Now after 2 months and several email traffic with different exhibitors
since our visit, I had the chance and time to write a full fledged
Summary about our experience and encounters at the Nuremberg IWA 2013
Exhibition.
After waking up at our “headquaters” at 6am in the morning, we packed
us a small lunch (in typical german manners – bread buns with salami
and cheese) stuffed our “equipment” in the car and headed off to
Nuremberg, which is around 200km (2 hours) away.
After arriving and getting our Entry passes we started to mark the
exhibitors with a circle in the guide-map, in whom we were more
interested (like russian and eastern block exhibitors) and went into the
busy exhibition halls.
First and probably our personal highlight of the exhibition was the Booth of “RoS” – RusOpticalSystem.
They have engineered a nifty and never seen before lenssystem within
their scopes. I won’t go too much into detail, since we wrote already a
very detailed post about their amazing scopes! Check it out here!
Just a few meters away there was a Booth of “Sightmark“,
where the CEO personally greeted us very friendly. They have some cool
products including a Bore sight which can be fitted to several Guns and
Rifles due to a Magnet and a cone, which makes it possible to fit any
Barrel and a big variety of good and rugged looking Red-Dot sights in
even greater price range! More to follow on that!
Our next stop was at the “Light my Fire”
Booth in Hall 4 in the “Scandinavian Outdoor Group (S.O.G.)” Corner.
Besides some pretty cool Outdoor eating dishes and several Firemaking
and cooking equipment we saw this beautiful child of Mora and Light my
Fire! It is a cooperation Work of both Companys which combines the great
Morakniv Compainion MG Knife (Read our review about the proven classic here!)
and a Fire Steel which is hidden in the Butt of the Grip and holds in
place via a bayonet lock. You can strike the fire steel on the dull back
of the blade and “light your fire”! Stay tuned for a full review
exclusivly here on Gruppa L from us!
Something
that caught my attention was this littel neat carbine Kit from CZ which
is intended for the CZ 75 Duty – a modern polymer duty pistol version
from the all-time classic CZ 75 (Read our KWA CZ 75 review here!) – Is it that obvious that I am a CZ fan?
The next Booth in our little “paperchase” around the exposition grounds was “Aimpoint”
– you’ve probably heard already of this company - probably. It was the
exact same Booth as last year and there was nothing special besides the
above shown Corner/Mirror sight – which is in my opinion one of the
unpractical ones on the market – no quick flip thing or something. You
have to attach and deattach the whole unit with the mirror….Not to
mention that I was really disaimpointed…I mean
disappointed of their red dots. Nearly every red-dot sight got a 1 MOA
dot, which is too small for their “purpose”, which is fast target
aqusition in CQB situation (especially the Micro ones). Not to talk
about the ghosting while looking trough the sights (and we tested
several red-dot sights on the booth, to make sure that we not
accidentally used one which was already mangled and abused by all those
exhibition visitors). In my personal opinion I would
rather buy a chinese clone then the original one, since then the price
justifies the quailty. Not to mention that I don’t promote the buying of
fake products - well in conclusion, I liked the blue rubber guns the most at this booth.
The next cool thing we encountered in Hall 1. There was a “small” Booth from “RADETEC” kinda hidden, since it was across from the HUGE “Carl Zeiss” Booth and a lot of visitors walked just by this amazing product.
So
what is this “amazing” product? Well it is a Bullet-Counter! All your
Counter-Strike and Call of Duty or Battlefield Dreams come true! A new
pair of Handgripss which got a little backlit LED display on the right
side of the grip above your triggerfinger which shows after each shot
how may bullets are left in your magazine (including the one chambered!)
So how does it work? Well first of all you need a pair of those fancy
looking grips for your pistol (They displayed a Beretta M9, Glock 17 and
a 1911 besides a M4/M16 Rifle prototype). The second thing is a special
Magazine Follower you need to install in your magazine (or you buy the
already modified magazines directly from RADETEC). So the Grips know
where the follower is positioned and then let you know how many rounds
you got left in the magazine via the display! They also got a “LED
advisor” version. Since they said in high stress situation it can be
difficult to read the number on the indicator, they made some kind of
“traffic light” system. Not sure how the numbers were, but something
like “blue or green = 5 rounds left”, “yellow” = 4 rounds left” and
“red= 3 or less left”. The red also starts flashing if you have only 1
round left. Maybe we can take a more detailed look into this at some
point later.
