The Angry Gun L119A2 rails have been released, and have in the past week or so been landing on doormats around the country, and indeed worldwide.

Almost invariably the feedback has been great, and having had a part in bringing them to fruition, I am immensely relieved and gratified to know the community likes them. It really was an effort by the community of airsoft L119 fans for airsoft L119 fans. It’s somewhat surreal, despite having had my own prototype rail for some time, to see the production model cropping up all over on people’s builds.

In total it took about 18 months from the first public sighting of real L119A2s in May 2016 for the product to hit the market. This time included the period taken when several of us were trying to entice manufacturers into looking seriously at the prospect, through early discussion with Angry Gun, the gathering of sufficient information and reference material to allow the design, and discussions between Angry Gun and potential distributors to determine if there was a market for the product. This is where Redwolf UK really stepped up and backed the product where other UK distributors and retailers had been cool on the idea; there RWUK showed foresight, a dedication to deliver an innovative product, and a canny eye for the market, which allowed the whole enterprise to go ahead. From there the product was fully designed, prototyped, tested, refined and then put into production, which was expanded from the initially projected production numbers to meet demand.

I won’t go into specifics, but the popularity of the release has surpassed expectations and it has been a great success. Hopefully this will bode well for more UKSF and L119 related releases in future.

I received my two rails I had ordered from the production run and was pleased to see a couple of the really minor issues I had highlighted with the prototype had been finessed. My rails are currently waiting for base rifles to be added to, but many others on the L119 Owners Club and The Airsoft Diemaco L119 Series Group Facebook Groups have been posting up some truly excellent A2 builds.

While I don’t think anyone has achieved a truly perfect build quite yet, with trademarks, receiver mods, blending, and correct accessories in in one package, a couple are very well on the way and already have rifles which would satisfy all but the most pedantic.

The below are a few of the rifles I have picked out from the groups or which the owners have very kindly sent me information and pictures on – all are stunning builds, and a few varying aesthetics are on show which already displays the variation in function, look and base rifle which is possible. Any who frequent the groups may well recognise all of them, but I wanted to provide a bit of a showcase here.

Andy’s GHK base L119 is the first featured, he has already built a truly excellent L119A1 so I was keen to see how he would deliver an A2 – it certainly doesn’t disappoint. It features all the necessary parts, from the Ergo Grip to the extended charging handle, a TA01ECOS and a Surefire M620v. The whole package looks believably like an issued weapon.

Gaz’s rifle is also GHK based, and features many of the same little details as Andy’s above. Gaz however has opted for the sleeker M600s used on A1s, and features a T1 sight on the CQB upper, a popular choice I also made with mine. Most striking however is the carbine upper, which is really simple and elegant, and again looks like it could have come straight from an armoury. A tiny detail, but a very important one, is that Gaz has modded his uppers using modelling putty to replicate the monolithic IUR, and disguised the join and altered the profile around the ejection port.

James C’s Marui NGRS is a deceptively simple, slick build but if you look closely, many of the key details are there. Trades and the receiver mods should round it out into a build which is absolutely spot on.

James M’s A2 is another GHK build, but this time features the much rumoured Surefire Warden, and an offset mount with another M600. A bold paint job unifies all the disparate parts into a convincing modern build, and the beginnings of wear and chipping to the paint make it look authentic. The chunkier profile of the Magpul ACS stock balances the weapon visually and is true to reference material.

Mike’s Systema PTW L119A2 rounds out the selection. It uses the standard A2 accessories of a M620v, LA-5B and Magpul AFG2, with the optic a T1 on GG&G mount. Everything is true to reference material there and really pulls it together into a convincing L119A2 setup. A Magpul pistol grip is the first pistol grip of the selection to be swapped out from the issued Ergo, and so follows on from the increasing variety of pistol grips shown on later L119A1 build – this also neatly deals with the difficulty of making Ergo grips work for PTWs. The use of a Magpul STR stock, much the same as James’ above, balances the weapon aesthetically. What stands out most for me is the simple but effective paint job, with a variety of tans, greens and browns, which looks very realistic, and is unerringly close in colour palette to an actual painted A2 reference picture I have seen.

Beyond those featured above, there have been loads of really great A2 builds cropping up, and I hope to see many more in future.

Thanks to all the above for providing or letting me feature their builds.