BrightCandle

The challenge for the sites is that some of them really want to ensure that the weight you say really is the weight that is fired. Combine that with the fact that all sites around me use a 0.20g defined limit (328 fps or 350 fps for automatic guns) and you have the recipe for problems we see. An unscrupulous person trying to get more range and accuracy can use the sites own system of testing with 0.20g BBs against them. All they need to is fit their gas gun with a tight barrel and get that nice over volume effect and then turn up and let the site use its own ammo (which lots do), or use 0.20g BBs for the chrono and bingo they are in with a massively hot gun when they put 0.28g's in there. From the players perspective taking account of the effect and setting your gun for the appropriate muzzle energy is important, but we there is a wider problem of ensuring guns are safe before a match starts and this more than just testing with 0.20g BBs even if that is the standard. Sites need to be pretty confident the gun is tested with the actual BBs that will be run for the game and I don't really see any other way to go about it. I don't think a site can ensure this safety, a player can always test with one BB and use another in game and utilise an amount of joule creep, because the alternative is to lock the BBs they intend to use in a box and have them reload from it and only it. I don't think many gas gunners are going to want to be searched just to check they aren't using different BBs either! Having had my finger broken before by a BB (well above power presumably) I tend to not trust other players and have a preference for sites that do a decent chrono test. But none of them is catching the joule creep issue because they are either just trusting a player when he says its a 0.28g BB in there or alternatively using their own 0.20g BBs. I don't know what the fix is, presumably testing gas guns with 0.28g BBs from the site, but then if the owner is really intending to use 0.25g BBs and has it set to the limit for those he is going to get turned away. Its not easy to fix the situation so I can see why sites might just choose to ban these guns that have this effect. I personally think they also ought to test for rate of fire as well. I saw a polarstar last Saturday that was putting out a frightening rate of fire and I was glad he was on my team because it was a complete laser beam of BBs. This is also a safety issue as multiple strikes in the same place also cause a lot more damage as well, and the intention of all these limits is to avoid penetration of the skin. You get hit with a polarstar firing at 50 rps all in the same place and it could dig a hole in your arm, both from joule creep and ridiculous rate of fire. That is every bit as dangerous as the over power from a gas gun. I think the only thing stopping these things being real incidents is that most players dress up pretty well to defend against the strikes and we don't see many gas or polarstar guns on the fields and those that do take the safety seriously. I genuinely believe that most of us really don't want to have the potential of hurting others so we pay due care and attention to this after tweaking our guns. But I don't think its currently practical for a site to ensure safety with gas guns, testing with 0.20g BBs isn't sufficient and testing with 0.28g BBs isn't fair if the intention is to use less. So it remains mostly in the gas gun owners hands to ensure they aren't utilising this to get an unfair and dangerous advantage.

The rifle is fixed. I used Loctite red on the screw and put it in nice and tight so hopefully this time it will stay together forever. Thankfully its shooting as accurately as it did before. As to the pistol proairsoft still hasn't gotten back with a price and likely date for it yet, and mispecsoluitions never responded. I am getting the distinct feeling I am going to be without a backup pistol for a while at this point. Airsoft guns like to break, and due to the way the retailers work it always takes longer than it should to get the replacement parts. The fitting work is super quick, its the sourcing the parts that is near impossible.

I have always set my gun to work with the hop off, mainly because I don't have the space to get the hop dialed in where I work on the gun. But chances are I am leaving a good 20 fps off the possibilities with doing this because the hop certainly reduces the speed of the projectiles. But usually when I go to a site I am there with hop off, chrono and then dial my hop in. I guess I could do it the other way and creep my speed up a little but its just not worth it, especially since my gun has a slow tendency to undo its hop which would likely result in it being hot sometimes until I fixed it. That would not be good. I don't know if its really 50 fps but that could very well be the case. You could chrono with 0.43g BBs instead and then just use the energy level, which is what everyone ought to be doing anyway since 500 fps with 0.2g BBs isn't really what its about, its about energy levels, which is 2.32J. Your chrono will allow you to set weights and see the energy level but if it doesn't go all the way up to 0.43g then you just need to know its 341 fps with a 0.43g BB for 500 fps with 0.2.