Some
quite good and high-quality looking Scopes caught our attention while
passing by. A Romanian Booth with some unbelivable unfriendly romanian
exhibitors. We really were interested in their different scopes, which
in fact were amazing – nearly as good as the Schmidt&Benders one.
But they kept taking the “fake” rifles with the mounted guns out of our
hand and didn’t let us take their flyers and don’t even wanted to talk
with us properly.
But oh well – lets keep it professional and talk some names and numbers. The Name of the company was “Valdada”
and they appear to be settled in Bucharest, Romania. We really liked
the Short-dots from them with changeable magnification and illuminating
reticle (as you can see above). Well, numbers I don’t have, thanks to
some grumpy exhibitors – but you can see the prices and specs on their
homepage by yourself.
As we passed by the “EKA” Booth, we saw the updated version of the EKA Viking Combi Saw (Read the full review here!),
which included just a color update. We were also shown a new
“switchblade” (take the “switch” in “switchblade” literally) –
officially called the “EKA G3 Swingblade” which is for hunting and
fishing purposes. It has a regular blade on one side and then you
“swing” it around by 180 degrees and get a “gutting” blade. The
Rubberized Grip feels very good in hand and sticks really to your hand.
Maybe later we will have the oppurtunity for a full review.
Finally
we got into Hall 7A where a few of the “Big” Companys in terms of
Airsoft were displaying their products. First stop was “Real Sword Company“. You
guessed it right! The RS GBB SVD was the main attraction on this Booth,
which was identical to last years Booth. Non-the less, they were very
friendly and tried to answer all our questions – well the only one we
had was “When will you release the GBB SVD?” and they couldn’t answer
us… But I really liked the display of the GBB SVD and the parts from the
“making it” and their different stages – all to touch and feel!
But
to be fair, we asked also about their amazingly well build Chinese
QBZ-95/97 and QBU-88 AEGs (they feel great!) and if they intend to build
GBB versions of them and their AK/Type 56 as well. They said that they
are considering it, but there are no plans yet of doing so. So again, no
real answer, despite the companys name – We will keep you up to date anyhow!
Passing by the “Trijicon”
Booth we couldn’t help ourself and look trough this amazing futuristic
looking Scope with rangefinder and windspeed indicator mounted on a blue
rubber M249 SAW (sadly no PKM).
The
Mother of all Assault Rifles and Rifle Mounted Night Vision systems.
The Sturmgewehr 44 (Stg/MPi 44) in the “Vampir” (Vampire) set-up. Neat
display!
Finally we got to “KWA”
and got a first-hand look at the AKG-74M GBB. After asking them when
they want to release the GBB on the Market, we were told it will come
out in May 2013 – yeah right. I also asked if this would be a real
release date, since they said the same thing in 2011 Shotshow Las Vegas
and 2012 at IWA in Germany. We were told that this is a crystal clear
release date in will come in May 2013 to USA and Europe…hmm.. let me
take a look at my calendar….could get quite narrow with this date…
However, they were very friendly. We asked why they intended to built
this “stroke shortening piston” in the GBB? Since it would be more
realistic to have a full-stroke rifle – since they call their GBB
Rifles “Professional Training Products”. We were told that it
could be due to US Goverment rules reason, that any “toygun” must be
built in a way that you can never turn it in a real firearm. Sounds
legit. After asking if it is possible to remove it afterwards, he said,
maybe, but was not sure if it will still work afterwards. We will see…
Sadly no Trace of the MKV “Makarov” GBB and also no date could be
elicited from the guys and girls there. We were told that it is still in
testing etc. I cought one of them red handed, after asking why they
intended to discontinue the KWA CZ-75
(KZ-75). I was told that it wasn’t. After a few seconds he asked some
collegue and was told that he was wrong – I had to smirk a bit. Never
the less- we will keep you up to date what is going on with the Makarvo
and the GBB AK from KWA!
EOTech
got a “new” Holo-sight called the X-Bow and is intend for the same. As
you can see there is a new reticle with a ballistic correction
“display”. Next to that was the “strange” Biohazard Holosight with the
Biohazard sign as reticle in green….with salutes from Call of Duty.
