ICS L85A2

[Airsoft-Ed]

TL;DR? Well you're lucky then, because I've now made 2 videos:

 

Behold The Rundown Of Ed’s EPIC ICS L85A2

Out of the box rifle specifications:

FPS: 345, 370, 410 – spring tension is adjustable. Values may vary for each gun.

Barrel length: Supplied with a 480mm brass barrel, of 6.05mm in diameter. However, up to a 510mm (M16, AUG, M14) length barrel will fit without protruding into the flash hider.

Supplied with: Two high capacity magazines (470 rounds each) unjamming/cleaning rod and a pot of ICS .20g BBs

Rails: Top rail – 19mm

Hop: Unique design, no aftermarket hop units available for this rifle. It has its issues but it works well enough.

Gearbox: Again, unique to the ICS L85, supplied with very solid gears, bushings, factory shimmed and all around, pretty darn good to be honest, it's also heavily reinforced.

Motor: Comes with the godly ICS Turbo 3000. This thing can pull any spring you gear it to.

So let’s get started.
I bought the rifle back in December 2011 with the intention of making it look exactly like the one currently issued in Afghanistan.

The first things to order were the replica Daniel Defence RIS made by Madbull, as well as the adaptor for fitting to the ICS L85, I then bought a grip-pod made by god only knows what company, I can’t even remember where I bought it from, but it’s a nice high quality product for the price, works flawlessly and looks great.

Once those parts came and were fitted I needed the correct ACOG mount, so I ordered that from Ant-Supplies, as I was a little weary about ordering from RSOV in Hong Kong because of all the horror stories I’d heard about import tax and such.

I already had an ACOG at the time and back when I started the project I thought that would do, later on I decided it wasn’t accurate enough to the real steel, so I decided to order a new ACOG, but that wasn’t until about 5 months into the project when I went to the Arms Fair in May.

So at this point I had the gun set up with the DD RIS, grip pod, ACOG mount and an ACOG, but not the right one.

Since the RIS was fitted I needed to start running LiPo batteries, issues arose at this point, the connector that comes with the gun is for a large Tamiya and there’s so much extra wire that I couldn’t come anywhere even close to fitting the battery in with a connection conversion lead. So I rewired to small Tamiya and cut short the cables so everything fit.

I was happy with this set up for a fairly long time until I ran into issues at a skirmish at The Stan. The gun just died, like there was no battery connected and the trigger mech kept making a strange clicking noise. I finished the day using my MP5.
Once I got back I looked into it and found that from all the stripping and reassembling I’d been doing to change bits and alter the spring tension for different site rules etc. had caused the connection pins that break the circuit when the receiver is split as a safety feature, to be pushed away from their contacts. They didn’t complete the circuit once the gun had been re-assembled, as they should have.

So I bent them upwards, which seemed to fix it.

To fix the trigger mech clicking I dismantled it, couldn’t understand what the issue was, re-assembled it, and now it’s fine… That seems to fix a lot of things in my experience. If something doesn’t work, take it to bits and reassemble it before you plan to do anything else to it.

Since I’d been looking into the internals, I decided I’d start doing some actual work on them, this is the first AEG I ever dismantled, so that’s testament to how easy to work on it is.

I knew I wanted a Tanio Koba Hop-Twist barrel, but I couldn’t find the right one anywhere on earth, so I ended up getting one for an L96 from Land Warrior for about £70.

Since the barrel cut was for a sniper, the barrel retention pieces in my gun didn’t fit the barrel, so I had to decide to either mod them, make some new ones, or remove them altogether. I realised they weren’t needed for anything other than a better air seal, which I didn’t realise the importance of at the time, so I opted for full removal.

This meant that the barrel had to be held in by friction alone, so I wrapped insulation tape around the barrel so that it was a super tight fit in the outer barrel, it was damn hard to get in and out after that.

Now the barrel was done I went for the hop unit, I’d been advised to get a Madbull Blue rubber, and so I did. I also experimented with different nubs, eventually choosing to use the biro ink tube mod, so I cut it to size and used that.

