Recommended beginner gun?

Hi guys. Had my first skirmish recently and liked it enough that i think I’ll do some more. Thinking of this one for my first gun. Thoughts?

Great first blaster,

but a dubious supplier :confused:

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Spotted your other post, would you still recommend this one instead if I can get it?

Gel Blaster GBX-CQB 4012T | gbxgelball.com.au

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Yes, the GBX and the people who are selling them are pretty solid as far as I know.

Definitely a much better blaster and supplier than CEH :+1:

The GBX is pretty good value. JG. Full metal. Takes gen8/ldt style mags. Airseal is great. If you want more performance only need gears, piston, spring, and if you get the long version a full cylinder. very nice.
Be aware, it comes with deans plugs. That’s good.
It has the female and male on the wrong things. That’s BAD!! Some twat in China decided that the female should be on the blaster and the male is on the battery. Its wrong. And potentially dangerous. If you touch the male connectors on the battery to anything metal you risk fire or battery explosion. If you can solder, change them to the right way around. If you can’t, pay someone who can. Then you can run a deans battery from anywhere, and its safe. Something to be aware of.

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Insane bit of “electrical engineering” to have the connector’s arse about!
I wonder if they were trying for a “proprietary” style battery/wiring system and failed?

Yeah, stuff safety we are special! It is kind of like how Kublai at one point had tamiya plugs with reversed polarity, and could only use the battery they supplied. And of course then “flip” them the right way around to use normal batteries, then had to change the magazine terminal polarity… Just trying to be different, but doing it wrong.

Yeah, came across that reverse polarity on a couple of different blasters over the years.

Certainly a trap when you aren’t expecting it!
It taught me to check EVERY new blaster after the first incident, which was changing connectors from Tamiya to Deans.

The first thing I did to all my new blasters was fit Deans connectors, and that was the first time that I experienced the reverse polarity in a stock new blaster…… certainly never made any sense whatsoever at the time :roll_eyes:

Probably has something to do with airsoft plug standard being different to model racing plug

Wiring[(View source for Tamiya connector - Wikipedia)]

The usual wiring has the positive (red) wire running to the terminal with a square profile, and the negative (black) wire running to the half-circle, half-square terminal. This is true for both genders of connector. The female sockets are in a male housing and the male pins are in a female housing. The male pins (female housing) connector is usually on the battery side.

In electrical and electronics engineering, the convention is that gender refers to the metal contact parts of a connector in order to avoid ambiguity. A large number of hobbyist retailers selling these connectors refer to the gender of the plastic housing, which is against convention and can lead to errors.

In some cases, Mini-Tamiya connectors are wired in reverse polarity. This is often the case with airsoft guns, where the square profile terminal is the negative terminal and the rounded terminal is the positive terminal.[3]

Appreciate all the info guys! Hopefully I can get one of those GBX ones…

If I can’t, what are the differences between the double bell I mentioned an this one:

Double Bell M4A1 CQB AEG Gel Blaster - Black for Sale Online Australia - Tactical Edge

It mentions a 7.4v battery where the other has 11.1v. Is that just sticking a different battery in the same gun though?

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Looks like it’s the same model as @BradleyPhillipsYT reviewed, but I’m not up to speed on the latest models and their variants.

If there’s no FCU/MOSFET as standard, I couldn’t see any reason why they couldn’t run on 11.1V, especially with the type of gearbox they are running :+1:

The DB nylon range is arguably the best bang for your buck. 350 fps and running on the 3 cell.

Being a metal gear box and metal gears, you wont have a single issue with 3 cell. the only difference being a 2 cell compared to a 3. you would see a slower rate of fire and thats mostly it.

DB runs on gen 8 mags which is the cheapest and most common mag around. I highly Highly recommend looking at @BradleyPhillipsYT videos because he does great honest reviews. I do also highly recommend going out to the field first and trying out the sport if you havnt yet already

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Oh no, mixed advice!!!

Seriously though, happy for all input. I’ve had 1 go at it and had a blast. Have a group of mates who are also keen, a couple have already bought their own gear. I figure as long as I don’t spend thousands it’s pretty hard for me to go too far wrong. =)

The double bell does seem a great starter, but the GBX is easily the cheapest all metal you can get and also seems to be viewed positively.

The GBX is going at a premium over the double bell (about $50 more) but it’s full metal, which presumably will help durability and resale value.

The double bell has a higher rate of fire (350fps vs 310fps reported). It’s also longer, than the GBX CQB which I think is probably a downside.

I’ve seen Brad’s video and that’s why the double bell was the initial gun I queried. There is a definite lure to an all metal gun though.

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Yes, full metal for the GBX is a pretty good deal.
310 vs. 350 fps isn’t really a breaking point when many fields are limited to 300 fps anyways.

40 fps difference is hardly noticeable and nothing to do with distance or accuracy depending upon design and performance differences between the long and short rifles.

I would pick the GBX myself given the opportunity, simply because of the full metal build.
Nothing wrong with the DB at all, quite the awesome blaster for sure…… but just lacking that solid metal frame.

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The GBX JG has the long and short versions, the short version is much heavier, mainly due to the front end. If you are playing outdoors I would recommend the long version. Another point on all the ones I have worked on (lost count at this point as I am near the field selling them) is that the gearbox is identical on both, except the piston. Piston on long version is a metal rack item, while the short is a nylon piston. If you are planning on using 11v battery, the long is going to be a better choice, though I wouldn’t call it a deal breaker as the piston with the metal rack is not great, and is best replaced with an shs or equivalent piston anyway.
I have skirmished both, and outdoors, much prefered the long version as it is lighter.

You can’t go past the CYMA M4 @$165 (no scope or suppressor) they are excellent value for money and easy to upgrade

The GBX is the metal Bad Boy at almost the plastic M4 version cost. At $220 it’s the best deal for metal I know of as other Metal blasters like this go for $400+

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I ended up getting the double bell. The GBX was $250 but coming from out of town and it seems clear they are an experience company rather than a products company. Might have worked out fine, but slow turn around times on queries (not sure why they wouldn’t talk to me on the phone) meant that I wasn’t going to get it before a game this weekend so I bought the DB locally from tactical edge. $185ish with a 10% off code.

In truth I suspect I’d be happy with almost any gun because I’m such a noob. Looking forward to Saturday.

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Congratulations :clap:
According to @BradleyPhillipsYT I don’t think that you will be disappointed with the DB.

The CYMA M4 CQB’s were a good thing at the time, especially when we were getting them on sale for $80 odd dollars…… but you have got a good blaster at a good price with the DB :ok_hand:

I wouldn’t factor resale value into your considerations… :thinking:

Gel blasters have never been a good value added investment, at least not for me. I’ve lost count of how many I’ve just given away in the past because they’re just so hard to sell and buyers never want to pay what they’re worth.

If you’re just starting out, look for quality and reliability, best fit for your budget, and best fit for your preferred style. Don’t discount nylon blasters either. Weight isn’t everything… :wink:

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I’m wanting to get into gel blasters and i was surfing the internet and saw this: JM M4A1 Gen 9 J9 w/ Nylon Gearbox Gel Blaster [CLEARANCE] - Renegade Blasters the Jingming gen 9 m4a1, im not sure if this is a good buy but its 50% off so i though id be a good deal. i also want to get a hand guard to place attachments on it and a few hardened gels (maybe a hop up as well) what do you think?


in total without the hopup the price is 140 aud