Intrestingly
we found a Zeiss Scope which will be used and is intended for the
German Military (Bundeswehr) at some Red-dot Booth, which was not
Carl-Zeiss.
We also passed by “UTAS”
and took a look at the updated UTS-15 shotgun with its revoulutinary
magazin system, which allows you to feed 2 different ammo types by the
flick of a switch. Now with a integrated Flashlight/Laser System. (Side
note: Kel-Tec’s KSG was produced 1 year earlier then the UTS-15 and has the same magazine system)
The
Strizh or “Strike-One” was actually one of my most anticipated things I
wanted to see. But the Booth was a disappointment. The Guns were fixed
on the table, you couldn’t move any part of them and the exhibitors
around the booth didn’t talked english or german. It felt quite god ON
my hand, since I couldn’t lift it I can;t say jack about the weight,
etc. and how it felt IN my hand. Well maybe next year…
We
found some Russian chemical Exhibitor, who have some Signal Flares and
Grenades for Traingin Purposes. Sadly also here they spoke a really bad
english and didn’t understand well enough our questions.
The
Trainng Grenade had already a BAM-certificate, which is needed here in
Germany to ensure safety for the consumer and in use. No information on
retail price, though…
Not sure if this is actually something new – but “Molot” got a 4.5mm bb Airrifle version of the PSSH-M. Feels great and looks even greater Probably not precise at all tough – but who knows? I like it anyways.
“G&G”
got something new in their product line – somehting new in the Airsoft
scene to be precise. It is a hybrid system of GBB and AEG. Besides 1
(one) Prototype displayed and this huge billboard (see first picture
above – and read) there was not much to see or information about it.
After taking the pictures and trying to open it to take a closer look we
were asked to stop. Hmm… my guess is that the propane will only propell
the Blowback and the BB’s will fly via the AEG system – also if the
billboard says otherwise.. maybe more to come…
zhmash!
Yay! Well first thing that caught our view was this “strange” AK
variant called “Saiga MK 107″ – It reminded me immediately at a AK-107
(well obvious due to the name with the 107 in it and the BARS system).
After we took a bunch of pictures in detail of it and wanted to open it
we were also told again to stop it and were asked to stop taking
pictures – well too late, lady!
Looks
like a civil version of the PP-19-01 “Vityaz” – I took it down the
shelve and loved it right away! Would love a GBB version of this thing.
Not to mention that the frontgrip was really ergonomic (any information
about the Frontgrip and where to get it would be appreciated!) I also
really liked the Tacitcal Magazin release on that Saiga-12 (picture
below) – I have only seen those which goes under the triggerguard.
It was a kinda difficult to leave this Booth, as you might guess – so many things to see and touch…
“ASG” got behind a glas display a CZ Scorpion EVO3-A1 AEG Prototype. Looks cool! Will be on my watch as well.
We saw this Booth actually by accident, but are quite happy we did encountered it! The Company called “TLSFx”
specialized themselfs into making great wargame grenades. From Smoke,
to “Fraggrenades” filled with BB’s or Paintballs to even functional
flying Mortar rounds with Smoke trails to lay smoke down in the
distance. What makes this Company so special is that not even they take
good care that their products are enviroment-friendly but also
affordable! I really enjoyed chatting with the owner of this fine
company. More to come definitley- including heavy testing with a full
fledghed review afterwards!
After
passing by alot of Booth’s specialized in Nightvision, Digitalt
Nightvision and Thermal Vision, I decided not to write all the details
all in here but dedicated a seperate Post to this Matter with some more
technical information (since net’split is gonna write it – he’s the NVG
& Thermal Professional)
Well that was it actually for now – It was a great experience after
all – alot of Hunting accessories and clothing and clay-pigeon equipment
sadly – but thats ok. We enjoyed the 2 days and met alot of intresting
people and even more intresting products. We hope we could bring you a
little insight on this years IWA Exhibition.
If you want to have any details on something mentioned here are have
something particular on your mind, feel free to ask us via the comment
function.
26.05.2013 – by Logisticz for Gruppa L
A bit late, but just found the blog and.. well, got to this page so I guess i Like it :P.
AntwortenLöschenBtw, Valdada is a US company (not Romanian) that imports and sells Romanian scopes on US market. The company that produces them is called IOR and it's been in the business for quite some time. They do have some pretty good optics.