The term “LiPo ready” is another marketing ploy that brands like KWA and a few others used to throw around to get their AEGs sold. And it worked. Not only did it work, but it got KWA’s AEG division off the ground and made them a huge brand.

The truth is “lipo ready” simply means the gun is electric. A LiPo is a power source. Generally, there are two flavors for Airsoft: 7.4v (two cell) and 11.1v (three cell) and both come in many different sizes and amp hour ratings for Airsoft.

When this term was coined it was more relevant then than it is today. The LiPo of old was unstable and when knocked around could become a hand grenade in your hands. Or if it was charged wrong, or was too hot, or shorted or discharged completely, or if you just didn’t buy it pie on its birthday.  LiPo’s now have a small fusible link between cells or similar safety systems because waivers cost trees. Since LiPo manufactures took liability into account on their design, the Airsoft world switched over to this new power-source, albeit with many road bumps (I’m sure you have heard the stories). The first company that could claim the title would be popular in the AEG manufacturer realm. Thus, in walks the “LiPo ready AEG” and everyone had to have one.

What does it really mean?

In reality it means the Airsoft gun doesn’t suck. If it can’t handle a LiPo in stock form then it has problems anyway and is likely garbage. When Airsoft GI did their “LiPo ready your gun for 75$” marketing schtick, it meant they opened it and re shimmed it and checked your piston. So basically: “send me your gun and 75$ + shipping and I will give you a 20 minute shim job.” Everyone major retailer would do just that with a smile back then.

There are many AEGs that should not have LiPo’s. But most today can handle an 11.1v with no problems. All manufactures around today got here by:

(Not in any order)
1. Not sucking
2. Lots of fan boys
3. Customer service
4. Quality
5. Overall appearance and feel of said product
6. Product reputation via word of mouth
7. Final cost
8. Can I make it better than the other guy
9. Reliability

All these pretty much are relevant to making an AEG lipo ready and all the manufactures left in operation today have done so by doing this list or at least most of it – and through a form of Darwinism, the weak have gone out of existence and the strong get birthday pie.

So “LiPo ready?” really is a question of gearbox quality. From a JG G36 to a Systema PTW, they both have good enough internals for a LiPo. It’s just when they break – and they all do – the LiPo will get you there faster just because it is sending more rounds downrange in less time (if that makes sense.)

A decent manufacturer can go 100,000 rounds until failure. If you’re doing more rounds per second you are simply getting there faster.

One of the new (it’s been out a while, actually) battery options on the scene for airsoft is the LiFe battery, also known as LiFePO or LFP. LiFe stands for “Lithium Iron Phosphate.”

When LiFe batteries first hit the market, they were known for having low electrical conductivity – this unfortunately has followed the reputation of the LiFe battery around like a dead turkey tied around the neck. Better engineering and technological advances have overcome this shortfall, and as such, the LiFe batteries of yesterday share nothing of their modern day counterparts except in name alone.

LiFe batteries have a few notable advantages over LIPO’s:

1) Most batteries have a highly constant discharge voltage. Voltage stays close to 3.2v during discharge until the battery is fully exhausted. This allows the battery to deliver virtually full power until it is completely discharged. This can greatly simplify or virtually eliminate the need for voltage regulation circuits.

2) LiFe cells typically experience a slower rate of capacity loss than traditional LIPO batteries. What this ultimately means is a much longer shelf life. A typical LiFe cell will have a capacity loss of up to 10% over the course of a month, whereas a NiMH can experience 30% or greater if the temperature isn’t in its favor.

3) LiFe cells are considered safer to charge and discharge than LIPO’s. The chemical composition of the cells resists heat, short circuiting, and abuse far better than LIPO’s. Granted, LIPO’s have come a looooong ways of late, and the gap between the two battery types has decreased dramatically. So short answer is yes, they are more stable and safer than LIPO’s – with the important caveat that you do your part and take care of your batteries. I have read a few accounts of individuals failing to buy the proper charger that has a “LiFe” setting and destroying their battery / personal property. Regardless of battery, type, etc. the key lesson to take away here is always: “NEVER, EVER, EVER, CHEAP OUT ON YOUR CHARGER.” I also recommend charging in a fire proof “Lipo-Sack” or even better is a .50 cal ammo can to store your batteries in. Airtight, and metal, so it’s not going to burn. No point in saving a buck today to torch a $100,000 house tomorrow.

4) LiFe cells are constructed of cheaper components than LIPO’s, but ironically, this hasn’t really trickled down to the consumer yet – LiFe cells are usually more expensive than their LIPO counterparts. Shop around and you can find some good deals, however.

5) LiFe cells are more compact than NiMH cells, so you can enjoy the benefits of small size and more power. They also come in some different voltages such as 9.9v with a 20c discharge rate, which puts it right between a 7.4v and 11.1v LIPO both of which usually have a 25c discharge rate. LiFe cells offer you more voltage per cell than NiMH. For example: the maximum voltage for a NiMH cell is 1.2v. Maximum voltage for a LiFe cell is 3.7V. This is over three times more! This also means they pack more capacity per ounce than a NiMH. An 8-cell 9.6v 600mAh NiMH battery weighs 5.7 oz. But a 3-cell 9.9v 1500mah LiFe pack offers you 250% more capacity, but only weighs a miniscule 1.2 oz.

