The Ares Tavor/ T.A.R 21 Review.

Soo i finally got my hands on one of these Israeli Cricket Bats.,

There's not many reviews out there that are done honestly and in detail while disregarding the hype this generated up to its release. I aim to do that and give as much info on it as possible. At the end I'll be posting a Discussion thread where you are more than welcome to ask any questions on the review.

My aim was to take a Tavor as my new primary gun of choice (since its bullpup and stanag compatible, nothin to do with MAC, honest...) and build a rifle than can out perform most top end rifles out there. I'm hoping to catalogue the process of modding and upgrading, with pics and maybe even do a thread on that separately.

Here goes...

Externals:

AT first glance when you see this thing most people usually think either "Oh man, what the hell did you do to yore Steyr" or "Deadly!, Now all ya need is a shaved head and yore practically MAC!". I would be the later and like many other tavorians out there, a big fan of the ever popular TV show, Future Weapons. This was probably the first place i had ever seen or heard of the Tavor Rifle and from the begining I really liked it (although i'd prefer a Mirco) so i knew i would have to get one in the end. Unfortunately, it seems like getting any solid release date from the bods at TSI for their own attempt at the Tavor is a close comparason with trying to do root canal on a hen.

Appearance wise though, they at Ares seem to have it down, it looks and feels nice and shouldering this feels very natural. All the controls are where you would naturally look for them even if your not familiar with the rifle and they are "supposed" to be ambidextrous. its slightly shiney though, even more so on the front hand grip, and the plastics aren't nearly as good as some of those we see from the likes of Magpul PTS etc, Particulatly in front of the mag release from the underside where there is quite an obvious moulding mark, these can be found right the way down the rifle but the biggest and most obvious is here, presumably where the plastic was injected from. There are some cracks in the plastic moulding of the rear sight base where it wasnt moulded properly. this same part was installed wrong and was sitting up too high on one side which in turn meant the rear sight wasn't sitting straight. This can be corrected with an allen key, not the end of the world, but a blatant sign of laziness in the assembly process.

(Here you can see a crack in the plastics, nothing serious and only cosmetic. The plastic seems are also quite visible.)



While on the topic of the body finish, theres also "IWI Isreali Weapon Industries" trademarks on the butt stock along with "Tavor-21 5.56mm" and a serial number. the trades look good and although i never used to really care about trades, they add that little bit more to the realistic look and are good to have when taking the arts'y photo's. The serial number on the other hand is some mass produced looking, stick on fake metalic finish plastic with printed numbers instead of being pressed and it looks el cheapo. Im unsure of weather the numbers are unique or if they use the same one on batches, meh, dont really care.

(The trademarks, I'm happy with these, the serial number plate is a let down though. )


As said previously, when you pick it up it feels nice and natural and as you go through your combat routene of drawing on imaginary targets and sighting the rifle, you notice as you lower the gun from your eyeline just how easy it is to look like a fool as your magazine makes the journey from the magwell to the tarmac thanks to a combination of the mag release positioning and an extremely sensitive release that needs very little pressure to disengage the mag. This is something that happend to me immediately, and 2 righty's i later handed the rifle to too. This is one of the area's i think Ares could have paid more attention to. Theres no need for this latch to be protruding as much as it is (noticeably smaller on the TSi model.) and to be so sensitive, its too easy for the mag to fall out without you even realising, especially if you are ingame with a soft surface under foot, when it matters most you might not have a mag.


Following on with the ambidexterous'ness (yep, i made that up just now) of some of its parts. The forward sling mount on this can be unscrewed and simply pushed in the oposite side of the rifle and screwed in.

The rear isnt so well thought out though and involves threading a string through the stock of the rifle to loop a sling onto. This could very easily have been made as a quick detach mount as seen on many other airsoft rifles, so players can use their own slings with ease.


(The front sling mount, Easy to switch over but thanks to the chunky design, not possible to get the average 3 point sling metal clasp onto)

(Found on www.militaryphotos.net)
(Even if they had of supplied a nylon sling mount with it, Who's going to have an actual Tavor sling lying around...)


The fire selector on the other hand, although its said you can switch it over to the other side, it doesn't quite work like that and the select modes are then out of sync with the indicator marks on the grip when oyu switch them.

