JG Full Metal AK w/ RIS Review | Solid AEG for a Great Price

Wow, JG sure has gotten a lot better over the years.

We were surprised by this particular AEG. You’ll see what we mean as you read.

We’ve been playing airsoft for well over 2 decades now and JG was always known as a budget brand. They had some very strong components (they had ROCK solid gears and a mean motor for some reason) with some other components not being so good (like their tight gearboxes which would make a “whiney” sound no matter how well they were shimmed.

JG has been around for a long time now, and they were one of the first airsoft manufacturers to pioneer the OEM (original equipment manufacturer) idea for airsoft. The first Echo 1 airsoft guns were originally just rebranded JG airsoft rifles for example.

JG AK47 Full Metal Rail System Review Hero Image
JG Full Metal AK47 w/ RIS
JG Full Metal AK47 w/ RIS

Allow us to get into the nitty gritty details as to what this airsoft AK is all about, and why it is one of the best deals you’re gonna find for starter AK builds.

We imagine you’re looking at AK’s because you’re trying to stray away a bit from the bazillion AR15 or M4 airsoft rifle variants out there. It’s okay if you want to be a special snowflake, we certainly do see the appeal of these Eastern Bloc monsters (One of my favorite guns is an AKS74U by CYMA).

Airsoft Gun Specifications:

FPS 400 – 410
Range: Medium – Long
Build Material:
Full Metal Externals, Full Metal Internals
Battery Type:
Rear Wired to Stock (Small Tamiya)
Ammo:0.20g 6mm BB
Stock Type:
Full Stock

External Build

View of the AK barrel & hand guard rail system

We’ll start with the external build – which is actually extremely solid. JG’s are known for their externals being of decent quality. Their full metal bodies seem to be made of metal that’s a bit thinner than the ones from CYMA or A&K, but are every bit as durable.

Barrel

The barrel is full metal and doesn’t wobble in any way. Just like on the real thing, the components that should be metal are fully made of metal and those made of polymer are made of plastic.

Hand Guard / RIS

The included hand guard rail system is rock solid and fully capable of taking any tactical attachments as needed. The picatinny rail runs on all sides of the hand guard, although they’re longer up top than on the sides or bottom. This isn’t really a problem though, since the railed segments are exactly where they need to be.

Full Metal Receiver

This AK’s receiver has zero flex and comes in a mostly matte finish. The paint ends up getting scratched rather easily, but for most airsoft guns that’s fairly normal. To be honest, think the beat-up AK look is just perfect.

The rear sight leaf is authentic to the real thing allowing you to set your elevation to adjust for distance. Although, in the case of airsoft, your BB only has so much range, so you won’t really need to set it for distances more than 100 – 200 feet.

The upper receiver is removable in the same manner as real AK-47’s via a button near to top-back of the receiver. You really won’t need to do this, except to take down the rifle for cleaning or for gearbox work. The charging handle gives you full access to the hop up unit, which utilizes the standard AK hop up (which in our opinion is superior to the rotary gear-style hop ups featured in the airsoft M4 line).

Pistol Grip

Moving to the pistol grip, we’re happy that they went with a modern contoured variant over the standard AK grip. Don’t get us wrong, there’s nothing wrong with the standard AK pistol grip, but we prefer something more comfortable for our hands. By the 7th hour of holding onto this thing, you’re always looking for more comfortable ways to do anything in airsoft.

Fixed Stock

This airsoft gun is rear-wired, meaning the battery compartment is located in the stock. On one hand, stock mounted batteries is great because this allows you to carry a nice large battery for a longer gaming duration. However, accessing the battery compartment will require a Philips head screwdriver, which chances are you’re not carrying out to the field.

We were able to stuff a large 9.6v 2000 mAh block style battery in there with ease.

Internal Build

The internals on the JG Full Metal AK w/ RIS is indicative of how far JG has come from being “just a budget brand” type airsoft gun.

GearboxVersion 3 – Full Metal
Inner Barrel Length445mm
Threading
14mm Counter-Clockwise
Motor TypeShort Blue JG Motor
Hop UpStandard Adjustable AK Style

Gearbox: RPS & Reliability

For starters, the model we received was decently shimmed right out of the box. While there was a bit of the classic JG “whine” every time we fired this gun, it wasn’t nearly as bad as we remember them being back in the late 2000’s.

