The ICS L85s are rock solid, the Patrol Base techs are just weirdos...
The ICS L85 is the single easiest, most user friendly gun to disassembly and take apart ever. it's one of the easiest to fix, it's one of the easiest to get parts for, it's one of the most robustly built. It's got very good out of the box performance, as well as having space for larger batteries (a rare trait for L85s) and comes with two high cap mags.
Best L85 on the market imo. Best bang for buck out of all of them.
I had the ICS for 2 years, modded it to fuck, and eventually sold it to get a WE gas one for the added realism.
The WE performs worse in every way and comes with a lot of disadvantages, using a gas rifle is a handicap, plain and simple.
It's less consistent, less reliable, doesn't work as well through the colder months, in fact it's straight up useless in anything less than about 4 degrees C and it costs a shit load more because the mags are about £35 each.
I'd recommend the AEG over the GBB. Having experience on the real thing won't help you, in fact it'll probably give you unrealistic expectations, the airsoft versions aren't comparable in anything short of control manipulation. For gas guns you need to have spare money, patience, and an existing knowledge of airsoft guns to help get them set up correctly. Or friends who can help you with it.
When I first started, the first gun I bought was gas, I had no clue what I was doing and I fucked it up. Never had a good game with it and spent around £1k trying to make it work right, all because of my stubbornness and lack of experience. I learned the hard way lol, don't take my advice lightly.
Usually everything except the stock, pistol grip and pump- like most weapons. Any metal airsoft replica will usually have metal in all the places a real version would have it.
They have fixed hop, when you cock it back the shell ejector port opens and where a hop adjuster would normally be found is the switch for the 3 and 6 shot modes. It's not an issue though as the spread means it's next to impossible to hit someone well before the BBs would need further assistance from a hop rubber.
I'm no expert but the only shotgun I know of with adjustable hop is the upcoming TM AA12. There could be others but I think it's largely pointless anyway as you get into the realms of using the wrong gun for the job if you want a long range gun.
As in the CYMA models? The metal ones are more expensive and have a different manufacturer's code- I think the 'M' suffix denotes that they are metal, as seen on this French retailer's page: http://www.airsoft-entrepot.fr/catalogsearch/result/?q=CM35
Basically and I am by no means expert only been playing a few years myself. There are two types of full face protection you can buy there are always risks and advantages and disadvantages no matter which option you decide choose:
Mesh Masks: These are masks that have tiny holes for you to see out of, but small enough so that BB's cannot enter an example of this would be a fencing mask http://www.zerooneairsoft.com/product_info.php?cPath=287_438&products_id=7272 or you prefer a mesh mask http://www.zerooneairsoft.com/product_info.php?cPath=287_438&products_id=2439 these are very common for starting airsofters as they are cheap and effective
Glasses Masks: As you are under 18 youll need a full face glasses mask which fog up like crazy no matter how much anti fog you apply to them. There are easier to see out of though (debatable) however fog tends to ruin my day heres an example for you http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Paintball-Proto-Goggles-Switch-EL-Black-Paintball-Mask-UK-SELLER-CC1-/271177017874?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_3&hash=item3f2368ea12
Please note these are just examples you will have to do research on which masks have protection for your eyes, no sport is worth loosing your eyesight so be sure you are buying a worthwhile official product. Dont let this scare you though ive been using mesh masks for years. Just do your homework if its glass ensure they can withstand the penetration of a bullet
Rent a gun and equipment for your first game, they will kit you out to get going and then you can have a chat with the other players and find out what they use, try it out and see what you want. Go slow with your kit up is my main advice, you don't need a lot to get started once you determine you want to play the sport but getting it right to begin with can save a lot of aggravation.
If you have never played before, I would suggest going to a game and renting a gun & kit for a day.
Reason being you don't have to spend hundreds on your own gun and gear just to find that you don't like it.