I ran with this set up for about 2 months until I noticed Red Wolf had the correct twist barrel in stock, so I immediately ordered one. This gave me back the bug for adding stuff again…

I asked for advise on how to make the gun the best it could be (thank you Mr. Finius) and was told I needed a better hop nub and a new piston head (amongst other minor, home grown internal modifications that so far I haven't attempted). So I ordered a big-out H nub and a Lee’s Precision Engineering piston head, which has an air brake on it to increase the life of the internals. In retrospect the piston head wasn’t really needed, the only change I’ve observed is that it’s more difficult to tell when the gun is dry firing because it sounds similar to when it’s firing rounds, and it’s ever so slightly quieter.

At this point I was running the same externals as before but with a new piston head, proper twist barrel allowing me the correct barrel fitting and the H nub. This is possibly the greatest combination of parts for any rifle if you want immense accuracy and even more immense range. I have my rifle set on the middle spring tension, which is about 350fps on .20s, I run it using .25s and I can comfortably hit a man sized target at up to 50m.

Twist barrels are said to work best at under 330fps, so if you want to stick one in a sniper running 500fps, it’s fine. Just use .40g or .46g BBs to bring the fps down and your sniper will become a laser rifle… Well, minus the projectile speed.

After adding those parts I started researching into the real steel a bit more, I found out that the real steel L85 was now fitted with a new flash hider, a different ACOG to mine that's equipped with a docter site, I also noted that the L85 was now issued with Magpul EMAGs and an LLM01.

So I ordered all of that, and some rail ladders for good measure. Shortly after making this order I realised that the docter sight on the ACOG I'd ordered didn't look like the proper one on the L85, so a quest began to find one. I eventually found it thanks to a tip off from CKinnerley about BritKitUSA, so thanks to CK for the final, finishing touch.

A lot of this stuff was in the post for absolutely ages, I ordered the ACOG from G1098Airsoft and they messed me about for over a month, so I re ordered most of it from RSOV.

Whist it was all in the post I thought I’d improve the internals. My aim was to increase the trigger response, as it was the only thing letting the gun down.

I looked into changing the motor, but decided that the ICS Turbo 3000 was actually an amazing motor already, which troubled me somewhat, how can I increase the trigger response time if I can’t just get a new motor?

I decided to look into shimming the gearbox, the idea being that if the gears are more properly aligned, the motor won’t have to work as hard to turn them over, giving me a more efficient use of battery and motor power. I’d been practising taking guns apart and getting to know and understand gearboxes over the last couple of months, so I ordered a few packs of shims from Patrol Base and managed to shim the gearbox pretty well, it did give a noticeable improvement, but the trigger response still wasn’t good enough.

So I’m stuck now. The gun’s absolutely flawless in every way, externals, internals, accuracy and range. But the trigger response is still terrible. I would say it’s the only thing I can hold against the ICS. I think the G&G L85 has a pre-cocking system, which would make the trigger response literally instantaneous. I’d pay a lot if there were a way I could have that in my ICS.

Since I can’t think of any solution to this that can be realistically achieved I’ve decided to let it go.

I’d considered getting an even better motor or switching to higher voltage LiPos but I don’t want an unrealistically high rate of fire and I don’t want to have to buy stronger gears. The ICS L85 also has a proprietary piston, there are no after market pistons available. Meaning if my set up shred one, I can never run the set up, because that’s the only piston I can ever have.

My current thoughts are that if the target is far away I have the range advantage about 90% of the time. If they’re up close and personal, I’ll just have to switch to auto to deal with them, as that’s the only way to overcome the trigger response issue, I’ll just have to learn better trigger control and not get greedy. Running real caps means auto is rarely a good idea.

Edit:

Motor packed in today, before the ACOG, docter sight and wing mount have even arrived! So I guess we'll see if changing the motor can get me a better trigger response, I've got a Systema High Torque motor on the way, from Zero One... £85. Gulp.
Still planning on swapping to Deans connectors and at some point completely rewiring it with low resistance wiring.
If possible I'll also fit a Mosfet.

My quest for better trigger response has begun!

