WE Browning Hi Power (FN HP35 Tangent model)

[Strelok]

Review of :

Wei Tech Browning Hi Power 35.

Alright, I realize there are very few reviews of the browning HP35, so I figure I might as well help along with anyone interested in buying one of these in the future.

So, lets start off with a bit of a back history on the Browning HP35:


Courtesy of http://world.guns.ru

The Browning Hi Power is based on an unfinished design by John Browning himself. He originally started the design in the early 1920's to correspond with French Military requirements, requiring a light pistol with a higher magazine capacity, ease of disassembly and assembly. Browning intended the Hi Power to be an improvement of sorts to the previous M1911, and due to selling the patent rights to the 1911, he had to work around such limitations.

Unfortunately, Johns involvement in the firearms design ceased upon his passing in 1927, leaving the design to FN Designer Dieudonné Saive. By the time Saive was given the opportunity to pick up the work on the HP35, the patents of the 1911 expired, allowing him to take features from it to incorporate into the HP35

Following the release of the firearm, Many countries around the world picked up on the design as a service pistol. Ranging from the commonwealth, and even adopted by Nazi Germany during the second world war. The pistol is even used to this very day due to its reliability and exceptional performance.


Introduction



I've been a fan of the browning HP35 for a while. Its an unusual, old design (I'm a sucker for older pistols!) and a nice looking pistol to boot. I originally purchased a Tanaka Hp35 a couple years back. But being a Tanaka, it was next to useless as a pistol to use in games due to their infamous leaky mags, metal infused plastic buildf and inability to use propane. Again, not very ideal for a pistol to use in games, and i'm an outdoors player.

So, while I loved the pistol, I couldn't hold on to it much longer. I sold it and moved on.

Years later, WE released a couple teaser videos of a Browning HP35 that appeared identical to the Tanaka… Only metal. To put things short, I was very intrigued. So, ever since release i've been eyeing the damn thing and finally came across an opportunity to buy the thing. The guys from Karma Import offered a deal to bring in WE pistols at a very low price, I jumped on the deal and got them to bring one in and received it in short order.

Initial Impressions

Due to being a US import, the gun came as is wrapped up nice and tidy in tape and bubble wrap without the original box, manual or any minor extras (Or even trademarks). Which isn't too important as the gun doesn't require 'any' tool for disassembly aside from a fine hex key to get into the internal workings, and I was familiar with the gun from owning the Tanaka in which it was cloned from.

The gun itself is incredibly comfortable to handle, the grip is wide to accomidate a double stack magazine, and is shaped in a way that it seats comfortably within the wrap of your hand. On the top of the slide, there are AK-esque tangent sights and slider, so you can adjust if the pistol shoots too high, low or whatever.

Disassembly

The disassembly is simple and easy, there is a notch in the slide for the safety to latch onto, along with the catch pin that protrudes on the other side of the frame that pushes through easily. The guide rod itself has a spring and ballbearing that prevent the slide catch to slip out on firing.


Lock the slide into place with safety.

Push the pin on the other side, it protrudes quite a bit. It helps if the catch is tilted into the catch notch in the slide.

Remove the pin and catch.

Guide the slide out, and hold the rod and spring, it 'will' fly out if you don't hold it as you remove it.

Concerns

Though, a few concerns came to view as I started picking the thing apart. From scratches set into the metal, a poor paint finish (We's are infamous for their paint) and even a very obvious chip in the slide itself, which they ended up painting over and assembling instead of discarding. I wasn't impressed, but i'll just work around it.



As you see here, there is a very nasty looking chip in the metal where the safety catch fits into. Luckily, this doesn't do ANYTHING to prevent functionality, its just purely cosmetic. I plan on cleaning that area up with a dremel in the future.

For comparison sake, here is a picture of my Tanaka Browning Hp35, present with trades and all.


And the WE itself, without trades, poor paint finish and so on~


Internals

Onto the internals, the gun is basically identical to the Tanaka's and similar to the real HP35. Including a really finicky slide rod and sticky slide. Curiously enough WE forgot to include the hopup grub screw, and on my model, the buffer and washers on the rod itself.



Here is my spring and guide rod. Note the lack of buffer in comparison to this:


Courtesy of Evike's youtube reviewers.

Without the buffers, you'll notice a bit of sticking of the slide as the spring coils create a bit of resistance with the spring port in the slide itself, it keeps the rod aligned and straight within the frame. Getting creative with grease will give a fix, but only a temporary one. Without the hopup? Well, the result is obvious.

Aside from that, the gun was absolutely bone dry inside, which is another WE trademark i've found. The gun would not return the slide without assistance and would jam upon cycling. Adding Molybdenum grease to the roof of the inner slide, and the slide rails itself, the gun becomes VERY crisp in action and doesn't have any issue beyond that.



Moving on to the barrel, the outer barrel itself is rather impressive. It's a very clean aluminum aside from some scuffs thanks to the lack of lubrication on the inner slide. Interestingly enough, WE incorporated the internal threading to take their suppressor adaptor, which I plan on buying in a couple weeks.



On the internal bits, the barrel is a basic brass, probably 6.05 - 08 in diameter with a rather brittle looking aluminum base. As mentioned before, its missing its adjustment screw, and it appears the hopup rubber itself is a bit warped or placed in incorrectly., as I get very drastic curves to the left. Due to that, I won't do any accuracy tests until I have this issue resolved.