You're a new player, it's not unreasonable to think that you might not know how specific guns work. (And judging by your above post it looks like i'm right- not many shotguns have a function to change the number of rounds fired, it's pretty much just the TM m870, and possibly a couple of others).
Calm yourself.
Many of the 6 shots can be switched on the fly between 3 and 6. Of course, you'll probably save money avoiding it. But I don't think any of them are locked at 6.
I use a TM M870 breacher which is a gas trishot and isn't shell ejecting. Thing is for intents an purposes a sub £100 spring shotgun(ASG are normally the go to brand as far as I am aware) will do exactly the same job, it's just harder to cock. On the plus side a springer doesn't need gas charges so as long as it's cocked and you have BBs in the shell when you do it will fire.
For CQB it's normally my main weapon and I either just hold it one handed or put it down if I want to use my pistol, which is normally when I'm completely out of ammo or someone tries to rush me while I'm reloading.
Personally I think if you play right a trishot is hard to beat as the spread compensates for when you aim slightly off target or when someone is running and you are trying to lead them. Regardless they are very fun weapons to use, especially if you have mates with you room clearing with their own shotguns. People also get spooked by them, i've seen a lot of people flinch before I fire or when i've fired but I was out of ammo.
I wouldn't bother with a shell ejecting gun as I just don't see the point and i've tried putting my shotgun in the hydration pouch with it on my back but it was really hard to draw. I'd hazard a guess it's the reason you don't see many people with shotgun scabbards after the initial novelty of running a "holstered" shotgun wears off.
I have one because they suit the British Army load out, when I bought it I was a very firm Sig P226 fan - because their ergonomics are amazing, all the features you'd want are all within reach of your thumb without you needing to shift your grip.
However, I was sold on the Glock almost immediately because of more or less one thing.
The grip angle.
Before handling a Glock this was never something I'd given any thought to, but holding one made me realise it's quite an important feature.
The Glock has a pretty darn steeply angled pistol grip, traditionally pistols are a lot more upright.
My hand just suits the Glock angle a lot better, with Sigs and M1911s I find myself pointing the muzzle down a little because my hand and wrist wants to relax a little.
The Glock is just natural point and shoot. Suits me perfectly.
Moving on from that though, they're so simplistic. Function over form, keep it simple stupid etc.
That's the Glock mentality I think.
There's no safety, decocker, trigger's single action only. Makes the mechanism a lot simpler, fewer parts means fewer things to go wrong, easier to fix when they do, ease of use and popularity make parts easy to find.
They're just great lol, I love the look too, personally.
For all the people saying the grip is small, have you tried the larger back straps on the Gen4?
well once the gun is together, the barrel shouldnt be able to move itself, and you cant apply pressure anyway (unless youre twisting the hop wheel too hard)
it doesnt matter if the hop unit it twisted slightly one way, sure it will send all your shots slightly to one side, but all you need to do, is adjust your sights for windage/elevation at the start of the day (not a hard job) and then its as good as if it were shooting perfectly.
if it really bothers you, you can wrap some tape around the inner barrel so that it fits snugly in the outer barrel
I've been using that tube for over a year now. I usually have it half full which is roughly 50-60 blanks at a time. I've changed my load out now and no longer use an mp5 so the tube is just loose in a zip up pouch. It rattles around and I haven't had a problem yet, so don't worry about it. As someone else said, you have to hit in the right place pretty hard for it to go off.
After the mp5 set up I stuck it in pistol mag pouch. One time I didn't put the cap back on right, bend over dropped about 30 blanks. I was playing in ucap bunker where it was pitch black, I couldn't see a thing. That's why I decided with a zip up pouch, if it happened again they'd only go in the pouch.
Yeah, after a few days of use I ordered an M120 spring. Fitted it which is very simple, and it fired bang on what Ed was predicting on the middle setting. I think they shipped it with a lower power spring than I was expecting.
TL;DR? Well you're lucky then, because I've now made 2 videos:
Behold The Rundown Of Ed’s EPIC ICS L85A2
Out of the box rifle specifications:
FPS: 345, 370, 410 – spring tension is adjustable. Values may vary for each gun.
