New photos of the L119A1

Now that I have improved my photography skills and got to the point where I know what most of the knobs and buttons do on my Sony DSLR, I can finally put up some photos of my gun that I am happy with. These were taken under artificial light on shutter priority with a 10 second exposure. They seem to have come out okay.

The specs of the rifle are as before. Please note that this is an airsoft rifle and not capable of firing, or being converted to fire, real ammunition:

L119A1: Guarder Colt Canada metal receiver, Marui M4 internals & stock, AR15.net stock pad, DBoys RIS, delta ring, foresight cup, DragonRed L119A1 barrel, Blackhawk mag pouch, Guarder oversized grip, ACM ACOG. there is still a few things I want to change about the gun including upgrading all the internals, fitting a tight barrel and getting the RIS to stay still - it currently twists slightly around the barrel, cheap Chinese tat.

The rifle is sitting on a bunch of my gear. Some of the stuff you may spot in the background:

TT 2-Piece MAV with Warrior triple M4 pouch, TT canteen pouch and TT GP pouch. Desert and DPM assault vests, DDPM windproof smock, Warrior assault pack, SOTech plate carrier and my custom PLCE webbing. Hope you like the pics.

More L119A1 Barrels

Seems that someone else has started making barrels for L119A1 SFW conversions. Airsoft Global are advertising a two piece 119 barrel conversion for both M4/M16 Series AEGs for US$58 and for WA M4/M16s for US$64. A bargain.

Photos from the recent abortive barrel installation

Here are the photos I took to put on a forum for advice on installing my new L119 barrel (see previous post for details). You can clearly see in the pics that the Marui M4 RIS is too short to sit between the delta ring and the foresight cup.

L119A1 Project

It's been a while since I posted anything about thie project, mainly down to the difficulty in getting a barrel. I thought this sticking point had been resolved when I saw that DragonRed and AFS Airsoft both had an L119 barrel for retail, and in decent numbers (as opposed to the joke that Army Code's production runs were).

With a barrel on order at a slightly elevated price, of £62 thanks to the appalling rate of exchange against the dollar, I waited with baited breath.

The barrel arrived last Friday. and appeared to be of excellent quality, arriving as a 3-part set consisting of the main section, an extention that screwed on in front of the foresight, and a sleeve that slid over the end and replaced the washer at the end of the Marui barrel. The barrel had a nice weighty feel, and the parts all fitted together nicely with no play or wobble.

I was away at the weekend, so I had to wait until Sunday night to install it on my almost finished L119. Off came all the old Marui M4 front end with very little effort and on went the main section of the new barrel, fitting perfectly and snugly into the Guarder metal body.

Fitting the Delta ring, foresight and the cup at the front all went well, until I went to install the two halves of the Marui RIS unit, where I encountered two issues.

The section of the barrel at the end that attaches to the receiver is much thicker than the stock Marui barrel and the RIS does not fit around it. No problem there, out with the files and the Dremel to grind a bit away. The second issue is much more of a problem. The Marui RIS is not long enough to be held in place between the delta ring and the cup, there is about a 5mm defecit.

I havee no idea how I'm going to solve this at the moment. I have emailed DragonRed to ask their advice. I have posted on the DragonRed forum for advice. I have also emailed AFSAirsoft to ask them and they claim that they do not supply DragonRed with these items even though someone on the ASCUK forum said he bought a barrel from DragonRed and showed pictures of it complete with the AFSAirsoft label still attached to the packaging.

I now have two possible solutions to my problem.

1. Buy a new RIS unit. Simple enough, but how do I know that the unit I buy will be long enough to fit the barrel?

2. Buy an Element CQB barrel to replace the main section of the DragonRed barrel. Another suitable resolution, but makes me feel like I have wasted a lot of money.

I haven't taken any pics of the gun as it stands, but I feel like I needed to have a moan and to warn other prospective buyers of this barrel.

More to come, undoubtedly.

L119A1 News from AFS Airsoft

Had another email this morning from AFS Airsoft about their new L119A1 barrel and receiver...


Thanks for your patient, the L119A1 Metal body & Steel Barrel set has ready for delivery, please place your order by reply with this Email, and please find the enclosed file for reference, thank you.

Best regards,

Sales & Marketing
AFS Airsoft


AFS can be contacted by email at afsairsoft@gmail.com.

Army Code

Massive Defense have put up pictures of the Army Code L119A1 SFW foresight (seen at the bottom of this page that they are due to be producing in the near future (website says July, but as July is nearly over, we can assume that it'll be August or later).