The first step on the quest was successful, the Systema motor came today and the trigger response has improved noticeably. The gun actually feeds more powerful, you can really feel the shake of the internals in your shoulder when you pull the trigger. I tried turning this motor over by hand before installing it and it was damn difficult. I used to think my ICS motor was difficult to turn over, this thing must be at least twice as powerful. The power of it makes me feel like I have to do something to reinforce the circuitry a bit better.

Edit:

Trigger response has been massively improved by getting a new trigger mechanism. There's a small pin in the trigger assemly that acts as a guide rod for the trigger contacts and mine had snapped in half somehow, but I didn't realise it wasn't supposed to be like that until the new trigger mech arrived. Trigger is absolutely spot on now, response is perfect, ROF is perfect.
New hop hasn't really made any change, even with an AEG cut barrel the barrel retention bits still needed modding, so I just used the pre-modded ones from the old hop.

The gun is shooting straight as an arrow though, accuracy is above average, it could still do with a few hop tweaks, but I'm going to skirmish it on Sunday and see if the parts don't just all bed themselves in a little better. I imagine consistency will increase through use.

I also now have all the parts, so after I've skirmished it and have a bit of spare time I'll get some photos added... Though I might not do it until something buggers up. Once I've set the gun up I don't really like taking it apart to do anything apart from change the spring, 'cos the barrel assembly is an utter arse to get back together properly. It's really hard to seat the hop rubber correctly because of how tight the unit is.

I've recently decided that I'm going to get an M140 spring for this to whack the fps up to 450, then use .36s or .40s and field it as a DMR. I'm pretty certain the internals can take it and I've already shimmed it to perfection, the systema motor could probably pull an M9billion so that won't be an issue either. I'll let you know how it goes.

Anyone know how to disable auto? 'Cos to me it looks like you NEED the fire selector mechanism to be able to use semi, without it there's no way to engage the cut off lever... Might have to just hope my site trust me. Which I think they do.

Edit:

DMR plans fell through, somehow the motor is unable to pull even an M130 (I couldn't find an M140 in stock anywhere) so for the time being I've decided to just use it as a regular AEG, it running at about 360fps at the moment because my new spring is yet to bed in, but with .25s it's running around 320fps.
If I take up the DMR plans again I think I'll start it by changing the ratio of my gears, as it stands I can't really be bothered to work out what ratio I'd need, or which gears will be compatible.

I'm also planning to make an L129A1 DMR at some point over the next year or so, so there'll be no need to have my L85 at DMR specs.

Edit:

Currently it's August 2012, the gun is about 8 or 9 months old and has had approximately 20,000 rounds through it since I bought it, so various parts have been added and removed etc. I don't think I'll be making any vast changes from this point forward, other than replacing parts as and when they break.

I'll write an update for this around this time next year and see how everything's holding up.

Edit:

Just a little update on how the gun's performing. It's now December the 11th, so within 10 days of the gun being a year old.
At approximately 3000 rounds, or one pot of ammo per month, that means it's fired something in the region of 36,000 rounds.
Everything is still solid and showing no internal wear at all on any of the internal parts - Except, the motor gear and whatever the name of the gear that the motor meets, don't mesh 100% perfectly, the angle of the slope on the motor's gear is slightly steeper than the corresponding slope on the 3rd gear from the piston in the gearbox. This is causing wear on the 3rd gear and the motor's gear, resulting in tiny little metal chips building up in the gearbox and a very, very slow rate.
I've only cleaned it out once in about 4 months and the little bits I had to remove were akin to sand, or very fine iron filings. It does not appear to have any effect on performance.

Currently I'm running it with a 6.01mm barrel which I initially bought for a 16-17inch barrel M4 project but it was too long (455mm) so I tried it in the L85 and I've actually been seeing much better results.
I don't know whether it's because my twist barrel has been used too much and the "threading" I'll call it, in the barrel has been knocked by BBs too many times to be effective anymore, perhaps twist barrels can expire, or wear out... Well either way, running a Version 1 Madbull 6.01mm by 455mm tight bore barrel I have been seeing better results than with the twist barrel.