Do NOT buy the G&G midcaps, they don't feed in G&G guns. I am not sure what they do feed in (haven't found a gun they actually fit yet) but its not their own guns, they are simply faulty. I use MAG plastic mid caps in my G&G and S&T gun and those have been great, they feed everytime and they seem robust enough. For hi caps I actually found a lonex flash mag clone from these guys (http://uk-airsoft.co.uk/collections/magazines/products/m4-m16-black-380rd-flash-magazine) has been by far the best hi cap I have ever had. I might use 6 mid caps for a game or 2 hi caps. I rarely need more than that in terms of ammo.

The replacement barrel might be better, but the "tightness" isn't what tells you whether its better or not. An AEG can use anything from a 6.08 down to a 6.01 and depending on the BB size used (they usually come at 5.95mm, due to tightbore barrels the BBs are actually getting smaller!) that may very well work. You'll get a marginal increase in FPS going to a tighter barrel but its more the finish of the surface, the straightness of the inner channel and basically the quality of the barrel itself that is going to determine the end result. Curving BBs is more than likely hop than inner barrel. The inner barrel is more about the spread of the BBs and if it curves off then there is a high speed rotation on the BB . Barrels can definitely be bent, and you can usually see it just by looking down them (note that rolling them on a table will show inconsistencies in the external surface, it wont tell you much about the internal surface) and if its off centre you will see the light being inconsistent in the barrel (and scratches potentially where the curve is introduced and the BBs are hitting it). But when it exits the barrel it does so relatively straight. To get them curving it has to be putting a rotation on the BB to cause lift sideways and that is going to be introduced by the hop unit via the hop rubber, which more than likely isn't in straight or the nub is placed badly or just plain the unit isn't perfectly aligned.

The gen 3's come with a 6.03 tight bore barrel. Its not the only thing that makes the guns inaccurate but I saw a noticeable improvement fitting a PDI barrel in place of the G&G ones. I would say its OK as far as a stock barrel goes, its worse than the one that came in my S&T Tar 21 pro but its not frighteningly bad its not good either. Indeed I found my G&G transparent carbine to be more accurate out of the box than the G&G T4-18 gen 3 and I suspect a large chunk of that is down to the inner barrel. Maybe they have a high variance in the quality from production, I could be unlucky or typical none of us has enough information to know. But my barrel was not very good. Barrels aren't just measured in tightness. Manufacturing quality is actually more important for accuracy overall and a wider opening at the end like the Orga barrels also helps stabilise the BBs on exit. So yes G&G fit tightbores to their guns, all that does is marginally affect FPS. PDI and prometheus will both tell you there 6.05 barrel is their most accurate AEG inner barrel and the guns with lots of spare gas (GBBs HPAs etc) go with 6.23mm barrels. The current theory is that BBs actually roll along the top of the barrel and if you have a well used barrel you should see that for yourself that on exit the top of the barrel is scratched whereas the bottom isn't except on entry. So actually what we are looking for is a barrel that allows a consistent roll across the top without bumps that push it into the lower part or the sides of the barrel. The further away that bottom of the barrel is the less often it will inconsistently bounce off it. But if we don't have enough air to keep the push going then its going to negatively impact performance as well. We aren't at the point of fully appreciating all the things we can do to stablise the BB exit to make it super consistent, we do know however that the tightbore marketing is hogwash. If its not a precision steel barrel then your gun is going to be less accurate than it could otherwise be, and the G&G guns ship with coated brass barrels that when cut apart show variances in width down their length that suggest calling them 6.03 width is painfully optimistic in quoting the second decimal place.

