STAR G36 Review - английский

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STAR G36 Review - английский

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STAR G36 Review
By: StrikERZG36 / http://airsoft-barracks.com
Разместил у нас так как в оригинале полетели картинки и пришлось править статью

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After reading around many airsoft forums, I have come to the conclusion that 90% of the airsofters who talk about the STAR G36 don’t know what they are talking about. This isn’t meant as an insult-it is just a note on how little is really known about the STAR G36. There has only been one review that covered the basics of the gun, and splotches of information here and there on the Internet. I hope this review can help dispel some of the myths and mystery surrounding the STAR G36 series.

First, a quick overview of the real H&K G36 family:

G36
-Standard Bundeshwehr assault rifle. This model sports the standard length barrel (18.9 inches), along with the standard hand guard which is distinguishable by examining the number of vents on each side of the hand guard. The standard model sports six vents on both its right and left sides. These models also have the integrated dual-optic scope in the carry handle, with a three-power magnification scope on the bottom and red dot reflex scope unit on top. A bipod on the hand guard is something that is not always present on the standard G36 models. The MG36 bears a strong resemblance to the standard G36. Most MG36 configurations are the same as the standard G36 with the add-on of a heavier barrel for sustained firing and a Beta Co. C-mag. The only current airsoft manufacturer of the standard G36 model is STAR, which also provides conversion kits that are nowadays somewhat hard to find in stock at retailers (and are also quite expensive).

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G36E or V
-Export version. This G36 model is quite similar to the standard G36 model except for the lack of the integrated red-dot on the carry handle as well as the removal of the bipod on the hand guard. Classic Army makes the airsoft version of this G36E.

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G36K
-As all G36 models are based off of the same receiver, the main difference of this G36K from the standard G36 model is the shorter hand guard and barrel (12.5 inches). The hand guard has four vents on either side, as opposed to the regular six on the standard G36 and G36E. The barrel is also shortened to a carbine length, as the K in G36K means “Kurz”, or short. This model still has the integrated red-dot scope carry handle. STAR probably makes the closest replica of this model. However, STAR chose to mount a rail on the carry handle instead of the integrated red dot sight.

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G36KE or KV
-As the export version of the G36K, this variant lacks the red-dot on top of the carry handle, like the G36E. Everything else is essentially the same. Classic Army makes this variant, with yet another variation in the hand guard due to the mounting points for RIS rails.

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*This is a picture of the Classic Army model. Note the special hand guard.

G36C
-The smallest G36 model, this is the Compact version, hence the “C”. This version is distinguishable with its shortened stock (with diagonal cut rib in the back to clear space for ejecting brass), top integrated rail/carry handle, and shortened hand guard and barrel (9 inch barrel). The carry handle sports a full length rail that is bordered with the iron sights, and allows for the mounting of most optics and accessories compatible with a 20mm rail system. The hand guard is shortened to the point that it only has two vent holes on either side. The hand guard supports mounting points for rails.

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Those are the most common and standard G36 models. Due to its modularity however, it is not hard to find a G36 that has a combination of different parts from different models.


Ordering:
The first thing to note about my particular STAR G36 sample is that I purchased it used from another airsofter. He claimed that the STAR was never used except for backyard plinking, and after inspecting the gun, I concluded that there was no external or internal damage and that the gun was bone stock from the factory.

I came home from school one day to discover a large, cardboard box standing straight up on my door mat. Needless to say I rushed over and confirmed that my last airsoft acquisition had arrived. The seller shipped the STAR G36 in its original packaging. The silver sticker with a outline of the STAR G36 as well as a big “AEG-09” written in black Sharpie on the side were the only distinguishing marks on the box that indicated the AEG which lay inside.

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I wonder if the UPS guy noticed the gun outline in the sticker…

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Opening the box:
I was quite excited, but had enough sense left in me to grab the camera and snap a couple pictures as I opened the box. After slitting the tape holding the two halves together, I lifted up the top cover to be greeted with…foam-A nice, long, solid wedge of dense foam. Wonderful!

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I lifted that foam cover up and saw the best-looking airsoft G36 I ever laid eyes upon. There she was, sitting inside a foam cutout (made of the same foam), unscathed from whatever rough handling shipping may have occurred during her long journey from Illinois to Washington. I have had previous woes with shipping G36s due to their somewhat fragile hand guards and stocks when greeted with excessive force. The STAR packaging doesn’t allow any rough handling to upset the gun.

