PLAYING THE LONG GAME

SOME GBB PLATFORMS ARE DESTINED FOR ICONIC STATUS AS SOON AS THEY APPEAR ON THE MARKET, WHILE OTHERS, ESPECIALLY NEW DESIGNS THAT HAVEN’T APPEARED IN THE MAINSTREAM BEFORE, TAKE A LITTLE LONGER TO TAKE ROOT AND GROW ON YOU! WHEN THE B&T-LICENCED LAMBDA DEFENCE GEN I GHM-9 LANDED WITH US SOME TIME AGO, AND WE HAD OUR DOUBTS, BUT WITH THE CONSTANT DEVELOPMENT PROGRESS OF THIS INITIAL MODEL AND THE RELEASE OF THE GEN II IT APPEARS WE’VE FOUND ANOTHER “CLASSIC” IN THE MAKING! BILL AND DAN DELVE DEEPER…

Every so often we see a platform that just doesn’t cut it, and our approach to this is to speak with the manufacturer or distributor that provided it for test and evaluation with our comments as to why we believe it is not “fit for purpose”; it’s then down to them to rectify these issues and come up with functional solutions that make the platform work as it should before we revisit it in order to create a review.

It’s not the “AIRSOFT ACTION WAY” to simply slag something off before it even has a chance to shine, as over the years we’ve seen too many “first runs” that were lacking, but that with a little finessing have gone on to become true airsoft classics. If there is a failing in the design and the manufacturer is unwilling to admit this and make a fix then we’ll tell you, but everyone should have the benefit of the doubt, and the focus shouldn’t be on the player/buyer to fix what the manufacturer should have done in the first place!

Over a year ago we were kindly “gifted” a Lambda Defence GEN I GHM-9 GBB and it quickly became apparent that there were “issues”; Dan in the USA also received one to work on that suffered the very same issues…

However, as always, we delved deeper and we discovered that a number of the first batch, including the one we had, had been “greyed-in”, that is they were pulled into stock early and from outside the approved distribution channel from who knows where without any of the quality-control checks that should have taken place.

These “grey” GEN I models were deficient, and I can be no plainer than that, but then without going through the correct procedures the retailers that ended up with them for sale really had no idea what they were getting, and indeed speaking to one particular retailer he told me that he would be withdrawing the models he had for sale, and taking the loss on the chin rather than disappoint players… and trust me, they WOULD have been disappointed.

This just goes to show how, as Stewbacca would say “the East is the new Wild West”, and apparently some folk are okay with a bit of “grey dealership”; but stock arriving outside the usual distribution chain can come from anywhere, and end up being junk. This is why I, and we, work directly with manufacturers and reputable, professional distributors as that way we can be certain that all the correct “checks and balances” are in place.

When we recommend something to you it’s because we, and they, have done “due diligence” to to the smaller G-Series magazines of the GEN I, benefitting from a new lower receiver and gas chamber. They also told us (as we reported in the daily web news) that;

“The GEN II will be hitting the AIRSOFT WORLD store later this month! Improvements from the GEN I include the angle of the magazine (MP9 or Glk), with improved performance and gas efficiency in the GEN II due to the new nozzle and improved MP9 mag, which also has yet to freeze up in use, even down to 5C ambient temp!”

Thankfully we’ve had chance to spend some quality time with the GEN II now, and it already has fans among the AA Crew other than me! Ben said after our photoshoot “I want one… with all the accessories… just let me know how much!”… and that’s quite an endorsement right there!

Parris Island; suffice it to say, he wouldn’t exactly be in a hurry to receive it back! Nevertheless, I took advantage of the window of time that was afforded to get an early start on the work so it would be ready well before his return. As it happens, however, the “grasshopper mouse” proved to have more than a few curveballs ready to throw my way.

Upon receiving the unremarkable brown box that housed the GHM-G 9, I set about immediately gassing up the factory magazine and loading it with 35 .30g BB’s. The tech in me was curious about the stock performance; both from being able to gauge what could potentially be improved upon, and also so I had a benchmark to measure against.

