Ares Amoeba Striker AS-01/AS-02 Owners Thread

[Skara]

It's a one piece cylinder, it's supposedly stronger than the usual brass one you find on 01s and 02s, but there have been reports of bad machining (well it's Ares after all and being a single piece I imagine it's not too easy to manufacture) with sharp edges and burrs on the inner wall.

 

[Deanh707]

Hi guys,

  A friend of mine is offering me his AS-01. I believe its still stock parts. What do these rifle need to work well? I understand there are some issues with the stock rifle and not just bits that need upgrading, such as body pins or something along those lines. 

  I'm thinking of going down the HPA route as I have a tank, regulator and airline at home from another project. Hopefully that would bypass the cylinder volume issue.

  Any more help would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers

Dean

 

[adas1223]

picked up this "EVIKE custom" ares striker. the price, TDC and magazine placement was VERY tempting for me, though the cylinder volume was an issue. but this will be more like a a low power scout rifle.

Im coming from a JG Bar10 (tdc mod, ml bucking, 500fps), I also just picked up the new SB tac-41.

I already did the indicator delete mod. it was ALREADY giving me issues. shooting 1.4joules on 0.43g from the box.

View attachment 81340

 

[Kilooneone]

Hi All,

I got an AS 03 for Christmas. Unfortunately it is only firing at 0.13J with a M110 spring! I have checked the hop up seal and cylinder over and over again but cannot see what the issue is. I have an AS 02 and it fires dead on the 1J limit. Any tips would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

 

[AK47frizzle]

Hi All,

I got an AS 03 for Christmas. Unfortunately it is only firing at 0.13J with a M110 spring! I have checked the hop up seal and cylinder over and over again but cannot see what the issue is. I have an AS 02 and it fires dead on the 1J limit. Any tips would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

If you check the cylinder, there is a tear drop shaped hole which limits the power to about 1.3J in my case when I had the as03. If you patch that up with some tape, you should get a great increase in power. Although, 0.13J before even patching the hole up is a bit concerning. Mine was around 1J.

 

[Kilooneone]

Thanks for your reply. The tear drop hole / port is the only difference between the AS 02 and AS 03 cylinder (I have an AS 02 Also). I'll give your suggestion a go. Again - many thanks.

 

[Kilooneone]

Sorry to report that sealing the port didn't work (was worth a go in any case)

Does any one else have any suggestions?

Thanks for any tips.

 

[Kilooneone]

I replaced the stock AS 03 cylinder with a CPSB 007 and all works fine now - firing at just on the 1J limit.  As far as I can tell there is a design flaw with the AS 03 stock cylinder.....Ares and the seller stopped responding to my queries a week or so ago....

 

[Skara]

This reminds me that I need to buy an as03 at some point, just to meme around. I still have all my parts from the 02 including Peter's trigger and handle.

 

[xollob]

New to the site, I did get a Ares Amoeba AS-02 Knee Capper Striker Sniper Rifle last year, and I'm finding that it comes in at 320 fps, is this normal? and if not how do I fix it?

 

[Skara]

Yes it's normal, it's a 150mm barrel + ported cylinder after all.

Due to the stupid low air volume, getting to 2+J energy is gonna be a) expensive and b) not a fun bolt pull.

 

[xollob]

Yes it's normal, it's a 150mm barrel + ported cylinder after all.

Due to the stupid low air volume, getting to 2+J energy is gonna be a) expensive and b) not a fun bolt pull.

Thanks. Looks like I need a new hop unit to improve accuracy. Any ideas?

 

[Samurai]

Thanks. Looks like I need a new hop unit to improve accuracy. Any ideas?

Factory unit is good. Get a gunsmithy hop arm and a decent bucking for accuracy.

 

[Skara]

Thanks. Looks like I need a new hop unit to improve accuracy. Any ideas?

What Samurai said.

I used a (shit) 3d printed hop arm on mine so I could use Maple Leaf tensioners, but the GunSmithy is actually very well made.

 

[L1ct0r]

Hi

Hopefully I'm not reviving a completely dead topic. I've just picked up a new AS-02 as my first bolt action. My knees are feeling too old to run and gun and my local site is quite small and mostly wooded, so I'm looking for more of a scout rifle concept than a full-on long range sniper. I've got two 14 year olds who are happy to charge in on full-auto so I'm just going to sneak about in the bushes and take things slower. I've watched a lot of videos about various upgrades and I think I probably need to do a few things to make mine what I want. Also, I just like to tinker.