In the hop I'm still using a Madbull blue rubber. I keep meaning to experiment with different rubbers, but so far the Madbull is a signifiant improvement over the standard rubber. Additionally, when using the Madbull a smaller nub is required, otherwise even with hop off, the rubber will obstruct the barrel to such an extent that it will overhop literally everything you shoot through it. The nub I use to overcome this is the same as I had before, a Big Out H nub.
I've changed the spring to an M100.

I'm now seeing the fps sit at around 360 in the middle setting using .20s and as per usual, I run it using .25s.
The rifle is effective out to around 40m. By effective, I mean I could hit a target with one shot. As for hitting a target at all, the max range I've ever hit someone was round about 70m and required me to aim around 6 feet above the target and just spray on auto when they were unaware of my position, so as not to see the BBs coming in and move out of their path.

For reference to its effectiveness there's my YouTube videos (link to my channel in my signature), all of which, bar one (or two if you count the one that isn't airsoft related) I use the L85 in.

Aside from the barrel change, I also bought a new charging handle and tappet plate. The charging handle replacement was bought because the standard one had become so wobbly that I just couldn't deal with it anymore, tightening it to the point where the screw wore away could be completely undone by simply racking it once.
Interestingly, the replacement charging handle was different in this respect, instead of the bolt handle being screwed into the fake bolt, it was screwed in and then welded in place, so it physically cannot move. I've had no issues since then, and regularly rack it back and let it go for the fun of it.

The tappet plate was bought more as a spare because the part is proprietary and I didn't want my current one to break for me to then be stranded without one. Again, interestingly, the new tappet plate was of slightly different design. Testing it in the rifle showed no performance difference from what I can see, but what ICS seem to be doing, is in some way or other improving all the individual components, separate from the rifle itself. So you buy the gun and it comes with all the standard bits.

But, should they fail and you buy a spare or replacement, the part you get is different to the one you broke, despite it being by ICS and for the L85. So it seems that ICS are making up for the fact that these parts are proprietary, by making the replacement parts better than the ones supplied with the gun, so that replacing parts when they break, is akin to getting an upgrade.

I also readdressed the DMR idea. I haven't skirmished it with this set up yet, but I bought a new Madbull M120 spring and put it on the highest spring tension. This put the fps up to 380 (average over 5 shots) with .20s
Couple this high fps with .30s - the same 6.01, madbull blue and H nub as with my regular set up and this thing shoots an untold distance. As I said, I've not skirmished it yet. But I did test it when I took it to chrono at another site (they wouldn't let me use it because they don't have a DMR rule... ) and the BBs were flying out of sight before I saw more than 1 foot of drop and I could clearly see them for at least 60m.

So in short, should I ever skirmish this with this DMR configuration, everyone I see will be within engagement range the only downside, is that there is no way to lock this gun to semi. The fire selector which is linked mechanically to the trigger mechanism is required in order for semi auto to work and the only conceivable way to remove the auto function is to remove the fire selector. Since I can't remove the fire selector without losing semi and not auto, there's simply no way to lock it to semi only. Which in all likelihood will make it impossible to field as a DMR legitimately.

I'll also update the parts list and overall cost to account for me now using a different barrel and having 12 Emags.

 

UPDATE - 13th April 2013

 

Since the above posts, my motor's pinion gear shredded itself to pieces. Rather pleasingly, the ICS gears and piston are still completely fine, so that's some evidence that ICS parts are of comparable quality to Systema.

 

I worked out Sherlock Holmes style that the reason the motor gear imploded was because the angle it met the gears wasn't right, and since there's sweet FA I could do about that, I thought I'd use this opportunity to buy some new bits and bobs.

 

So in the post I had some Ultimate High Torque gears - in the hope that they'd meet the Systema Magnum motor's pinion gear at the right angle, a new pinion gear of the exact kind I'd had before, a Systema version 2 cylinder head, some new shims and probably some other stuff. It's getting too much to remember all the stuff I've done to this rifle now.

 

In short it took roughly 50,000 rounds for this part to fail (discounting the ICS motor burning out) and it wasn't even a standard part.

