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Tokyo Marui Sig Sauer P226 Review


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On Saturday 30/04/05 at approximately 10:30 hours, I took delivery of my brand spanking TM P226. Like a child at christmas, I busy myself with ripping it open in a frenzy to get at the goodies inside.

 

I have no piccies (need batteries for camera), so I will jump into the details people want, and try to describe them.

 

The finish on the gun is very nice and clean, though there is a seam line along the base of the gun. This is not repeated up top. It is only noticeable if looking at the underside of the gun at point-blank range...and let's face it, if you skirmish, most people will be staring down the barrel at distance and not at close quarters. They ain’t gonna notice.

 

The sights are metal but non-adjustable, though they seem to be pre-aligned quite well. Removal and replacement may be awkward because there are no clips on the inside of the slide to release them. I haven’t attempted to remove them (don’t want to break it), so I have no idea how they come off or how easily. Also, they are marked with white dots for night-sighting, and well marked at that. They are clear even in very low-light conditions, but they are not glow-in-the-dark. May not be too clear in night engagements.

 

The mag is all metal, including baseplate, with a recessed gas refill port in the base. The port has a rubber ring around it’s outer edge to ensure a good seal, but can make refilling a little tricky. You have to make sure and screw the gas can’s nozzle into the port before pushing it down to fill. If you don’t ensure it is seated properly, none of the gas goes into the mag. Just something to remember.

 

The grips are nicely stippled but, because of the material, they can be prone to some slippage with sweaty hands and don't feel entirely comfortable. Gloves will, of course, negate this...but with bare hands, they are not great. Their size is actually rather surprising. The P226 uses a double-stacked mag and that means that SOMEthing must be wider than average, but you do not have to be King Kong to get your hand around this gun. I am a pretty average size (in the hands department ;)) and I can get an easy grip with room to spare, so those with smaller and larger hands shouldn't have any difficulty. However, I would recommend a replacement of the grips as soon as something that appeals to you appears on the market. The stock ones aren't good enough.

 

A few more pertinent points about it's construction and then onto the fun stuff;

 

Firstly, the decocker works. From a fully cocked hammer position, the decocking switch drops the hammer to half-cock with a full long pull required to fire.

 

Secondly, the real steel Sig doesn't have a manual safety. The Tokyo Marui had to have one and it does. However...not wishing to add anything extra or to alter the operation of the existing switches, TM have stashed it rather cleverly. The slide release is on the left hand side of the unit, this you know. But directly opposite it is a flush-mounted circular section. Pushing this in engages the manual safety and pops out the slide release lever. This stops you from dismantling the unit (and indeed firing it) until the slide release lever is pushed back into place.

 

Now…is the gun plasticky? Yes, this is unfortunately true. It looks and feels it, especially on the grips (read above) and the ejection port cover. The slide does not seem thick enough or strong enough to withstand any punishment at all, and there is a bit of wiggle between slide and guide rails. But make no mistake...this is high-end ABS. VERY tough stuff. It handles the hard-kick blowback with ease, though the first few times you fire it...you will be expecting the slide in your eye or for it to shatter into a million pieces, despite the famous Tokyo Marui build quality.

 

Although it has this plasticity to contend with, there is no audible - and horrible - 'clacking' noise from the slide's action simply because the crack of the muzzle report is so powerful you do not notice the slide at all. It has a VERY satisfying kick and bang - at least in indoor conditions.

 

Next we have the cool-down factor. This is a factor that can reduce the efficiency - and even lock up the firing mechanism of a gas blowback gun completely until it literally thaws out, so is this gun affected, and by how much? There is a definite cool-down, especially under rapid-fire conditions. This is to be expected, but it doesn't hamper the gun one bit. There is no obvious leakage of gas or significant drop in power while rapid firing, though I have no facilities to measure this except what I can see and feel. Also, so far, all this has taken place at indoor room temperature. Outside in colder temperatures, this may be a different story. However, because this is a predominantly plastic sidearm, there is not as much cool-down as you would get from a metal-bodied model. It will be interesting to see how much of a factor this becomes after a conversion to metal parts.

 

I am running this on Abbey Predator Ultra Gas and not the weaker 134a. There appears to be no problems here, but I do not think I would recommend green gas without an overhaul. By the way, one thing worth mentioning while talking of upgrading parts…the slide guides are in fact plastic on this gun. A metal slide would not be of any great benefit without also changing the lower body.

 

Nah-ha! The bit where you shoot things. Ignoring all that above, how does this gun actually perform?

 

I do not have any way to accurately chrono the P226, so I have adopted the Coke can method of gauging the power, as per Redwolf Airsoft’s guidelines (see http://www.redwolfairsoft.com/redwolf/airs...il?bulletID=34). I ran the test after allowing the filled mag to come up to near-body temperature because when you are out skirmishing, the odds are the mag will be warmed as you sweat and pelt around. You see, I am trying to estimate performance based on actual skirmish use (which most people will be primarily interested in). As I said at the beginning, my cam needs batteries so no pics for you…but here is how it did (drum roll, please). It does not penetrate into the can, but it does come VERY close. It will make a huge dent and large tear in the can, but doesn’t actually punch through. With this in mind – and going by Redwolf’s guide – I estimate 270 to 280fps. And remember, that is running off Abbey Ultra, and not 134a. With metal parts and green gas, you will be looking at perhaps 300fps. Not bad, but nothing exceptional.

