Post by deeno on Oct 9, 2006 13:04:33 GMT -8
First, I'll start this off by saying that I usually do not like to write gear reviews of things that I haven't played extensively with and especially gear that I don't own myself. With that said, here's a compilation of the information that I've found on the P226 RAM.
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Before flying down to California and checking out the Sig first hand, I did a bit of digging around to find out as much information as possible beforehand about the P226. Here are some detailed break down pics from the RAP4 forums:
I just noticed that they've posted a short demo video that will show you how the gun operates and fires:
rap4.com/video/demo/sig_sauer_pistol.wmv
The P226 comes well packaged in a small hard shelled case shown below
The demo unit that I played with also included a barrel plug, a manual, a small dropper with oil, and a short squeegee (squeegee and oil not pictured)
One thing to note before continuing is that RAP4 does not manufacture the P226. APS is the manufacturer and all warranty claims and troubleshooting help (and probably replacement part requests) will need to go through APS USA and not RAP4 (APS website is found here www.asiapaintball.com/company/apsusa.html) . This kind of worried me as I had fears of trying to call for a warranty repair and getting an answering machine in China. This is definately not the case though. I sent a few emails to APS USA (asking about a different product that is slated to release late this year/early next year) and they were all returned the same day which gave me a lot more confidence in the product as there's no way I'd drop $300 on a gun if I couldn't get somebody either on the phone or via email.
As for the P226 itself, it's surprisingly heavy for the size. Perhaps a bit lighter than an Overlord, but the balance is spot on and makes the percieved weight while carrying a lot less. The Sig felt great in the hand and filled up my palm niceley and comfortably. I can't tell you how solid it felt and pictures just really do not do it justice. The picture below will show you the approximate size. The orange paintball is one of the .43 caliber hard shelled balls and the black thing below the 12gram is the CO2 holder when fully extended.
The CO2 holder screws in in two steps. The inner most ring screws the entire assembly into the buttom of the grip. The outer most ring then can be screwed in to put the squeeze on the catridge and press it against the puncture pin. While playing with the demo unit, I unscrewed the CO2 holder while the gun was still aired up and it functioned as expected. The trapped air was released and the 12gram slid right out without any resistance.
The slide was fully functional and retracted about 3/4". Here's a picture whith the slide all the way forward and then with the slide fully retracted and locked in place. The slide release works just like the real Sig
Pulling the slide back, cocks the hammer and also chambers a ball. The only part that doesn't work like the real deal is that no shell casing is ejected. If you continue to pull the slide back to recock without firing, you're going to chamber a second ball (I actually did this and chambered 4 balls into the barrel just to see how it all worked). Firing after feeding two balls into the barrel is definately going to cause a ball break, so you'll have to use your head and remember if a ball is chambered or not (or just test fire once).
The barrel is pretty short at ~4" in total length and is made of brass. Palmers has made good use of brass in barrels and I'm sure it was used to add some weight in the P226. Here's a pic of the paint-> barrel match. The picture is terrible, but I can tell you that the paint -> barrel match is acceptably good with the Nelson hard shelled paint sold by RAP4.
Here's a labeled pic of all of the levers. I forgot to play with the maintenance lever, but from the breakdown instructions posted by RAP4, I don't think that lever works, but the rest of them do.
The trigger is a DA/SA type with no safety. The way these work is that when the gun is uncocked, the trigger pull will be heavier, but it will cock and fire (a ball must already be chambered or you'll get a dry fire). Once cocked, the trigger will be lighter and will function like a standard trigger. I found the trigger to be pretty heavy, but I can't really quantify it. Let's just say that you're not going to be ripping off 5bps with this trigger setup, but at the same time it's not so heavy that people with small fingers will have trouble pulling the trigger when the gun is uncocked. The trigger weight is similar to an Overlord's trigger, but it's hard to say without pulling both one after the other.