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The entire package included:

-STAR G36 AEG
-Loading tube and ramrod
-Standard-Midcap magazine

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There was a sticker on the foam surrounding the gun that tells new owners where to get their catalogue, and I assume instructions manual.
http://starairsoft.com/catalogue

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Of course, that link doesn’t work. If you need to find the instructions manual for the STAR G36 or any other gun from that series, just go to http://starairsoft.com and find the G36 AEG series. Then click on your G36’s model and you should find a line in the description of the gun that has links to the pages to the manual.

First Impressions:
Weight was the first thing I noticed about the STAR G36. I was surprised by how light the gun was. In fact, a fully loaded STAR G36 w/ magazine and battery is about 7.5 lb. That's just about one pound lighter than the real G36.

The external quality of the STAR is unmatched by any other G36 in AEG form. The only manufacturer which is coming up on the STAR’s external plastic quality is SRC. The CA36 series has a pretty external plastic, but it is rather soft and flexible-Too soft and flexible. The STAR has a wonderful looking, pebble-textured external plastic that has a nice balance between being rigid and soft.

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My G36 sample came with full HK trademarks. I suppose it was one that slipped through customs.

Moving from the front to the back of the gun, we have:

Flash hider:
High quality, machined steel flash hider. Painted flat black, it’s a pretty flash hider.

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Outer Barrel and Bayonet lug:
High quality steel outer barrel and bayonet lug. The entire front barrel assembly weighs much more than the aluminum barrels used by SRC and CA.

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Hand guard:
The quality of the plastic on the gun is quite uniform, so I won’t go into that much since I have already described it. The bipod folds smoothly and clicks into either the unfolded or folded positions. When folding the bipod back onto the hand guard, the operator must be sure to press the little tab on each leg before folding in the bipod. One feature about the STAR that I don’t necessarily like (but which is much better for airsoft) is that there is a reinforcing plate in the front part of the hand guard that the barrel pokes through. This plate is good for keeping the barrel stable (especially with the heavy steel barrel for the STAR). The only real complaint I have with the hand guard plate is that it makes the gun lose its “free float” barrel. I suppose that under some fair pressure from the sides, the hand guard could flex enough to flex the barrel in some direction, therefore making the gun shoot crooked. With the precision used in putting the STAR together however, I doubt that such a scenario is likely to happen. (I got this idea from reading about the CA36 series which has a softer plastic-therefore the hand guard flexes easier and can bring the barrel out of alignment).

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Upper Receiver:
The upper receiver for the STAR G36 is another high quality part by STAR. As a clone of the TM design, the STAR has the metal backbone that gives the gun it’s strength. The charging handle is part metal and part plastic. The actual swiveling paddle part is made out of the high strength plastic used for the rest of the gun’s plastic parts. It is connected via a metal pin to a metal bolt carrier, which is likewise attached to the faux dust cover. Pulling the charging handle back will give the operator access to the hop-up adjustment dial. Turning the dial up gives more hop-up, and turning it down lowers the hop-up effect. The dial’s movement is quite solid. It takes a bit of force to get if moving. Do be careful though-it is still plastic…

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Here are some shots of the trademarks:

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Magazine Well:
The magazine well is made of the same high quality plastic as the rest of the gun. There is not anything really special about the magazine well. I will do a magazine test later however to test for magazine compatibility.

Lower receiver:
The lower receiver is made of the same great plastic. The motor base plate does not sport any manufacturing trademarks. In fact, the entire gun does not have any trademarks that hint towards this gun being a STAR product. The only manufacturer trademarks are those of H&K. The fire select pictograms are painted on. White for the safety pictogram, and red for the semi and full automatic firing modes.

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The paint/ink seems to have bled out a little bit for the safe pictogram, but it’s not very noticeable. The full auto pictogram is, however missing a bullet! Comparing this to other G36 AEG brands (and real G36 photographs), the STAR only has four bullets, while other brands have five! Again, that isn’t something that is very noticeable. The faux bolt release is plastic and can be pushed up just for fun.

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Here is a shot of the internal selector switch parts. They are essentially identical to the TM version:

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Stock:
The stock uses the normal TM design of the stock button and internal latch. It is solid and doesn’t look like it will break with any hard use. There were some funny molding circles on the stock…I will check to see if they are present on the real G36.

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The stock folded:

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The rubber buttpad-the buttpad is a thick slab of nice-feeling rubber. It is molded into the correct shape for the G36, unlike the more rounded pad that CA uses on all their G36 guns.