It was a pretty warm day out, with the high sitting in the upper 80’s. After racking the charging handle and letting it fly home (well almost… it actually

WITH

BIT OF

DEALERSHIP”; STOCK ARRIVING OUTSIDE THE USUAL DISTRIBUTION CHAIN CAN COME FROM ANYWHERE, AND END UP BEING JUNK. THIS IS WHY I, AND WE, WORK DIRECTLY WITH MANUFACTURERS AND REPUTABLE, PROFESSIONAL DISTRIBUTORS” guns, which are sporting lightweight tuned triggers that flutter their wings if you breathe on them. This felt like a heavy milspec trigger with an indefinable break. My .30g sailed about 20’ before taking a nosedive. At maximum adjustment of the hop up wheel, I was able to get it to lift the .30g’s relatively well, but they petered out after about 50’ and the groups were frankly terrible. Full auto was all but useless, turning in even worse range and groupings. Rather frequently, the bolt carrier was getting stuck about ¾ of the way back and would require assistance to close.

Initially I blamed the accuracy on the heavy trigger causing me to pull my shots, and I also suspected (like many GBBs), it was probably heavily overlubricated. I took it into my shop and disassembled it for inspection. As it turns out, the gun was bone stacked up against even a bone stock AEG. No matter. the joke, this is a tongue-in-cheek jab at CZ’s marketdominating Scorpion SMG.

The Lambda receiver comes effectively bare, but includes new Torx screws for affixing the innards from the old receiver. In this case, the only thing you’re really transferring over aside from the bolt carrier group is the barrel mount.

One of the things I quickly discovered is the threads on the barrel mount were not cut cleanly and I had to chase them out with a metric tap to clean them up. This also included the threads for the two grub screws that hold the outer barrel in place. Both of those were actually bodged and the topmost screw required an extractor to remove it. Fortunately I keep a stock of metric hardware on hand, including grub screws, so it wasn’t a loss. After the barrel block was fixed, I installed the outer barrel for the SD kit into it.

This is kind of a cool looking assembly, albeit pretty short, which has some neat porting replicating the real steel version. That the outer barrel is just held in place with grub screws is a little odd to me though. It would later turn out that these became a problem as the recoil vibrated them loose and the outer barrel began to wobble around. Adding some thread locker to the grub screws and ensuring they were sufficiently tight solved this issue.

There is no indication of which end is “up” for the outer barrel, so I simply arranged it in the manner which best allowed me to time the mock suppressor so the trades were displayed nice and level. The mock suppressor itself is hollow and benefits from having a thin O-ring added to the cap to prevent that from vibrating loose. From here, you can actually attach the SD rail to the receiver. This is large enough to slide over the mock suppressor and conceals the base of it for a little bit of a recessed appearance. Aesthetically speaking, this rail setup also looks the most attractive to my eye.

Next, I turned my attention to the hop up assembly. The GHM-G uses a fairly basic chamber design, which consists of two clamshells that clamp around the inner barrel and a rotary wheel on top for the adjustment. The hop up arm itself is very much reminiscent of an AEG design, and it even uses cylindrical nubs like an AEG. After assembling the Crazy Jet and a Maple Leaf bucking, I noticed that the entire assembly was able to shift around inside the hop up chamber. As it would turn out, the chamber itself sits on the loose side, and no combination of bucking or barrel actually sat tightly within it. I ended up sanding the right half of the chamber down so I could get it to sandwich tighter around the bucking and barrel and prevent these from shifting back and forth. This at least did the trick, but as I was to discover, my accuracy woes were far from over.

With the newly assembled and upgraded SD assembly completed, I loaded up a fresh magazine and set about for some test fire. The action was admittedly the definition of what one would find in Webster’s Dictionary of the English Language under “gritty”, and I dare say that was putting it lightly!

I ran about a dozen BBs through it before I realized

I was wasting my time and had to remedy the roughness of the componentry before I could proceed further. At this point, the gun was a borderline boltaction by way of operation.

A friend across the pond and GHM-9 owner himself, Keith Fox, pointed out that these are plagued with “sticky bolts” and the culprit is the bolt release catch tends to stick up a little high and drag on the bolt. This was definitely the case with my example. After giving it a little trim with a file and a polish to smooth it all up, this did help improve the action. Still, it was rough. After more investigation, I would subsequently find that the post at the end of the charging handle was digging into the top of the receiver. That was solved by turning down the outer diameter until it adequately cleared. Then, the underside of the bolt carrier was rough as sandpaper as it rode over the top of the hammer. A nice polish smoothed that up. Further gains could likely be had by polishing the guide rails for the bolt carrier and the grooves in the bolt carrier itself. But I was at a stage now where the physical operation of the bolt was dramatically smoother than it was in pure stock form.

