Comprehensive Ares AW .338 spring version (MSR-006/7/8) review.

[Liam Porter]

With that trigger, if it's decent, if it fits, if the site is legit, and if pistonris compatible with PDI cylinders, you could then get the PDI Raven cylinder set. The piston that comes with it is the weak part, that is only designed for 1 Joule, but the cylinder should be fine at higher values. And, this will give you a black cylinder rather than the shiny silver one.

 

 

Also, I just did a quick Google, not sure how legit "Marksman Craft" is. I think it's similar to Cheeseman Industries and Hunterseeker Armory, in that they're both airsofters rather than companies (like PDI), who have had ideas and the tools/ability to set them up and build them (HSA is the RHop, and CMI does RHop installations and LRB mods I think).

[Fiddich]

So, I've been examining these parts and I see a huge similarity between these parts. The difference seems only to be the mounting points. Makes me wonder how difficult it would be to make those kind of mounting points and use another brands trigger???

[Airsoft-Ed]

Awesome, so now there's a 90° on the market, as well as two upgrade cylinder sets.

What's up with the difference in length of the pistons in the two photos above, Fiddich? Also, $216 is about £140, so that's actually not that bad, especially considering it comes with a new cylinder, piston, spring and spring guide... In fact, it makes me wonder if the parts are low quality... But, so long as the exchange rate works out properly on checkout, and customs doesn't anally rape the buyer once it enters the UK, I think that's pretty affordable.

Hop and barrel parts can be sourced easily, so the only thing that can't be improved are the magazines, which squirt ammo everywhere if you touch them, and the feeding mech, which is still shit...

Any hope of seeing the trigger on a better known website, do you reckon? I might see if my regular site can order me one in...
Once I've got out of my overdraft anyway...

[Liam Porter]

Fiddich, what are those two triggers for? One for ARES and one for the TM?

[Airsoft-Ed]

I'm currently fitting an R-hop patch.

 

I shall test it once I have time, and the sun isn't hiding around the other side of the Earth... It'd better be an improvement... Turns out the hop rubber I had installed had been butchered through use anyway, so it can't be any shitter than it was!

[Fiddich]

Hey Yeah...sorry I should have identified the two pic. the top one is for thew Ares and the bottom is for the TM L96. the only shite thing for that trigger group is they only accept bank transfers. Not my favorite payment option.

 

 

AND!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

PDI has released the black palsonite cylinder set for the AW338....no need for the shiny silver ugly one!!!!!!

 

 

Sweetness....

[Fiddich]

I'm also wondering what the chance would be to mod this to fit the Ares. It looks a hell of a lot like that one from TNT Sniper parts...

 

I do think that you will sacrifice some of the novelty functions of the rifle, namely the cocking indicator...ooo..and likely the functioning safety.....but.....worthy trade offs considering the upsides...

 

This one on the other hand I do not thing would be that easy to adopt....

 

 

I know that PDI did tell me that they were focusing on making a trigger first for the AW338 this year, the hop up was likely to be next year. Looking at how simple it "could" be to mod an existing trigger, I can see why.

[Airsoft-Ed]

I don't fancy my chances modding one of those triggers to fit, if I'm honest.

Anyway though, I have some news.

I fitted an M150 VSR spring just now, unfortunately my chrono is being a bellend so I've no idea what the hell the fps is, but using .43s, the stock hop parts + a biro ink tube nub, stock barrel, stock trigger components, an ASPUK piston and spring guide, I was able to hit a metal drain pipe at approx 80m, measured with Google maps. Most other shots came within about 1.5m to it as well, from what I could see. Though I'm by no means experienced when it comes to judging the flight path of BBs at that range, my back drop was the sky so I could see the black BBs, so it's quite hard to gauge at what point along their flight they were deviating.

 

I have almost no faith that the stock spring guide stopper will hold up much longer though, it was visibly bent before I even fitted the M150 spring, so I dread to think what it looks like now.

The rest of the trigger parts seemed to perform fine, I've not looked at them yet either, but I have confidence they'll still be fit for hard use.

On the down side of things, my range dropped off substantially after about 60 shots, and although I've not looked into it yet, I suspect the hop rubber is going to be in tatters.

Also, I bought a VSR10 metal hop arm from ASPUK, the B type one and it's massive. A good cm too long to fit in, as well as being too fat and too high as well. Just far too chunky in every dimension to fit into the gun.

I might give R-hop another go and buy a spring guide stopper that fits. I have a PDI one but it won't go in because the arm you pull it out with hits on the gun chassis when closing it, so you can't get the gun together.

Once those parts are sorted though, I actually think it could be made a rather decent gun, everything seems to be holding up really well and I'm astounded I hit 80m with mostly stock parts and without the accuracy being too terrible either.
In fact I was so surprised with the performance that I'm starting to worry I might be firing massively over the 500fps marker, 'cos if I can get 80m from the stock rubber and barrel with this spring fitted, an R-hop ought to put me well into the 100m zone, the shots seem to carry a ridiculous amount of momentum as well, I could see this covering more than 150m if I angled the barrel.

Actually properly excited about getting it up and running effectively, 'cos it's going to be a beast. I'm still having feeding issues though... Pain in the posterior to say the least.

[Fiddich]

I just got a reply from pdi. Sadly they are still not close to releasing the trigger for the aw338 yet.

[Unrustle_Thine_Jimmies]

I noticed in your Status yesterday that you were thinking of cutting up a hop rubber to make an R-hop style patch,I posted a youtube link,but I messed up and broke it,I'm not sure if it worked and if you saw it since the post got buried.

