest), the belt is very decent quality. Adjustment-wise it can go from midget to fat git, so that's cool too. Dunno for sure yet of course, but it looks pretty damn waterproof to me and certain seems very robust; I was certainly expecting a lot less in terms of quality for this kind of price tag. Bit of a bargain and particularly recommended to anyone you know who is starting out with airsoft, since its a fairly complete solution in one item and extremely inexpensive too, especially suitable if you have an M4 and a something like a Glock as back up and want to have a fairly light load out that is easy to put on and take off, since it can hold three M4 mags and two pistol mags and still have room for a radio and some other bits and bobs, plus it has a crapload of molle slots on the back and some on the front which you can hang other things off. Looking forward to giving it a field test in the next week or so.

Fair enough if it was a requirement to wear a certain pattern, and obviously in that case it aids with recognition between friend and foe, which is of course one of the other purposes of specific camp patterns. Having said that, I'm sure most of us are aware that camouflage is not merely about attempting complete concealment, its other purpose is to break up outlines in order to make rapid recognition and range finding more difficult for your enemy even when they do spot you, which it does through the function of not appearing as a recognisable shape for your enemy to process mentally when his eyes make saccade sweeps. There's little doubt that any sort of foliage pattern isn't going to do a great job of that against urban backdrops, since the tonal ranges are so different, urban camouflage will make that mental recognition process from a saccade sweep slower for an enemy, which is why such patterns are developed, although I'm inclined to think something like Finnish Snow Pattern might arguably do as well in an urban environment. It's interesting to note that few militaries have actually officially adopted any urban camouflage patterns, whereas they do get used a lot by Military SF and SWAT units quite regularly, since they have found them to be more effective when deployed to urban areas. I suppose this is a case of horses for courses and also a testament to the notion that that Military Intelligence is indeed sometimes a contradiction in terms in the light of that evidence. Those of us who were around in the Seventies will doubtless recall how ridiculous and indeed scandalous it was that British troops had to patrol around the streets of Belfast wearing woodland camouflage patterns, which made them stick out like a sore thumb, whilst carrying FNs and SLRs suitable for engaging targets a long ranges, as opposed to something more suited to engaging a target across the street from them, as was likely to be the case. Meaning neither the troop's clothing nor his weapon was suited to the task at hand. Some things never change of course, more recently during the 1991 Gulf War, the first troops out to the region were being sent out with green woodland pattern battledress whilst riding vehicles still painted in olive drab patterns designed for combat on the plains of Germany during the Cold War. So once again the old saying about the British Army being 'the best trained and the worst equipped' was true.

That's very true about holding stuff to see if you like it. I can remember the first time I held an Armalite, it was an AR-15 with the full stock, and I thought it was horrible the way the buttplate was so high up on the thing, since I was used to rifles where the stock is not inline with the receiver, as it is on Armalites, then of course you realise that it was designed like that because the carry handle places the rear pipper up high, so the whole main body of the gun has to sit a bit lower than is the case with a more conventional stock, so it does then place the buttplate in the right spot when you get used to holding it the correct way, but it was weird the first time I held one and wasn't used to the receiver being that low down. Nowadays I don't even think about that though; so you do get used to guns when you are familiar with them, which means it's probably not a great idea to dismiss any gun just off having held it for a few seconds.

Some cool loudout pics there, however, wearing all that jungle/desert camo whilst creeping past brickwork and whitewashed walls is rather self defeating. It actually makes you stand out even more. If it was me and I was going to go there often, I'd think about getting some urban patterned stuff.

If you really want a springer, then you should take a look at the Galaxy G26 (it's a Glock 26 copy, albeit made from metal). You can find them for for about 20 quid if you look around on the interweb. It shoots at about 250 fps, so it's not bad. I do actually have one and have had no issues with it at all and sometimes take it to skirmishes as a back up. Mag release could be better, but it works. Not sure if you can get spare mags for them, but for 20 quid I guess you could just buy another one for the mag, or dual wield them for comedy value lol Since it is all metal, you can happily buy an orange two-toned one from anywhere you like and then spray it matt black with an aerosol. That's what i did with mine. Think I paid fifteen quid for mine if I remember rightly, so it's definitely a cheap solution even if it isn't the best thing in the world, although in fairness, it is actually pretty accurate for shooting. Here is that very pistol, sprayed black:

Oh I'm not saying you cannot use an L85 left handed, just that it's not ideal for it, particularly considering that it was supposed to be a modern, more progressively-designed weapon which was supposedly taking haptics and ergonomics into account, but ended up having to be remanufactured by H&K and even then got rejected by numerous forces who evaluated it. That said, it's certainly not alone in not being ideal for lefties, but it is a lot poorer in that regard in comparison to many of its direct contemporaries, particularly bullpups when it comes to things such as the position of the ejection port and the charging handle. Having fired the real L85, the SA80, as well as its its smaller chambered version for cadets - one of the advantages of having a friend who was an armourer for the SAS - I'm just of the opinion that I would not like having that charging handle and ejection port clattering away that close to my face if I was a lefty (not to mention it being a crapload louder). Although to be fair, there are certainly a lot of other weapons out there which are equally open to criticism for their various design features; even the M4, which i was advocating on this thread, has many points which one could be critical of. Of course many of these issues are a moot point with airsoft versions, but it does at least make for an interesting discussion.

Welcome aboard. Hope your injury gets better soon and hope you enjoy your first skirmish; even though Jan 2015 sounds like it is a long way off, it's actually only two weeks until next year, so not too long to wait for you. Yup, as nice as it is to spend big on airsoft, sometimes we have to temper enthusiasm against the cost of living. But don't worry about that too much, you certainly won't be alone at a skirmish site if you do not have bottomless pockets, but the way I look at it is, for the cost of a day or evening's airsoft, I could spend more than that rocking up to the bar and buying a round of drinks for my mates, so it's actually quite an economical hobby once you have the gear sorted. And on the subject of gear... The Well D4817 M4 is actually not that bad an airsoft gun considering it is a budget weapon; yes it isn't the hottest gun in the world - probably does about 270 fps - but that is perfectly okay for skirmishing. Whilst it has a fair bit of plastic on the internals, I do know that -unlike a lot of lower end airsoft guns - it does have metal gears and it is compatible with a good many replacement parts if anything goes t*ts up with the thing. Well quite often get slagged off a bit in airsoft circles, but whilst that is often justified, it isn't always, I've got a Well D69 amongst the many airsoft guns I have, and that too is not a bad gun which you can skirmish with in spite of its budget origins, although to be fair, I have tarted mine up a bit, and the Well L96 sniper rifle is another example of one of theirs which is a very good gun. Your CYMA 023 MP5 is probably not up to woodlands stuff though, it being a pretty low powered gun - I'm guessing it will be making about 200 fps - although it'd probably do okay in CQB, which in fact is where you'd see the real thing most often, so horses for courses. After all, I don't reckon my gas blowback MP5K is up to woodland fighting either. Nevertheless, you should be aware that with airsoft, it requires people to be honest and call their hits, and to do that they need to feel them, or hear them, so don't be too surprised if you don't get people calling hits from your MP5 if they are wearing a plate carrier or a lot of webbing and they are more than fifty feet away, because they may not feel or hear a hit from an LPEG (low powered electric gun). That said, in a CQB site, something doing low fps is actually pretty welcome if you are on the receiving end of the hits, since the last thing anyone wants is a BB getting them in the face from ten feet away when it's just left a gun that is choreographing at 350 feet per second (that's the scenario where I have most often seen people getting teeth shot out). And that's another thing to be aware of, snipers at woodland sites can be shooting at 500 fps and indoor sites can have people shooting 350 at very close range, so wear full face protection, because a dental bill for some shot out teeth can rapidly make an affordable pastime into an expensive one! As far as your springer pistol goes, the only disadvantage to a springer pistol really, is the rate of fire, since you have to cock it manually. Beyond that, a springer pistol is as up to the job as any other pistol and frankly, in many cases it's more reliable, because at this time of year in cold temperatures, the vast majority of fancy gas blowback pistols will be lucky to get a full mag off and as nice as electric ones are, they are undeniably more prone to jams than any springer ever would be with their more complicated mechanisms than the relatively simple internals of a springer (in fact, I had an electric blowback pistol do exactly that once at the worst possible moment (when someone was literally around a corner from me) and had to resort to making a knife kill because I was so close to the other guy, if I'd been using a springer pistol, I at least know it would have fired! I've taken springer pistols to skirmishes loads of times - and still do most of the time, since they are a reliable back up - and I've had kills with springer loads of times too. I'm not saying you don't want a semi auto pistol at all, because you're definitely at a disadvantage firing slowly and manually cocking a springer pistol at the kind of ranges where a pistol is useful, but you absolutely can make kills with one if you get the drop on someone. Anyway, just keep in mind that it's not too long until all those airsoft websites will be having sales in January, so even if you are on a budget, you can afford to go for it then. In the meantime, you'll get on okay with what you've got and will be able to see the kind of stuff everyone else thinks is best for the skirmish site you want to frequent.

