There are times when the Airsoft Buisness can be a bit tricky and the G&G P-90 is one such occasion. I have owned several P-90s (one is currently seeing service as a Stargate Autograph Book) but I found them wanting, especially in the body quality. They are often light, agile and good weapons but all of them – from the Tokyo Marui to the King Arms – feel like they are made from a low quality plastic.
It was therefore with rather keen interest I saw that Gunfire.pl offered up a PDW99 for sale – built in red dot, internal laser and apparently with a polymer body. I had planned to purchase the Snow Wolf Pulse Rifle but those plans where quickly put aside when I realised that I would most likely have more use from a P-90.
Trying to get a Swedish Vendor to get the gun was however a fools errand. Almost all of them bought their stuff from the same dealer who requested 400€ for the pleasure. Since Gunfire just wanted 250€ I felt that I could just as well buy it from them – it would be cheaper and I would have the gun quicker. Said and done.
Now, my fascination for the P-90 comes mostly from my deep fandom of Stargate. This is the gun that won us the Galaxy and some of the best PR FN Herstal ever could have hoped for. It is a light, personal defence weapon that packs a punch, thanks to its 5.7 calibre bullet that is carried in a top-loading 50-round magazine. As Jack O Neil put it, this is a weapon of war. It is meant to kill your enemy. How does the G&G Version add up against the Gua’uld?
I am not going to lie, the body is what sells this gun. The included dot sight is fine, its nice with the laser, the adjust spring system is neat but those things is not something that is actually that important. They are not the kind of things that make or break your decision to purchase. The body is.
For anybody who is willing to put down the serious money required to own this gun, the body will not disappoint. While I have never held a real P-90, I would not doubt that this is pretty much as close as you can get. The finish is excellent, the polymer is convincing as hell and the entire gun is also heavier then other P-90s on the market. When it comes to the build quality and feel, the gun simply wins the Internet.
However, it is not all praise and glory for this gun. The fire selector is where you expect it to be but on my gun rather tight – something that can be annoying in skirmishes since you cannot easily move it with a finger as intended. I kept having to move my second hand forward to fix it and is not optimal at all. On a related note, the Trigger also felt a bit sluggish something that use has not fixed for me. Lastly, honourable mention for the very satisfying charging handle that obviously had some effort put into it.
The sight portion of the gun is as far as I can tell interchangeable with other brands in case you want a triple rail on there instead of the built in sight but I only tried with the KS one. The sight itself is nothing special – just a red dot and not the circle one the real P-90 has. It is a disappointment considering the effort put into the rest of the gun. The built in laser has a trigger near your fingers so just move your hand forward and you will activate it. It can not be locked but is a simple push-to-laser affair. Sadly, the button is a little too accessible, meaning you will push it at times when you do not intend to. Worth nothing is that both sight and laser will require separate batteries.
On these two notes, I expected better from G&G. I would have liked a way to lock the laser in either setting and I would have preferred the sight to be in the same manner as the original. Some may call it nitpicking but with a gun that retails for between 300 and 400 dollars, I have the right to be picky.
The Magazine included is a standard P-90 Midcap and I must comment this decision in an age where most suppliers tend to send high caps. The magazine clicks into position with a satisfying click and has survived every P-90 slap I ever subjected it to. It feeds well, is rather easy to load and just about the only problem I can find with it is the standard one when it comes to the P-90 – the difficulty of finding magazine pockets that works with it.
Before we talk about the performance of the gun, we need to talk quality control. It is obvious that my gun was never tested after assembly. Nor did the Gunfire.pl test it before shipping it out. The cut-off lever was missing and the cables to the motor was in the wrong direction, meaning the gun did not fire. This is not acceptable for a brand new gun but since I had not bought the gun at a national retailer, returning it would be more trouble then its worth. An Airsoft Workshop ended up fixing it for me but it cost me money I rather not pay to get a brand new piece working.
The performance is what you could expect – around 345 FPS (105 m/s) – and that suits your CQB expectations just fine but not really optimal for a woodland setting. The range is fine but nothing spectacular. This is a gun for close or mid-range engagements, not long range shootouts. Both the guns inherit accuracy as well as the large magazine capacity should serve you well – aside from the lack of range this gun preforms as I would expect from G&G.
The P-90 has been made by a large number of airsoft manufacturers and I would say I am surprised it took somebody this long to make it right.
The gun is not without its flaws, but its not the important kind of flaws. I am bummed out about the lack of quality control but in the end, that was easy to fix. If you are a huge P-90 fan, the G&G is where you should go but if you do not just want one on a lark, a cheaper version might be the way to go for you. This is a top of the line gun and it shows from everything from the body to the price tag.