Gunboat Diplomat

I’ve just jettisoned a load of money on a new Double Eagle MK18, a HPA conversion for a boneyard M4 and a shed load of knock off gear from AliExpress, plus my son finally got a day to use his freshly built AAP-01 carbine so thought this one was worth a write up. Went to my local (and by local I mean walking distance) site Army of Airsoft. It bills itself as a CQB site, but in reality it’s a bit more flexible than that. Think urban ops in a small war torn town. Always a good mix of gameplay on offer, they’ve recently added pre-recorded next game instructions in the staging area, meaning less faff when you go out for the next match. This months miracle allowance was clearly used up as all the guns we brought along worked almost flawlessly all day, most miraculously of all the HPA gun which I’d barely finished building the night before with no time for any real testing or setup. I set off knowing nozzle alignment was far from perfect, but the Inferno Gen2 seems forgiving as it was still shooting straight. I expect with some fine tuning it will be even better. Some highlights of the day… Got shot in the nose = open wound. Common occurrence for me these days. Size of nose is the issue I think… Later shot in the face with a shotgun. Nose felt funny again. Prodded it. Some BBs fell out. Size of nose is still an issue I think… HPA gun performed like a champ all day. Son then claimed it for the rest of the day and had a jolly good wheeze cheesing through ammo. The thrill of one-shotting dudes with the MK18 and making the limited ammo count last a match. Surprising brilliance of my son’s custom AAP01. Rifle like range and accuracy out of a featherweight setup. Lunch - brilliant stew served with crusty bread and enough to go round for a second helping. Torrential rain in the afternoon reduced us to a tense 4v4 finish.

I’m a nob. Bad lipo, one of the cells is dead. Didn’t have enough power to cycle the solenoid. Fresh battery - all good.

Must admit I’ve not adjusted dwell yet from factory defaults. Didn’t consider it would make a difference since the engine is under powering even out of the barrel. Good shout though, will give it a try and see if it changes anything.

Any help welcome and appreciated on this one. Just completed (well, assembled) a new HPA build using an Inferno Gen2 on my boneyard Specna M4. I’m getting inconsistent output shot to shot. On semi, each shot is very weak with an audibly weak output (think mouse fart), often failing to fire completely or posting very low sub 100 fps. On quick double taps of semi, the second shot is much stronger. And on full auto, output is audibly more consistent shot to shot. Have tried output pressure between 90-110psi with no observable change in behaviour. Reg pressure gauge cycles as expected with each shot. Splitting the lower shows it’s nothing barrel or hop related. Will post a vid to demonstrate shortly. https://youtube.com/shorts/Rv-CdfinMqk?si=EQp79Y1U4V8hxUiB

Short of submerging it in water you’ll be fine. You’ll have given up with the weather long before your gun does. As said, just make sure you dry it thoroughly when you get home.

Have you any experience of an MWS to compare it to? I've been swinging back and forth on buying a V3 VFC for a while, but Jaeger Precisions latest range test of them vs MWS shows suggests they are still not there in terms of accuracy. If this latest revision of their hop can close that gap I'd be interested to know.

There's a gap in my increasingly nonsensical, borderline-indicative-of-a-personality-disorder list of YouTube subscriptions for a channel with a focus on pot-bashing within waste water run-off systems so crack on chum and get that content out.

Ha - so it was you who bought that one! As an aside to this thread for anyone who stumbles by, be careful if ordering any Mini-Tamiya to Deans converters from eBay/Amazon/AliExpress etc. Most (if not all) of these are aimed at the RC Car market, where the polarity is reversed so you'll need to swap the wires for airsoft use. (Or just snip and solder on a Deans plug as above which is infinitely more sensible)

Interesting, I'm planning to HPA this one and I know the Maxx units are hit and miss when it comes to nozzle alignment.

Been tinkering with my recent boneyard Specna One series M4 (still unsure of the exact model, but the externals are very nice, think it's an E&C OEM). It came with the old style metal 3-gear hop unit. When I tried to fit my preferred ZCI rotary plastic hop, it sits a tiny bit further back in the upper when fully seated into the outer barrel, making it impossible to close up the lower (albeit only by a couple of mm, but no amount of shoving will allow them to close). I've measured both hops with my verniers and overall outer dimensions are the same, just with differences in the shape and position of various protrusions. Hard to make out from the attached image but the outer barrel has quite a lot of profiling going on, presumably to ensure a secure fit but possibly the source of my issues. I don't want to take a Dremel to it, I'd rather find something that just fits. I suspect the answer to this is just 'airsoft tolerances innit' so I'll have to play the parts roulette to find something that fits. Maybe I should try the newer Specna blue rotary hop, better chance they have engineered it to fit all their receivers?