Barrel length: Supplied with a 480mm brass barrel, of 6.05mm in diameter. However, up to a 510mm (M16, AUG, M14) length barrel will fit without protruding into the flash hider.
Supplied with: Two high capacity magazines (470 rounds each) unjamming/cleaning rod and a pot of ICS .20g BBs
Rails: Top rail – 19mm
Hop: Unique design, no aftermarket hop units available for this rifle. It has its issues but it works well enough.
Gearbox: Again, unique to the ICS L85, supplied with very solid gears, bushings, factory shimmed and all around, pretty darn good to be honest, it's also heavily reinforced.
Motor: Comes with the godly ICS Turbo 3000. This thing can pull any spring you gear it to.
So let’s get started. I bought the rifle back in December 2011 with the intention of making it look exactly like the one currently issued in Afghanistan.
The first things to order were the replica Daniel Defence RIS made by Madbull, as well as the adaptor for fitting to the ICS L85, I then bought a grip-pod made by god only knows what company, I can’t even remember where I bought it from, but it’s a nice high quality product for the price, works flawlessly and looks great.
Once those parts came and were fitted I needed the correct ACOG mount, so I ordered that from Ant-Supplies, as I was a little weary about ordering from RSOV in Hong Kong because of all the horror stories I’d heard about import tax and such.
I already had an ACOG at the time and back when I started the project I thought that would do, later on I decided it wasn’t accurate enough to the real steel, so I decided to order a new ACOG, but that wasn’t until about 5 months into the project when I went to the Arms Fair in May.
So at this point I had the gun set up with the DD RIS, grip pod, ACOG mount and an ACOG, but not the right one.
Since the RIS was fitted I needed to start running LiPo batteries, issues arose at this point, the connector that comes with the gun is for a large Tamiya and there’s so much extra wire that I couldn’t come anywhere even close to fitting the battery in with a connection conversion lead. So I rewired to small Tamiya and cut short the cables so everything fit.
I was happy with this set up for a fairly long time until I ran into issues at a skirmish at The Stan. The gun just died, like there was no battery connected and the trigger mech kept making a strange clicking noise. I finished the day using my MP5. Once I got back I looked into it and found that from all the stripping and reassembling I’d been doing to change bits and alter the spring tension for different site rules etc. had caused the connection pins that break the circuit when the receiver is split as a safety feature, to be pushed away from their contacts. They didn’t complete the circuit once the gun had been re-assembled, as they should have.
So I bent them upwards, which seemed to fix it.
To fix the trigger mech clicking I dismantled it, couldn’t understand what the issue was, re-assembled it, and now it’s fine… That seems to fix a lot of things in my experience. If something doesn’t work, take it to bits and reassemble it before you plan to do anything else to it.
Since I’d been looking into the internals, I decided I’d start doing some actual work on them, this is the first AEG I ever dismantled, so that’s testament to how easy to work on it is.
I knew I wanted a Tanio Koba Hop-Twist barrel, but I couldn’t find the right one anywhere on earth, so I ended up getting one for an L96 from Land Warrior for about £70.
Since the barrel cut was for a sniper, the barrel retention pieces in my gun didn’t fit the barrel, so I had to decide to either mod them, make some new ones, or remove them altogether. I realised they weren’t needed for anything other than a better air seal, which I didn’t realise the importance of at the time, so I opted for full removal.
This meant that the barrel had to be held in by friction alone, so I wrapped insulation tape around the barrel so that it was a super tight fit in the outer barrel, it was damn hard to get in and out after that.
Now the barrel was done I went for the hop unit, I’d been advised to get a Madbull Blue rubber, and so I did. I also experimented with different nubs, eventually choosing to use the biro ink tube mod, so I cut it to size and used that.
