Hi,
I'm brand new to airsoft and a couple weeks ago picked up a Cybergun M1A1 cheap off eBay (it's my first 'serious' airsoft) and while my nine year-old son and I are having a blast bouncing soda cans around the back yard, I agree with your thoughts that a Tommy Gun just doesn't look like a Tommy Gun without a drum mag - even tho' the M1A1 didn't take a drum ('tho I understand it's pretty standard practice for owners of 'real' M1A1s to modify drums to fit) .
Have you managed a functioning conversion of one on yours yet?
If so, could I ask how you accomplished it?
I've got a drum from a Cybergun springer 1928A1 that I picked up cheap off eBay as an experiment and am in the process of fitting to the M1A1. It now slides into place just as smoothly as the original stick and I just need to get the original 'stirrup' that snags the BBs at the top of the drum replaced with something resembling the open-topped feed tube system on the stick (sorry for the lack of anything like proper nomenclature -- like I said I'm brand new to this). I'm hoping, with a little luck, to have it up and running tomorrow.
I see in Shotgun News I can pick up a mil-surp original vertical foregrip for about $25. Is that an original on yours? If it is, are there any problems in fitting one (I'm assuming the CG and TM are close enough that the fitting would be similar)?
My Dad lugged a much-beloved M1A1 around the Pacific Theater as a WWII Marine (yeah, I'm somewhat older than the average airsoft enthusiast)and as he felt he'd earned it, he was bringing it home with him after V-J Day. The Government, being the humorously-challenged spoilsports they frequently are, had other ideas concerning the legalities of ownership and it wound up on the bottom of San Diego Bay.
Probably just as well. What the hell would I do with a real one (besides peddling it for enough for a new car)? If I cut loose with one in my back yard here in Phoenix (even ignoring approx. $5/second for ammo) the SWAT team would be crashing the party in mere moments whereas, having nearly as much fun, I can harass grasshoppers and shred cans with BBs all afternoon without the neighbors ever noticing.
Much as I love the looks of a finned barrel, the price means I'll probably be foregoing that. I'll probably try to build some sort of reasonable facsimile of the Cutts Compensator of the '28 'cause it looks cool.
Yours is an inspiration and any advice you might pass along would be greatly appreciated by my son and me.
The only suggestion I might offer on yours is possibly stripping the finish from the foregrip (assuming it's wood) and staining it with perhaps a mahogany stain or whatever would match the stock and grip more closely -- 'tho in 'real life' such esthetic considerations were obviously ignored on military Thompsons, so it may actually look more original the way it is.
