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The Church of Daytona Gun


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  • Root Admin

Update 02/08/16: Kits now need to be bought from https://blackblitzairsoft.myshopify.com/collections/daytona/Daytona-Kit

 

So er, I know of all of two of us on these forums that run a DG but what with the re-release of their update L85/L86/SA80 family kit on the horizon, I thought it worth going in to what Daytona Gun is, how much is costs, how they perform and why I think they're the most fun guns available for airsoft right now. I've seen more of these popping up in the UK recently, and what with our cold weather and the increasing availability and affordability of HPA, I can see these only getting more popular. They don't get much publicity (this is mostly intentional actually) so here goes.

 

Wot is it?

So Daytona Gun is a drop-in kit (similar in the way that a Polarstar, Wolverine, PDiKs is) for a range of guns from LMGs to PDWs. It's a fully pneumatic (i.e. no electricity anywhere) CNC'd block of steel, brass and aluminium that aims to be both a consistent shooter and also have blow back - thing is, it's also meant to be seriously durable (more on that in a second). It was born out of some of the old Escort and Sun Project kits from the 90s, and is basically a refinement of the high pressure air (HPA) engines of old.

 

What does it do?

As I say, it's a big-ass lump of metal that reciprocates like a GBBR does to produce recoil. The closest thing to it is an Escort pneumatic blow back rifle, but the closest thing you could probably compare it to that everyone has seen is the Tippmann - an HPA GBBR. Thing is, it has a marginally higher rate of fire than the Tippmann and produces more recoil. That's kind of its USP right now (apart from being superior to almost anything on the market when it comes to durability given how simple its operation is).

 

In essence, it's a steel air shaft with a big old recoil spring and a bolt that travels down the length of the body after you fire a shot (similar to a lot of current GBBR designs in concept, but radically different when it comes to manufacturing).

 

Daytona Gun M249 kit

iTIKK0K.png

Courtesy of this video.

 

Installed M249 kit

m87Lo98.jpg

 

Why is it good?

I see DG being basically the perfect gun due to its recoil. I've never much liked AEGs, but can't deal with the inconsistency of GBBRs and don't like the lack of recoil that you get from electric solenoid engines like the Polarstar and Wolverine kits; to me they're just not as fun as these things are. The recoil is snappy and they're very loud too, so that's a bonus.

 

The second point is durability. These things just keep going and don't permanently break. Sure you get a loose screw here and there, or some dirt clogging up your air shaft but ultimately they just run and run because there's very little to go wrong.

 

Thirdly: They still perform well. Not much to say on this - they just shoot pretty straight and consistently.

 

The bad

Two main things here. The smaller issue is the break in period of up to 10,000 BBs - during this time your ft/s fluctuates a lot and you get BBs being chopped or just flying off. All the pieces in each kit need fitting together over time as obviously after manufacturing they're fractions of a millimetre out until they wear on one another a little over that initial break in. You also need to lubricate it a lot during this time.

 

The bigger issue is cost: Most kits clock in at $475 and some come in at around $550 - once you factor in a regulator, decent tank and the donor body, you can be looking at about £800 - £1000 to get one working in the UK.

 

A further issue is air consumption: M249 kits - as an example of one of the most air-hungry kits - get through an 88/4500 tank (basically one of the largest you can buy) in about 3000 rounds. Obviously that's not a massive amount if you're running support.

 

Some shooting videos

Bit of shooting at 4:18 (a lot at other places too if you watch the whole thing)

 

Shooting at 1:15

 

(Note: this guy is breaking in his DG so you can hear a slightly fluctuating RoF)

https://www.facebook.com/1056528797744842/videos/1116193228445065/

 

 

Link to their website

http://airsoft.tnkguns.com

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  • Root Admin

Well there are pretty good guides out there :) The good thing is that, like I say, these things are basically impossible to actually break. Jam? Sure, if you use cheap ammo, but irreversible breakage? Not seen it happen yet really.

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  • Root Admin

Yep - they sell extremely quickly. The latest batch sold out within 30 minutes and crashed the website, heh.

 

The shipping is pretty brutal but Tony will declare it at less value so the VAT doesn't kill you. Your best chance is signing up for the notification list thing that I added - then you'll get an email within 30 seconds of them being restocked.

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  • Root Admin

Couldn't tell ya, but you'll rarely get a heads-up before anyone else. Customs and border agencies have been known to delay shipments for months in some cases and days for others, so it's really luck of the draw. DGs are snowballing in popularity though and I know TNK Guns are getting a new shop with the potential to expand their real steel stuff, so I'd imagine larger orders will be coming in of the kits too. Pure speculation though.

 

Even Tony doesn't know when the kits will be coming beyond the couple of days heads-up he gets from whoever is delivering it. I think he keeps it a secret just to deter people from always asking, and the notification form he wanted done was kind of made to solidify that. Best you can hope for is that you're concious when the batch comes in. Last lot hit the shop at about 10:30pm our time, but I did suggest that maybe doing it a little earlier would be nicer for us Europeans :)

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Tony (TNKGuns) isn't importing anymore, but other shops have taken the reigns. Blackblitz will be taking over distribution for the US and Canada: http://blackblitzairsoft.com/

 

Tony is still doing spares and machining spares though, and I'm still doing the spares for the EU so all is still ok.

 

Who invented the Daytona system, owns the designs?

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  • Root Admin

I honestly don't really know for sure. I pretty sure it's TNKGuns (Tony), but his real business is real steel so I think he wants to concentrate more on that as he gets paid way less for working on airsoft guns (even the DG system) than real stuff. The kits are made in HK AFAIK and there are constant cock-ups with them delaying orders - it's one of the reasons why it's so hard for TNKGuns to run their business, because they don't know when they'll be getting inventory at all.

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So where is the best place to get daytona kits from now on? I was thinking of making a daytona m249 but can't seem to find it anywhere.

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  • 1 month later...

I'm now officially on the look out for one of these kits Prof, keep an eye out and if you see anything about give me a shout! ;)

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  • Root Admin

They will ship to the UK, but it costs a lot ($70 I believe).

 

DG kits are rare - best thing to do is sign up to the mailing list and then sacrifice your first born in the hopes that you can whip out your credit card in the 30 seconds it takes for a new production run to sell out. There are a lot of people waiting on them.

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All unavailable. Do they also ship to the UK? Or are they Canada/Continental US only?

I emailed them about the M249 kit the other day and they said:

 

"Hi Tom,

We are hoping to expect our next batch of kits by mid to late August. Feel free to sign up for the email notification on the product page. This way you will be notified via email as soon as the kits are back in stock.
Regards"
You better be snappy because I'm sure there's lots of people waiting for these to become available :)
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