I ran with this set up for about 2 months until I noticed Red Wolf had the correct twist barrel in stock, so I immediately ordered one. This gave me back the bug for adding stuff again…
I asked for advise on how to make the gun the best it could be (thank you Mr. Finius) and was told I needed a better hop nub and a new piston head (amongst other minor, home grown internal modifications that so far I haven't attempted). So I ordered a big-out H nub and a Lee’s Precision Engineering piston head, which has an air brake on it to increase the life of the internals. In retrospect the piston head wasn’t really needed, the only change I’ve observed is that it’s more difficult to tell when the gun is dry firing because it sounds similar to when it’s firing rounds, and it’s ever so slightly quieter.
At this point I was running the same externals as before but with a new piston head, proper twist barrel allowing me the correct barrel fitting and the H nub. This is possibly the greatest combination of parts for any rifle if you want immense accuracy and even more immense range. I have my rifle set on the middle spring tension, which is about 350fps on .20s, I run it using .25s and I can comfortably hit a man sized target at up to 50m.
Twist barrels are said to work best at under 330fps, so if you want to stick one in a sniper running 500fps, it’s fine. Just use .40g or .46g BBs to bring the fps down and your sniper will become a laser rifle… Well, minus the projectile speed.
After adding those parts I started researching into the real steel a bit more, I found out that the real steel L85 was now fitted with a new flash hider, a different ACOG to mine that's equipped with a docter site, I also noted that the L85 was now issued with Magpul EMAGs and an LLM01.
So I ordered all of that, and some rail ladders for good measure. Shortly after making this order I realised that the docter sight on the ACOG I'd ordered didn't look like the proper one on the L85, so a quest began to find one. I eventually found it thanks to a tip off from CKinnerley about BritKitUSA, so thanks to CK for the final, finishing touch.
A lot of this stuff was in the post for absolutely ages, I ordered the ACOG from G1098Airsoft and they messed me about for over a month, so I re ordered most of it from RSOV.
Whist it was all in the post I thought I’d improve the internals. My aim was to increase the trigger response, as it was the only thing letting the gun down.
I looked into changing the motor, but decided that the ICS Turbo 3000 was actually an amazing motor already, which troubled me somewhat, how can I increase the trigger response time if I can’t just get a new motor?
I decided to look into shimming the gearbox, the idea being that if the gears are more properly aligned, the motor won’t have to work as hard to turn them over, giving me a more efficient use of battery and motor power. I’d been practising taking guns apart and getting to know and understand gearboxes over the last couple of months, so I ordered a few packs of shims from Patrol Base and managed to shim the gearbox pretty well, it did give a noticeable improvement, but the trigger response still wasn’t good enough.
So I’m stuck now. The gun’s absolutely flawless in every way, externals, internals, accuracy and range. But the trigger response is still terrible. I would say it’s the only thing I can hold against the ICS. I think the G&G L85 has a pre-cocking system, which would make the trigger response literally instantaneous. I’d pay a lot if there were a way I could have that in my ICS.
Since I can’t think of any solution to this that can be realistically achieved I’ve decided to let it go.
I’d considered getting an even better motor or switching to higher voltage LiPos but I don’t want an unrealistically high rate of fire and I don’t want to have to buy stronger gears. The ICS L85 also has a proprietary piston, there are no after market pistons available. Meaning if my set up shred one, I can never run the set up, because that’s the only piston I can ever have.
My current thoughts are that if the target is far away I have the range advantage about 90% of the time. If they’re up close and personal, I’ll just have to switch to auto to deal with them, as that’s the only way to overcome the trigger response issue, I’ll just have to learn better trigger control and not get greedy. Running real caps means auto is rarely a good idea.
Edit:
Motor packed in today, before the ACOG, docter sight and wing mount have even arrived! So I guess we'll see if changing the motor can get me a better trigger response, I've got a Systema High Torque motor on the way, from Zero One... £85. Gulp. Still planning on swapping to Deans connectors and at some point completely rewiring it with low resistance wiring. If possible I'll also fit a Mosfet.