Keith had also recommended some 3D printed “pre-load spacers” for the guide rods. These basically slide over the guide rods and create more spring tension so the bolt operates less sluggishly. True enough, the stock springs are rather weak. In fact, I was observing a disconcerting amount of bolt bounce because of the weak springs. I suspect this would also be part of the reason why the velocity was so erratic.

I sent the Cults 3D STL link to my buddy Bob Kay who printed me off a small pile of spacers to play with. The spacers did help with the return stroke of the bolt, and the bouncing issue itself was fully rectified by their use. This proved a double-edged sword, however, as now I was suffering other issues arising from their use.

The Crazy Jet and (now current intern) Maple Leaf MR Hop bucking proved to be a pretty decent combination in semi-auto. The range was extended greatly and the accuracy much improved. The real issues started when you flip the gun to “fun mode” and try to run it in full auto. Here, you’d have better results just throwing the BBs as they simply roll out

FROM

A THIN O-RING ADDED TO THE CAP TO PREVENT THAT FROM VIBRATING LOOSE. FROM HERE, YOU CAN ACTUALLY ATTACH THE SD RAIL TO THE RECEIVER. THIS IS LARGE ENOUGH TO SLIDE OVER THE MOCK SUPPRESSOR AND CONCEALS THE BASE OF IT FOR A LITTLE BIT OF A RECESSED APPEARANCE” the end, nosedive 10’ from the bore, or just shoot for the moon. Regardless of any myriad of barrel and bucking combinations I tried, I was unable to fix this issue. Suspecting the preload spacers might be affecting full auto mode, I removed those and checked the results. Interestingly enough, a lot of the issues I was experiencing in full auto went away. The groups were still terrible, of course, but at least now I was hopping BBs out there. But the bolt bounce had returned, and with the return of the bolt bounce so too did the wildly erratic velocity. Since I had a bunch of the spacers available to me, I experimented around with cutting them to differing lengths, trying to find the right combination to combat both the bolt bounce issue, velocity and accuracy issues plaguing it. Alas, No dice…

“Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results” ...a quote popularly misattributed to Albert Einstein, but still very apropos here. I would not let this become my new white whale, though. I just needed distance. And with distance comes fresh perspective and new ways to solve old problems. In the meanwhile, purgatory awaited my recalcitrant Swiss friend; I set down the Lambda, picked up all the parts and pieces and put them into a plastic bin. Setting a lid atop the morass of parts and the detritus of failure, I mused to myself that this story wasn’t quite over yet… “Until we meet again.”

The Good

Bill: Thankfully “my grey” wasn’t as bad as the one that Dan had, and after speaking to AIRSOFT WORLD I simply had all the original O-rings swapped out, the bolt release filed down, and some jiggery done on the nozzle.

Whilst, as Dan said, the velocity is still somewhat erratic the GHM-9 GEN I is now perfectly usable, and I’m getting a mean of 0.75 Joule/285fps on .20g using VORSK V6 Fuel with it. Semi and full both work just fine now, although not all G-series mags appear compatible, so you’ll need to check with what you already own.

Accuracy for such a short barrel is as expected, that is solid to 10m then dropping off over distance. The

RELEASE adaptability of this licensed replica is great though, exactly the same as the real deal too, so you can interchange pistol grips, hand-guards, outer barrels, flash-hiders, suppressors, stocks and a myriad of gucci, so basically it’s as versatile as an AR/M4 style platform in the way of accessories!

Dan did mention that on his GEN I he had some issues with the picatinny rail; again my own didn’t appear to have that problem and a LayLax/First factory folding stock works perfectly. I also fitted a muzzle device from a LEVAR to the stock short polymer outer barrel… wrong I know, but it looks cool and “suppressor ready” to me!

