Colin Allen

Indeed; mine works happily with STANAG mags, although it looks much cooler with the 6x35 style mags. I have the battery in a pouch on the stock.

The rule is unworkable. Whoever came up with it needs to give their head a shake, ideally after covering their ears so that their brain does not fall out.

Today, I went to the rather chilly and extremely muddy Airsoft Plantation. Airsoft Plantation's winter mud is fascinating and intriguing; its surface area, depth, varying consistency and slippery essence would delight the most jaded connoisseur of pedological science, a subject about which the Lad knows rather a lot. Having set up the latest addition to the HK family, which JG call a G3 SAS, I readied the HK33 and HK53 for the day's action. Around 120-130 players were present, a decent number which resulted in the safe zone being a little less busy than it sometimes is. The first game was a shortish warm up, which involved us, the red team, attacking from the village into the mortar pits with the aim of getting 20 players on the top deck of the bus that is parked in the middle of it. On reflection I do wonder why someone would park a bus in the middle of some mortar pits; it seems an odd thing to do. We had infinite regens on one of two marshals, while the defenders had two lives in the mortar pits. The defenders could have players on the bottom deck of the bus, but not the top. A group of us cut across the site, forming the right flank of the overall assault and swinging down towards the comms truck, from where we dislodged the enemy rather handily, although I did have to take several trips to the nearest regen marshal. Eventually, of course, the enemy were overwhelmed, although it was interesting to witness how long it takes for 20 airsofters to get onto the top floor of a bus and back down again. After a very short break to mag up, we set out for a game which involved getting a crate into the enemy's HQ. We started at the DEA base, with the plane as our HQ, while the blues started in the village with the town hall as theirs. Each side had unlimited regens on six medics; if a medic was hit, they had to find another medic to regen on. A couple of us medics stayed with the group defending the plane, where we soon became very busy shooting the attacking enemy and reviving our colleagues. A strong enemy attack from the direction of the mortar pits was repulsed after an epic fight, as were several probing attacks. Eventually, the enemy increased the pressure on us and managed to get their crate into the plane, winning the game. I am unable to report on our colleagues who were trying to get our crate into the town hall as I have no idea what happened to them. After another very short break, our team went to the village where ten high value targets, of which I was one, had to be defended by the rest of the team. As HVTs, pairs of us had to occupy a building, so five buildings were occupied by HVTs; once hit, we had to drop our yellow armbands where we were and the go to the border to get new instructions from a marshal. Other defenders had two lives, while the attackers, whose aim was to collect all ten armbands and get them to the marshal, had infinite regens on a teammate. After several good exchanges, a wafty BB at the very end of its flight drifted through the window and gently tapped me on the shoulder. When I reached the marshal at the border, he offered me three choices: 1. Remain there with him looking bored and glum. 2. Go back to the safe zone for an early lunch. 3. Betray my teammates by swapping sides and joining the attackers. Being a true gentleman and a man of honour, I immediately chose the latter, rejoicing in shooting my former colleagues. After lunch, we set out for the mortar pits for a reversal of the first game of the day. I started off at the comms truck, holding back an enemy attack for a while until discretion became the better part of valour and I decided to fall back towards my colleagues; unfortunately, while carrying out a tactical withdrawal (honestly not running away!) I was shot in the back and had to regen at the berm, where I fought until I was hit again, ending my involvement in the game. Following this, we reversed the game with the high value targets; attacking into the village was hard, but we gradually wore down the defenders and captured all of the armbands. As the game with the crates had gone so well, it was reprised with different start points and targets; we started at the tower in the village and had to get our crate onto the bus in the mortar pits, while the enemy started at the bus and had to get their crate into the tower. This was not our finest moment; after holding off the enemy's attack for a while, a group of them swung right around the site, entering the village from the far end and eventually getting their crate to its destination. The day finished with a rather fun game of infection; I lasted quite a while, combining shooting the ever growing number of attackers with successfully avoiding being shot until quite near the end. Of course, I was eventually hit and, by the time I had regened at the hill fort and returned as an attacker, the game was essentially over. When all clear was called, one surviving defender popped up. It was a typical AP day; well organised and well run with well designed games and a good mix of players from the very experienced to first time rentals. No airsoft for me next weekend as our guitarist and I are going to see the utterly bonkers Laibach on the Saturday evening and then have a rehearsal on the Sunday. Weapons used: Classic Army HK33 Classic Army HK53 JG G3 "SAS" (not for very long as I only had one mag with me) ASG XP18 Commander (CO2)

That has to be the bargain of the decade.

