WE TECH SCAR review

[Jonny357]

WE Tech SCAR L CQC Review

Heres my take on We Tech’s new offering, the SCAR – L CQC



Packaging

This was one of my main gripes with this gun, while I know packaging doesn’t count for squat when your out on the skirmish field, it defiantly is important. Sadlly the packaging was rather lacklustre if I’m honest, frankly I don’t care about what it looks like, more so that it ensures my £250 worth of brand new gun arrives safely. Unfortunaltly, the packaging consisted of a big brown cardboard box and two cable ties. That’s it, no polystyrene, no padding. Consequently my gun came with a few scratches and dints, though small, I thought this was a pretty poor show from WE.

Inside the box was a single 30 round mag, a 15 round specialist speed loader and all the usual instructions and blurb

Appearance

Aside from the few dints and scratches caused by the poor packaging, the appearance was second to none. The upper receiver is solid metal; a real plus for me was that it is anodised black, not simply painted. The lower receiver and stock are made of nylon-reinforced fibre and I must say are very sturdy with a nice matt black finish to them. The trades are laser etched and very clear and crisp. I do like the fact that all the guns are individually serialed, as you can see, mine was number 26 off the production line. However, mine was missing one Allen headed bolt out of the box. While not a crucial bolt, it was rather annoying. Despite this I got onto the retailer and he sent me one out free of charge.



view of reciever and trades

Feel

This gun feels awesome. I can state this enough. The 6-position adjustable stock, and 3 position adjustable cheek piece really allows you to tailor this gun to you size, build and shooting position. The anodised aluminium receiver feels solid, as does the nylon fibre furniture, with no flex or creak. The pistol grip is real steel size and spec, meaning you can bold on whatever real steel grip you want and it will fit just fine. My only gripe is the RIS is razor sharp, I have actually cut myself changing mag on it. Being a southpaw the ambidextrous controls really make a difference for me. The fire selector (ambidextrous) feels solid and responsive clicking from modes of fire and safe. The mag release (ambidextrous) also feels very solid and positive. Mags click in with a nice solid ‘thunk’ with no wobble what - so – ever and allow you to be nice a rough with you mag changes. The bolt catch, is not ambidextrous, but that does matter as you can be very rough with it and give it a good whack to release the bolt carrier. Another nice feature is the switch able bolt, being able to swap the bolt over from left to right be a real plus for those that don’t want bolt whacking back and forth in front of their nose.



view of bolt locked back, this picture sure the fullest extent of travel during firing

Internals

Again, all metal here, no surprises. The bolt carrier is solid steel, as is the valves and gas parts. However, this sturdiness comes with a disadvantage, because of the sheer weight of the thing this gun will not cycle on 134a, I have also found it does not tend to cycle perfectly on Ultra either if the weather is a bit cooler. Due to the different system, parts like TS valves, NPAS systems etc that fit the WE M4, will not fit the SCAR. The hop up and inner barrel is the same system as the WE M4 and so all those parts are interchangeable. However, I found the hop up to be fairly substandard, having to replace the hop up rubber straight out of the box as it was damaged. Even so, the hop up was fairly average although I am still in the process of bedding it in. One thing I have noticed is that even with the hop switched off it will still over hop .25s and cause them to ‘ski jump’ as such I am having to run .30’s in order to get a much flatter trajectory. A nice touch is the torx driver concealed in the gas block, though how long this will last before it is lost on the skirmish field I cannot say.



torx driver

A real downside however, is the ‘vents’ at the front of the upper receiver. I have found that over a days skirmishing these will attract dust and grit, meaning your scar will slowly start to double feed and feel gritty and slow. As a result this gun needs to be cleaned probably twice a day during a skirmish (in woodland) and when I say cleaned I mean cleaned. Full removal of the inner / outer barrel and hop unit is required to reach this area, and it does need to be cleaned, as part of the bolt carrier protrudes past this all the way to the front on the gun.



