Does anybody practice with airsoft handguns? I just ordered a 1911 blowback gas gun that is supposed to deliver 13 shots at 350 fps. I haven't got the gun yet but it should be here in a few days. From what I can tell in the description, it functions like a real 1911. The weight is supposed to be about the same too.
Yep, I asked about these a while back 'cause it sounded like they would make good indoor practice. So I played it safe and bought my nephew one, and of course I got to play with it for a while. And I'm impressed! Except for the obvious things you can't recreate (flash,noise,lots of recoil), it makes for great instinctive shooting practice. I let my nephew shoot me in the back to see how hard it hits and boy am I sorry I did that! I think I've still got a mark!
I have a full auto MP5 soft air. It is fun to shoot. It's pretty accurate out to about 30 yards. I also had a friend that wanted me to shoot him from from about 15 feet. It left a weal for almost a day. It came with a blow back 92FS, but I sold it when I got it, wish now that I hadn't.
My kid does..I`d rather shoot my real pistols.I handload all my stuff so it doesn`t cost me a fortune to shoot plinker ammo.
I prefer my real guns too, but the ability to practice in the house and $5 for 3 thousand reuseable rounds is hard to beat.
Too much fun! We have pistols, shotgun (easily broken - so either be really careful or spend your money on something else) and a couple of auto's. The handguns have a much longer range than the long guns. I couldn't imagine asking to be shot in the back. Ouch!
My little brother bought us all MP5's a couple of years ago, full auto fun. We had some epic battles. This past year we bought some full auto AR's to play with, but they were really unreliable and we took them back.
My MP5 is the high dollar steel one that is electric driven. The weight is close to the real gun Matter of fact, if I didn't know better, I wouls say they used a real MP5 body.
My son has quite a collection, and regularly smokes the other kids with his M4 version. When he first got the 92 pistols, we did a quick draw test. He hit me in the neck a fraction of a second after I hit him in the body. Stung like a wasp! After that, I insisted on all parties wearing goggles. jim
I've played airsoft for a number of years now. I started back around 2002. I've gotten to do some cool things with them over that span of time. Around the St. Louis area we have various mil sim games with 30-40 people at times (a couple years back we even had one with 100+ people). I've done a little traveling too and went to this event at Ft. Knox called Operation: Irene for the last two years in a row (It was run in honor of the guys who died in Somalia). There were slots for only 300 and those that went got to have 2 days of missions at Zussman village (the MOUT city). It was pretty cool... trucks blowing up, burning tires, RPGs (didn't really explode, but the rocket flying through the air made for a cool effect), and riding in APCs. Hmm... so yeah, airsoft can be cool at times, lol. The only thing I have to say is if you buy cheap, you'll buy twice. Most of the more expensive electric guns operate about the same, so just get the model you like. Well... actually I should say that the AK's are known for having very strong internal components and are hard to break. I personally have an M4 from a company called Classic Army and it's been great. Comes stock with a metal body and slightly upgraded internals. It's as solid as a rock. The same cannot really be said about the Tokyo Marui brand M4.
I haven't done any of this, though back in the 80s I did play a lot of laser tag. The thing that I see is that the behavior of the 'guns' doesn't mimic the real deal so learning some things are quite useless. You can still use the safety aspect, like 'Point at something you want to shoot' and so forth. Also you can use this as a strategic training thing. You can have all the gear in the world, though without a good strategy, it is so much dead weight. I like my video games at times. I play a lot of Command & Conquer. It's an old game though I use it to test myself strategically. There are some things left wanting, though for the most part it's good IMO. Once was shot in the back by a pumped up pellet rifle. I didn't like that too much. Haha. Hurt like heck. I wouldn't want to repeat that with these things though. Another thing. When you are hit by one paintball, does the person stay 'dead' if it's a head shot or do they keep running around shooting other people? Question is, are most people teaching others that you can take a shot and stay alive?
The great thing about paintball and now the airsoft wars is that when you get hit, you can instantly evaluate what you did to get hit. I've been able to evaluate both my tactics and my camoflage techniques.
Tailor: There are no "universal" rules for airsoft or paintball, it depends on the field. I used to play paintball quite a bit, and there were some fields that didn't allow headshots or shooting an opponent closer than 10 yards away. I thought that was really stupid, I shot one of my opponent while rushing him from about 15 feet away and the ruling was he got to live and I died.... LAME! In general though, when your hit, your dead, and if your weapon is hit, it's considered dead, you have to go back to the staging area for "repair/replacement". Some places allow you to go back to an area and "respawn"(come back to life), so you can get back in the game and not have to sit out for what can be a long time. As far as getting shot..... I've been hit with bb's, tons of paintballs, and now an airsoft bb. I'd have to say that the airsoft hurts the least, then the paintballs. A heavy bdu shirt takes out most of the sting. The steel bb's are far worse than than the others. .
Good to hear about the rules. I was wondering if it was run like a video game. Too many kids get into this mentality that if you die, you magically come back. Then when they deal with real weapons and 'accidentally' shoot their buddy, they are all traumatized that he doesn't get back up again. Depends on the parents involvement and the IQ of the child I guess. I know you guys understand this concept, though some children are left to their own devices and ideas. I have never been shot by the airsoft or paintballs though that pellet hurt. I have been smacked by a high velocity waterballoon and that hurt less than the pellet though it was travelling very fast.
Heavily, I'd say. Big difference between kids now and back a while. I remember a carnival as a child that had live 22 pump rifles in a shooting gallery. The guy actually handed me a 22 rifle with 3 live rounds in it. I could't have been older than 3rd grade! Could you imagine doing that at a carnival these days OMG! (the bb Tommygun thread reminded me of this).
Do that now and you wind up in jail for child endangerment or abuse. 'Handing an assault rifle to a kid. What will they come up with next? Sheesh. Hope that horrible person sits in jail for a long time. Imagine trying to teach that poor child to be a killer. Torturing a child I tell ya.' That is what you would hear now I bet. Seems like it would have been a blast to have seen some of that stuff. Ah the glory of yesteryear and here we are living in an age when it is all but gone. Speaking of carnivals, remember any of the glass rock-n-roll pictures you could get for throwing darts? Plastic now. All plastic. A plastic film that is placed over a cardboard picture. I want my glass back. Though since they have done that, I now have a highly prized one that I cherish. 'The more things change, the more they get insane.' Okay, back to the good times. Haha.
Plastic Rock'n'Roll Mirrors? No way! Back in the day, I had a lady smash a Guns n Roses one over my head (I was fighting with her husband Ah, the days of gunpowder and glass shards at the carnival, now those were the days
Sad but true Blackjack. The one that I prize is an Ozzy mirror. That was the only real reason, besides the roller coasters, that I would even go to the fair. I wanted more mirrors. Now I guess I'll have to hunt them down on ebay. Life is a lot like Windows. The more you upgrade, you'll find that the good stuff got left behind and all you have now is imitation.
Long story short: We do have a problem with idiot kids coming to the Stl airsoft forums. Luckily the bigger games tend to draw people with a decent level of brains. Here are the general trends in the more organized airsoft events - If you are shot anywhere, you are out (Honor system of course. Sometimes there are medic rules) - Team and tactics oriented - No hi-caps or drum mags on assault rifles... (more so at milsims than at an open play game) - Have at least a set of od/woodland/desert BDUs. Chest rigs are pretty common also. Military boots are popular also, but I have started to see some high dollar hiking boots recently. The Pain Factor of an Airsoft BB: Not very high. Just make sure you wear some goggles since your eyes think differently than the rest of your body.