One of the things i did like the sound of when reading reviews is the fact that the brass deflector which usually sits on the right side of the gun (by default for right handed shooters) can be removed quite easily with a pair of allen keys and replaced on the other side of the rifle, visa versa with the cover plate that usually lives on the left side. This basically makes the rifle look like its setup to be fired from the left hand, something i usually do where pobsible, like on the AUG for instance.
In their infinate cleverness though, they seem to have overlooked one glaringly obvious side effect of that. the hopup unit they used, similar to the typical M4 hopup can only be adjusted from the right side and thanks to the previously mentioned cleverness, the cover which once lived on the left side of the gun now covers the ejection port and prevents access to the hopup altogther, making the switch over completely pointless and a waste of design time.
(some clever asians are gonna come up with a hopup mech that can be adjusted from both sides for this, i betcha)

(This video shows the travel on the bolt and the lack of hop adjustment from the left side of the rifle.)


The charging lever is also removeable and can be setup on the other side of the gun, It takes a little bit of disassembling to do this but its not too challenging to do. Its functional too and it draws back the bolt cover to reveal the hopup. Theres a locking bolt there too which is then released with the bolt release behind the magazine, of course..
Unfortunately though, it feels like there is almost nothing going on when you cock this. My Cheap as chips FN2000 by JLS feels like theres more going on when you pull the lever back. it feels like theres gubbins doing something or other in there as you do, this on the other hand, it feels like counting on a spring loaded abacus. Fell feel in the bolt than your typical cheapo MP5, JG/ Galaxy etc.
Theres hardly any travel on the bolt either, maybe 2 inches at its most whereas the channel it sits in, its about 6-7 inches long where the real Tavor bolt will travel. Again not the end of the world but it lacks in that " Ohh, i can see where my money is going" kind of feeling you get when you crack open your new VFC or G&G case.
One other thing too, the lever can often stick in the retracted position, it needs to be encouraged to go farward again. this was an easy enough fix, a little greasing and a repositioning of the screw had it operating as its supposed to.
Oh, also while on the topic of cocking it, If you are not careful with the positioning of the battery cable when installing, it can prevent the bolt from locking back and will bite into the battery wires in the stock.

Moving on to Magazines, This uses typical Stanag mags and ive tested it with G&G and MAG branded ones. no misfeeds, all A-OK so far, however there is a lot of play in the magwell, maybe as much as a millimeter either side allowing the mag to move all over the place. this doesn't interfere with feeding but its noisey and since the mag catch is already extremely easy to disengage without noticing, this makes it all the easier for your mag to go walkies.
I have been using it with the reccomended 8.4v battery and combined with the noise of the magazine, it sounds worse than a half filled hicap when sprinting through a room full of skittles.
The magazine issue i hope to cure with some stick on felt to take up some of the space and cushion the mag in there.




MARS Sight:
This has been almost universally accepted as a piece of junk by most who bought the rifle. The reticle when you focus on it, seems to be a clear red dot but when you actually look through the sight this is nothing more than a large red blotch on the glass (which has dirt inside too, grrr). It would have served Ares better to offer the gun with a choice of MARS or 20mm RIS rail attached, and of course a healthy price reduction for those without the sight because most people out there seem to want rid of it now anyway.

Externally though the sight looks the part and feels nice. its constructed from some sort of metal and has the laser warning marks and the MARS trade mark on the right with the serial number included. the windage and elevation adjustment dials are your typical flat head screwdriver types and do the job. Theres a sticker surrounding them that scratches easily when your adjusting the dials.
The glass i the sight looks the part and the front lens has a red reflective coating on it. It looks like a fancy pricey (and it is pricey) sight, no complaints there. Looking at the sight from the left side you see the 5 position selector for the red dot (4 brightness levels and OFF obviously). These adjust the brightness of the sight but although there are 4 positional settings on the dial, there is really only 2 brightness levels in the sight, Bright red blob and not so bright red blob.

Also built into this sight is a red targeting laser. this is operated by a button on the forgrip of the gun that can confortably be used ambidextrously with either the left thumb or the right index. This button has the writing "Forever good Intl LTD and a phone number imprinted on there. Ive no idea what that's all about.

The laser itself can be zero'd as per usual with most lasers, by windage and elevation screws on top and on the side. Unfortunately though theres quite a bit of play in the system and when setting it, it can move both horizontally and vertically with the single screw. It just makes things that bit more awkward after setting one to the way you want it, you'll usually just align the other but by the time you get to this stage you'll find its already moved off. There is quite a bit of refraction from the laser itself too. you'll notice at about 10ft with the laser that there is a seperate, more faint red dot about 10 inches to the left of the main one. this is commonly caused by the misalignment of the laser unit and its reflection off some of the components inside. The plan so far is to remove that altogether and replace with a high quality laser that can be adjusted accurately and hold its zero. Maybe even replace the MARS internals with those of an Eotech holosight to get some decent performance from it with a reticle that doesn't look the size of a traffic light when you aim it at someone.