That's what I do with my M4 - one 300 round high capacity magazine, plus either three, or five (depending on the scenario) 160 round mid capacity mags on my tactical vest or webbing. The high cap is good for not worrying about reloading and general use, but there is the possibility it might need a quick wind up in a firefight, so there's the option to switch to a 160 round spring mag, allowing plenty of triple taps on semi auto without worrying about missing a snapshot because the mag needs winding. Also, I can stow the high cap and use a mid cap if I don't want any rattling to give my position away in CQB. In other words, lots of flexibility. Might want to consider this factor too, if you are mixing mag capacities: I made a point of getting olive drab 160 round mags so they were easily distinguishable from my black high cap one, in fact I can also differentiate them in the dark too, since the high cap is metal and the mid caps are ABS. Yes you can tell a high cap by the winding wheel, but if you have mag pulls on them (as I do) it's not so easy to do that quickly, whereas an entirely different colour for the mag makes it instantly obvious which mag is which when you are busy thinking about tactics and stuff.

It does if it is gas blowback one, unless you fancy getting your earlobe ripped off

Any of the guns you were originally considering on your first post on this thread will be okay. So just go with whatever floats your boat. Since there's not a lot to worry about in those original choices you were considering, what's probably more important is things like magazine capacity, whether the ergonomics suit you, whether you want metal or abs plastic, whether you fancy dressing up as a Yank, a Brit or a German special forces dude, etc. Other things which might help you decide: G36 mags have that cool ability to clip the mags together in stacks, which means if you go for realistic capacity thirty round mags, then the G36 is a bit more practical for making fast mag changes, since you don't have to drop the spent mag or put it away, although you could of course tape mags together on other weapons 'jungle style', so it's not an exclusive feature, just more neatly achieved. If on the other hand you prefer high capacity mags, that's less of a concern with the M4 or L85, since there isn't much need to rapidly change a high capacity mag that often. The L85 on the other hand, like most bullpup designs, is not known for facilitating fast mag changes, so is a slightly worse choice if you do use realistic capacity magazines, nor is the L85 as suited to switching to firing left handed as a G36 or an M4, both of which have some ambidextrous features more suited to lefties. Most M4s have a collapsible five position stock, which means it is easy to get it sitting in your shoulder exactly right, and it can be made a bit shorter for the tight confines of CQB. With an airsoft G36, theoretically you could fold the stock and fire it, but if you favour realism, the real G36, whilst it can indeed be fired with the stock folded, is not intended to be used that way, since firing a real G36 with the stock folded causes internal damage to it, thus its folding stock is only really intended for storage and to facilitate getting in and out of helicopters and APCs. but of course if you don't worry about realism, then it's not a concern. All three have plenty of rails, or can have them added, so they're all suited to putting scopes, lasers, tac lights, grenade launchers etc on them, although again, you'll find the M4 is easier to faff about with in that regard. The G36 is largely made from polymer in real life, so a plastic airsoft one actually looks and feels like the real thing more than a plastic M4 or L85 would, although to be fair, the novelty of having a real metal weapon is largely just that, a novelty, and makes little practical difference in airsoft unless you are the kind of person who likes to dramatically dive for cover, in which case a metal weapon might stand up to things a bit better. The M4 is the most ubiquitous of the three, which means it suits a lot of loadouts and nationalities if you want to dress up in realistic camouflage, as it is used by several nation's armies, many special forces units, and a lot of swat teams and police forces, whereas the L85 is only used by the British Army, the Jamaican Defence Force and odd units around the world such as the Columbian Drug Squad, so it's less suited to a lot of different loadouts, but then again, if you really fancy dressing up like a Brit in Helmand Province, then it might be your ideal choice. The G36 is of course in a bit more widespread use than the L85, but it comes nowhere near the M4 in that respect, which aside from being popular with many legit forces, is far more likely to be a rebel or terrorist weapon than either the G36 or the L85, although if that notion floats your boat, then an AK of some description would be a more suitable choice of course, as well as opening up the possibility of dressing up as any one of a number of Eastern European or Middle Eastern military force dudes. You'll find a lot of us on here have Commie leanings (or at least we do when it comes to buying assault rifles ). There are many other little things like that which might suit you or annoy you, such as the M4's fire selector easily able to be knocked into another position when on a sling rubbing against you, or the L85 being the best one for lying prone owing to its bullpup design, which also gives it the longest barrel too, the AK on the other hand, is fairly difficult to go prone with owing to that long ass mag digging into the ground and preventing you from really digging in, it is however, ideal for firing into the air whilst yelling in Arabic and will definitely legitimise your keffeyah. Thinking about all that stuff might help you toward a decision.