My quest for better trigger response has begun!
The first step on the quest was successful, the Systema motor came today and the trigger response has improved noticeably. The gun actually feeds more powerful, you can really feel the shake of the internals in your shoulder when you pull the trigger. I tried turning this motor over by hand before installing it and it was damn difficult. I used to think my ICS motor was difficult to turn over, this thing must be at least twice as powerful. The power of it makes me feel like I have to do something to reinforce the circuitry a bit better.
Edit:
Trigger response has been massively improved by getting a new trigger mechanism. There's a small pin in the trigger assemly that acts as a guide rod for the trigger contacts and mine had snapped in half somehow, but I didn't realise it wasn't supposed to be like that until the new trigger mech arrived. Trigger is absolutely spot on now, response is perfect, ROF is perfect. New hop hasn't really made any change, even with an AEG cut barrel the barrel retention bits still needed modding, so I just used the pre-modded ones from the old hop.
The gun is shooting straight as an arrow though, accuracy is above average, it could still do with a few hop tweaks, but I'm going to skirmish it on Sunday and see if the parts don't just all bed themselves in a little better. I imagine consistency will increase through use.
I also now have all the parts, so after I've skirmished it and have a bit of spare time I'll get some photos added... Though I might not do it until something buggers up. Once I've set the gun up I don't really like taking it apart to do anything apart from change the spring, 'cos the barrel assembly is an utter arse to get back together properly. It's really hard to seat the hop rubber correctly because of how tight the unit is.
I've recently decided that I'm going to get an M140 spring for this to whack the fps up to 450, then use .36s or .40s and field it as a DMR. I'm pretty certain the internals can take it and I've already shimmed it to perfection, the systema motor could probably pull an M9billion so that won't be an issue either. I'll let you know how it goes.
Anyone know how to disable auto? 'Cos to me it looks like you NEED the fire selector mechanism to be able to use semi, without it there's no way to engage the cut off lever... Might have to just hope my site trust me. Which I think they do.
Edit:
DMR plans fell through, somehow the motor is unable to pull even an M130 (I couldn't find an M140 in stock anywhere) so for the time being I've decided to just use it as a regular AEG, it running at about 360fps at the moment because my new spring is yet to bed in, but with .25s it's running around 320fps. If I take up the DMR plans again I think I'll start it by changing the ratio of my gears, as it stands I can't really be bothered to work out what ratio I'd need, or which gears will be compatible.
I'm also planning to make an L129A1 DMR at some point over the next year or so, so there'll be no need to have my L85 at DMR specs.
Edit:
Currently it's August 2012, the gun is about 8 or 9 months old and has had approximately 20,000 rounds through it since I bought it, so various parts have been added and removed etc. I don't think I'll be making any vast changes from this point forward, other than replacing parts as and when they break.
I'll write an update for this around this time next year and see how everything's holding up.
Edit:
Just a little update on how the gun's performing. It's now December the 11th, so within 10 days of the gun being a year old. At approximately 3000 rounds, or one pot of ammo per month, that means it's fired something in the region of 36,000 rounds. Everything is still solid and showing no internal wear at all on any of the internal parts - Except, the motor gear and whatever the name of the gear that the motor meets, don't mesh 100% perfectly, the angle of the slope on the motor's gear is slightly steeper than the corresponding slope on the 3rd gear from the piston in the gearbox. This is causing wear on the 3rd gear and the motor's gear, resulting in tiny little metal chips building up in the gearbox and a very, very slow rate. I've only cleaned it out once in about 4 months and the little bits I had to remove were akin to sand, or very fine iron filings. It does not appear to have any effect on performance.
Currently I'm running it with a 6.01mm barrel which I initially bought for a 16-17inch barrel M4 project but it was too long (455mm) so I tried it in the L85 and I've actually been seeing much better results. I don't know whether it's because my twist barrel has been used too much and the "threading" I'll call it, in the barrel has been knocked by BBs too many times to be effective anymore, perhaps twist barrels can expire, or wear out... Well either way, running a Version 1 Madbull 6.01mm by 455mm tight bore barrel I have been seeing better results than with the twist barrel.