The original S&T tar 21 was terrible, it had a plastic gearbox and so that right there tells you everything you need to know about the qualities of its internals. However last year Elite force licenced S&T to make a new model of the Tar 21 and this is the Tar 21 professional and the old one is sold as the sport. The professional is a decent metal gearbox, decent gears and the other parts are OK. I wasn't impressed with the airseal so I replaced the piston head, piston, cylinder head and nozzle and that has tightened the groupings a fair bit. But that replacement piston head is what failed, not the original part which has been flawless since I got it. My main concern with the Tar 21 is two fold. 1) is the special parts like the bullpup connectors for the trigger switch box, the trigger box itself and all the other special parts like the gearbox shell. These are all custom to this gun and are going to be a pain should they ever break. 2) The hop unit is plastic and its not great. Its not terrible, it can lift a 0.25g BB reasonably but it can't really overhop it. It undoes a little bit as the day goes on and its something I would really want to replace. Its basically an M4 hop unit but with one difference, where the spring would be on the top there is a small raised area with a hole instead which a metal pin goes through to attach it to the outer barrel. If I could find a decent metal hop replacement I would have it immediately, and its one part I think is always going to hold the accuracy of the gun back. Saying that the tar 21 is currently putting out a chest shaped hit at its maximum range (350 fps), so its accurate enough. My upgrades helped quite a bit in that regard, the airseal was bad as the original piston head and nozzle were kind of rubbish but it was actually pretty good out of the box and it took me a while to get around to the upgrades. As to the KWA pistol it won't be the backup, it will become my new side arm. Now the We F228 has finally given up the ghost and I don't know how long a replacement part will be I think its time to get a decent one. I'll probably get a full size gun this time, a HK45 or a Glock 17.

Yesterday I played and I managed to break not only my primary weapon (S&T Tar 21) but also my seconday (We F228) within minutes of each other. The tar 21 went first and then I switched to the pistol for the last short game and that failed in the last 20 shots of the game, it kept firing but something was clearly wrong with the accuracy. I took apart the Tar 21 and its one of my new upgrade parts that failed. The new piston head fell apart! Looks like the spring flex undid the piston head screw. That was unexpected but there is no damage done to anything in the gearbox or head thankfully. The original head has no bearings on it so I might run it without them when I fit the replacement head again (ASG ultimate) and hope that works better. Then I took apart the We F228. There is a piece on the side that impacts on the rail as the barrel rises on recoil and the part on the hop unit that takes that impact has snapped clean off. Its clearly done a few shots after that as I have impacts on the right hand side of the rail from the outer barrel as well, the gun didn't stop working, and indeed I suspect it will fire again but I am doing damage to other parts. So far I have been pretty forunate with my guns, the worst that has happened on game day is a temporary jam that was cleared with switching to full auto. Then yesterday two guns broke at the same time. One I can just fix but the pistol needs a new hop unit and I think based on this its time to get a KWA pistol as well, as a backup to my backup!

I used Nuprol 3.0 (big red canister bought from landwarriorairsoft) yesterday in my We F228. Outside temperature according to the weather forecast was about 1-5C. Was around 250 fps with 0.25g ASG BBs. Interestingly with this gas on a normal rate of fire I could empty all the BBs out of the magazine, so 20 shots or so. If I fired as fast as I could it would have 1 or 2 left but unlike the Abbey or other We green gas I use it was able to clear the magazine and do so with reasonable power in the cold conditions. That is pretty good IMO, its not a sub zero solution nor will it solve it in every gun but its better than getting 10 shots out of a fill and then having it run out of gas. However I did find my We F228 in pieces today when I went to clean it. There is a part on the left hand side of the hop unit that takes the impact of the barrel raising during recoil and this part of the hop had snapped off. I suspect its just the usual wear and tear and We quality control issues but it was with the first use of this special low temperature gas and its the first time I used. So I am cautiously optimistic that this gas works better than the usual green gas mix, however I wonder if its powerful enough to damage the gun.