Tried Interlink Express?

For a bit of a fun project over Christmas (and because I wanted an airsoft SKS, since I like Russian and Chinese weapons), I just bought a cheap springer Yika 56 for 24 quid from bbguns4less. The Yika 56 is essentially a Simonov SKS45/Chinese Type 56 without the folding bayonet. Although on the few of the reviews I've seen of this thing, people seem to imagine it is some kind of M14, rather than the predecessor of the AK. As was the case with my cheap ass AK12 which I souped up, I'm going to stick a decent AEG gearbox in the Yika 56 so it be more reliable and will also work as an semi auto, as the real SKS does, and then i might try and soup it up a bit to have it as a more practical Eastern Bloc DMR than the SVD, which as much as I like it, is a big ass gun to lug around, whereas an SKS carbine is a more practical proposition for that kind of running about malarkey. Interestingly, ordering this was once again an example of a BB gun website getting a bad rap, but actually demonstrating good service. Not long after ordering the thing (which was listed on the site as being the last one in stock), I got a call on my mobile from them saying they didn't actually have any in stock and wanted to refund my money, but then the guy said 'actually, hold on, I think I can see one on the shelf, gimme a sec, I'll check' and sure enough he did have one in stock, so came back on the blower and said he'd get it in the mail to me. So, there's a BB gun site which was happy to refund when they thought they needed to, and quick to get in touch when they thought there was a problem with the order, and on the ball enough to spot something sat on a shelf a long way off which might sort the problem! As ever, a caveat to BB gun sites, and ordering from them, is that you'd better be cherry picking the gems from much of the less than brilliant stuff they sell, but if you know what you want, they can be a decent place to buy from.

Don't get the Sten. I'm not saying it's not a good gun - I've got one myself - but it would be a terrible choice for a first gun. It only fires on full auto, and that would preclude you from using it at any site where you can't go full auto (and there are a few sites which have that rule, notably a lot of CQB sites). As much as it might seem like an unadventurous choice, there are plenty of good reasons why lots of people go for the M4 and why so many of us recommend them on threads such as this one. This is especially the case if you go for something like the metal Combat Machine ones linked to on the preceding page of this thread. Only 149 quid for one of those is a bargain. People will say an M4 is boring, but there are vastly more spare parts and upgrade bits and bobs for an M4 than there are for anything else, and that means upgrading or customising the thing is inexpensive, which in fact means that despite loads of people using M4s, it's rare to see two looking exactly the same at any skirmish. Spare M4 mags are cheap and widely available, most people have M4 mags at a skirmish and can lend you one if yours goes tits up, and in fact many site shops sell M4 mags because they are a commonly required item. I'm not the world's biggest fan of the M4 myself, but I do in fact tend to use one as my main gun much of the time simply because they are so good and practical for everything from CQB to woodland fighting, and if you get a metal one, they can really take a lot of punishment when you are rolling and diving around in the mud. Don't get me wrong here, I've got loads of airsoft guns, AKs, G36s, MP5s, M14s etc, you name it, and will probably buy even more, but you can leave the obscure and more exotic choices until you are buying your second and third gun (and if you are anything like most airsofters, you will surely end up with many guns). A Combat Machine M4 is light, reliable, tough, easily upgradeable, inexpensive, easily customisable and looks good with many different sets of gear.

Get some model aeroplane silicone fuel line, this stuff: http://www.sriremotetoys.co.uk/product_info.php?products_id=3733&osCsid=18ff2bc625c494ae1ef3f421212bdd7c split it lengthways with a scalpel, fit it and then secure it with superglue.Looks neat and stops rattles.

What ammo are you using?