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MARUSHIN |
DolphiN#1’s
M1 Carbine review
| Meh-Lindi’s M1 Carbine Review | Images page
An M1 carbine – in fact
Meh-Lindi’s M1 Carbine – a fine beasty of an AirSoft gun. Or to give
its full and illustrious title: The Marushin Gas Type Super Sonic Barrel
U.S. M1 Carbine “MAXI”. S’what it says on the box – no really.
The important bits in
the box are: An M1 carbine, A magazine, and a wee allen key – which is for
adjusting the hop up.
So
why the M1? So I was happily pootling along, with my AEG
in one hand, pistol in the other, and dragging a 90kg sled loaded down entirely
with batteries and bags of ammo behind me, and was thinking surely there’s
a better way?
Actually I was looking
around the web, and thinking about one too many films with romanticised
images of snipers in them…
No. Sorry. I must admit
the truth. Actually I was just chatting with my work colleague who sits
alongside, and we were discussing finer aspects of the Airsoft pastime,
and we agreed that it would be marvelous to have a sniper rifle of some
description, that we could share between us when we played.
Browsed internet – found
lots of info about APS’, and what you needed to do to upgrade them. Saw
a few second hand on the forums – usually the OR versions which I didn’t
think would even remotely fit in the car. Usually expensive. (which is why
I didn’t even mention M40’s M24’s etc)
Then remembered my first
‘real’ skirmish, and how in a couple of games, I was tagging along behind
a chap using entirely WW2 US equipment – including olive fatigues, sometimes
an M1A1 thomson, and sometimes an M1 carbine – and how he was picking people
off in a bridge assault.
And lo and behold, an
advert for an M1 on the forums popped into view. Being rediculously impulsive,
I put an offer in immediately.
The
Feel When you first pick up the M1 carbine – you immediately
notice how light it is, and how nice the wood feels. Despite the full wooden
stock, it seems almost haf the weight of an average AEG.
Putting the magazine
in does bring some weight to it as, since it’s a gas powered gun, the magazine
is a gas reservoir and heavy – much like any GBB magazine.
But still, you start
to feel that you can hold this up to your shoulder for quite a while without
tiring, and taking standing shots with this is very possible, since you
don’t have to strain to keep it up – it’s not at all like holding an air-rifle
for instance.
It’s a very short gun,
and you can reach the end of the barrel with your fingers whilst holding
it in position in your shoulder.
Where
is everything? In a right handed hold,
your left hand naturally wraps around the foreward part of the stock, and
slots into a grooved slide cocking lever. You can either use this to cock
it, or the more normal ‘bolt’ style lever nearer the action.
Left
handed, you can only easily use the bolt to cock it. |
The
safety is on the right hand side of the trigger guard, which is a small rotary affair, “down” is safe, “back” is live. |
The
magazine release is the push button in front of the safety |
Sight There So here you can In theory, where To do this you You Unfortunately, Ok, so forget So the long silver
Thus you get a
However the best The scope mount |
Now about that
stock…
I find that the scope actually mounts a little far back for me to easily
use it without craning my neck backwards.
So I also invested in
the extended butt stock plate – which is the thin black rubber at the end
of the butt, but thicker – about 20mm thick instead of 5mm.
With the extended butt
plate, and with the mag pouch slipped on the butt, it gives me an extra
25mm of eye relief – which is about right for my combination of scope, shoulder
and eye!
Magazines You can get “(real) I The M1’s magazines Power On green gas you |
What about an
original sling?
I do have a real M1 sling – there is a little Oil bottle you can get – i
mean quite tiny little thing.
The way it works is
you put the sling through the hole – put the oil bottle through the loop
in the sling, and then pull it back through – the oil bottle wedges into
it’s little slot – holding the sling in place inside the butt stock – and
it should all stay there. The front just clips on fairly normally.
I don’t have the oil
bottle though, and couldn’t be bothered to knock up the right shaped bar
– so I just ran a normal shoulder strap all the way around the butt plate
and through one of those “slide though grips”, and then at the
front end, put a snap lock (like you get on all modern rucksacks and things)
and sewed the strap back through the front sling point around the other
side of the snap lock. This gives me and adjustable length, with an extra
length I can click in or out, not quite a 3 point sling but good enough
for me.
I further converted
one of my 2 magazine pouches, so that it slips over the end of the butt
(along the length, rather then across it, which is how the pouch was originally
designed) and then tightens around the stock – the sling is then trapped
under the pouch and can’t slip.
To
recap then: So to recap – how did I end up with this combo?
-
The
M1 Carbine itself was second hand from the forums (http://forums.kechara.net),
and provided me with no less than 5 extra magazines. -
-
Scope
mount ‘widget’: off of some block who I don’t know, what wandered up to
me one day at a skirmish. -
Scope
: recommend: 3-9×40 – Mine’s a Zieler bought 10 years ago when I was Air
rifling. Would also recommend a compact scope, e.g. I have a 1.5-5×20
which looks excellent on it, as it is small – like the gun.
Conclusion So this makes In the summer Upgrade 4/5 is for externals, Would I
by Jason |
External
Links:
History
of the M1 Carbine – from David L. Velleux’s World
Numrich
Gun Parts Corp – A handy source for original M1 parts
Comment
about this review in the forums
Last modified:
Wednesday, May 9, 2001 9:37 AM copyright 2001 ArniesAirsoft