Rogerborg
Supporters
- Aug 22, 2017
- 9,195
- 6,058
http://www.csiairsoft.com.tw/xr-5.html
View attachment 129599View attachment 129496
What we have here are some very basic V2/M4 components inside a chonky plastic futuregun shell that comes in 8 variants (2 each of stock, lower handguard, and front end) and a variety of colours - although you'll be hard pressed to find any still in stock in the UK other than Dayglo Blue from a BBGnuz seller.
Good stuff:
A nicely finished gearbox with what seem like decent gears, and mine was shimmed perfectly.
A well sealed cylinder head, and a reasonable piston with a partly-metal rack (but no bearing) and decent compression out to the cylinder head nozzle.
A huge battery compartment in the front stock, accessible just by sliding the lower front rail forwards then the entire bottom handguard opens up.
The cheek rest is designed to be removable, to get a better sight picture.
The hop nub is an H style (but read on).
The motor height adjustment screw has a second grub screw on top of it, which will help to lock it in place. A small touch, but a welcome one.
Rails for days.
Meh stuff:
The motor turns well enough on 11.1V, but is anaemic on 7.4V. CSI themselves recommend 9.6 - 11.1V.
A light barrel, I suspect aluminium, although decently anodised and smooth inside. Aside, mine is ~325mm, not the advertised 363mm. The stock flash hider is a lonnnng boi that extends well inside the shell, so I think a 363mm would just about be hidden.
An old dial-style metal hop unit, decently finished with little slop (... but read on...)
There's a hop bucking, I guess, with a tiny contact patch. I managed to foul mine out of the box, so I can't speak to the efficacy, although one reviewer reports effectively no hop.
The trigger has a stiff semi fnar, although mine is starting to soften up after some finger blasting.
Plastic spring guide with no bearing, just a flat washer.
QD mounts on either side at the rear, but not the front.
The spring is progressive, although I remain unconvinced that this is more than a gimmick.
Bad stuff:
Despite being mostly plastic, it's a heavy sod.
Plastic 6mm bushings. Yes, plastic, in CURRENT_YEAR.
No radiusing on the gearbox.
No lubrication in the gearbox, at all.
Thin, weedy wiring to a mini-Tamiya connector. The +ve spade connector on mine was loose and needed crimped.
Teching is an absolute sod, needing near-complete disassembly and the gearbox, hop and barrel removed as a unit. I can count at least twenty-three screws and pins and bolts that need removed and replaced just to get the gearbox, hop and barrel out, and I may have forgotten some. You will not be doing any adjustments on-site beyond motor height.
The H nub is hard plastic, and glued in to the hop arm!
The plastic (21mm) nozzle has no o-ring, and compression is poor with it extended. Despite the full size cylinder and 325mm barrel, I was seeing slightly under 1J with no hop, dropping to 0.8J with full hop (but very little hop effect)
Lots of slop between the inner and outer barrels, that begs for shimming.
Feeds OK off the supplied small-capacity hi-cap (jumbo shrimp!) but I've had to file the rear of all my other mags to get them to fit and feed, and they need donkey-punched in hard.
tl;dr:
Would I recommend it? Strong no, the out of the box performance is poor, and there are too many red flags in the construction. It's a really old fashioned no-frills G&G Raider or CYMA M5xx style build but without the G&G performance or CYMA robustness, and with none of the features that you'll find in Specnas or Lancer Tacticals today that sell for £30 less.
So, it's a project gun, but one that requires so much disassembly to access any component that tuning will be a nightmare. You do not want to be paying someone for their time to work on these, and you'd better triple check every component in isolation before you re-assemble.
Do I regret it? Nah, I wanted the looks, and the project, and it's fixable with a lot of time and a little money. An AK2M4 order is already ordered, to address the worst culprits.
View attachment 129599View attachment 129496
What we have here are some very basic V2/M4 components inside a chonky plastic futuregun shell that comes in 8 variants (2 each of stock, lower handguard, and front end) and a variety of colours - although you'll be hard pressed to find any still in stock in the UK other than Dayglo Blue from a BBGnuz seller.
Good stuff:
A nicely finished gearbox with what seem like decent gears, and mine was shimmed perfectly.
A well sealed cylinder head, and a reasonable piston with a partly-metal rack (but no bearing) and decent compression out to the cylinder head nozzle.
A huge battery compartment in the front stock, accessible just by sliding the lower front rail forwards then the entire bottom handguard opens up.
The cheek rest is designed to be removable, to get a better sight picture.
The hop nub is an H style (but read on).
The motor height adjustment screw has a second grub screw on top of it, which will help to lock it in place. A small touch, but a welcome one.
Rails for days.
Meh stuff:
The motor turns well enough on 11.1V, but is anaemic on 7.4V. CSI themselves recommend 9.6 - 11.1V.
A light barrel, I suspect aluminium, although decently anodised and smooth inside. Aside, mine is ~325mm, not the advertised 363mm. The stock flash hider is a lonnnng boi that extends well inside the shell, so I think a 363mm would just about be hidden.
An old dial-style metal hop unit, decently finished with little slop (... but read on...)
There's a hop bucking, I guess, with a tiny contact patch. I managed to foul mine out of the box, so I can't speak to the efficacy, although one reviewer reports effectively no hop.
The trigger has a stiff semi fnar, although mine is starting to soften up after some finger blasting.
Plastic spring guide with no bearing, just a flat washer.
QD mounts on either side at the rear, but not the front.
The spring is progressive, although I remain unconvinced that this is more than a gimmick.
Bad stuff:
Despite being mostly plastic, it's a heavy sod.
Plastic 6mm bushings. Yes, plastic, in CURRENT_YEAR.
No radiusing on the gearbox.
No lubrication in the gearbox, at all.
Thin, weedy wiring to a mini-Tamiya connector. The +ve spade connector on mine was loose and needed crimped.
Teching is an absolute sod, needing near-complete disassembly and the gearbox, hop and barrel removed as a unit. I can count at least twenty-three screws and pins and bolts that need removed and replaced just to get the gearbox, hop and barrel out, and I may have forgotten some. You will not be doing any adjustments on-site beyond motor height.
The H nub is hard plastic, and glued in to the hop arm!
The plastic (21mm) nozzle has no o-ring, and compression is poor with it extended. Despite the full size cylinder and 325mm barrel, I was seeing slightly under 1J with no hop, dropping to 0.8J with full hop (but very little hop effect)
Lots of slop between the inner and outer barrels, that begs for shimming.
Feeds OK off the supplied small-capacity hi-cap (jumbo shrimp!) but I've had to file the rear of all my other mags to get them to fit and feed, and they need donkey-punched in hard.
tl;dr:
Would I recommend it? Strong no, the out of the box performance is poor, and there are too many red flags in the construction. It's a really old fashioned no-frills G&G Raider or CYMA M5xx style build but without the G&G performance or CYMA robustness, and with none of the features that you'll find in Specnas or Lancer Tacticals today that sell for £30 less.
So, it's a project gun, but one that requires so much disassembly to access any component that tuning will be a nightmare. You do not want to be paying someone for their time to work on these, and you'd better triple check every component in isolation before you re-assemble.
Do I regret it? Nah, I wanted the looks, and the project, and it's fixable with a lot of time and a little money. An AK2M4 order is already ordered, to address the worst culprits.
Last edited by a moderator:
). Air seal is king.
