Review: Well AW .338

Puding

Ordered the new Wells G96D aw.338 from gunner about 2 weeks ago, it took about 5 days from payment for the goods to be sent with no communication from gunner had to chase them up myself for the tracking number.

Fortunately the parcel was in Ireland within 3 days with a brief stop in customs over the weekend for there pound of flesh :rolleyes: . Parcel was sent via TNT and i have to say i was not impressed, i waited in on Tuesday for the courier but i received no calls and the door bell never going off, check the web site and i was informed that no one was apparently home when they tried to deliver :mad: . I was not happy so gave tnt a call as i was annoyed that the courier had not call as tnt had my number, they had used it to tell me i had money to pay COD, but for some unknown reason they do not give the number to the driver! i find this rather strange and rather annoying. Enough of my rant onto the new toy

The Well aw.338 is a clone of the star/ares version, it comes in two version ( with and without scope and bipod, scope mount is included with both version ) and 3 colours , black tan and OD. This is just my initial impression of the piece i will not be able to test it fully until this weekend.



Parcel turned up in the normal brown parcel paper covering, the box is a simple affair nothing special but functional.




0.28J i hope not ....



Everything in its box nothing damaged bbs unfortunately had gone everywhere.







The rifle is transformed in a few piece to save on space and to make the box a little bit more user friendly, even the box layout is a copy of the star/ares version. Supplied with good instruction although slightly tatty along with 3 types of allen key all you need to take apart and put together the rifle.

Puding

The rifle is supplied in two main parts, you have the stock/receiver and the barrel/trigger assembly. The stock is matt black with a slightly textured feel to it, feels solid not rattles or flexing. There are seem lines but nothing sharp and no more than can be found on the ares/star version. The rear spring loaded stand is very loss and extends with the slightest knock.





Barrel and trigger assembly is solid as well, matt black finish again with no signs of flaking and wear on the edges.





Both parts go together well with no gaps, the two allen screws hold the two halves together firmly with again no flexing and creaking.

Puding

Stock folds, both solid when extended and folded no movement in mine.




The magazine as we would expect is an exact copy of the ares/star unfortunately no spares are avaliable at the moment, hopefully they will be released in the future as i would like to get hold of some. The magazine uses the same strip system for the bbs, unfortunately i was unable to remove the strip with ease so i did not press the issue at this time as i had no need to remove it and it has not effected operation in any way.

The magazine holds 134a gas without leaking (using a bucket of water to check ) a fill of green gas resulted in a small amount of escaping gas from around the valve, i don;t think this will be an issue but something i will be looking into over the next couple of days.




the bolt is smooth but the bolts nozzle does get court on the lip of the bb housing, you need to apply a small amount of down would force to the bolt assembly to bring the nozzle up a little to stop this happening, something again i will have to look into in the future.

Puding

Package included scope mount scope and bipod, the scope and bipod are the same as supplied with the other Wells products, i personally don;t like there look so will not be using them but both are perfectly usable is your not as picky as me .





Again this is just a first look, a more technical write up will follow.

Puding

Bullwhip

Puding;
Very nice I am looking forward to your review. I wondering about potential durability and build materials as the Star/Ares says the stock is "nylon fiber" and I have read the G96 is ABS. Is there any chance you can get hold of a Star/Ares AW338 owner (Bullets perhaps?) and do a side by side comparrison or at least get some comments from a AW338 owner?
Thanks and cheers.

bitoy1981

is the trigger box of the g96 metal or plastic? if plastic, what is its characteristics? or metal, is it casted, pot or machined metal?

any disassembly guide for this gun? thanks! :-)

SOCOM

I have this rifle same brand but in OD, its developed a really annoying fault, if you cock the rifle, i.e. chamber a BB, and then point the muzzle to the ground the BB rolls out of the barrel, I changed the hop rubber for a prommie but even that does not grip the BB when you just sit the BB on top of it, I tried moving the barrel out of the hop unit itself but to no avail. Is there a specific hop rubber and bucking for this rifle??
Any info would be much appreciated

gian

SOCOM wrote: »