I forgot to take pictures of the mag, but it's very small. Much smaller around and shorter than a 10round tube. In fact it might be a good idea to carry the mags IN a sawed off 10 round tube to help keep dirt off of the paint as the topmost round is exposed. One thing I checked was releasing a mag before all of the rounds were spent. No extra balls feel out and in fact I popped the mag right back in and chambered another ball just to check. I did this a few times and didn't have any problems. With this in mind, it should be possible to chamber a ball, remove the mag and put another round in which is effectively 10+1
With all that said let's get on with actually shooting the gun (whole point is to shoot this thing right?). The RAP4 store manager was nice enough to load up a mag with paint, pop a 12gram in, and let me shoot the Sig. One thing I noticed right away is that when you pull the slide back and release it with no balls in the mag, the slide will return all the way forward. With a ball in the mag, I had to push the slide forward the last 2/8" which I assume is pushing the ball into the barrel (the paintfit is nice and snug). It could have been that this demo unit had been dissassembled and reassembled incorrectly as I didn't see the same behavior in the video or it could be that the paint was swelled a little. The store manager did tell me that the paint was a bit on the old side. Either way it's not something major, it's just something to note and be aware of to check that the slide is all the way forward after manually cocking the slide. When firing the P226, the slide definately returns all the way forward and the report is much much quieter than .68 caliber pistols. Inside a room with no sound, it was hard to gauge sound, but if you've shot an Ion, I don't think this pistol is all that much louder.
The first 3 shots I took were over a chrono, but there was only room to back up ~8-10 yards so I couldn't pick up any readings. The next 6 were taking aim, again at only 8-10 yards. I noticed the rounds were shooting straight, but the splats were a good 2"-3" up which IMO is desired at this range. At ~20-25 yards the sights would be dead on for elevation is my guess. At the 10 yard range, I felt that I could deliver head shots with confidence. The 10th and last round in the mag broke in the barrel which was a bit disturbing. I snooped around quite a bit and this is apparently abnormal and as we all know breaks do happen occasionally.
I'm still a little skeptic about the .43 caliber paint. Firstly the velocity on the Sig is set stock to about 250fps. To adjust velocity, it's necessary to remove the core which doesn't look to be too difficult, but also looks to be a total PITA when fine tuning before a day of play so you're not going to be adjusting this thing to the hairy edge of 300 for fear of having to readjust. Secondly, yes this is Nelson paint and the "hard shelled" version didn't feel that much harder (if at all) than Nelsplat, but with such a small diameter (the balls seriously feel like they are 1/3 of a .68 caliber round), wind is going to be a major factor and more importantly, the effective range where you'll get breaks vs. bounces is going to be totally off. Couple this with the fact that the paint will tend to be old (unless you have the luxury of living near a RAP4 dealer and can just by 250round bags) and I have serious doubts about the effective range of this pistol (but then again I guess that keeps this thing as a side arm and will make the owner really take "for sure" kill shots).
Anyhow that's about all I have to report on the P226. One thing I will recommend is that you don't hold one unless you're willing to buy one. Even with all of the doubts I have about reliability and the .43 caliber paint, I'm most likely going to pick one up just because it's so damn cool.
On a side note, there is also a Walther P99 version that uses the same core.
It's the same deal as the Sig where everything works just like the real P99 (red dot shows cocked or not, working decocker, etc). This unit was made by APS for sole distributing by Umarex so it's not available in the states yet, but the RAP4 store manager said probably in the December time frame they're hoping to have them and it will be roughly the same price
[edit] Forgot to mention, these things carry a 3 year warranty which is nice. I forgot to look at the manual to see maintenance instructions, but I don't see why you couldn't maintain it like any other mech by putting some oil on the air inlet hole before use to keep it nice and lubed.
[more edits] I forgot to mention that one good thing came out of the barrel break. I got to see how the squeegee works. It is a short wire pull type with a cloth hanger on the end. The store manager just locked the slide back, removed the mag, and then fed the squeegee in through the hole where casings are ejected on real P226. The barrel opening is right there. Pull it out from the orange tipped side of the barrel and you're good to go.