vents at front that tend to get 'gunked up'



bolt locked back, hop up is just visible as black ring right at the front of the ejection port

Firing

WOW, I must say, the kick on this is pretty substantial (for an airsoft gun) this is mainly due to the large heavy bolt carrier whacking back when you pull the trigger. This is even more impressive on auto, though with only 30 round mags available I wouldn’t recommend this! Despite this it’s fairly gas efficient, with around 2 –3 mag coming from each fill of gas. As mentioned earlier, this gun wont cycle with 134a, I have also found that due to the weight of the bolt carrier it does tend to suffer more than an M4 does in cooler temperatures.

It is pretty damn loud and has a very distinctive clank that will scare the pants off the enemy side.

[Jonny357]

Re: WE TECH SCAR review

Field Strip

One of the easiest guns to strip I have ever come across, and about as close to the real thing as you can get. Which is good considering the maintenance needed is a damn good thing. First pop out the pin, as shown below



Then remove the whole of the lower receiver and trigger assembly



Next apply a bit of downwards pressure to the cheek piece and it should slide down, take care that the recoil spring doesn’t pop out



Next slide the recoil spring out of the rear of the upper receiver



Slide the bolt back to its fullest and slip it out of the bolt carrier



Then slide the bolt carrier out and their you go! That’s it!



Finally just a quick picture of the stock collapsed and folded

[kershmallow]

Re: WE TECH SCAR review

great review! id love some field tests, and if you could stick some comments up after a few weeks, checkin out if any parts had broken ect, that would complete it. Ive been seriousley keen on one of these, but i dunno if its a bit too much work for somebody who never had a GBB before.

[xX-Sneaky-Pete-Xx]

Re: WE TECH SCAR review

Any idea what the fps is??? and can it be adjusted in anyway??? up or down.

[Thornster]

Re: WE TECH SCAR review

Second the request for fps info! I think RA-Tech are working on one of those adjustment thingies...but what does it do stock with the gas you need to cycle the bolt?

Also does anyone know if all the WE SCARs come in such poor packaging - or was Jonny357 just unlucky?

[Jonny357]

Re: WE TECH SCAR review

Right ok i had a chrono this weekend

i was using a ultra/green gas mix to provide sufficient pressure. it was chrono-ing around 300 to 310 fps although this did produce variable results so its not great for consistency

i also had it chrono-ed entirely on cybergun aps 3 green gas a got a fps of around 340

as of yet, they fps CANNOT be adjusted (aside from using a different gas mix like i did) although as has been mentioned i spoke to RA tech and they said they are working on a NPAS although a release date has not been specified.

to clarify, what i mean by cycle, is that it will not reach its fullest extent of travel, as such, on lower power gas it WILL fire, although very poorly, with little recoil, and the bolt will not have enough power to lock back



Skirmish review

in my latest skirmish i had a few issues that one needs to be aware of

the stock fell off. however, this isnt a biggy, it is the second half of the stock (the extendable bit) which is held on by a single nut and bolt. it is my opinion that the recoil works this nut lose over time so this can be solved by one of two options

a) keep an eye on it, tighten up the bolt often

b) take the later part of the stock off, and put some threadlock onto the nut to stop it working lose.

when mine fell off i lost the nut, however, i quick trip to b and q solved this.

As mentioned earlier, the vents in the upper reciever caused me some issues, it was fine all morning, then on the second from last mission, i put the gun down on the ground (stupidly) whilst checking the objective for booby traps. this allowed grit and sand to get in and rendered the gun FUBAR until i could get back to the safe zone

this could be fixed by

a) getting a decent sling
b) no putting it in the dirt :s lol

one thing you need to look out for, on a full strip by removing the inner barrel and hop assembly in order to clean this section, is that there is a metal assembly that holds all the internals into the reciever. i have noticed that due to the pot metal quality of this assembly the torx bolts have started to bur the top half of the thread, this is an issue as i can see this having to be replaced eventually and the only way to do as such would be to get in contact with WE and order this part (pain in the arse)

negatives aside, the gun performed very well indeed. while the accuracy has not yet settled down, i was still getting some decent shots in and getting some good hits. I found that the noise is both a blessing and a curse. It scares the crap outa your opponents and sounds damn cool, yet at the same time, its so distinctive and loud that it pretty much gives your possition away straight away.