We did need to adjust the motor height just a little bit, but that’s not hard to do. You can do this by removing the pistol grip and then using an Allen wrench to adjust the height a bit.

Unfortunately, these gearboxes still come with 6mm plastic bushings, but to be honest, we’ve never actually seen plastic bushings fail on stock guns, but if you’re planning to upgrade to a high speed motor or use 11.1V lipo batteries you’ll want to consider getting upgraded here to prevent future failures.

The gears are rock solid as usual, and the motor is a JG “blue” motor that is built for high torque. If you’ve got a good 9.6V NiMH battery.

With a fully charged 9.6v battery we were able to achieve around 16 RPS – which is respectable for a gun in this range.

Compression: FPS Consistency (We were surprised here)

The compression components for this gun surprised us. JG has come a long way in their QA for assembly, as really nothing about the parts seems out of the ordinary for parts on guns of this price range.

Our muzzle velocity checks were as follows:

Shot NumberFPS
1409
2403
3410
4408
5404
6403
7405
8411
9403
10408

As you can see – the shot consistency was quite good, ranging between 403 and 411 in our tests. We consider a variance of 10 FPS pretty good for a stock gun.

Accuracy

Adjusting the hop-up was a piece of cake. We just needed to pull back on the charging handle and move the slider tab forward (less hop) or backward (more hop). After we made those adjustments we tested the accuracy of this AK.

We tested out target out to 125 feet (all we can do during this pandemic), but our groupings at that range were not half bad – with 25 out of 30 shots landing in a 7.5 inch group (good enough for a man-sized target).

We used Elite Force bio 0.25g BBs for our test, and the results are respectable.

For a budget gun, this works as you can expect most engagement distances to be around 125 – 150 feet on a standard field. Personally, we like to play it in closer, but to each their own.

Conclusion: it’s a goodie and very affordable

Considering the low price – this airsoft AK surpassed our expectations for JG’s. In fact, consider it a runner-up in our best airsoft rifles list. See below for our final thoughts:

8.2Expert Score
JG Full Metal AK w/ RIS

Budget friendly AK with above average stock performance. Great for modern PMC or Russian loadouts.

Performance (Accuracy)
8.5
Performance (Reliability)
8
Internal Quality
8
External Quality
8
Value
8.5
PROS
  • Solid external construction.
  • Includes handguard RIS system for installing tactical attachments.
  • Surprising performance in stock configuration.
  • Stacks up well to CYMA budget competitors.
  • Great value
CONS
  • External quality still doesn't quite match CYMA.
  • Does not include AK side rail mounts.

Click on the link below to secure your JG AK from evike.com.

See updated price for this gun on Evike.com

Also consider the CYMA AKS74U as a potential AK alternative. Read our full review here.

What Tactical Attachments Do you Recommend?

The first tactical attachment we’d recommend for this airsoft gun is a flashlight. Yes, we recommend a flashlight over a red dot (the obvious choice) – hear us out.

One of the more difficult things to do is to confirm that your BB hit your target. The BB is small, moving at a fast rate, and the lighting conditions aren’t always the best. A flashlight helps solve this by actually lighting up the BB’s as you’re firing.

Many players are amazed to see that they can actually track a BB in flight with their flashlight and use the impact point to adjust their point of aim, so the next round hits on target.

After that, we commend going with a red dot optic of some kind. Because the hand guard RIS is set so far forward on this AK, you’re not going to get much use out of a scope made for longer distances. However, we’ve found that some kind of red dot optic is more than enough to help you with acquiring and sighting in targets easily.

Remember that red dots need to be zeroed just like actual scopes – you can check out our guide on zeroing your scope here. All the tips there are fully relevant to how you would zero a reflex sight.

Below are some light options as well as some red dot options that should work for this airsoft AK.

Avengers T1 Micro Reflex Sight
Avengers T1 Micro Reflex Sight
Element NEO640U Pro Tactical LED Weapon Light
Element NEO640U Pro Tactical LED Weapon Light

Related Article: Check out our best airsoft guns for beginners buyer’s guide here.

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Timothy Hackett
Timothy Hackett

Tim has been playing airsoft since 1994. With over a thousand (no lie) airsoft games under his belt he has spent countless hours testing various airsoft guns and tactical gear. He's gotten hundreds (still no lie) of people into the airsoft hobby and is more than willing to spread the love of slinging 6mm plastic to any new player.

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