Ordering the gun
I ordered my gun from airsplat.com. Despite its previous bad fame, I decided to follow some members advises and trust that airsplat improved its customer service. I remember last time I TRIED ordering from them: The checkout was slow and clumsy, they where always picky about how you wrote your personal info, and at last, they didn't want to accept my credit card. They even charged me with no apparent reason 20$!! Anyway, that was about 4 years ago.
This time was the first time I visited their page since that incident, and I was greeted by a complete different site: Their overall website was more clean and tidy. Their prices where not bad either.
I proceeded to click on the ARMY L85A1, and checked out (With paypal). The tansaction was smooth and there where no problems at all. That was a Friday.
The next morning, the order was already processed and on monday it was shipped.
I had to wait until it reached the office that re-directs all packages to me (I live in Guatemala), and it took only 5 days to get there. Unfortunately, this time it was the office the clumsy one, and it took 3 days for the package to arrive here (It normally only takes 1 day).

Real Steel History
The SA80 (Small Arms for the 1980s) is a family of 5.56 mm small arms designed and produced (until 1988) by the Royal Small Arms Factory at Enfield Lock. In 1988 production of the rifle was transferred to the Royal Ordnance’s Nottingham Small Arms Facility (formerly British Aerospace's Royal Ordnance, now BAE Systems Land Systems Munitions & Ordnance).
*For additional info, visit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L85A1 )

First Impressions
I received my gun in a brown box, and inside there was another nice box, with the photo of the L81A1: (The photos are not too nice in this review, because my camera decided not to work anymore, so I am forced to use a web-cam.)

Opening the box revealed what I have been craving for for the last half year:

The only flaw about the packaging was that the screws for the carrying handle and the front sight all came loose, no bag or anything:

Nothing like a tidy, protected box to get it started!!
Here you can see that every item had its own area, and they all fitted perfectly:

The battery:

And a comparison between three different batteries (The one to the right is the ARMY 8.4V 1800Mah, the middle one a G36C 8.4V 1100mah, and the left one a LPEG 4.8V 400mah one, just for laughs )

Now to the gun itself:
The very first thing that I heard when my dad came in carrying the box was: "Darnit Christopher, this thing is heavy!!" (He payed the shipping )
When I held the gun for the first time... Wow. It is very heavy, around 8-9 pounds. An interesting thing is that most of the weight is located on the back of the gun. It makes sense, since the motor and the gearbox are located there. It is not the most comfortable thing though.
One thing I was convinced of before ordering the gun was, that despite being full steel, the quality wouldnt be so astonishing. But surprise! The steel was very good quality, and it felt sturdy as a rock when held. The only thing that is not steel is the green furniture.
This is how the gun looks when you put the front sight and the carrying handle on:

(I know, my pictures are neither artistic nor creative, but I did my best to take "decent" quality ones with a crappy web-cam)

Fiddling with the gun
Having the gun on my hands, I couldn't resist pulling the bolt back and releasing it. *Clinch* is the satisfying sound it does.
But there was one flaw: The dust cover tab that holds the dust cover in place was a little too big, resulting in the dust cover not always opening when the bolt is pulled. I trimmed a little this tab, and everything was once again back on its feet. To lock the bolt back, all you have to do is push the bolt release down while pulling the bolt back, and it stays locked. To release it you just push the bolt release up, and it clacks forward again.
I am a lefty shooter, and let me tell you: Being lefty and holding a L85 is not nice stuff. All the controls are on the back, left side of the gun, and changing between semi and auto or swapping a mag is nearly impossible without having to switch the rifle to the right side. I see some mayor tactical disadvantage in this.
Heres a shot from the bolt:


Dust cover open and bolt locked back:


Pushing the bolt lock up releases the bolt:


Despite all the nice features of the gun, there where some flaws too: One of those flaws was the before mentioned problem with the dust cover tab.
The other one was a little more serious:
After 1 hour of holding the rifle, the frontgrip started to get wobbly. Thinking that it was normal, I left it that way. After another 15 minutes, the frontgrip started to go up and down the barrel, turning around 360º. I looked for the problem for about 15 minutes, until I noticed some small screws of the sight turret where loose, causing the sight turret to move at its will along the whole front grip.
The sight turret:

The loose, right side screw:

I decided that this was one thing I didnt wanted to happen in the middle of a skirmish, when the gun is hanging from the sling. So I took some precautions:

Mister stubborn screw, I present you the white glue:

After putting some glue on the screws and the screw holes, I tightened everything the best I could. There has been no wobble whatsoever since then.
One thing that made my job easier was that the dummy gas tube can be taken out.


This post has been edited by CMP: Jun 19 2008, 12:54 PM

Heh. Star, the AR-Riser monts can be fitted ont he Rail without moidification so sight can be mounted.

Also. I just got the carry handle installed on mine. just need some optics and a new hop-up unit and its ready 2 rockn Ruin.