A few possibilities spring to my mind: - If some of the gearbox wiring is inside the gun and not part of your test there is a chance that is broken, I would test it with an amp meter or just connect the battery through it to confirm all the wiring is healthy. - There is a chance that something is getting stuck on the casing of the gun. Make sure the safe/semi/auto switch is moving the way its meant to and the trigger has full range and isn't getting caught on the gun case. Ultimately there aren't many things that given a gearbox works outside of the gun that can stop it functioning once its installed. Ultimately it must be a physical obstruction on a key function from the gearbox or faulty wiring meaning power isn't getting there for the motor not to spin and then turn the gearbox over.

Hunterseeker 5 did an experiment to try and determine if the orga barrel was good because it was precision engineered, wide bore or actually because it has a long secondary crown. He did this experiement by making a bit that can be used to widen the end of a barrel in much the same way the orga barrels do, and you can get the other elements in other barrels. The end result of this experiment was the tapering works to improve accuracy on all types of barrels (wide bore and tight bore). Its simply more accurate to flare the barrel out a little bit at the end. Orga has no better precision engineering than any other company out there. Whether tight verses wide is measurably different I don't know, mainly because the two don't really apply to the same gun so we never see all else being equal. But the orga flare is definitely worth having and you can pick up the parts to do it from Hunter seeker armouries or go ask air-lab to import it like I did with the lapping kit.

The T4-18 has a 293mm inner barrel IIRC. I suspect the CQB-R has a similar length. Probably best to measure it before you go about buying a replacement so you can be sure, because you can't just cut them down to size if its too long (as you need to crown it) and you can't just lengthen it if it ends up too short (and will mean your cylinder air volume will be too large impacting accuracy). So its best you get the right one and you are thus best measuring it.

The trajectory project does have a calculator for Minimum engagement range, and given a power level different weight BBs do have different MERs. Given 2.32 Joules (500fps 0.20g). 0.20g is 12 metres but 0.43g is 23 metres.

Once you combine the two I think you get to the bottom of why the HPAs are very accurate and hit much harder than they should. Heavy BBs, joule creep combined is more energy and more accuracy and more speed maintained. The recipe is dangerous if the user is specifically exploiting it, even at range they could be hitting above the magic 1.1j limit. Combine that with a ROF that is just insane and yeah I am glad I don't see them very often.

My first upgrade was a spring. Gun came out of the box firing at 340, site wouldn't let me use it so I had to downgrade to an M90 spring. The end result of which was that I learnt how to take my first gun apart and I have been taking them apart and fixing them since.

If there is a big difference in the springs I haven't yet come across the review that shows that. I wouldn't say it really matters but maybe someone has tested and found some are harder than others. Its probably best to choose one that has twistings that aren't uniformly spaced (http://www.landwarriorairsoft.com/parts-c8/springs-c102/ultimate-m90-m100-aeg-spring-black-p377) as it puts less stress on the gears. I don't think there are many M100 springs that aren't like that however.

I also wonder whether some of the issue is ammo weight. We very rarely get shot at 0 metres, generally we get shot at 10 metres at least. The heavier the ammo the more energy it maintains as it travels, it isn't slowed as much by the air. So while (in theory as ed as shown not in practice due to joule creep) the BB velocity is initially lower the speed is maintained for further. Those with upgraded guns are probably also running heavier weight BBs as they have larger hop patches and have tuned their gun and it can now shoot nice and far and more accurately with heavier weight BBs which are deflected less over distance.

Cough Cough I told you so cough cough. Good to hear its working.

The very rough rule is about 1mah = 1 shot. Most guns are more efficient than that but it covers just about every situation and since a lipo will loose voltage as the power drains its usually best to try and use them in the 8.3 - 8.0 V range anyway instead of near empty where the rate of fire will be impacted.

I think 14 is when I started working on a clat pigeon shoot as a trapper. IIRC it was pretty good money, somewhere around £40 a day (this is back 2 decades) every other week. I don't know if those sorts of jobs still exist and whether you can do them at that age anymore, gun laws were quite different when I was a teenager. But might be worth enquiring with a local clay pigeon shoot. Its not airsoft but you get a similar buzz firing 12 gauges at clays on a quiet day.