I have this rifle same brand but in OD, its developed a really annoying fault, if you cock the rifle, i.e. chamber a BB, and then point the muzzle to the ground the BB rolls out of the barrel, I changed the hop rubber for a prommie but even that does not grip the BB when you just sit the BB on top of it, I tried moving the barrel out of the hop unit itself but to no avail. Is there a specific hop rubber and bucking for this rifle??
Any info would be much appreciated

ive read in another review that you should use a 'hard type' hop rubber

Captain Chaos

gian wrote: »

ive read in another review that you should use a 'hard type' hop rubber

Thats for +1J countries. For 1J and under, soft rubber hopups work better.

SOCOM

gian wrote: »

ive read in another review that you should use a 'hard type' hop rubber

Thanks dude, stuck in a hard type a couple of days ago and it sorted the problem also stripped and rebuilt mag with new screws and seals, it used to leak like a sieve but it's totally gas tight, it's a cracking rifle now but have to wind down the mag to make her legal

gian

SOCOM wrote: »

Thanks dude, stuck in a hard type a couple of days ago and it sorted the problem also stripped and rebuilt mag with new screws and seals, it used to leak like a sieve but it's totally gas tight, it's a cracking rifle now but have to wind down the mag to make her legal

no problem man, im glad it worked out, if any of you want to sell an OD version let me know LOL

gian

btw i just ordered 1 of these and i have a question about how many rds it can hold some sites say its 10rds some says 22...

gian

got mine today happy days!

MagicIRL

Looks nice indeed! Cheers for the initial review!

metroman

ya nice review with pics im new to this so bare with me please ... is this rifle .gas... i was told the spring verion was more reliable ??? why did you go for gas instead of spring !!!! if anyone can explaine wood be much of an insight for me ... many thank ... o by the way it is a smart looking weapon i have to say hope you have the best of luck with it ...;)

gian

metroman wrote: »

ya nice review with pics im new to this so bare with me please ... is this rifle .gas... i was told the spring verion was more reliable ??? why did you go for gas instead of spring !!!! if anyone can explaine wood be much of an insight for me ... many thank ... o by the way it is a smart looking weapon i have to say hope you have the best of luck with it ...;)

first off yes its gas, yea spring sure does have the reliability and consistency but heres the diffrence, since a spring have to use a typical AEG air compresion setup (ie. cylinder and piston) it leaves the spring sniper less room for a long barrel, remember long barrel = accuracy and range, while the gas sniper doesnt have the consistency it does however offer a full length (650mm for the AW) inner barrel thus giving you what the spring cannot and since the AW uses a regular AEG pres barrel it gives you alot of options on choosing your preferred inner barrel and quite frankly the springer just looks wrong because the magazine usually can be found in the middle of the gun except for the new Marui L96 AWS ( btw no offense spring owners)

metroman

well thanks for the info .. i just bought a spring warrior L96 got it today ... i looks good good wate to it but im lost on how to set the hop up and how to set the scope i live in an appartment in town just bought it for fun .. could you give me any advice on how to sort these,s two problems out ... you seem to know what your talking about .. bare in mind i live in dublin city centre so dont have much room to play around with this gun .. any help at all would be great .. im new to airsoft .. dont intend to play airsoft at the moment maybe in the future .. just want to get this gun as accurate as possible ...

gian

metroman wrote: »

well thanks for the info .. i just bought a spring warrior L96 got it today ... i looks good good wate to it but im lost on how to set the hop up and how to set the scope i live in an appartment in town just bought it for fun .. could you give me any advice on how to sort these,s two problems out ... you seem to know what your talking about .. bare in mind i live in dublin city centre so dont have much room to play around with this gun .. any help at all would be great .. im new to airsoft .. dont intend to play airsoft at the moment maybe in the future .. just want to get this gun as accurate as possible ...

what make is it? do you have the manual?

lpgautogas

Nice post...Greatly appreciated!!!