-------
Before flying down to California and checking out the Sig first hand, I did a bit of digging around to find out as much information as possible beforehand about the P226. Here are some detailed break down pics from the RAP4 forums:
I just noticed that they've posted a short demo video that will show you how the gun operates and fires:
rap4.com/video/demo/sig_sauer_pistol.wmv
The P226 comes well packaged in a small hard shelled case shown below
The demo unit that I played with also included a barrel plug, a manual, a small dropper with oil, and a short squeegee (squeegee and oil not pictured)
One thing to note before continuing is that RAP4 does not manufacture the P226. APS is the manufacturer and all warranty claims and troubleshooting help (and probably replacement part requests) will need to go through APS USA and not RAP4 (APS website is found here www.asiapaintball.com/company/apsusa.html) . This kind of worried me as I had fears of trying to call for a warranty repair and getting an answering machine in China. This is definately not the case though. I sent a few emails to APS USA (asking about a different product that is slated to release late this year/early next year) and they were all returned the same day which gave me a lot more confidence in the product as there's no way I'd drop $300 on a gun if I couldn't get somebody either on the phone or via email.
As for the P226 itself, it's surprisingly heavy for the size. Perhaps a bit lighter than an Overlord, but the balance is spot on and makes the percieved weight while carrying a lot less. The Sig felt great in the hand and filled up my palm niceley and comfortably. I can't tell you how solid it felt and pictures just really do not do it justice. The picture below will show you the approximate size. The orange paintball is one of the .43 caliber hard shelled balls and the black thing below the 12gram is the CO2 holder when fully extended.
The CO2 holder screws in in two steps. The inner most ring screws the entire assembly into the buttom of the grip. The outer most ring then can be screwed in to put the squeeze on the catridge and press it against the puncture pin. While playing with the demo unit, I unscrewed the CO2 holder while the gun was still aired up and it functioned as expected. The trapped air was released and the 12gram slid right out without any resistance.
The slide was fully functional and retracted about 3/4". Here's a picture whith the slide all the way forward and then with the slide fully retracted and locked in place. The slide release works just like the real Sig
Pulling the slide back, cocks the hammer and also chambers a ball. The only part that doesn't work like the real deal is that no shell casing is ejected. If you continue to pull the slide back to recock without firing, you're going to chamber a second ball (I actually did this and chambered 4 balls into the barrel just to see how it all worked). Firing after feeding two balls into the barrel is definately going to cause a ball break, so you'll have to use your head and remember if a ball is chambered or not (or just test fire once).
The barrel is pretty short at ~4" in total length and is made of brass. Palmers has made good use of brass in barrels and I'm sure it was used to add some weight in the P226. Here's a pic of the paint-> barrel match. The picture is terrible, but I can tell you that the paint -> barrel match is acceptably good with the Nelson hard shelled paint sold by RAP4.
Here's a labeled pic of all of the levers. I forgot to play with the maintenance lever, but from the breakdown instructions posted by RAP4, I don't think that lever works, but the rest of them do.
The trigger is a DA/SA type with no safety. The way these work is that when the gun is uncocked, the trigger pull will be heavier, but it will cock and fire (a ball must already be chambered or you'll get a dry fire). Once cocked, the trigger will be lighter and will function like a standard trigger. I found the trigger to be pretty heavy, but I can't really quantify it. Let's just say that you're not going to be ripping off 5bps with this trigger setup, but at the same time it's not so heavy that people with small fingers will have trouble pulling the trigger when the gun is uncocked. The trigger weight is similar to an Overlord's trigger, but it's hard to say without pulling both one after the other.