 

I now have it fitted with:

A Madbull Ultimate aircraft aluminium, 6.01mm tightbore, of 510mm in length. The hop unit has a Systema standard AEG hop rubber in it, and a Big Out H Nub. I also managed to grab an aluminium hop arm off someone on these forums.
The air nozzle is the stock part, the cylinder head is a Systema V2, for the piston head I've recently gone back to the standard one, as the Systema cylinder head's shape renders the LPE air brake piston head pointless. The piston itself, piston head and cylinder are therefore all as they came when I initially bought it.

The gears are Ultimate High Torque gears, I think the ratio is 28:1 and the gears are helical.

The gears have been shimmed.

Lastly the motor is a Systema Magnum High Torque.

 

I use it with a 9.9v 1000mah LiFe battery, Blaster .25g BBs, Magpul PTS Emags and an M100 (I forget which make, but I don't think that matters)

 

With spring tension on full, this is possibly the most accurate, long range, skirmishable AEG I've ever known. Hitting a man with one shot at 50m? Piece of piss. I can see it reaching out to up to 70m with the barrel pointing up a fair bit of course.

Anyway, here's a list of absolutely everything I've bought to add to the gun, externals, internals and generic parts, as well as parts I've replaced due to wear, or fault.
If you want to know where I got any of it from, just ask and I'll help you find a place to get it.

Update - 30th July 2013:

So the helical 1:28 ratio gear plan didn't last very long in the end. Since the motor had to turn so many more times for me to get one shot off, rate of fire and trigger response suffered quite a lot and since my batteries are only 1000MaH, they were running out pretty quickly as well.
So now I'm running with all the same parts as the last update, except I've got the original 1:18 ratio gears installed and I also picked up a Systema V2 piston head, to better compliment the Systema cylinder head.

I've also bought and sold a few ICS L85s and L86s since the last update, and one of them went to a collector who just wanted it as a display model; so now I've got a complete set of internals spare in case anything goes arse over tit.

The only thing I really have to keep tabs on is the motor's pinion gear, since the angle of the gears don't mesh with the pinion gear, they do gradually wear each other down. I might have to buy a load of pinion gears in bulk just in case it packs in unexpectedly.

But aside from that, I'm happy with it.

Maybe I'll think about getting some high speed gears just to make the trigger response even more epic...
Still need to rewire it all to Deans connectors as well =/

I had an art teacher at school who used to say, "You can't finish art"
It's TRUE! Argh!

Base cost:
Rifle £320

Externals and related:
RIS £130
RIS adaptor £16
Grip-pod £20
LLM £70
ACOG and docter £110
ACOG mount £26
Docter wing mount £11
Rail ladders £60
Flash hider £25

Total: £788

Current Internal upgrades:
Barrel Madbull (6.01x510mm tb) £30
Hop rubber Systema £6
Hop nub Big Out H Nub £10
Systema High torque motor £85
Systema V2 Cylinder head £10
Systema V2 Aluminium piston head - Left it too long to update this... I think it was £12, not sure.

Aluminium hop arm £10

Total: £173

Grand total: £961 (Minus postage and additional costs below)

Additional costs:

Magazines:
Magpul PTS Emags x14 = £280

Batteries:

9.9v LiFe x4 - £60

Charger:
Basic LiPo/LiFe charger = £15

Generic internal parts:
Shim set x3 = £12

Replacement parts due to wear or other fault:
Trigger mechanism = £23
Hop unit = £19
Charging handle = £14

Pinion gear = £10
Butt plate (lost the screw from the back that stops the motor adjustment screw from altering through use) - £22

Overall costs, including everything apart from postage costs and ammo = £1,432

Oh and here's a photo of a real Afghan spec L85:



And here's a photo of mine:

[joshcowin]

so including postage were talking a grand,

[Airsoft-Ed]

Including magazines and batteries and still discounting postage we're talking well, well over a grand. I just spent £120 on a mere 6 Emags...

 

I think I have some sort of economic, financial disease.

[Deva]

LiPo's, dean's, correct wiring, mosfet and brand new motor should give a pretty good trigger response I would have thought!!