This boneyard (but fully functioning) Specna M4. I bought this specifically to do a HPA build but it seems to run really well so I’m in two minds about gutting it for HPA. No model number on it so if anyone can identify it I’d be grateful. It uses the old style hop unit and a Tamiya connector. After a clean up it’s in great shape and the receiver and hand guard feel really substantial. I think it might be a very early ONE series?

Relying to my own post above, the only workable way to fill the GM mag is to eject the shell and lock back the follower which is a bit of a faff. I destroyed my speed loader this weekend trying to load this and my DE stanag mag, then borrowed someone else's loader which lasted one mag before shattering a BB inside itself jamming the feed chute. So I'm now on the hunt for a better speed loader. The 6mmProShop one's look good but they are only available from the US with hefty shipping.

What speedload adapters work with V4 GM P-Mags? I cannot for love nor lust get my loader to top or front feed my new V4 Pmag. Apparently GM changed the castings on this new version. Am I going to have to eject the shell every time I want to load it?

Double Eagle’s new DD MK18. Early days yet, so not done much more than chrono it so far. Hopefully get to use it in anger this weekend, though I only have 2 mags and none of my speedloaders are any good at feeding them.

I reckon old Monty would be right at home in a ghillie, laying in wait for the fool who steps on his hydrangeas. Don by name...

Got through a few thousand of their .25s without issue in the past. I'd use them again happily.

I watched the first episode the other night after seeing this thread, and thought it was utter shite. Does it get better? Worth another go? Struck me as just another low-IQ combat-bro series with slightly above average use of props.

I use Bolle Tracker IIs (about £10 a pair) along with Revision antifog wipes (about £5 each but they are multi use). As long as I'm on the move they stay fog free.

I'll second the vote for any of the Specna Edge 2.0 models or the Double Eagle Falcon equipped RIFs. I wouldn't buy something without a proper ETU (Electronic Trigger Unit) these days and the Aster in the Edge 2.0s and the Falcon in the Double Eagles are both solid, well featured units. The X-ASR in the plain Specna Edge models is reportedly crap and prone to failure so I'd avoid them. Airsoft internal barrel length is largely academic and the performance variations between the extremes of barrel length are minimal. Handgaurd and outer barrel lengh are going to be more significant in terms of ergonomics. Do you want a long gun with lots of rail space or do you want something shorter that you can use in CQB environments?

Can you not order from someone like WGC shop or JKArmy and have them ship it directly to SA? I'm not sure what the import rules are for SA but presumably no different to your sister trying to bring it in person on the plane.

If you like that one you should see their other auction... only £20 for an instant site ban and a personal injury claim. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/126540465210?itmmeta=01J1PZ3SRGWNSZ5WFMS97V4HAT&hash=item1d7666443a:g:p7gAAOSwWbVmFDwv

Close to the sun indeed, didn’t realise at the time just how close to the limit the Guarder 100 would take me. I’ve kept the factory spring in my game day kit so I can do a quick change should I fail chrono. Oh I’ve no plans to try and chase any more consistency, it shoots fine irrespective of the numbers. This thread is really just for curiosity sake, the result of a quiet afternoon when I probably should have been fixing my garden fence but instead decided to play with my toys. I am yes, as you say shifting the muzzle around can make quite a difference so for each group of shots I keep it pretty much static.

I recently picked up a cheap chrono from AliExpress so have been doing some testing to see how my Double Eagle fairs in terms of consistency, but I'm wondering what the benchmark is? I've done several runs of between 10 and 20 shots and nearly all are between 1-3FPS of one another, but then occasionally one shot may deviate by maybe 10-12FPS. I'm not really sure here if that is an error in the chrono reading or a sporadic inconsistency in the gun. Here's an egregious example where one shot drops by 28fps, but the variance can be up or down and is usually less dramatic: I had another example of a shot reading at 307fps, which for a .28g BB puts me well over the UK limit, but I'm struggling to see where it suddenly gained all that extra power from for a single shot. For reference the gun has a Guarder 100 spring, ZCI hop unit, Macron 60 and Omega nub. I'll frame this all by saying I don't really have any complaints about the gun in the field, this is all the the name of science/being a geek.

You could buy some of those silica gel pouches and chuck one in each box.