Fortunately these days you can get MI outside the US quite easily in most places, to include multiple retailers selling directly here in the UK like Land Warrior Airsoft.
The many reviews that, naturally, primarily come out of the US have always been positive in the overwhelming majority, so I’ve acquired a few bits over the years myself for fun little toy builds. Though in the end, I didn’t keep this specific example and went with the Pakse Sapper plastic handguard, since those were available in the specific grey that’s a spot-on match with my replica here.
These come in different lengths to suit various barrels and overall are as well made as one would normally expect from MI. My personal decision to not keep it shouldn’t be regarded as a negative overall, I was mostly very happy with the design and the quality, but with airsoft the #1 thing that matters is of course trying to look cool, with ergonomics coming in a close second.
With the above said however, even if it’s a 1 of 1 example, I make it a policy to always show whenever something is wrong on anything I acquire. In this case you can see some aluminium shaving/chips were left in place on the 12 o/clock picatinny and then anodised over. It’s easy to see what’s happened, they’ve made the long cut down the centre and all has gone well, but some of the material peeled when the mill made the perpendicular cuts to form each rail segment. Some of the excess didn’t quite detach fully, and I don’t know if they use a liquid wash or air blast to clear swarf, but either way the method used has not quite been sufficient to clear everything it needed to. Then either there wasn’t a check stage before surface finishing, or this example slipped through the cracks.
Functionally there won’t be any effect to this minor issue, it’s aesthetic, because the accessory bolts and recoil lugs won’t be blocked from fitting. And every retailer I’ve ever seen to stock MI shouldn’t have any issue getting you a replacement sorted if you do have a problem like this. I’d certainly hope not if you buy direct from the company in the US. Which is one of the biggest plus points to the better brands; a fact which doesn’t get highlighted enough in my opinion.
If you’re a white plastic warfighter, just be aware these will sit on to the ASG, but to my knowledge you’d have to do further work to get the whole config properly mounted with the battery housed inside. Check specific relevant resources for further info online before committing.
Above is the view from the muzzle end.
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