Of course both Dan and I are working with “flawed grey goods”, and now that the two variants have arrived in their properly finished form from the actual manufacturer and NOT a dubious intermediary, if the GEN II is anything to go by the GEN I is also undoubtedly rockin’ n rollin’ from the box too!

And the GEN II is a peach as far as I can see; AIRSOFT WORLD kindly sent me down the GBB itself along with a big old box of parts, and again I have to say that Lambda Defence have made everything up to the standard that B&T as the licencee would expect of a replica with their name on it.

Everything is made out of premium-grade aluminium, steel and nylon to make it absolutely bomber-tough, and the woes that Dan experienced with bad tapping and the like are nowhere in evidence as all the accessory parts fit together brilliantly, and if anything add further strength and rigidity to an already stable little platform. And I love the fact that is truly is a “mix and match as YOU like” setup; when the GHM-9 arrives it is absolutely just a bare-bones solid, base platform on which to build!

For our test model I installed a new metal outer barrel which is swiftly and simply installed by just removing the rail system to access two further hex screws deeper in the body; it’s then a simple matter of unscrew, release the original polymer outer barrel, replace with the new metal one that carries threading for the suppressor (the new chunky fellow, not the skinny-ass one that Dan had! Please note that the grey-railed version shown in our main images is a prototype, and that the finished production version will be black), replace the old rail with a much longer one, and then attach the suppressor “barrel”.

Same deal with the excellent sliding stock; simply remove the back of the receiver which incorporates the form-the-box picatinny rail by punching through two push-pins (G3/MP5 style), replace with the part for the stock, and slide that on… done… and once together it all feels solid as a rock and looks superb!

B&T are rightly protective of their reputation, and therefore it comes as a bit of a surprise to

WORLD KINDLY SENT ME DOWN THE GBB ITSELF ALONG WITH A BIG OLD BOX OF PARTS, AND AGAIN I HAVE TO SAY THAT LAMBDA DEFENCE HAVE MADE EVERYTHING UP TO THE STANDARD THAT B&T AS THE LICENCEE WOULD EXPECT OF A REPLICA WITH THEIR NAME ON IT” handful, and beautifully balanced; the alloy/steel parts and the 48 BB metal magazine account for most of this weight as the body, just like the real thing, is of a reinforced, lightweight polymer, although you can also now add a metal upper as an accessory if you so desire.

The whole construction of the GHM-9 is very realistic and it feels extremely durable; it can indeed be field stripped just like the real thing. The cocking handle is functional with a realistic metal bolt, and even the stock cocking handle can be replaced with ultimately it’s shorter engagement distances that the “real deal” was created for. Cranking up to full-auto sends BBs downrange with some gusto and a nice recoil impulse, and it was easy to achieve short bursts thanks to a balanced trigger, albeit one that is a little heavy, but no heavier than some other GBBRs in my gas armoury… the GEN II is actually a delight, and a whole heap of fun, to shoot.

Overall I have to say that both variants of the Lambda Defence GHM-9 have certainly found a place in my heart, and I really will be disappointed to hand the GEN II sample back. Although Dan obviously will return to “his grey GHM-9” in due course to complete the project (and we’ll detail that when it happens), the performance of even “my grey GEN I” is now up to scratch for CQB encounters at least, although I will definitely be adding the new “chunky boi” suppressed front end to mine… I may even have to buy a new GEN II lower as well, as in addition to the 48 BB MP9style mags I found in testing that my VMP-1 mags fit and function too, although they are a little tight! That’s the joy of the GHM-9 as a GBB platform in my mind, it is VERY modular, and VERY versatile, and therefore can be thoroughly individual too!

If you’re looking for a cracking, compact CQB tool, or an absolutely excellent back-up for a sniper rifle then I have to recommend the GHM-9 to you now. With both variants currently under UK£200 it’s a solid price for a gas machine-pistol, although as with all GBBs buying extra magazines will send this price up ...unless you already own G-series or MP9-compatible mags, then you’re quids in! It’s a really solid performer and it appears that Lambda Defence have now made the absolute most of their licence, and apparently with them set in for the long game it seems that good things really do come to

My sincere thanks go to AIRSOFT WORLD for the loan of the GEN II review sample, along with all their patient help and advice to get my own GEN I up and running. Head over to www.airsoftworld.net to check out both models, along with a whole raft of cool