6) The charge life of a LiFe cell is half again greater than a NiMH. Typically a LiFe pack will last over 1000 charge cycles, while the similar NiMH will run about 500 or so before it is shot. Charge capacity does not degrade as badly as a NiMH battery does over time either.

There are a few disadvantages to LiFe cells. One of them being that they haven’t really stormed the airsoft market in the same fashion as LIPO’s and NiMH batteries have. In fact, they aren’t altogether that common at all. As a result of their non-commonality, it can be a lot harder to find sizes that fit your particular AEG. Additionally, one should factor in the expense of a charger that will charge a LiFe cell if you don’t have one already.

Considering all the advantages of LiFe, it would make sense to make use of them as an upgrade – especially if you’re coming from NiMH. Switching from LIPO to LiFe is kind of a wash in my opinion if you already have a bunch of LIPO packs, and it doesn’t make a lot of sense if you can’t find LiFe packs that fit your AEG’s. If you’re getting into the Lithium technology game from the start, LiFe batteries should warrant a serious look, however.

This is a really common question from just about every airsofter out there. What is the best way to maintain my GBB magazines?

#1 is to mind what you feed it. The best method is to use green gas
that already has a silicone lube mixture inside it. The more popular
alternative is a propane bottle with a fill adapter because this is much
cheaper. Care must be taken with this
latter step, however. It is highly advisable that you apply several
drops of fine silicone lube to the top of the propane bottle before
screwing on the adapter. I recommend doing this for at least every 3rd
magazine fill.

The number one killer of GBB magazines is worn,
cracked, or dried out o-rings. An o-ring leak will obviously bleed off
whatever gas you have stored in the fill chamber slowly, or quickly,
depending on how bad your leak is. The best measures are preventative
measures. Keep your o-rings hydrated and they will last a long time. Raw
propane gas has a tendency to dry things out. This can be exacerbated
by temperature extremes too. Freezing, or shooting extremely fast (if
your gas allows it) in cold temperatures can adversely affect the
performance of the o-rings.

There are lubes out there designed
to “breathe new life into” dry o-rings. They are usually marketed under
the name of “Gas Blowback Magazine Saver” or the like. I have used
these with good success – most of them do work well. Generally you
depress the valve on the back of the magazine, place a few drops of the
lube into the top of the gas chamber opening, and then fill your
magazine with gas. Typically you leave the mag sitting upright for a
period of time up to 24 hours or so. I prefer to vent the contents of
the magazine afterwards, rather than fire it through the weapon as the
lube can tend to find its way down your barrel otherwise.

#2,
after o-rings, valves are the weakest link in the GBB magazine. These
are usually made of brass, plated brass, or in some cases, aluminum, or
steel. 90% of the time, they will be brass due to brass having good
self-lubricity properties. Potential for brass to be damaged, especially
when screwing it into harder metals, such as aluminum or steel are
there. It can be easy to damage the threads or chew out the slot for
your screwdriver, or even bend valve if you monkey too hard with it. The
valve usually contains two or more o-rings depending on design. These
o-rings are usually the ones that die over time. Finding and replacing
these o-rings can be a real pain, to impossible in some cases. 90% of
the time, you’re simply better off saving yourself the time, grief, and
agony by just biting the bullet and replacing the valve altogether.
Additionally, some valves are rather complicated affairs of engineering,
and don’t lend themselves easily to being dissembled without completely
compromising the structure to the point of making it impossible to
reassemble. If your valve is bad, try to rehydrate the o-ring first. If
this doesn’t work, take it apart, replace what o-rings you can access or
can determine to be bad. If that still doesn’t work, replace the valve.
Valves can be expensive, so once again, preventative maintenance is the
key here to ensuring long life.

I have read of some folks
using automotive gasket sealer to seal the valve to the magazine body. I
really don’t recommend this because it can be near impossible to remove
a bad valve due to this stuff. Remember: most valves are brass. It
doesn’t take much effort or a bad slip to chew up the slot and
completely trash your ability to remove a valve.

Another
common issue with valves is the valve plunger fails to depress
consistently or drags. This is usually the result of gunk, debris, or
bad manufacturing process (a machining burr) preventing it from working
properly. Blow it out if you can. If it doesn’t work after this, then it
is likely a defect and should be replaced. Plungers are another item
that is difficult and time consuming to fix.

#3 is relatively
simple. On GBB pistol mags, it pays to keep your feedway for your BB’s
clean. Lube and debris tends to collect in this channel during firing.
If you observe closely, it is not uncommon for this to severely
contaminate the cleanliness of your BB’s. This translates itself
directly to your barrel, which translates to decreased accuracy. The
feeble pipe cleaner is your friend here. Lock your spring back, double
up the pipe cleaner in half, and clean that channel out. Your BB’s will
thank you and your barrel will thank you.

