Airsoft Insider Airsoft News and Review Pros
Check out part IV of this How-To series here if you haven’t already.
Airsoft is much more than just MilSim and one of the fastest rising branches of the sport is competitive timed shooting events.
The plan for this build was to make a lightweight, yet still full metal and visually realistic M4 with snappy trigger response, excellent short-mid range accuracy and an ergonomic design using a tubular handguard, steeply angled pistol grip and other lightweight parts. We had a dream list of parts and were able to get most of those that we were looking for! Unfortunately, we did have one more part that we’d have liked to include in the build, a Deep Fire PTW type outer barrel and hop-up unit, but it just wouldn’t cooperate with the LCT receiver and gearbox.
LCT M4 RAS—$250
Trinity Force 10” Vented Handguard—$33
APS V2 Hybrid Trigger—$6
APS Trigger Guard—$4
MFT Minimalist Stock—$50
PTS Enhanced Polymer Grip Compact—$20
PTS Enhanced Polymer Magazine—$20
Madbull PWS Triad Compensator—$28
G&G Electronic Trigger Unit—$40
ASG Infinity 28 TPA Motor—$55
Reflex Sight—$30
Madbull Steel 6.03 x 363mm TBB—$40
VFC VR16 Hop-up Unit—Pulled from another gun
Madbull Orange Bucking—Pulled from another gun
Cerakote From Robin Sage Coatings—$125
29With the lower receiver pretty much wrapped up, it’s time to finish up the upper. As mentioned before, we just couldn’t get the Deep Fire PTW type barrel to work without machining down the gearbox shell, so we instead put together a different hop-up setup for the stock barrel. Of course, we painted the stock barrel with “Modern Metals Champagne Silver” to make it look great.
30The Trinity Force handguard has a separate barrel nut that needs to be unscrewed from the handguard itself before screwing it onto the receiver. If you’re not running a gas tube or gas block, you can leave it installed. It screwed perfectly onto the LCT receiver and tightened up nicely without the need for shims or spacers.
31A compact gas block and gas tube slide onto the barrel easily and once tightened up, stay firmly in place. These are merely cosmetic components, only adding to the looks and realism of the gun, but the weight addition was negligible, so we kept them around.
32The completed barrel setup was just plain pretty. Too bad we have to hide much of it under the tubular handguard!
33We chose the Madbull PWS Triad Compensator as the muzzle device for this build because I had one on my workbench and it looked good.
34The handguard itself screws easily onto the barrel nut and fits without any wobbles or free play. We chose this handguard because it weighs next to nothing and has a smooth, extended length design free from any unnecessary rails to catch your hand on regardless of your grip style.
35Inside the barrel setup, we went with a VFC VR16 rotary style hop-up, orange Madbull bucking and Madbull 6.03 x 363mm steel tightbore barrel. This combo has worked very well for me in the past and I expected it to perform well in this build.
36The completed upper receiver is lightweight, comfortable to hold, extremely well balanced and frankly, looks damn cool.
37Last but certainly not least, an Element CMore style reflex sight proudly sits atop the upper receiver, giving us a clear, easy to spot red dot with a lightweight and low profile design. Most real IPSC style shooters run this same optic, so obviously, we’re in good company on our build.
WRAP-UP
Now that the build is complete, let’s talk numbers. 5.5 pounds, with battery installed and loaded magazine. 385 FPS. 170-foot torso accuracy, even though this will primarily be used at ranges under 50 feet at most shooting events, though under 50 feet, if you can put the red dot on it, you will hit it. The trigger pull is light and crisp, with no reset length whatsoever. You can tap out shots so fast on semi-auto that it’ll rival some full-auto shooters. The center of balance is about 1.5 inches in front of the pistol grip, allowing you to guide your point of aim easily using your non-shooting hand. The cylindrical handguard allows pretty much any shooting position you can imagine, including an exaggerated Costa style C-clamp grip.
The rifle is fast to aim and faster to shoot and it does all of this while looking extremely good. The Cerakote job from Robin Sage Coatings makes this thing absolutely pop and there’s certainly going to be no mistaking this gun for someone else’s on the course. In addition, they are 100% comfortable with working on airsoft replicas, which is something that can’t be said for all Cerakote shops.
This build would be impossible without the assistance from the companies that provided parts. Airsplat carries most of the parts that we used for this build and has them at competitive prices. PTS and G&G both sent us pre-production prototype parts to try out for this thing. ASG got us the motor that gave us amazing trigger response, especially when partnered with the G&G ETU and Robin Sage Coatings made this thing look amazing. This build is certainly different than the types of builds we normally do here in Airsoft Insider magazine, but I think it turned out amazing and I’m 100% pleased with the end result. Now get out there, find your nearest competitive airsoft shooting match and put together your own race gun!
Links
Airsplat airsplat.com
Robin Sage Coatings robinsagecoatings.com
G&G guay2.com
ASG actionsportgames.com
PTS ptssyndicate.us