Yes, Airsoftology tested it last year and determined a couple of RPS increase on a pretty basic KWA. The original testing of this actually comes from RC planes which have similar high current needs. I saw some graphs last year showing the current capability was increased, the temperature of the connector decreased and the flight time improved. The combination of these two sets of tests tell us that a deans: - Impacts the speed of the motor in an airsoft gun - Improves efficiency so you get more shots from a gun - Helps keep the connector cool where it would otherwise get warm or even hot. Its basically a good idea if you are into customising the internals of a gun to go deans, its just a better connector due to the size and pressure of the contact and its tested thoroughly.

I don't think UKARA is a particularly good system. I have played a lot of games last year and this but they have mostly been on different sites. So the issue I am now facing is later this year is once again obtaining my UKARA renewal on a site I have played 3 times. There are some I have played on enough but which I haven't played recently but more where I have played just the once. I face the very real possibility that the only sensible thing to do is play on the same site a few times just to get UKARA. Its one thing to be forcing new members of the sport to wait until they can buy a RIF but messing up veterans just because they play 3 milsim ops a year or play a lot of different sites like myself is ridiculous. The system is stacked, its designed to maximise profits to sites that administrate it. Many charge for it and some are even using it to sell guns over their competition despite charging more (buy the gun from them, its not two toned and you can take it home on your 2 month third game). Its a system of proof, but the issue is with its rules and how its applied and how it ultimately is being used to distort the market. I imagine Wolf armouries would sell less guns without UKARA driving some of its sales, because their website is awful but their mastery of UKARA and selling guns to new members to the sport is really quite special. I still think a system that allowed multiple site airsoft proof would be better, it would at least solve my current issue with it.

Every site is different and goes between a spectrum from speesoft all the way up to milsim operations. You have a lot of choices about fun verses organisation across all the possibilities in the country. Its worth trying quite a few of the different types to work out what you do actually enjoy. Myself I started on the speedsoft side of things and now I tend to prefer woodland and the more milsim the better. I am kind of lucky with my site selection as I have found quite a few that meet my sort of games. Look around and you'll likely find one that suits what you are now looking for, just don't assume its milsim from the outset due to your background as you might surprise yourself.

T4-18 as a DMR - its a bit short IMO to look like one, you might convert it to single shot but people wont expect you are one from the gun. But that doesn't say much about technical feasibility. DMRs stuck on semi auto need to focus on accuracy quite a bit. Better quality inner barrels and air seal. They also need somewhat stronger gears to handle the spring which necessitates a partial metal tooth piston most likely as well. Then because of that the motor might struggle so you need a higher torque one. DMRs are kind of expensive to build really because you often have the same limits as the snipers with minimum engagement but you have a lot less power and hence accuracy just from throwing heavier BBs so you need to fix a lot of the inconsistency in the gun and then the knock impact of all that extra power. As to the locking up the main solution seem to be to using a breaking mosfet and then to remove the anti reversal latch. The end result is that the mosfet stops the gears turning on each shot and you don't need the reversal latch to stop bad things happening. Can't say I have ever tried to do this however. The other possibility is actually to use something like a King Kong Burst wizard. Instead of removing the ability of the gun to go full auto instead you lock it to semi with the mosfet. Then if it does lock up you have the ability to release it as the gun can still full auto with a bit of work (either removing the wizard or reprogramming it briefly and then setting it back to single shot). Whether the burst wizard is an option depends very much on your site and whether they would allow the possibility of potential 400fps+ full auto accidentally/for clearing a jam.

My experience is every site and day is different. I have been on sites where there is a lot of hostility towards renters and others where there really isn't, depends a lot on the site regulars around that day and how everyone slept etc. Its not something I have consistently seen as a problem anywhere but I have certainly felt unwelcome (not as a renter) on sites. It has happened and if you find that a site you attend a couple of times is always unwelcoming or has issues then hopefully you can find another one.