Are the WE 1911's reliable/any good?

[XOIIO]

Hey all, so I finally want to get myself a proper gas blowback pistol, and the tan colored 1911 meu has really caught my eye. I've been doing lots of googling and I see a lot of back and forth about we guns, apparently they can be quite good or utter trash from the start.

One thing is that parts seem to be harder to find than tokyo marui or kj works, and there is one full metal 1911 in tan from kj works but it seems very uncommon, and in general kj works is out of my price range, though I did see a quite reasonable all black one, though it took co2 cartridges (I'd like green gas so I can just use propane and add oil every now and then).

Now I won't be doing a bunch of airsoft battles with it, maybe the odd one with my cousins when I visit, it's mostly for the odd thing of target practice, and also just something cool to have around. That being said for a $200+ purchase I don't want something that's as good as a statue.

So for the 1911's in specific from WE, are they worth the purchase? I've got some feelers out to see if anyone can get the tan kj works 1911 in even though it doesn't quite have the look I want, but I'm not feeling too sure that the retailers I sent emails to will be able to get them.

The first pistol guide seems to indicate that the quality has gotten better over the years which does lift my spirits, I'm hoping for people with heavy use of them to chime in their experience, because if a heavy user likes it it should be more than good enough for my extremely casual use case. A lot of the threads I find are quite old as well hence me asking again, which unfortunately will probably annoy some of you.

[Drakker]

WE is in the process of updating their 1911 pistols, they are starting to pop up as "Gen 2" WE 1911. You have to be careful because some retailers have been flagging 1911 from WE as Gen 2 for a while, but these were barely upgraded 1st gen. The true Gen 2 have much better engineering, at least on paper. We'll have to see if its any better when real reviews start to pop up. WE have been using better materials on their newer full metal models (such as their Gen 2 Berettas), so chances are that the Gen 2 will be a pretty good pistol, but for now, there's no way to know, and their "Gen 1" are complete garbage made from cheese, bananas and other soft materials.

[XOIIO]

Ah interesting, a WE rep pointed me to an asian distributor that makes the pistol with a longer barrel for the 366fps limit here so it can be purchased and brought into canada apparently, I've sent them an email and also just asked now if it is gen 2 or not. That would be great if it is considering the price will also likely be cheaper than what I get here, $138 for the gun itself, at least in the stock form, waiting to hear back and I'm not sure what the shipping will be.

Best price I found was around $240 cad, free shipping and comes with a suppressor and barrel for it.

I asked them what "full marking" means, I haven't seen that on the tan 1911 anywhere, and it's $10 more so maybe it is a gen 2

[Drakker]

Once you pay shipping, taxes and tariffs, it will probably be 240$ or more. You are better off buying in country.

Markings have nothing to do with the generation. Also, if for some reason, while shipping the gun with full marking goes through the USA, it will be seized there and you won't have any recourse. They don't allow full trademarks over there, not even in transit. Make 110% sure the shipping route goes straight to Canada. Once it gets here, it will likely be seized by customs, its possible that they will keep it for many weeks, may even test it, and if it doesn't fire the advertised 366 fps with 0.20g BBs, they will destroy it and you will have no recourse.

So, in short, don't bother importing it yourself, it's asking for trouble. Especially with the extremely weak Canadian dollar, Canadian retailers make their markup by saving tons on shipping with high quantities orders, which is something you obviously can't do.

[XOIIO]

$149.62 shipped with the longer barrel which comes to 202 cad*, and they provide the customs declaration with a test. For another $50 cad i can get the one with a supressor though it's not full markings and I haven't heard back from them. I guess full markings means that it is as close to authentic as possible?

It's still tempting, I'll have to ask them about the shipping route and whatnot.

[XOIIO]

This is the example documentation that goes with gun sales.




I've asked if they can test one of the exact models and send me the papers, and also asked about the shipping route, and if there would be a guarantee of refund should the item not arrive/get seized. What I'm hoping is to see the lower fps limit be 370 or 375, that sort of range where it is handily above 366 fps.

[XOIIO]

If that doesn't work I may go for this socom gear, at first the brighter handles threw me off but they kind of grew on me now lol, plus I can always change them, and I know for sure it has the threaded barrel that I want. Not sure if the shipping is free or not though, and again it is more than I was hoping to spend especially since it's likely a we (though i hear that they do some kjw as well)

http://www.jsairsoft.com/socom-gear-...-tone-274.html

edit: shit nevermind I missed the out of stock note lol

[Tquilha]

Sorry for the late reply, but here goes my personal experience: Early WE 1911s were very poor and broke very easily. As Socom Gear were basically rebranded WEs, they have the same build quality. From 2015 onwards WE upped their game quite a lot, and newer models are on par with KJW and KWA. Gen2 1911 looks very good, but you need to be careful as said above, some stores are selling the old models as new.