 

Anyway,It's called G-Hop,and some guy made a great guide video and a video detailing his experiences with it comparing it to ER hop.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=90PQ7ec1Ne0

 

Like I've said,you may have seen this,I'm just not sure the link worked.

[Airsoft-Ed]

Nah I didn't see it, cheers for the links.

[Airsoft-Ed]

Seems that G-hop is the much more workable, easy solution, with similar if not better results.

I'll have to pick up some glue and give it a go.

[Sic]

I bought the Marksman Craft trigger and it seems to be good quality.

The only problem is that i cant close my gun back together.. the front "Wing" where the bolts are is too thick so the trigger wont sink down enough, thinking about doing some "dremeling" in the magwell and it will fit nicely.

[Airsoft-Ed]

Any chance you could stick the photos up? Where did you get the trigger from? How much was it in total with shipping? Did customs anally rape you with stupid charges or anything?

 

If you have an overall good experience then I'd be interested in getting one, especially if it only takes a bit of fine dremmel work or filing to get it to fit.

[Sic]

Omfg.....seriously....http://www.tntsniperproshop.com/product.detail_909472_en_5096423

I bought it here and i will get some pics up as soon as "my" gunsmith gets home.

Hopefully he hasnt started with the gun yet.

[Airsoft-Ed]

How much was it with shipping?

[Airsoft-Ed]

I just stumbled across a review of the MSR, which is largely the same as this apart from the bolt handle and the trigger unit.

 

http://www.airsoftsniperforum.com/36-rifles-parts-reviews/6451-ares-ms-700-msr-review.html

 

It seems a few people have CNC'd their own parts out of steel and it performs quite well. There's also talk of people buying 90 degree piston sears and pistons, or modifying the existing sears and pistons to make them 90 degree, so I might look into that.

 

Nineball Purple hop rubbers, 500fps springs and steel spring guide stoppers seem to be a winning combination. Shouldn't even cost too much to sort the gun out like that, so once pay day comes around I might try my hand at upgrading it a bit.

 

It seems I'm the only person on this earth to have had any feeding issues

[Airsoft-Ed]

Also just found another review of this actual rifle: http://www.airsoftsniperforum.com/36-rifles-parts-reviews/7897-ares-aw338-comprehensive-review-msr-008-spring.html

 

It seems I'm the only person in the entire world that's had any negative experiences with it at all! It's not fair D=

[Sic]

Crappy camera in my phone but maybe you can see it anyway.. it had to be filed down about 3-4 mm and it fits nice now.

I found another problem with it. when i bolt and fire the second sear falls out after 3 shots so i get slamfire after that and have to set the pin back in and it works fine.. will put some tape or something on it to make it stay in the gun.

 

the total cost was $250 with shipping and customs fee

[Airsoft-Ed]

What fps are you firing at? If it's low, upgrading the spring to a more powerful and longer one, ought to stop the stopper falling out. Though it being missing shouldn't make the gun slam fire.

$250 is about £160. I dunno what ZeroTrigger's usually cost, but that sounds like a lot for it to not even fit the gun and fall apart once it's in the gun... I might hold off until I hear more about it, or an alternative comes available.

[Liam Porter]

£160 is about right, apart from it not fitting and falling apart, the Laylax one for the Maruzen and clones is £180.

 

Sic, are you on about the spring guide stopper, or the piston sear? If the piston sear, then it definitely shouldn't fall out in a zero trigger, and if the spring guide stopper, then you have a couple of options; put a more powerful spring in it, or put a spring with the same power, but a longer length in it, or, as you said, put tape over the bottom, which is what I do with mine.

[Airsoft-Ed]

I've managed to get R-hop working, but I don't honestly see any improvement over the stock rubber, other than it having lasted longer so far.

It's far more hassle than it's worth, I'd have sooner bought 500 shit hop rubbers and replaced them every 50 shots than go through the rigmarole of pissing about with R-hop again.

I've had to use an old L96 cut twist barrel, which is sending my shots off everywhere, so it's nothing close to accurate and the range is pretty erratic too, sometimes it'll shoot 80m, sometimes it'll drop off at around 50, I think I might need to locktite down the hop adjustment screw.

[Unrustle_Thine_Jimmies]

I'll be interested when/if you get the new rubber and try Ghop,I'm set on doing it to my gun when I come back from Ukraine,not much stuff on it being done on a VSR type hopup.

[Airsoft-Ed]

Nineball purple rubber came today, works the best I've had it so far. It's pretty much one shot hit guaranteed out to 30m so long I have a full torso to aim for, I can get up to 80m range out of it, but I'm worried about actually maxing the hop out in case I destroy the rubber like last time.

Think I might skirmish it seriously for the first time on Sunday and see how I get on with it. I just wish the mags were so incomprehensibly shit, I have 3 but I can't load more than one at a time because if I try to store the ones not being used they just spray their entire load (hurhurhur) everywhere the second I try and pouch them in a pouch, knock them on something, or even touch them for that matter.

Still getting feeding issues as well, I actually can't chambre a round from the mag without cocking the bolt, releasing the mag and then reinserting it, then closing the bolt; that's literally the only way I can get it to feed. Which means I pretty much have to work off a bipod.

Annoying.com

[Liam Porter]

Is the Nineball rubber soft or hard?

 

Did you ever try again with the R-Hop, or did you give up with that?