The MC51 was indeed pretty much pointless; more controllable weapons such at the HK53 could do the same job and not concuss the user.

Well, I just learned something; that would be almost impossible to control and appalling to use. I have amended my post in the interest of accuracy.

JG G3 "SAS". Bought a couple of weeks ago and now nicely upgraded.

You are a braver man than I.

The weight of BBs used will not have any impact on the longevity of the trigger unit.

Excellent! I am glad it went well. I did the same with the G3 trigger when I fitted a Hybrid.

Indeed; trying to import a RIF using anything except UKARA as a defence is risky.

Crikey! That is a price!

That is impressive!

That isn't normal; BBs should not be able to roll out of the barrel as the pressure from the hop rubber should hold them in place. How long have you had the gun? Have you adjusted the hop to give good flight?

He threatened to get his brother Leo to sing to him.

I ended up putting a Perun in mine.

The idea of LCT making mags for the FAL worries me after their issues with G3 mags.

A bandolier seems sensible and is probably a necessity. What about drop leg mag pouches as well? A couple on each leg would be useful.

And a few on the back for his or her buddies to grab if they need them; that should get it up to at least 20, which sounds like a decent number.

That is a decision that only you can make. Was your post a question, a statement or a really bad attempt at haiku?

All matching serial numbers as well.

I should have known it was you who bought it. The Lad has this MAS36 and I was considering making an offer for that one.

Today I went to that curate's egg of a site, Splatoon in Essex. My main reason for going was to set up three newly acquired and upgraded guns on their well marked out and very clear 50m range. More about one of these later. With this done and the safety briefing out of the way, followed by the briefing for the first game, we set out to play fallback through the barrel yard, the barricades and the two parts of the container field; after the attackers had cleared each area, there was a reset before they could attack the next. As the defenders, we had one life in each area, while the attackers had infinite regens on a marshal. This was a reasonably hard fought game and we were slowly pushed out of the first two areas; after we had set up in the first half of the container field, the enemy began their assault on that. I was positioned in the pallet pile; four enemy players ran past me and positioned themselves on the back of a structure about 15-20m from me. I had a perfect line of sight to them and put a couple of rounds into each of them; two of them took the hits, while the other two turned around and returned fire! I had already shifted position and flicked to three round burst, which they took. Our defence collapsed pretty quickly in both parts of the container field; the attackers completed their mission in 42 minutes. When the game was turned around, our assault was noticeably slower; a few of us tried to keep the momentum going but most of the team seemed unwilling to press forward. We ran out of time after an hour, while we were still clearing the final area. By then, about half our team had already gone back to the safe zone; a few left at lunchtime. After lunch, we set off for a game called Smokes. Starting at opposite ends of the container field, each team had to collect three smoke grenades of their colour (purple for us and yellow for the other team) from a marshal who was at the far end of the site, bring them back and set them off in three locations in the container field. We split into two groups, one of which would get the smoke grenades, while the rest of us attempted to secure the locations; this resulted in some good fights, during which I got some lovely kills, including one from a couple of nicely aimed shots under a car. However, one enemy player located behind a door was blind firing around it by shoving his gun around the edge of it and firing wildly. A few of us shouted at him, pointing out that he was blind firing, but he persisted, so a few three round bursts aimed at his hand were deemed necessary. The enemy won this game 3-0. When we returned to the safe zone, more players disappeared. The final pair of games involved transporting a VIP in the form of a very large stuffed toy zebra from the lower end of the field to either of the helicopters in the container field. Our much diminished team made a decent attempt at preventing the enemy from doing so, but were overwhelmed while trying to split our limited resources defending two locations. When the game was reversed, we failed to break into the container field, while the chap carrying the VIP ran around in multiple directions. I got a number of nice kills on players in the upper levels of the container village and around some of the structures, but it was all somewhat frustrating. Thus ended a somewhat average day of airsoft. Weapons used: JG FN FAL (SA58) ASG XP18 Commander (CO2) Classic Army ISSC Mk22 (An Austrian designed .22 version of the SCAR, because clearly the world needs such a thing!): it only lasted for a very short time before the extremely torquey brushless motor destroyed the CA spur gear, which appears to have been made from the most brittle material possible. I had suspected that this might happen, but it was interesting to see.

1. A plastic ZCI rotary hop with a Maple Leaf Macaron and red nub and a 6.02mm XT barrel from AK2M4 will make a considerable difference. 2. If you want advice on other upgrades, it would be useful to tell us what you want to improve.

Cool; it should work then!