Echo 1 MP5 A4 Review 2 (WIP)

The MP5 was developed in the 1960s by the German arms company Heckler & Koch (HK). Its formidable ROF and relatively rapid reloading capability has made it extremely popular with many military, law enforcement, and special ops units. Its innovative "delayed blow back" design makes it easy to control when firing. There have been countless variations of the HK MP5, including the MP5 A5, MP5 K, MP5 K-PDW, MP5 A4, and MP5 SD3.

HK MP5:






When I went to my walk-in store, I was planning to purchase an Echo 1 M4. However, when I arrived there, I was informed that the M4 was out of stock, and my choices were the MP5A4 and G36C. But with my UTG shotgun broken, leaving without an AEG was not an option. So, after several minutes of carefully considering the pros and cons of the two guns, I decided on the MP5A4.

The inside of the box has quite a bit of text on it, mostly in Chinese. The gun came with 200 BBs, a wall charger, an extra plastic flash hider, and a battery.

When I got home, I was very excited to test my new AEG. I charged the battery, loaded the mag, and set up several makeshift targets which I then demolished.



A nice feature of the Echo 1 MP-5 A4, is the battery compartment. Because the Echo 1 MP5 A4 has the battery compartment in the full stock, it can except a larger battery then the MP5 J. The battery included is a 1500 mAh 8.4V NiCd rechargeable pack, putting out about 850 RPM. It will fire approx. 2,000 BBs with a single charge. If you find it necessary to obtain higher ROF or longevity, you can easily upgrade to a better battery, however, in my opinion it is not needed. I highly recommend investing in a smart charger however, as they will prolong the life of you're battery and often come with a discharge feature as well as charging your battery in a fraction of the time. The battery will fit into the slightly compact battery compartment without too much trouble, though the fuse may need to be maneuvered into position.




The Echo 1 MP5 comes with a 200 round high cap magazine. I once counted, and was able to cramp 260 BBs into it. The magazine is completely metal, and appears to be almost indestructible The winding gear is very nice. It is wider than any other winding gear I have seen. I have never had any miss feeds, however it requires almost continuous winding to keep the BBs loading.

The magazine releases works very well: There is a standard MP5 lever, which I find is the easier of the two, but there is also a button similar to the magazine release on the M4/M16 variants.






The selector switch worked very well when I got it, but in the 20,000 rounds since, the safety has become sloppy. Both semi and full auto still work perfectly, but if you want to have a safety, you must hold down the switch all the way.
The switch is completely metal as I found when I disassembled the MP5, though it is very difficult to tell without disassembly. Full auto is symbolized by seven orange symbols that are apparently supposed to look like bullets, semi is one of these bullets, and safe is a white bullet crossed out. I have heard people say that these bullets are unrealistic and must be designed for people who cannot read, however I would like to point out that the symbols on the selector switch are the same used by the real H&K MP-5.
Because it is just paint, the bullets and other markings on or around the switch comes very easily. While removing dirt from the Echo 1 MP5 after a game, and almost took off the safe semi and auto symbols. The selector switch is ambidextrous, and it is very easy to switch from auto to semi (or semi to auto) while fighting.





The sights on this AEG are very nice and quite accurate. The rear sight is a rotating cylinder with four apertures. I only ever really use 2; The smallest and largest, and most of the time I use the largest. In my opinion, it's easier to use the large aperture at long range than the small one at close, but what you do depends on you're preference.

Although the rear sight is constructed completely of metal, the front sight is plastic. It consists of a vertical rod within a large ring. I am thinking of painting a white dot on the tip of the rod to help the make the sighting easier.





I was excited to see the internals for myself, I opened it up. The gearbox, (After 20,000 rounds) has a small crack in it, but it should be another 20,000-30,000 rounds before the pressure could cause it to break off completely. When I opened the gearbox, I found all of the internals to be in surprisingly good condition.

Gears and Bushings:

The gears were, like most of the other internal parts, in good shape. I found no broken teeth or wear of any kind. They are stamped "C.A" which some people have believed to mean that they are CA gears, and others have insisted that they are cheap gears, stamped with CA to fool unsuspecting airsofters.

The bushing were much like the gears. They are nylon, so I suspected they would be in need of replacement, but I see no reason to upgrade to metal, unless you would just like to be on the safe side.

Piston and Cylinder:

The piston is constructed from a very hard plastic. Between that and the fact that the first tooth is not plastic, but metal, there is no noticeable damage to the piston. The air seal is decent. I have heard it is great, and I have heard that it is horrible. It is neither. Their is enough of a gap for some air to escape, but not enough to make a huge difference.

Spring/spring guide

The spring is about what I expected. It feels like it's about an M100, but I have no way to tell for sure. It is dirty and greasy, like everything else in the gearbox.
The spring guide it made of a plastic very similar to the piston. It feels pretty strong, but of course, metal is always better than plastic.

Ok first error:

Don't use exclamations like that, it makes the review look un-professional.

Second,

Quote :

flash hider that can be used if you REALLY want people to know it's now a real gun

Clear that sentence up for us, so we know what you are trying to say, there could be possible misunderstanding at that sentence.

