Matrix M500 video review

[Moondog]

Watch video review:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EEPxFX85h_w


Transcript

When your shotgun can fire, not 1, not 3, but 5-BB's at a time, you've got a shotgun that can hold its own against an AEG. That's the Matrix M500.

The M500 SSB is modeled after a special purpose Mossberg 500 shotgun often used by law-enforcement and tactical units for CQB and forced entry. The Mossberg 500 is one of the best selling series of shotguns in the world. First introduced almost 50 years ago, it features a pump-action hammerless design with a 5-shot tube magazine underslung beneath the barrel.

The Matrix M500 is a full-metal clone of the Marushin gas shotgun. Marushin is one of the oldest airsoft makers in Japan, making highly detailed gas powered weapons in both 6mm and rare 8mm sized BB.

The Matrix M500 SSB comes in a typical ACM box with the CSI brand name. Inside you'll find the shotgun, owners manual, barrel cleaning rod, bag of BB's, two allen wrenches and as a nice touch, a bag of spare o-rings. The manual does include an exploded view which will be helpful should you need to take this shotgun apart to repair it and use those spare o-rings.

The barrel, magazine tube, heat shield, trigger, sling mounts and body are all metal. The only plastic parts are the ABS plastic pistol grip and trigger guard, rubberized pump foregrip and the plastic blaze-orange barrel ring.

The finish mimics a polished blued-steel finish, though the shine seems to be an acrylic clear-coat, painted on a mix of brass and pot metal. Those who've handled the real steel will note some rough edges and warped surfaces that don't quite look quite readl. But you'd have to hold it up close to notice.

Holding it though, it feels realistic. It weighs over 5 and half pounds. The body feels solid. The only weak part is the pump slide feels a little dinky and shaky. In fact the manual warns against 'action movie' style one handed racking, like you saw in Terminator 2. Doing so will eventually break your slide and this is the case with the Marushin and this clone.

This shotgun lacks any iron sights since the real steel version was made for CQB and not precision aiming.

The safety is a sliding thumb switch located on the top of the gun. Push, forward for fire, back for safe.

To load, you rack the pump to reveal a loading port. If the gun has already been racked, you can manually release the slide by pushing up a thumb lever located next tot he trigger on the left side of the grip.

A locking pin and lever are located on the right side of the gun, beneath the front of the barrel. Pressing the pin down and rotate the lever forward, releases the magazine tubes.

Load the BB's in each tube until full, then rotate and fill the next tube. Re-insert the mag tubes and lock it in place. Each time you rack the pump, the BB's will load from one of the tubes. When that tube empties, you have to manually rotate the tubes to load from the next full tube. Each tube holds 50 BB's each, so you'll have about 10 shots per tube and a total of 30 shots or 150 BB's.

Green gas is loaded on the underside of the shotgun, in what would be the shell loading port of the real shotgun.

The manufacturer's stats claim ~300fps which is typical of NBB green gas guns. Because it fires multiple BB's, I'm not able to use my chrono to confirm. With .25g BB's we got a 5" spread at 30ft. Firing 5-BB's you can easily expect to hit man sized targets from 50ft away. Though without hop-up you'll have to arc any shots beyond that.

CONCLUSION

High-end airsoft collectors will prefer a real Marushin for it's build quality and attention to detail. But at half the price and the exact same performance, the Matrix M500 clone is without doubt a good value. And on the field, it's a sledge hammer.