I forgot to take pictures of the mag, but it's very small. Much smaller around and shorter than a 10round tube. In fact it might be a good idea to carry the mags IN a sawed off 10 round tube to help keep dirt off of the paint as the topmost round is exposed. One thing I checked was releasing a mag before all of the rounds were spent. No extra balls feel out and in fact I popped the mag right back in and chambered another ball just to check. I did this a few times and didn't have any problems. With this in mind, it should be possible to chamber a ball, remove the mag and put another round in which is effectively 10+1
With all that said let's get on with actually shooting the gun (whole point is to shoot this thing right?). The RAP4 store manager was nice enough to load up a mag with paint, pop a 12gram in, and let me shoot the Sig. One thing I noticed right away is that when you pull the slide back and release it with no balls in the mag, the slide will return all the way forward. With a ball in the mag, I had to push the slide forward the last 2/8" which I assume is pushing the ball into the barrel (the paintfit is nice and snug). It could have been that this demo unit had been dissassembled and reassembled incorrectly as I didn't see the same behavior in the video or it could be that the paint was swelled a little. The store manager did tell me that the paint was a bit on the old side. Either way it's not something major, it's just something to note and be aware of to check that the slide is all the way forward after manually cocking the slide. When firing the P226, the slide definately returns all the way forward and the report is much much quieter than .68 caliber pistols. Inside a room with no sound, it was hard to gauge sound, but if you've shot an Ion, I don't think this pistol is all that much louder.
The first 3 shots I took were over a chrono, but there was only room to back up ~8-10 yards so I couldn't pick up any readings. The next 6 were taking aim, again at only 8-10 yards. I noticed the rounds were shooting straight, but the splats were a good 2"-3" up which IMO is desired at this range. At ~20-25 yards the sights would be dead on for elevation is my guess. At the 10 yard range, I felt that I could deliver head shots with confidence. The 10th and last round in the mag broke in the barrel which was a bit disturbing. I snooped around quite a bit and this is apparently abnormal and as we all know breaks do happen occasionally.
I'm still a little skeptic about the .43 caliber paint. Firstly the velocity on the Sig is set stock to about 250fps. To adjust velocity, it's necessary to remove the core which doesn't look to be too difficult, but also looks to be a total PITA when fine tuning before a day of play so you're not going to be adjusting this thing to the hairy edge of 300 for fear of having to readjust. Secondly, yes this is Nelson paint and the "hard shelled" version didn't feel that much harder (if at all) than Nelsplat, but with such a small diameter (the balls seriously feel like they are 1/3 of a .68 caliber round), wind is going to be a major factor and more importantly, the effective range where you'll get breaks vs. bounces is going to be totally off. Couple this with the fact that the paint will tend to be old (unless you have the luxury of living near a RAP4 dealer and can just by 250round bags) and I have serious doubts about the effective range of this pistol (but then again I guess that keeps this thing as a side arm and will make the owner really take "for sure" kill shots).
Anyhow that's about all I have to report on the P226. One thing I will recommend is that you don't hold one unless you're willing to buy one. Even with all of the doubts I have about reliability and the .43 caliber paint, I'm most likely going to pick one up just because it's so damn cool.
On a side note, there is also a Walther P99 version that uses the same core.
It's the same deal as the Sig where everything works just like the real P99 (red dot shows cocked or not, working decocker, etc). This unit was made by APS for sole distributing by Umarex so it's not available in the states yet, but the RAP4 store manager said probably in the December time frame they're hoping to have them and it will be roughly the same price
[edit] Forgot to mention, these things carry a 3 year warranty which is nice. I forgot to look at the manual to see maintenance instructions, but I don't see why you couldn't maintain it like any other mech by putting some oil on the air inlet hole before use to keep it nice and lubed.
[more edits] I forgot to mention that one good thing came out of the barrel break. I got to see how the squeegee works. It is a short wire pull type with a cloth hanger on the end. The store manager just locked the slide back, removed the mag, and then fed the squeegee in through the hole where casings are ejected on real P226. The barrel opening is right there. Pull it out from the orange tipped side of the barrel and you're good to go.