I wish I were a real tree

“Jester” and I have come to affectionately dub these our 3D leaf hunting camo – as the pattern itself features both a printed foliage pattern (similar in concept to a few more well-known hunting camouflage brands, such as Real Tree) as well as cut shapes to resemble leaves (once again, similar in concept to other hunting camouflage). We both noted that this pattern works well when wet from rain, rather well.

The main reason for my search for this camouflage set is due to inspiration from Taskforce Valkyrie and Team Cobalt (both have awesome MOUT/Mil-Sim YouTube channels, if you aren’t already aware of them). AFAIK, the dude on TF Valkyrie wears a higher end product, which definitely looks like a more useable pattern in itself… but in the end, I didn’t feel like shelling out the cash for a product that I wasn’t sure I would like to wear. That being said, the one I got instead has certainly proved to be an excellent test of this 3D pattern.

TM SCAR-H: External Setup

One of my favourite parts of getting a new AEG is setting up the externals to suit my needs. With the TM SCAR-H, I wanted to go for an issued MK17 look, with a couple of small adjustments to personalize it to my tastes (and suit what I had lying around).

Tons more pretty pics and descriptions of all the stuff I’ve bolted on to this thing after the break.

Dr. Tran

What happens when you tell “Jaws” that his helmet isn’t entirely kosher for the kit he’s been working on?

Gas Gun

Some post-game cleaning on one of my most rarely-used guns – my WE M4A1 GBBR.

I shot through 15 mags through the M4 in a span of two games today. Approximately 30C weather made this easily possible and incredibly satisfying, but I still managed to freeze it over real good three times in the span of a few hours. Despite that, I now remember why I kept my WE AWSS (OB conversion) after all these years.

Let me tell you, its been an annual struggle to decide whether or not I should keep it come spring for the past 3 years. But as with every year prior, I’ve just reached that point of gas gun euphoria, thanks to the warm summer weather.

LCT AS-VAL Unboxing Video

So recently after the winter hiatus I got back into airsoft, kicking off the spring by picking up LCT’s AS-VAL.

Below is a short video of the unboxing when I received it from Julian at Airsoft Gear back in May.

The gun is built solid as a rock, as you would come to expect with LCT’s build quality. Most of the components on the gun are made of high quality steel, everything from the suppressor to the receiver and the stock. It certainly adds to the weight of the gun but its not overbearing. After about a month or so of fielding the  gun it definitely lives up to the LCT  internal quality. In the time I’ve had it I haven’t done any upgrades to it, its bone stock and I wouldn’t have it any other way.  With the stock build the gun can effectively reach out to 180 ft +.    Currently I have no plans to upgrade the gun until something breaks, but something tells me that will be a while.

Additionally the  AS-VAL features the rail bracketing system allowing a User to install a scope  mount onto the side of the rifle easily. On top of that LCT has just released suppressor rail adapters which allow the user to add a vertical grip, flash light or other accessories to the front end of the gun.

The only con I see with the gun, which is incredibly minor, are the mags. The AS-VAL has proprietary mags so you need to order the specific mags to run the gun. Currently LCT only has low-cap mags at 50 rounds each. While King Arms, G&G and Echo 1 all have AS-VALs or VSS Vintorez on the market  I haven’t had the opportunity to test out compatibility. On the plus side, the mags are just a little larger than M4 mags and can easily be run in M4 pouches.

Later on  I’ll add some more photos for detail.

Tokyo Marui SCAR-H: Dat Hop-up

I’ve long been a fan of the SCAR-H platform, but my experiences with the VFC SCAR-H and its consistent feeding issues, along with the poor build quality of the proprietary hop-up, eventually drove me to finally put down the cash for Tokyo Marui’s version.

The TM SCAR-H lives up to the Tokyo Marui reputation for excellent performance right out of the box; 150 foot shots are easy as pie to make (with a maximum effective range of 150-170 feet), with great consistency from shot to shot. And this is all with 0.25g BBs, and at a paltry 300fps. The recoil of the platform is not as strong as the KWA ERG platform (or even TM’s M4 Recoil Shock series), but is still strong enough to give the gun a pleasant bump against your shoulder with every trigger pull. The bolt release function is always fun to have, and I’ve grown used to bolt lock functions on my other AEGs so I’m used to hitting that paddle.

Anyway, I did have a 407mm 6.03 Prometheus barrel lying around, and I’ve been a fan of the look of the longer 16″ barrel on the SCAR-H that can be achieved via the included barrel extension. Thus I set to work opening the SCAR up to install the Prometheus barrel and perhaps get to the bottom of what makes Tokyo Marui hop-ups so great.

CONCLUSION: Tokyo Marui hop-ups are made of crushed unicorn bones and fairy dust, forged together in the fires of Mount Doom by the dark lord Sauron.

More pics of my (not-so-simple) walk into Mordor after the break.