Lots of people are eager to get their hands on this, and Army Code/Massive Defense are obviously aware of the high demand for this largely pointless accessory, and have priced it at £29, which has to be at least £20 too much. As their supply of the now mythical L119A1 barrel has dried up and they seem unable to say when they will again be in stock, I'm not gonna hold my breath. Modifying a standard M4 foresight with milliput (or not being so bloody obsessive about my L119A1 project) is now again on the cards.

Presumably, they have it at this price to pay for their new website.

L119A1 Project

Just had this email from Massive Defense:

Hi David,

Thanks for your email. L119A1 Front sight will release in the coming few weeks. Meanwhile I don't have any news for when will the barrel back in stock.

Thanks & regards,
M.D.S./ Massive Defense Shop
www.massive.hk

Bugger.

L119A1 Pictures

Guarder Colt Canada Metal Body (click images for full size):




Before (more or less bog standard Tokyo Marui M4A1RIS):




In Progress:





After:

L119A1 SFW Project

The gun is all back together again and working. Hopfully, I'll get some before and after photo's on the blog over the weekend. Just the outer barrel, stock pad and ACOG to add now.

L119A1 SFW Project - Problems So Far

The build got under way last night. Stripping down the doner Marui M4RIS was a doddle, following the instructions on 858 Airsoft and the booklets that originally came with the gun (the instructions from 858 are for the M4A1 and don't tell you how to get the RIS forend off, which the Marui manual does). All in bits and safely lying in the lid of the M4's box, time to get to work putting the bits back onto the metal body.

1. The base plate on the grip won't go back on. The holes in the Guarder large grip don't quite line up with those in the Marui base plate. Coupled with the fact that the screws for the Guarder grip are very short means that this is a right bastard to fit properly. I currently only have one screw holding the base plate on, which doesn't strike me as being a very good idea. It all has to come to bits again due to a reason that will become apparent in a moment, so I'll have to try and find a longer screw that fits, or do something else about the misaligned holes.

2. If you follow the instructions on 858 Airsoft (which is for the standard M4A1), you will find that the gun comes apart very nicely - excellent instructions guys. If any of you have ever read a Haynes car manual, it usually says somewhere that reassembly is just the disassembly instructions backwards. Not so in the case of the Guarder metal body. As it turns out, you have to fit the mechbox back into the top part of the receiver and not the bottom, which is the way it comes apart. That was where I got up to last night, with the mechbox installed into the bottom half of the receiver, and not being able to get the two halves back together. As it was ten o' clock, I thought it best to leave it before I got cross/tired/destructive. A quick look on the internet, and I find a set of instructions on the Guarder website about how to put it together properly. I'll do that tonight. Why they don't ship the receiver with a set of these instructions, I'll never know.

More tomorrow, hopefully with pics of a much more complete, half finished L119A1 SFW assault rifle.

L119A1 Project

I recently found a link on ASCUK to a site called 858 Airsoft with an excellent article (well, I hope it's excellent, it's the one I'll be following when taking my M4 apart) on disassembling the mechbox and receiver of an M4.

The Colt Canada metal receiver and large grip are now sat under my coffee table waiting for me to have time to fit them. The SFW build is almost under way.

L119A1 SFW Project

The Colt Canada M4 metal body and the Guarder large grip are now bought and paid for and ready for collection at Fire Support when I'm over in Peterborough on Saturday. Hopefully this is a step forward for the L119A1 project that I've been trying to source bits for for nearly four months. I'll get some pics and a review up sometime next week.

The ongoing saga of the L119A1 build

It all started back in March (the 20th to be precise) when I placed an order with Tokyo Model Company and made a payment for $120US for an Army Code L119A1 SFW outer barrel. I'm still waiting for the bloody thing, which is not the fault of TMC at all, they have always been incredibly helpful. Army Code on the other hand, the company that manufacture the barrel, are possibly the most evasive company in the world. I must have emailed them ten times to see when the barrel would be back in stock. I've emailed them from different email accounts to two of the three email addresses on their website. I've never heard anything back - Army Code, if you do happen to read this, please let me know if I'm ever likely to see one of these barrels. I think I might make the L119A1 a CQB version now and just go with a 10.5 M4 barrel.

Still waiting for the Colt Canada receiver too (ordered around the same time from Guarder via Fire Support who, like TMC, could not be more helpful. Will this build ever come to fruition ?

Stay tuned.