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The locking mechanism:

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Carry handle:
Aye, the coolest feature about the STAR G36! The dual-optic carry handle! There is a red-dot sight on top, and a 4x magnification scope on the bottom:

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The 4 power scope in the bottom portion of the carry handle is a good piece of kit-except for the eye relief. If people complain about the CA36 series integrated scope (which is actually quite good), then they can cry about the STAR integrated scope. One’s eye needs to be ¼ to ½ of an inch away from the objective lens in order to get a clear, full image. Once in the proper position, the scope gives a wonderful, clear view. The reticule design is a fair copy of the real H&K reticule design. (CA is a bit closer in terms of realism).

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The red dot on top of the carry handle is one of the distinguishing features of the STAR G36. It is housed in the same high quality plastic the rest of the gun is made of, and is securely attached to the carry handle. I can pick up the gun by the red-dot unit.

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I was surprised to discover that the sun shade for the red dot is actually made of rubber!

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The on/off switch is on the right side of the red-dot in the form of a rotating switch. Rotating the switch up turns the red-dot sight on and turning it down turns the red-dot sight off.


To the left of the red-dot is the battery compartment.

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The cap for the compartment must be rotated out of alignment with some locking lugs. Then the spring tension in the battery compartment pushes the cap and battery holder out of the sight housing. BE CAREFUL. The batteries are spring loaded, and the plastic that keeps them together is fairly thin. It appears quite easy to snap this housing in half.

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Also be aware that jarring the gun may dislodge the battery cap.

STAR gets more points for adding a replica of the red-dot sight daytime use unit. A sliding "door" is on top of the red-dot sight.

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Pushing this door forward on the real G36 will allow ambient light to power/illuminate the red dot so one does not need to use the batteries (Tritium, which is used in illuminating many sights, is illegal in Germany, so the designers of the G36 had to resort to a battery-powered red-dot sight). Unfortunately, the STAR does not replicate the ambient-light usage feature, so the sliding door and clear plastic is purely cosmetic.

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Both the red-dot sight and the 4x magnification sight are adjusted via four holes. Two for the red-dot sight and two for the scope.

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A 2.5mm Allen wrench fits the adjustment screws. Note that adjusting the windage and elevation is just the matter of turning the screws. For the side screws, screwing in a clockwise direction shifts the point of aim to the left. For the top screws, screwing in the clockwise direction shifts the point of aim downwards. There are no "clicky" adjustments.

I do wish that the red-dot had a brightness adjustment. Its effectiveness in the dark is somewhat limited because it is so bright. During the day it works great and has minimal glare, but it really lights up when one is in a darker environment. Likewise, the 4x scope doesn't have the best light-gathering capabilities due to its size. At dusk and dawn it gets quite hard to see the reticule. At night it is very very difficult to see through the scope.

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Internals:

The take-down of the STAR G36 is quite simple. STAR excels once again by replicating the H&K cross-pin system. There are three main body pins.
One behind the selector switches:

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The magazine well pin:

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And the hand guard pin:

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If one wants to get to the gearbox, I recommend starting with removing the rear pin. Then remove the magazine well pin. (There are holes in the stock to place the pins in when they are removed from the gun so the operator doesn't lose them.)

With the two pins removed, swivel out and remove the magazine well. The operator might have to press the magazine release to give clearance for the magazine well. With that done, push the hop-up unit towards the front of the gun while simultaneously rotating out the lower receiver. If one wants to access the hop-up unit and inner barrel, one has two choices. Either:
A) Remove the lower receiver and fold the stock. Then push the hop-up unit towards the front of the gun and rotate it 90 degrees counter-clockwise. The hop-up unit should then spring out of the faux gas block/barrel assembly. One can then pull it through the back of the gun.
B) *My preferred method. It puts less stress on the hop-up unit. Remove the outer barrel and hand guard. One should see three screws. Unscrew these screws and the entire barrel assembly should slide out. Do not try to force it out the front. A little wiggling might be required to pull the assembly out along the path of least resistance.

Gearbox:

The STAR G36 uses a decent set of internals. The gun uses a METAL, VERSION 3 gearbox. While it is metal, it looks on the pot-metal side-not the highest quality gearbox in the world, but it should be fine. Take-down is basically the same as any other G36 airsoft variant.

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One interesting feature is a rectangular hole and stud on the left side of the gearbox that has direct access to the anti-reversal latch. One can therefore release the spring tension without opening the gearbox or taking off the motor cage.

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STAR was also nice enough to shrink wrap their wires next to the motor so that the wires don't get snagged when removing and replacing the gearbox.

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Some more interesting features of the STAR G36 gearbox:
Quick spring change feature:
Basically the spring guide can be pushed in, rotated, and pulled out the back of the gearbox. There are some recesses in the gearbox that lock it in place under normal spring tension, but the operator can use an Allen wrench to push the spring guide in and rotate it out.