Firing

Due to a bit of poor quality control, the gun doesn't seem to have the hopup set correctly, as it seems to be giving the bb a bit of backspin on one of the sides of the rubber, as it makes the BB take a drastic veer to the right. But beyond that, gun shoots to the right very consistantly, no shot really seemed short and the action works back and forth very crisply thanks to the added lubrication on the top of the barrel and inner slide. The magazine holds gas quite well, and shoots the whole capacity with a few more shots to spare afterwards.

The lack of hopup, and the bugginess of it as of current isn't making it all too ideal at all at the moment. I will update a firing test, results and more once I have the current problems remedied.


Conclusion

Anyway, I'm going to temporarily conclude the review here until I can make a few more tests with the proper hardware installed and current issues fixed. I believe the gun shows a lot of promise for the price. Its just the major setbacks (Such as missing PARTS from factory) make this pistol a buy for experienced players only. The gun is unusual, without any of that silly tactical shit that make up the majority of pistols these days, and with a bit of work can become a nice, pretty looking backup that'll fit into any older commonwealth or even modern kits.



Plans for the future

I will be adding a video of a firing test, including accuracy, range and a walkthrough on the disassembly and maitenance

Aside from that, feel free to ask questions and comment.

Thanks!

[sortie39]

The luger is RS???or u make it look aged??

[Strelok]

Its another WE. I just aged it. There are photos of it in the Post your Pistol! thread.

http://www.airsoftcanada.com/showpos...&postcount=712

The clean finish here just seemed to rub off over time... I don't mind, looks good still , Just need real wood grips.

I plan on doing the same to the metal of the Hp35.

[Disco_Dante]

Does the barrel tilt like on a 1911?

[Danke]

A lot of folks over on Arnie's have mentioned no hopup.

Maybe what they used to get the numbers from was missing a few parts?

[Kokanee]

Great review, shame it's not the CDN version or I'd grab one for sure.

[Disco_Dante]

Originally Posted by Kokanee

Great review, shame it's not the CDN version or I'd grab one for sure.

I'm hoping they'll release a model with fixed sights, and fix what's missing with the current model.

[Danke]

There were pictures of a MK III on WE's tool bench at the same time the pictures of the current version were leaked.

Not a sign of an Inglis one though. Too bad; they would have a real captive audience for anyone with the Commonwealth look from the 40s till the 90s.

[Strelok]

They may release a fixed sights model, if anything i'd be happy with just a slide kit considoring the price of the thing...

Alternatively, slides from the Tanaka will work and the aftermarket as well. Might try and source one and give it a shot.

As for the barrel, yes, it does tilt! But with that being said you really have to lube the damn thing up or the barrel and slide jam up.

[Porkchop]

An excellent review.

I wonder if the WE mags will fit the Tanaka GP35.
If they did then that might be a good alternative for mags.


Update Oct 2/2011
managed to get a hold of the WE mag. Construction is slightly different from the Tanaka one. But it seats the same way in the magwell of a Tanaka Browning as the Tanaka magazine does. However, the release valve sit in a different position on the WE magasine as compared to the Tanaka Magazine. As a result gas does not feed properly. The difference is not huge but there, nonetheless. So, based on my experience WE Browning magazines do NOT function in Tanaka Brownings.

I still would like to try out the WE GP35 one of these days.

[pounce_the_jaguar]

An interesting problem has cropped up with my hi power recently. After 5 games, The magazine suddenly doesn't sit in my gun properly. When I go to cock and fire it, the part that strips the BB's from the magazine just glides over them and gets them wedged between the magazine feed lips and the feed ramp. If I hold the magazine up into the gun there are no problems and this only began a few days ago. WE, you fail to impress me once again.

on a side note to this review: Any suggestions on how this can be fixed permanently? I've used glue but that strips off after a few magazines.

Thanks

[Strelok]

Hey there.

I know of the problem exactly, mine did the same too.

Do you slam your magazines into the magwell? I've found that the feed lips, despite being metal do have a bit of give to them.

I used a cylindric metal file to open up the 'port' where the bb's press through. It eliminated the feeding issue entirely.

Hope I helped.

[pounce_the_jaguar]

Originally Posted by Strelok

Hey there.

I know of the problem exactly, mine did the same too.

Do you slam your magazines into the magwell? I've found that the feed lips, despite being metal do have a bit of give to them.

I used a cylindric metal file to open up the 'port' where the bb's press through. It eliminated the feeding issue entirely.

Hope I helped.

I haven't been treating it the best so that is most likely the case. Thanks for the advice I'll give it a shot when I get home. What do you mean by port exactly? the feed ramp to the barrel?

Thanks again, much appreciated.

[Strelok]

Sorry, the area where the bb's come out of the magazine. or the 'feed lips'.

Just file or even try and bend that area a slight bit. Again, the metal seems to be pretty soft.

[pounce_the_jaguar]

Originally Posted by Strelok

Sorry, the area where the bb's come out of the magazine. or the 'feed lips'.

Just file or even try and bend that area a slight bit. Again, the metal seems to be pretty soft.

Tried bending to no avail but filing was very easy. While it did feed more positively I didn't want to do it with all my mags so I simply switched my WE blowback housing for my tanaka one and VOILA! she works like A charm. I really hope WE starts upping their game with these browning's.