In the hop I'm still using a Madbull blue rubber. I keep meaning to experiment with different rubbers, but so far the Madbull is a signifiant improvement over the standard rubber. Additionally, when using the Madbull a smaller nub is required, otherwise even with hop off, the rubber will obstruct the barrel to such an extent that it will overhop literally everything you shoot through it. The nub I use to overcome this is the same as I had before, a Big Out H nub. I've changed the spring to an M100.
I'm now seeing the fps sit at around 360 in the middle setting using .20s and as per usual, I run it using .25s. The rifle is effective out to around 40m. By effective, I mean I could hit a target with one shot. As for hitting a target at all, the max range I've ever hit someone was round about 70m and required me to aim around 6 feet above the target and just spray on auto when they were unaware of my position, so as not to see the BBs coming in and move out of their path.
For reference to its effectiveness there's my YouTube videos (link to my channel in my signature), all of which, bar one (or two if you count the one that isn't airsoft related) I use the L85 in.
Aside from the barrel change, I also bought a new charging handle and tappet plate. The charging handle replacement was bought because the standard one had become so wobbly that I just couldn't deal with it anymore, tightening it to the point where the screw wore away could be completely undone by simply racking it once. Interestingly, the replacement charging handle was different in this respect, instead of the bolt handle being screwed into the fake bolt, it was screwed in and then welded in place, so it physically cannot move. I've had no issues since then, and regularly rack it back and let it go for the fun of it.
The tappet plate was bought more as a spare because the part is proprietary and I didn't want my current one to break for me to then be stranded without one. Again, interestingly, the new tappet plate was of slightly different design. Testing it in the rifle showed no performance difference from what I can see, but what ICS seem to be doing, is in some way or other improving all the individual components, separate from the rifle itself. So you buy the gun and it comes with all the standard bits.
But, should they fail and you buy a spare or replacement, the part you get is different to the one you broke, despite it being by ICS and for the L85. So it seems that ICS are making up for the fact that these parts are proprietary, by making the replacement parts better than the ones supplied with the gun, so that replacing parts when they break, is akin to getting an upgrade.
I also readdressed the DMR idea. I haven't skirmished it with this set up yet, but I bought a new Madbull M120 spring and put it on the highest spring tension. This put the fps up to 380 (average over 5 shots) with .20s Couple this high fps with .30s - the same 6.01, madbull blue and H nub as with my regular set up and this thing shoots an untold distance. As I said, I've not skirmished it yet. But I did test it when I took it to chrono at another site (they wouldn't let me use it because they don't have a DMR rule... ) and the BBs were flying out of sight before I saw more than 1 foot of drop and I could clearly see them for at least 60m.
So in short, should I ever skirmish this with this DMR configuration, everyone I see will be within engagement range the only downside, is that there is no way to lock this gun to semi. The fire selector which is linked mechanically to the trigger mechanism is required in order for semi auto to work and the only conceivable way to remove the auto function is to remove the fire selector. Since I can't remove the fire selector without losing semi and not auto, there's simply no way to lock it to semi only. Which in all likelihood will make it impossible to field as a DMR legitimately.
I'll also update the parts list and overall cost to account for me now using a different barrel and having 12 Emags.
UPDATE - 13th April 2013
Since the above posts, my motor's pinion gear shredded itself to pieces. Rather pleasingly, the ICS gears and piston are still completely fine, so that's some evidence that ICS parts are of comparable quality to Systema.
I worked out Sherlock Holmes style that the reason the motor gear imploded was because the angle it met the gears wasn't right, and since there's sweet FA I could do about that, I thought I'd use this opportunity to buy some new bits and bobs.