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The Allen wrench size is large, 6mm for me. This Allen wrench didn’t fit too well into the hole, but it got a grip and did the job.
Trigger assembly:
No more burned trigger contacts here! The STAR G36 uses a “micro-switch” for its trigger assembly. This is similar to the CA and A&K SAWs. Instead of completing the circuit with a metal block that is pushed into two prongs by the trigger, the internal trigger block just hits the switch. I don’t know if this gives the gun a better trigger response time, but on a 9.6 it is quite snappy. When the battery is disconnected, one can also get a satisfying “click” sound when pulling the trigger. Kind of like a sear instead of the long boring pull of other AEGs.

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With the different trigger switch comes a different selector switch. It's real purpose is mostly just to push up the semi-auto cutoff latch when in full automatic mode.

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Here are the STAR’s guts in all their glory. Yes, you do indeed see XYT gears. They are made of steel and appear to be high quality gears.

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Even better, the gun comes stock with nicely machined 7mm metal bushings, with the two bushings for the bevel gear being bearing bushings!

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The gears were well shimmed and spun smoothly. The grease was a little excessive but did its job well.

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The piston is a clear plastic that feels quite durable. The piston head is made of the same plastic and is not ported. The cylinder is brass (and kind of dirty), and the cylinder head is plastic with a brass nozzle. There was some air leaking from around the cylinder head during my compression test, so I fixed that up with some Teflon/thread tape.

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Performance:
The STAR G36 got its performance test. Before any technicalities, I just have to say that it was pretty decent and “standard” in its performance. It sounded very smooth and quiet as well. The STAR series of guns are older than the new ACM clones coming out of China. Back then there weren’t many manufacturers that churned out 400+ fps AEGs…
I performed the accuracy tests in a pretty calm, outdoor shooting environment. The target, a 6x5.5 inch sticky target, was standing on a stool about eighty feet away. I was firing from the prone, bipod-supported position. I had zeroed the gun, cleaned the barrel, and adjusted the hop-up prior to the test. 0.20g BBs were used for the test. All shots were carefully aimed with proper breathing techniques.
Ten shots of semi-automatic fire gave ten shots that “hit” the target. Nine BBs actually stuck to the target, while the other BB bounced off the plastic border of the sticky gel.

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The groupings opened up a little more on fully automatic mode. About half of the BBs fired hit the target. They bounced around the plastic border or just flew by.
While most shots hit the target in the test, I had a fun time adjusting the hop-up and zeroing in the scope. The hop-up adjustment was a little annoying because the adjustment dial was rather stiff. After I got the dial moving, it seemed like the hop-up had no effect until the very last turns of the dial. Then I achieved orbital trajectory. I had to nudge the hop-up dial “just right” to achieve a relatively flat BB flight path. When I had the hop-up set, I found that the scope wasn’t too adjustable. The hop-up was set well enough that the BBs were hitting right around the crosshairs, so I did not have any problems. However, if your gun is shooting too much to the sides or up and down, then you might have to get inside and work the hop-up a bit. The scope doesn’t adjust far enough to the edges.

After getting into the hop-up (just because I could), I found that the STAR rubber was very, very soft. Turning the dial didn’t have much effect until nearing the maximum hop-up setting. I would definitely recommend a new rubber bucking.

I wouldn’t doubt however that the gun would hold just fine in a skirmish. I am confident that this gun can achieve torso shots from 100-120 feet away.

A Coke-Can-Chronograph test shows that this gun is shooting just as advertised, at around 300-340 fps. The .20g bb penetrated one side and dented and cracked the other side of the can.

Overall, I was extremely satisfied with my purchase.
The STAR G36 is a beautiful rifle out of the box. The plastic is unmatched in its quality and realism. The G36 configuration that STAR offers the G36 in is so far still unique with the red-dot sight.
The internals are quite good. Some might expect a little better from a rather expensive gun. I definitely would have liked the gearbox shell to be made of some better metal. I do believe that STAR's nifty little innovations like the quick spring change feature, AR latch hole, and special trigger switch more than make up for the more "decent" internal quality. Stock, the gun should still hold its own out on the field (not that I'm ever going to take mine out and risk scratching up the gun).
For a die-hard collector, the STAR G36 series is the right way to go. For a person who wants balance between a skirmish rifle and an impressive wall decoration, the STAR is the way to go. For someone looking for a high performance rifle, the STAR series is brought to about equal terms with CA and SRC.

I however love my STAR G36. This isn't ever going to leave me.
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