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Now days, gas blow back (GBB) rifles are everywhere, but most are quite an investment.  The best know are the Systema PTWs, while King Arms, WE & WA have also brought offerings to the table.  This month we have a review for those looking to get into the GBB scene without busting the bank- Enter the M4 GBB from manufacturer Jiong Gong.

Our intent will be to show the gun's value.  To justify the value we will be looking at the following characteristics:

• Cost- How much is the actual gun itself  & what are some of the basic things you might have to buy to get the gun usable.  This includes mags or any other basic parts for the gun to work, but does not include anything to upgrade it to shoot better.
• Shooting:  How consistent are the gun's shots.
• FPS Consistency- All gas-in-mag powered weapons have the issue of the cool down effect where the mag cools down when shots are fired in rapid succession.  The change in temperature decreases the gas pressure and consequently the FPS. 
  
• Kick- What fun would a gas blow back be if there's no kick from the shots
• Looks- This covers the body of the weapon, what it's made from and it's overall aesthetics.

Airsoft Hound was gracious enough to bring his new rifle over for the tests.   He purchased the weapon (including 1 magazine) along with 3 additional  AGM magazines and 2 extra sets of o-rings for @ $216.00 from PX-Airsoft, shipping included.  Not to bad for all that I think, a good investment for those that want to get into it without breaking the bank.  Technically they gun itself was only $75.00 plus shipping! Now on to the rest of the testing...

Shooting

Having a gun that doesn't shoot consistently isn't very much fun.  Add to that the fact that the magazines have 50 rounds each, and a gun that shoots consistently with decent grouping becomes pretty important.  For this test we set up the target at 35 feet and used a target that leaves green marks for the easy visual recognition.  The gun was held steady in one spot for 15 shots, each with a 1 second delay. The results are pictured right. As you can see the grouping is more than adequate for our purposes.  The largest diameter for the grouping is 4 1/2", with 12 of the 14 shots within a 3" radius.  The target used is a silhouette target in the head area.  None of the shots  went wide and it should be noted that this was without trying to zero the gun or adjust hop up on the unit, just strait out of the box.  Semi-auto was used for this test as we felt that full automatic results might not have shown the true accuracy of the gun.  We did test auto to see how tight the bursts were and noticed that they were also good, with 3-5 rounds bursts keeping within the same 3" radius.  Every once in a while on a rogue shot would fly wide, but that's bound to happen.  There was a bit of cool down after several longer bursts.  We'll add som more tests later to try and see the consequences, probably in the FPS section.

FPS

Note: When initially testing the FPS we discovered that all 3 AGM mags seemed to need to be broken in first.  After a little grease and putting some rounds through the magazine (going through a full mag twice seemed to do it) they were OK.  We still noticed a drop in FPS between the JG magazines and the AGM mags.  Further testing will be done after a few months of use to see if the discrepancy stands.

This test was done using a standard paintball chronograph.  Ambient temperature was measured at 83 degrees Farenheit.  Between each shot we waited 5 seconds to help minimize the cool down effect. We also used 2 types of gas; the results can be found on the table below.

As you can see there was a 60fps difference between the 2 different types of gas based on the same mag.  We did give the mag 10 min to regulate it's temperature between the 2 types of gas and made sure to release all of one kind of gas before filling the mag with the other.  Here's the same test using the AGM magazine for comparison.  Our goal here was to see if there was a difference in the quality and if there was, by how much.  Please make sure to read the note above to see an explanation of the AGM magazine results table.

Kick

While I can attest to the fact that there is a nice kick on this gbb we are still trying to devise a test for it.  I know that when I fired in semi-auto there was a good kick, but nothing strong enough to throw off my aim.  When fired in full auto there is enough movement to degrade aim, basically how I would expect it to be.  We'll add more once we figure the tests- perhaps a way to measure the force of the kick.

Looks

This is the most subjective of all parts, without any real tests to run.  The gun is made mostly of plastic with only a few parts being metal, the carry handle, rail and outer barrel..  See the pictures below for some different views of the weapon.  It should be noted that we checked the body and barrel for wobble when it first came out of the box.  Though there was some barrel wobble, tightening the ring where the hop-up is located took care of that and now the whole thing seems pretty solid.  There are decent markings on the gun.  Those of you who are in to special trades and all that, can get your fill by purchasing the metal bodies out there. The initial gun is so economical that you'll have money left over.

Conclusion

After running these few tests and being able to handle the gun a bit it seems like a good way for somebody to sample the current trend of gas blow back rifles without giving an appendage to get one. Only time will tell if the weapon will hold up to regular game play.  We will update the article after a few games with some long term results.  Would I go out and purchase this gun instead of a Systema PTW?  The short answer is no, ut to qualify that, do I have the money to go out and pick up a PTW?  The short answer to that is also "no".  For it's low price point the JG GBB M4 seems to be a good value taking into account it's decent FPS out of the box, it's accuracy and it's over all looks it seems like a good purchase.  The only down side is the all plastic body, something easily remedied.

Long term ussage report coming within the next few months after some BBs are put downrange.