Performance:
Out of the box this was firing at 300fps give or take a couple, The only problem was, this was the case regardless of the position of the hopup. ROF is decent, Average for your typical decent quality rifle although a little on the whiny side, shimming wise.. The range wasnt too bad but accuracy was a matter of guesswork and laying a bb on the same spot as the first is an achievement in itself. After a strip down I found a hopup rubber that was very loosely attached and made of a really thin material similar to that of the Guarder Clear Silicone hopup, only a lot thinner. it was very greasey too and the source of the accuracy problems mentioned above. Digging a little further you'll find the nub, one that is unique to this rifle in that it looks almost like a "Number 8". it was poorly cut and was about a quarter shorter than it was supposed to be, applying more hopup to one side of the barrel than the other. This was switched out with the previously mentioned Guarder hopup set and immediately made a huge difference to the performance.

Its a shame though, This is one of those things that really needs to be done and this isnt quite as simple a job as most barrel/hopup installations since you have to take pretty much everything off the tavor to do it.

Which brings me on to the internals, being a bullpup design they needed to come up with a way of operating the selector and trigger from in front of the gearbox, ala P90, AUG, FN2000, SA80 etc.
They did it by using pushrods that are placed interally just under the barrel. the selector works by way of an arm on the selector switch that engages and disengages with one of the pushrods. theres a lot of play in the way its been designed though and problems with the selector are all too common. sometimes when switching through the positions there will be no response from the gun at all until you give it another wiggle around. this is another thing they short changed on. It could have easily been assembled differently with less play in the workings. This gives the trigger a very long travel and lack of any difference feeling from the start to fully squeezed. You might as well be firing it by remote.

The gearbox is removed through the butt of the rifle and to do this you need to disconnect the pushrods mentioned above. You'll need a small allen key to do this and its a little awkward to get at, particulatly with big hands, a tweezers is also recommended to make life easier.
I forgot to take photo's of the internals so i'll be taking it down again and I'll post some then. Internally though, its decent, Id change the piston if i was to be picky and it needs to be shimmed to quieten her down a little. More on this when i get some pics.



You can remove the flash hider and attach a silencer in its place. Like the real Tavor, this uses a 14mm clockwise thread and without a grubscrew (like you see on most M4 flash hiders, hate those), just twist and go. (mind you, i tried a silencer on it and it looks rediculous.)

Summary:
First you'll want to know if its worth the 500 quid price tag huh? Well, in my opinion, I think not.
Its fits in the €250 price catagory comfortably when you take into account what you are getting. The internals and materials are nothing more than decent, But the gun is very unique. Its this one though that allows Ares to mug you without touching you. They know theres nobody else in the market offering anything like it at the moment (TSi is a no show at the time of writing) so they can ask for whatever they like really. (luckily though, i didn't pay 500 quid for it. )
Performance isn't as good as some you'll find in the €250 price range (G&G M16, KWA G36c, Everything Tokyo Marui) but with a little tinkering you can get it working very well.

Its the fact that you have to tinker with it, combined with how awkward it is to take apart that takes from its value in my opinion. Replace the hopup rubber as soon as you get it, clean out the barrel and the grease around the hopup. this alone will give you a huge improvement in its performance.

Fixing the fire select issue isn't as straight forward though, it can be as simple as taking the play out of the push rods by adjusting the screw but sometimes that'll make no difference and my own, although less prone, it still does it. (mine is gonna get striped again to try a new idea, will post more on that later).

So, its not a terrible gun, and if you don't mind getting yore mits dirty and doing some tune ups it can be a nice setup but for 500 quid I would expect a lot more than what is on offer. A lot more performance can be bought for that kinda money.

I'm still a little sketchy about how easily parts for this are going to be found. I know from previous experience with Ares and Star that customer service isn't all that high on their list of to-do's, Not many of the online stores stock their parts either and since pretty much everything they do uses a gearbox unique to themselves, it can mean pricey and hard to find parts, (My Star Scar being an example, Kudos to Puding too. )

So that's pretty much it, Needless to say I'm bound to have left something out so I'll add to it as necessary. So heres some pics...

PS, The Discussion thread can be found Here, please dont post in the review,

(What the red dot looks like when aiming, and an external view of the MARS)


(You can see the motor adjustment screw here, it moves as the gun is fired so you really should thread lock that or it'll go missing. To the right, the laser built into the MARS, my thumb is on the button )