#4, I have never
personally seen or heard of a case where the gas chamber of a magazine
was cracked or compromised in such a fashion as it leaked like a sieve.
Typically these are milled or case from a solid block of steel or
aluminum. It would be very hard to destroy one. Your o-rings and valves
will go out first before you ever destroy the main gas chamber.

One of the most common questions surrounding barrels is “which bore diameter is best?”

General consensus on the interwebs is that the smaller the bore diameter, the better your accuracy will be. Typical ‘small bore’ sizes usually start at 6.03mm and go down to 6.01mm to 6.00mm. There are even ultra rare sizes such as 5.99mm diameter barrels too.

Larger bore sizes tend to start at 6.05mm to 6.08mm and beyond.

One of the first things you need to realize with any barrel is that its performance is largely at the mercy of the BB’s you feed it. Lets take, for example, one well-known high quality BB on the market today: the 6mm Bioval. Bioval advertises their BB’s as having an average diameter of 5.92mm, which is billeted as being smaller than most manufacturers. Most well known brand name quality airsoft BB’s tend to have an average diameter of 5.98mm +/-. That +/- figure represents the margin of manufacturing deviancy possible. If you were to take a pair of dial calipers (or even better, a micrometer) to your BB’s and measure each and every one, you will find that they are not uniformly 5.92mm as in the case of Bioval’s, or 5.98mm or whatever else they are advertised as. Generally the more expensive the BB, the more uniform the diameter consistency versus a cheaper BB brand will be. Cheap BB’s can have some pretty wild diameter fluctuations to the tune of ungodly numbers that shouldn’t even be fired down the cheapest hand-forged-barrels-from-scrap oil-drums-sourced-in-the-landfills-of-Papau-New-Guinea.

Bringing the discussion back to barrels – slinging your 5.98mm +/- BB’s through a 6.00mm diameter barrel doesn’t leave a very big margin of error. If your BB diameter is too large, it will cause jams and accuracy issues as it is being forced down too tight a bore and/or ‘shaving’ itself along the way. On ultra-tight bores, if it is shaving the BB’s, it will eventually decrease the diameter even further as the BB’s leave their residue behind. BB residue is also bad for accuracy too. The
smaller the bore you go, the narrower the range of BB brands you will be able to choose becomes – ironically, this also means the cost of feeding your AEG becomes exponentially greater, as ultra-high precision BB’s are more expensive than their less precise counterparts.

For small bore diameter barrels, I feel 6.01mm is the absolute smallest one should go, while 6.03mm is a good compromise to account for those who use a wide variety of BB brands.

One school of thought suggests that a larger bore diameter is actually MORE conducive to accuracy than a tighter bore. There are a fair number of well known tech
guru’s who have conducted the testing and even used specially manufactured clear acrylic barrels with high speed photography to capture the BB’s ‘flight pattern’ so to speak and determine just how exactly the BB’s act when traveling down a barrel. Testing seems to suggest that when exiting the hop up chamber the BB travels along the top of the bore and generates its spin along the way (in somewhat similar fashion to the Tippmann flatline barrel in paintball.) Thus, the
less friction and obstruction imparted on the BB by the barrel the better it will be for accuracy. Additionally, it was determined that there were negligible gains on longer barrels over 450mm’s in length. My own testing has seemed to confirm that larger bore diameters (6.05mm) tended to to result in slightly better accuracy (the caveat being that your gearbox and hop up unit are operating in perfectly tuned harmony too.) I have several setups where I transitioned from a 6.01mm to a 6.05mm bore and noted demonstrable accuracy gains and range improvements. Although I would also argue that there can also be such a thing as too wide of a bore. My personal preference is for bores around 6.03 to 6.05mm.

So there you have two polar opposites in barrel thinking. Which one is correct? Well, you have to realize again that there is truly no precise clear cut answer for which barrel diameter is best for you. A combination of factors effect barrel accuracy, including your hop up, gear box performance, BB’s and overall bore cleanliness.

Fixing compression: new o-ring’s and Dow 55 or rubber conditioner.

The enemy: Teflon tape.

I’m sure you have heard of Teflon tape mods to fix cylinder head leaks on a V2 gearbox or air nozzle leaks on a bar 10 and all the random theories and “quick fixes” that you can do with a roll of Teflon tape on your Airsoft gun. The truth is Teflon tape dissolves in most lubricants, has a very low tensile strength, is designed for low pressure water applications, and easily goes everywhere in a working gearbox where it shouldn’t.

I have opened more gearboxes than I could count that looked like an Easter basket after their “mod” came off their cylinder head and wrapped its way around everything in a gearbox. Truth is, this method is more expensive then doing it right the first time. I’ve also seen hundreds of cases now where Teflon tape will partially dissolve and turn into a nasty gear-clogging goop inside your gearbox. At $30 an hour, I make a decent chunk of money fixing these so called “mods” for kids.

If your cylinder head leaks then replace the o-ring and lube with Dowe 55 or power steering pump leak stop. Instant 5 year fix. Teflon will do one or two games
before it fails. A basic o-ring cost’s $0.50 from most stores and saves you a lot of cleaning and headache.