Brass tube system Vs. open bolt system / WE GBB PDW and others
 

Alright peeps,

so i've been researching this a bit and can't seem to find a real review on the pros and cons of each system.

What is the exact and main difference between these 2 systems?

What are the up sides of each?

What flaws are each known for?

Which one is to reccomend, and if so under which conditions?

What would be your personnal choice and for what reason?

I ask this because i just put a deposit on a WE PDW this past tuesday, and consequently will soon need to either love it as it is or replace the brass tube with the open bolt. Therefore, im looking for facts on each. Hopefully this helps answer other peoples questions too.

cheers and thanks

Personally, I am for the brass tube approach, here's a breakdown of why:

1. Functionality: The brass tube prevents unwanted material from entering the firing system and potentially breaking your nozzle / rod assembly. Sure, material can still enter, but the worst it's going to do is jam your bolt. Which can be remedied by a quick field strip.

2. Looks: The flash of brass when the gun is firing is similar to that of a real rifle (and the glimpse of brass from a new round being stripped from the magazine and placed into the chamber.

There are obviously a few cons to the brass tube.

1. The brass is always there, so when the gun has the magazine pulled from the mag-well, it is not clear by looking into the ejection port that the gun is clear.

2. This is an extra part to clean, not found in open bolt systems.

Personally, for the reliability of the brass system, it's defenitely outweighed by the con of having to clean it with regular maintenance of the rifle. You should be able to field strip and clean it in about 10 minutes.

That is:

-Break the gun by removing the body pin.

- Extracting the bolt carrier and charging handle.

- Removing the buffer and buffer spring.

- De greasing and removing dirt / buildup from all obvious moving parts with a micro fiber cloth.

- Cleaning the barrel with a cleaning rod and piece of dry micro fiber cloth.

- Re greasing (lightly with super lube / ultra-slick) the main moving parts (that is any part with wear on the bolt carrier, but not the outer most sides. The inside of the buffer tube. The parts on the charging handle with wear marks. The hammer roller.). Re oiling (lightly with silicon oil pistol or grenade weight) the o-rings on the bolt carrier, and the stainless steel rod.

- Reassembly.

Sorry for the long post. ;)

Shelledpants, i'm glad your post is long, the longer the better in fact. i'm looking for content here, so both quality and quantity is good.

good input, thanks

I'm doing a write up on cleaning these bastards. It'll be up in an hour or so.

Looking forward to that!

Tom, from now on I am going to give you all my stuff in need of the cleaning! It seems you enjoy it.

five dolla.

Deal!
On the other note, I agree with the Pants. Also, open bolt kit you can get, closed, not so much. That alone have to count for something.



EDIT. Anybody is ordering one of those "open bolts" for PDW? PM me if you do!

i just want to bump this thread back up,

i've been hearing both "brass tube is better" and "open bolt is better". i got good info on why the brass tube is better by shelled pants, but not so much for the open bolt system.

Also, having myself the brass tube system right now, here are some cons :

the bolt carrier cracks in the frontat a specific place. As the bolt carrier for the open bolt is not designed the same, i think this issue has been resolved in the open bolt system?

also, having some problems with the bolt catch and the PDW magazine. the bolt catch doesnt seem to be pushed up enough by the magazine when empty, and therefore the bolt doesnt lock back when empty. Heard this was also improved/resolved with the opne bolt. Can anyone confirm??

My opinion from owning an open bolt and brass bolt system like in the WE... I would say the WE Brass System is great! I have yet to have a single problem with it.

I've had AGM, JG, and KJW all breaking and causing me problems.

The WE on the other hand, many games, many mags, and still no issues.

Had some leaky mag issues right out of the box, but a quick lube and that fixed that.

I would always go with WE over any GBB-R just because of the reliability I've had so far.

Why are we talking about reliability instead of awesomeness?

Guns can be fixed.

and in the case of the WE .. fixed easily.. few parts... and simple assembly
and lots of after market parts

and yes... loads of awesomeness

Meh still a fan of WE, I've had them all. So personal opinion.

you,re right about that, but for the WE PDW (for which this thread was intended) which i own, i cannot seem to be able to find a replacement bolt carrier. Or any other parts for that matter. RA-tech only have an upgrade kit. No bolt carrier in there.

link to thread showing the cracked bolt carrier in the PDW closed bolt system :

http://www.airsoftcanada.com/showthr...t=cracked+bolt