So in the post I had some Ultimate High Torque gears - in the hope that they'd meet the Systema Magnum motor's pinion gear at the right angle, a new pinion gear of the exact kind I'd had before, a Systema version 2 cylinder head, some new shims and probably some other stuff. It's getting too much to remember all the stuff I've done to this rifle now.
In short it took roughly 50,000 rounds for this part to fail (discounting the ICS motor burning out) and it wasn't even a standard part.
I now have it fitted with:
A Madbull Ultimate aircraft aluminium, 6.01mm tightbore, of 510mm in length. The hop unit has a Systema standard AEG hop rubber in it, and a Big Out H Nub. I also managed to grab an aluminium hop arm off someone on these forums. The air nozzle is the stock part, the cylinder head is a Systema V2, for the piston head I've recently gone back to the standard one, as the Systema cylinder head's shape renders the LPE air brake piston head pointless. The piston itself, piston head and cylinder are therefore all as they came when I initially bought it.
The gears are Ultimate High Torque gears, I think the ratio is 28:1 and the gears are helical.
The gears have been shimmed.
Lastly the motor is a Systema Magnum High Torque.
I use it with a 9.9v 1000mah LiFe battery, Blaster .25g BBs, Magpul PTS Emags and an M100 (I forget which make, but I don't think that matters)
With spring tension on full, this is possibly the most accurate, long range, skirmishable AEG I've ever known. Hitting a man with one shot at 50m? Piece of piss. I can see it reaching out to up to 70m with the barrel pointing up a fair bit of course.
Anyway, here's a list of absolutely everything I've bought to add to the gun, externals, internals and generic parts, as well as parts I've replaced due to wear, or fault. If you want to know where I got any of it from, just ask and I'll help you find a place to get it.
Update - 30th July 2013:
So the helical 1:28 ratio gear plan didn't last very long in the end. Since the motor had to turn so many more times for me to get one shot off, rate of fire and trigger response suffered quite a lot and since my batteries are only 1000MaH, they were running out pretty quickly as well. So now I'm running with all the same parts as the last update, except I've got the original 1:18 ratio gears installed and I also picked up a Systema V2 piston head, to better compliment the Systema cylinder head.
I've also bought and sold a few ICS L85s and L86s since the last update, and one of them went to a collector who just wanted it as a display model; so now I've got a complete set of internals spare in case anything goes arse over tit.
The only thing I really have to keep tabs on is the motor's pinion gear, since the angle of the gears don't mesh with the pinion gear, they do gradually wear each other down. I might have to buy a load of pinion gears in bulk just in case it packs in unexpectedly.
But aside from that, I'm happy with it.
Maybe I'll think about getting some high speed gears just to make the trigger response even more epic... Still need to rewire it all to Deans connectors as well =/
I had an art teacher at school who used to say, "You can't finish art" It's TRUE! Argh!
Base cost: Rifle £320
Externals and related: RIS £130 RIS adaptor £16 Grip-pod £20 LLM £70 ACOG and docter £110 ACOG mount £26 Docter wing mount £11 Rail ladders £60 Flash hider £25
Total: £788
Current Internal upgrades: Barrel Madbull (6.01x510mm tb) £30 Hop rubber Systema £6 Hop nub Big Out H Nub £10 Systema High torque motor £85 Systema V2 Cylinder head £10 Systema V2 Aluminium piston head - Left it too long to update this... I think it was £12, not sure.
Aluminium hop arm £10
Total: £173
Grand total: £961 (Minus postage and additional costs below)
Additional costs:
Magazines: Magpul PTS Emags x14 = £280
Batteries:
9.9v LiFe x4 - £60
Charger: Basic LiPo/LiFe charger = £15
Generic internal parts: Shim set x3 = £12
Replacement parts due to wear or other fault: Trigger mechanism = £23 Hop unit = £19 Charging handle = £14
Pinion gear = £10 Butt plate (lost the screw from the back that stops the motor adjustment screw from altering through use) - £22
Overall costs, including everything apart from postage costs and ammo = £1,432