 

One area we SHOULD see better than the norm, is in the accuracy. Tokyo Marui explicitly specify (on their site and on the box itself) “hi-grouping”. It has an adjustable hop – accessible by removing the slide – and the manual states 0.20 or 0.25 gram BB’s. For the accuracy tests, I used a mag of the 0.20g BB’s that come with the gun, and have not adjusted the hop-up. The results were – again – good but not great. At 5 metres, firing all 25 rounds at around 1 round per second, all shots landed inside a 2-inch circle. At 8 metres, the same number of shots at around the same speed achieved a grouping of approx. 2.5 inches. The last test I performed was a rapid fire trial. Capping off all 25 rounds again – still at 8 metres or so – but this time inside about 12 seconds. All 25 fired no problem and landed inside 4 inches. That is all WELL inside head size, so you are looking at 25 headshots in rapid succession. One important thing to remember (and it has to do with the gas again) is that the Abbey Ultra has added lubricant. This, I am told, is apt to screw around with the hop-up a bit so that may have been a factor. With plain old gas there may be better results, but I cannot test that at the moment.

 

Am I happy with it...you bet your *albatross* I am. One thing to bear in mind, folks, is that I know the thoery of Airsoft and it's technicalities but this is my first purchase of one. I have nothing to really compare it to except what I have heard reported by manufacturers/suppliers/owners. This is purely my personal opinion...and that opinion is, this is sweet, but it will need SOME work done to make it great.

 

Sorry this runs so long...just tried to cover everything. If I missed anything out, just ask andI will try and answer it.

Edited by Tigerlight
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Good review, and welcome to the forum!

 

Couple minor things need you to clarify:

 

First

the real steel Sig doesn't have a manual safety. The Tokyo Marui had to have one and it does. However...not wishing to add anything extra or to alter the operation of the existing switches, TM have stashed it rather cleverly. The slide release is on the left hand side of the unit, this you know. But directly opposite it is a flush-mounted circular section.

you really mean the take down lever, not the slide release, don't you? The slide release is the lever you push down to return the slide to normal position when the slide is locked back.

 

Second

the slide guides are in fact plastic on this gun

You sure about that? Mine feels like metal (albeit pot metal), and some other people have confirmed it's metal.

 

One last thing, there's a reader's review section (http://www.arniesairsoft.co.uk/forums/index.php?showforum=40 ), and this might be more suited there, and so a mod will probably move this there.

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Update, folks. After disassembling this right down to it's roots, I noticed that there are some very small screws holding the rear sights in place and a spring clip securing the front sights. They are - in fact - removable and replacable with ease, just didn't notice earlier.

Edited by Tigerlight
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Yet another update, if you can stand it, lol. May as well tell youa bout it since I had to do it to tell you about the sight releases anyway.

 

Disassembly and reassembly are a doddle. Removal of the slide does not involve locking it back before pushing the release catch button and rotating the catch in order to pull the slide forward and lift from the frame. With this, from the normal forward slide position, we simply rotate the slide release 90 degrees clockwise to unlock the slide, then pull it forward to free it. Easy-peasy.

 

Inside the slide the parts are held together by a sort of tension-mount system. The force of the recoil spring pushing back on the hop-up unit, and the hop pushing back on the valve assembly - along with a few well placed pins securing them - keeps everything firmly in place. Push the hop end of the recoil spring guide toward the front of the slide until the pin releases, and just lift it out. After that, pull the hop (with almost no force) away from the valve assembly at the rear to release and lift out the hop itself which takes the outer and inner barrels with it. The outer barrel is held on by only a small zig-zag clip that is still a fair push to release and is therefore quite secure when in place.

 

Everything is just clip together...but NOT insecure at all. With the recoil spring pushing back on them, the parts are all well in there. It makes field strips a breeze. I see no reason why - with practice - ALL the slide internals could be replaced in no more than 5 minutes. Why you would ever do this, I do not know...but it is pretty cool that you can. :)

 

Again, I rattle on in the search for accuracy, lol. If I have mis-termed anything, be sure and let me know Shao. ;)

Edited by Tigerlight
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Haha, you are still calling the take down lever the slide release. :lol:

 

Here, the lever circled in red is called the take down lever; and the lever circled in blue is the slide release. :D

sigs1levers.jpg

 

Actually, I'm not so sure of the terminology myself since on USP or 1911s, the take down lever and the slide release is the same. :P I supposed you can call the lever circled in red the slide release, and the lever circled in blue the slide catch. :lol:

Edited by Shao14
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  • 4 months later...
  • 1 month later...

One thing the initial reviewer failed to mention is the trigger pull of this pistol. Having owned a real P-226 in the past, and being accustomed mostly to Western Arms 1911 airsoft pistols, I found the trigger of the TM pistol totally unacceptable.

 

It's not the pull weight that bothers me, this is relatively OK, but there is no way of telling how far is the trigger from releasing the sear. A long mushy pull, either in double-action or single action. The trigger is definitely not helping in accurate shooting, however, it should be OK for skirmishing.

 

One more thing, in the real P-226, the take-down lever cannot be rotated, unless the slide is pulled fully to the rear. So this is a step away from the real thing. Finally, another step away, is the "half-cock notch" that the TM pistol has. I do not remember the real P-226 to have such a notch, and I can't understand why TM has included it in this pistol.

 

However, I have to agree with the initial poster, the pistol is not bad for showing and skirmishing. The aesthetics are quite good, even though mine came butchered, with parts of the "Sig Sauer" inscriptions being melted with a soldering iron, in order to bypass Sigarms patents in US. Still the pistol accurately mimics the real gun, and should be a respectable sidearm for those who play Airsoft.

 

Rgds

Edited by M1911
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