Right off the bat I'm going to come out an apologize for the lack of pics with this review. I recently purchased one of the low priced lancer tactical cqbr's for a buddy as a birthday present. This will be his first AEG, so Welcome to airsoft Sam.
Anyway, before I handed it off I went through the internals. I'm really pretty impressed with these for the price. externally there's nothing special. It's solid plastic, buffer tube, outer barrel, all of it. I was surprised thought that it does have a full length gas tube. I lot of sportline models don't. This is a nice bonus because the bull length tube helps to stabilize the delta ring. With a rail and a vertical grip you have a lot of leverage on the delta ring to loosen it up.
The only piece externally that was disappointing is the rear sight and the vertical grip. With the rails on it, you won't have any trouble mounting aftermarket grips and optics though.
internally this AEG is pretty much on par with any other sportline out there. I'd say it's just as good as any classic army sportline or stock JG. The spring guide is a ball bearing one, but mostly plastic. the bearings seemed a bit iffy, but it'll take any standard 7mm bearing. The mechbox itself is WAY ahead of a classic army sportline costing twice as much. Some shimming and AOE adjustment and it seems pretty good to go. The only other issue I had is the motor. Lancer Tactical uses the same motors as some of the JG guns. unlike most airsoft guns though the pinion has a set screw on it. this one was missing the little set screw so nothing was holding the pinion on. quick trip to the hardware store will solve that for about 75 cents. I just replaced the motor with one out of my parts box.
anyway, the really amazing thing about this is the weight. These things are super light weight. I mean, this gun probably weighs in at half of what my custom m4 does in cqbr mode.
1 additional minor grip. the mag release is plastic and seemed a bit less than solid with some mags. I just replaced it with another mag release out of my parts box and that really helped it out a lot.
bottom line, even with over $1k invested in a custom m4, i'm still considering one of these. the full plastic will take krylon camo paint well and with the reduced weight i think one of these would make and awesome backup and lower fps cqb gun.