i also enjoyed the limited ammo available, and found a positive to 'cool down'. both of these factors made me play much more tactically, making my choose my shots carefully, and never venturing onto full auto spray and pray (altho on a warm day cool down wasnt really an issue).

do not be put off by the maintence issues. yes this gun does NEED maintence, but its really not as much hassle as you think, in order to strip it down to the bare bones takes less than five minutes, and as long as you do this often then this gun is just as reliable as any AEG, and a damn sight simpler to take appart.

while not in the same league as my TM M14 in terms of accuracy and range, this gun is fast becoming my primary, and i feel it really adds something special to my day both in realism and just the sheer grin inducing fun.

[kershmallow]

Re: WE TECH SCAR review

thornster, theyre all packaged like this.

[Jonny357]

Re: WE TECH SCAR review

i have been informed, that the RA tech NPAS system has just been released

[kershmallow]

Re: WE TECH SCAR review

whats that? :S

[PtePatty]

Re: WE TECH SCAR review

So how many rounds have you put through the scar and have you noticed any signs of wear or any other issues coming up with the gun and mags? Ive heard of so many recurring problems with these.

[Jonny357]

Re: WE TECH SCAR review

it has had about 8-10 thousand rounds through it and showing absolutly no signs of wear.

i have some some issues with the hop, even with the hop turned off, it is 'over hopping' bbs. on .25's the still ski jump with the hop turned off. however, i have fixed this by simply running .30's through it, giving it a much flatter trajectory and better accuracy to boot.

mag wise, all my mags are still completly leak free and running fine. there is a small catch on the top of the mag behind the gas outlet that is used to lock the bolt back on the last round that is showing wear. however you can buy reinforced steel ones for literally a pennies.

going to get a co2 mag and see how that performs, will update when i do

[PtePatty]

Re: WE TECH SCAR review

Thats great to hear, ive been eyeing one up for a long time now, hopefully the latest ones have most of the glitches worked out.
love to hear how the co2 works out cuz thats what id be running

[Jonny357]

Re: WE TECH SCAR review

right just purchased 2 c02 magasines for the SCAR

for anyone whose interested, i have just bought 2 co2 mags, they chronoed at around 330 fps with two (out of 10) at 340, and the rest (8/10) around 300 - 310 fps

i have found that it actually increases the kick AND makes the gun more consistent over green gas.

i have also found it helps with the hop up issue, perhaps becuase co2 is drier it does not interfere with the hop up rubber by covering it in propane and silicone during firing.

I would recommend anyone thinking of buying this gun to get it with a co2 mag (where possible) as it will also work better in cooler temperatures.

only downside is gas consumption, getting bout one and half mags per co2 capsule, making it about 75p per mag.

i would also recommend anyone who does buy co2 mags to invest in some magpuls as the bottom plate on the mag (which is used to tighted the locking nut to burst the C02 capsule) is rather lose and i can see them going walkies on a skirmish field. Magpuls would stop this, plus they look cool.

[Reppyboyo]

Re: WE TECH SCAR review

Only 330fps out of co2 mags?
I was told that you can expct over 440fps with them.
What BB`s were you using to chrono?

[Jonny357]

Re: WE TECH SCAR review

yep, i can confirm that it did chrono around 330 fps on C02

it was using .2g bbs

although i cannot tell for certain, i am pretty sure the SCAR comes with a 350 fps gas nozzle in it as standard, and so it does not allow c02 to reach obscene velocities

thats just my experience anyway! will get another chrono done soon