[TPI]

Ed you Must be Propping up the UK Economy...

[Airsoft-Ed]

You can all thank me later lol.

[Ian_Gere]

I thought I'd gone nuts when I bought Agnes!

[Airsoft-Ed]

I thought I'd gone nuts when I bought Agnes!

 

I accepted the fact that I was nuts a long time ago lol, I think I have a financial illness. Kinda like a heroin addict, but my drug is airsofting.

 

When you're a student with a ton of dosh to spend on nothing, this seems like a far more worthy cause than a massive amount of alcohol... =/

 

At least with this I have something to show for my money, as well as the memories of spending it haha.

[Ian_Gere]

Yeah, I spanked my overdraft & several credit cards on sound recording equipment & computer stuff when I was @uni. Still got most of it so twas money well spent. Still paying off some of the debts too

[Airsoft-Ed]

Just thought I'd add that photos of this with all the external gear attached to it are now in the gun picture thread on page 44.

 

Once I've got all the internal wiring and stuff sorted out over the next week or so, photos will be getting added here.

[jaeproductions]

Photo + picture of real steal for comparison please?

[jaeproductions]

Sorry I posted the last reply asking for photos just as I saw the comment on adding pictures...

[StealthyAirsoft]

This is probably the best written review I have seen

 

 

Sorry for the sort of necro!

 

 

Look forward to the next one!!

[Airsoft-Ed]

This is probably the best written review I have seen

 

Sorry for the sort of necro!

 

Look forward to the next one!!

 

Thanks I'm hoping it'll help a few people out.

 

I would consider myself a self appointed ICS L85 guru, so if anyone has any questions about it PM me and I'll be happy to help.

[jaeproductions]

When you're a student with a ton of dosh to spend on nothing, this seems like a far more worthy cause than a massive amount of alcohol... =/

 

Wait...student...lots of money?

[Airsoft-Ed]

Well, most students are only poor because they go out boozing every bloody night. I can't stand clubs, or the people who go to them, or the feeling you wake up with the next morning after going to one.

 

So instead of wasting money on having a "good time" I spend it all on airsofting, I've got a lot more to show for it than all my alcoholic mates.

[adam bussey]

Well, most students are only poor because they go out boozing every bloody night. I can't stand clubs, or the people who go to them, or the feeling you wake up with the next morning after going to one.

 

So instead of wasting money on having a "good time" I spend it all on airsofting, I've got a lot more to show for it than all my alcoholic mates.

good on you man.

[AirsoftTed]

Hi Ed, I'm looking to get an L85 of some description, would you say the ICS is the best choice on the market? Also, is £295 a good price for an ICS L85A2 brand new?

[Airsoft-Ed]

I would say yes to both.

I've had mine for just under a year and it's the only gun I've used since, if I'd had anything else I'd have probably bought and sold about 5 guns in that time.

 

ICS is without a shadow of a doubt the best L85 on the market, in my mind.

I bought mine for £320 so £295 is very good.

I think the cheapest I've seen them is £290 which I THINK was on Fire-Support, but I might be wrong.

 

If you do get one then Fire Support is the best place to look for internal parts, they sell more or less every component.

[AirsoftTed]

Thanks mate might end up treating my self to one for Christmas!

[Airsoft-Ed]

Good choice!

 

You know who to come to if you need any help with it

There's Finius too, in case I'm not around for whatever reason.

[Airsoft-Ed]

Just added another update, as well as some comparison photos.

 

Quite pleasingly, my L85 actually came up in the first 5 photos on Google images search - "L85 Afghanistan"

[TPI]

I Can now also add that the ICS L85 is a Great Rifle (Owning 2 at the same time :-D) The Plastic is Of Amazing Quality (Strongest Plastic i've come against yet including Car Plastic's!, Feel's on Par with my RS Magpul E-Mag and they can take a car going over them!)

[Bridge8115]

Are you still selling this?

[Airsoft-Ed]

No...? I wasn't, and never will be selling it. This is the review section...

 

Just updated it again by the way, dated the update at the bottom of the initial post.