Looking around it seems hard to find some of the things like the ED 1 cylinder upgrade kits and the hop adjustment wheels. Speaking from 2022 in the UK, what do the experts recommend as 'must have' mods these days, and where should I look for them? I'm generally pretty competent, so I'm happy to do most work myself as long as there is a decent walk-through video to follow. I've not chrono'd it yet, but the shop said it should be running about 400 fps as is, although I don't know what BB weight that is with. They may also be fibbing, or guessing.

For my local site, I don't think I need to up the fps if it is near the figure I've been quoted. I'm most interested in finding the best bb weight for it and then making it as accurate as I can as well as anticipating known weak points (like low quality stock cylinder, etc) and replacing them before something fails. At the moment I'm thinking something like better hop rubber with the adjustment wheel upgrade and tighter barrel as well as a good after-market cylinder so I just don't need to worry about that either.

On a related note. I pulled the body pin earlier while familiarising my self with basic field stripping procedure. I notice that on mine the cocking indicator looks nothing like the one I've seen in videos warning against problems caused with using custom cylinders. Have Ares redesigned that part recently? Mine looks nothing like the blade/spring arrangement I see in the videos. It's more like a little silver bullet-point and I can't see how I would begin to attempt to remove it without replacing the entire part (pictures attached for anyone who is interested).

I'm interested in hearing what people who have been there before me would recommend to a first time AS-02 owner.

All tips and info gratefully received

View attachment 91926

View attachment 91927

View attachment 91928

 

[Skara]

So, yours is the new version with the one piece cylinder, which will save you a fair bit of money!

It still requires a TDC wheel (Action Army makes the best one) because the grub screw has a tendency to unscrew itself with use, then I'd look at a new o-ring for the piston head (it's AEG spec so any AEG o-ring will do), new hop rubber because the stock one is pisspoor quality and, if you can find it, a Gunsmithy hop up arm. You can keep the stock hop chamber because it's decent and seals well.

If you're looking at reducing the sound, I'm afraid there's not much you can do, airbrakes don't really work on this gun and the cylinder volume is barely enough for 0.32s, let alone heavier BBs.

 

[L1ct0r]

Thanks for the speedy reply mate

I found a site with the AA hop wheels in stock, so I've got one of those on the way. Glad to hear I've got the latest version of the gun. What does a one-piece cylinder do for me? Does that mean that I don't need to worry about replacing it at all, or would an after-market one still be better, but no longer a 'requirement'? Do you have any recommendations for a new hop rubber (assuming I'm only going to replace the rubber and add a TDC wheel)?

I'm not so bothered about the noise as long as the BBs are going where I point them. So what BBs would you recommend? Is it worth going to .3s or .25s or should I just stick with .2s?

Does my new-style body pin mean it would continue to work fine with a custom cylinder, or would I still have to get rid of the cocking indicator for continued smooth operation?

Do you have any recommendations for cleaning the inner barrel? I have heard the best way is to take the inner barrel out of the hop unit and clean it with alcohol rather than any sort of gun oil.

Thanks again

 

[Skara]

One of the problems the AS01 and 02 had was that the cylinder was made of brass and the butt plate (where the charging handle screws onto) was simply held in place by four small, presumably steel, pins.

The pins being much harder than brass would then carve their way out of the cylinder body, causing catastrophic failures.

A one piece cylinder, as the name suggests, has the cylinder body and butt plate made of a single solid block of metal, which makes it much, much stronger.

Regarding the hop rubber, it's up to you really, when I had mine a simple Maple Leaf Decepticon worked exceptionally well (if you go with concave rubbers you need a concave tensioner, which on the striker implies replacing the hop up arm because it has a very thin integrated one) but there are so many available it's not even fun.

The new design of the cocking indicator should be much better although being Ares I don't really trust them on actually improving something.

 

[ARC Fives]

Has anyone found a holster for an AS03? I was thinking of a back holster or something that will keep it fairly secure while I'm crawling about. Any ideas?

 

[ARC Fives]

Also, does anyone know if the AS03 fits into the AS01 stock?