I must say this again:

First thing you do when you read this post, add in a table of contents to your review.

Here is an example of what it should look like:

Quote :

Table of Contents

First Impressions
-----------------------------------------------------------------

Quote :

When I got there, they were out of stock, and I had my
choice of the MP5 or G36, and so I got the MP5

Here is my advice:
When I got to my store, the clerk informed me the M4s were not in stock.
However, I was not leaving without a new aeg, which led me to purchasing
a Mp5 instead.

Quote :

The inside of the box has a lot of writing on it, some in English, but most in Chinese.

Here is my advice:
Upon opening my box I noticed most of the text was in Chinese instead of English.

Quote :

The gun came with 200 BBs (The guy at the store told me to just throw them in the
trash) a wall charger, a flash hider that can be used if you REALLY want people to
know it's now a real gun, and battery.

Here is my advice:
The package contained a pack of low quality bb's, standard wall charger, 8.4v 1500mah
larger battery, and finaly a steel flash hider.

Quote :

When I got home, I couldn't wait to test my new (and first) AEG. I charged the battery,
loaded the mag and demolished anything I could use as a target. The best gun I had ever
seen before was a KWA G19, so this was unbelievable!!!!!!!!!

When I arrived home I was fairly anxious to test my first AEG. After charging the battery and loading up, I went out back to see what it can do.


Even what I added in can be fixed upon, this is just a quicky thought.

This is how it would sound:

When I got to my store, the clerk informed me the M4s were not in stock.
However, I was not leaving without a new aeg, which led to the purchasing
of the Mp5. Upon opening my box I noticed most of the text was in Chinese instead of English. The package contained a pack of low quality bb's, standard wall charger, 8.4v 1500mah larger battery, and finaly a steel flash hider.

When I arrived home I was fairly anxious to test my first AEG. After charging the battery
and and loading up, I went out back to see what it can do.

Edited by Me & sgt. Hartwig

I edited it to make it more interesting.

Good job, I would now move to the next section

Ok. I'm pretty sure the next section need a lot of work.

Quote :

If you want to fire more that 2,000 rounds you might want to get a new one, but if not, I don't see any reason to

Try rewording it to this:

If you want to, you can always upgrade to a battery with larger MAH, but I personally don't think it is necessary.

OvermedicateD wrote:

The battery that is packaged with the gun is decent

I think Ag worded it better than you my friend.

First off, never repeat *the* twice in one sentence,
sounds incredibly choppy and immature.

^^ Fixed.

And BTW, show me your suggestion, before you bash mine.

@ OmD,

I have been helping Airsoftguy on Yahoo Instant Messenger.
The first part of your help was good, just corrected the second part.
If it bothers you to be corrected, don't correct others.

is there anything else that should be corrected, or should I move on to the next section?

Hmm...
I would wait for Booligan or OvermedicateD to make a further response.

Either way, good job.

/

Alright. I tried to fix some of the mistakes.

Airsoftguy download Mozilla Firefox.
Mozilla has a built in spell checker, not to mention its safer than
Microsoft Internet Explorer.
Download Link 1

I have a spell check. But it doesn't get some mistakes because they are real words. I use safari, but maybe I will try mozilla.

Should I go onto the the next section?

Fixed your ToC again.

Refer to this topic when trying to make a ToC correctly(last post):

https://airsoftreports.editboard.com/user-review-submissions-f5/airsoft-reports-review-guidelines-t529.htm

Quote :

I would highly recommend upgrading to a smart charger. They will prolong the life of you're battery, and often come with a discharge feature, as well as charging in a fraction of the time.

This is the only sentence that bugs me, looks like you did a good job on the rest.

Also, you say "they will prolong the life...."

I would change that to, "They can prolong the...."

Other than that looks good.


EDIT: Before you move on, correct the mistakes I mentioned. Then, work on "Real Steel History", and get that over with.

ummmmmmmm we arent supposed to talk about real steel anymore, remember?

Within reviews you give brief real steel history.

Ok..........

Can you guys go more in depth into the rules, because I really dont know what we are supposed to do and what we arent........

^^ The best way I can explain it is using an analogy.

Think of the review forums, as an unincorporated territory, under the forums as a whole.

Only selected rules apply here, the one you cited is an example of one that doesn't apply to the review itself.

Read the rules and cross reference them with the review guidelines.

If you have anymore questions, do it through PMs.

There will be no more discussion of this in this review thread.

I have added a real steel history, as well as another section.

There are some issues with your real steel history.

First of all, there is no such thing as a "MP5J", you probably mean the MP5A3. or MP5A5.

Quote :

The MP5 was developed in the 1960s by the German company HK (Heckler & Koch). With it's easy to change mags, and 800 9mm bullets a minute, it is extremely popular with large numbers of military, law enforcement, and special ops units

Try something like this:

The MP5 is a submachine gun chambered for 9x19mm Parabellum cartridge, and was developed in the 1960s by the German arms manufacturer HK (Heckler & Koch). Because of its high cycle rate of 800 RPM, and its relative ease of reloading, the MP5 is extremely popular with large amounts of military, law enforcement and special operations units.

I have added another section about the internals.