I purchased the MP5SD3 made by UHC( Unicorn Hobbies Corporation) off of South Summit for $39.99 + $7.97 for an extra mag + $9.97 for s/h coming out at $57.89 (South Summit event tossed in a free LED Keychain light). It arrived in good time (3-4 days) in a nice looking box, for legal reasons the real name of the gun which it is modeled after is not shown. Instead, it is simply called a “silenced sub-machine gun”, with the designation UA-312. The gun came during school so I was not home when it arrived. I remember coming home anxious to see if it had arrived only to find the front door devoid of any box near it. After getting inside, I turned a corner to go in the kitchen and to get a drink. That is when I spotted a box from South Summit. I rushed downstairs box in hand and gutted the box with my trusty X-acto knife, only to find layers of some kind of stuffing paper. The gun came disassembled; in total there were five things inside the box, the gun, the cocking handle, the detachable silencer, the magazine, and a small box of 100 .2g BBs. There was a sticker on the gun which in my haste, I have lost (I regret doing this), the sticker pointed out that the gun’s hop up was calibrated for .2g BBs.

Realism/Appearance:
The first thing I looked at, and the only possible first thing that I could look at, was appearance. The gun didn’t look to bad; but it didn’t look to good either. UHC for some reason decided that instead of making a good looking true to life MP5SD3, they should add a “wavy” grip style to the front part of the gun. Not only is the bad looking, but it really doesn’t help with gripping either. It also came with not one, but two areas where it was painted day-glo orange in accordance with US law. The detachable silencer and the part where the silencer is supposed to be attached to were BOTH orange, I would say this is quite excessive, it also makes it a lot less of a “looker” too. Unless you decide to paint over, remove, or tape over the orange, you are stuck with having two pieces of “position broadcasters” in an airsoft game situation. You can take off the silencer, but you should only do that if you want to run with a butt ugly gun, the front site post sticks out over the muzzle making it look awkward, ugly and plain weird. Unlike the real gun, the fire selector is not painted like it is, it is left black, which isn’t a big deal to some people but for a realistic appearance it won’t do, it kind of makes it look “plain”. The weight of the gun is fair, although it could be heavier. All its weight comes from pieces of scrap metal inside of the gun, I don’t know what metal it is, but it is very soft, bendable, and heavy. The gun’s weight problem comes from its plastic parts, in fact the only metal on this gun involves screws, the inner barrels, weights, the collapsable stock rails, and the spring! The mags could use some work to, they look very weak and fragile, and they are really light, whichmakes it quite unrealistic. The color of the gun is fair, although its a little shiny in some parts. If you're adept at painting though, this can be taken care of. I would also like to add that there are NO trademarks on this gun, I've looked everywhere and have not seen a trace, although one of my friends (thats me!-Shriak) says that he can see a faint HK symbol on the side of the mag well, I have a hard time seeing this. I am not saying that this is an ugly gun though! As long as the silencer is kept on the gun looks great.

Function:
The stock is collapsible just like the real one which is nice because this can be useful if you have a mask that gets in the way, or if you would like to shorten it for storage or CQB/CQC type situations. If you don’t really care about looks, the gun can be further shortened by the aforementioned detachable silencer. Since the silencer has an inner-barrel inside it actually increases accuracy by being on. Another gripe I have about this gun is the sights, the back site is adjustable which is nice and cool, but it’s too low, meaning the front part of the back sight blocks your view. Look at the picture of the site to understand. I’ve heard that this can be solved by cutting a V shape into the sight holes. The front post sight is black, which can be a little tough to sight with in some situations; this can be easily cured by some white out. The sights are closed (a O with a little thing sticking out into the center of the circle), it is slow to acquire targets but quite accurate, this can be fixed with the addition of a Red Dot Sight. The gun shoots quite well in stock form, quite powerful compared to the other guns I’ve seen and used (Auto Hardball II, UHC M9, KWC PT92, 3PSA DPMS A15, UHC Desert Eagle). I can consistently hit cans from around 60 feet in windless conditions. The UHC MP5 does not out shoot the A15, but it does do very well, considering it is 4/10ths of the price ($99 compared to $39.99). I do not have a chrono but Airsoft128/Jungle Toys says it comes out at a whopping 310 fps, this is doubtful although it can be possible if they used .12g BBs. Cocking is very easy to do with this gun, the action is smooth and easy to get use to. Lefties may have a problem with this gun though, since it has the G3 style grip, meaning it has a little thing poking out to conform to a right handed person’s hand and the cocking lever is also on the left side of the gun mounted on top of the forward grip, making it a pain for a lefty. The stock can also get in the way of some face masks such as the Cybergun Mesh Mask, this can be solved by taking off the lower portion of the mask or cutting away a part of it. The normal mag that comes with the gun works fine although sometimes the last BB does not feed. Its not a problem since it's only the last round. The spare mag on the other hand needs fixing sometimes, if you don’t fix it your going to get around 10 or less shots before it stops feeding. The mag that comes with the gun and the spare mags that you buy only hold 20 rounds, which is very poor considering the real MP5 holds 30 rounds standard and the bullets are bigger to! There is an alternative to the UHC mags, the HFC MP5A3 mag (which holds 40 rounds) fits after some minor modification (sanding the sides of the mag). They fit into the UHC gun, although a little tight, you can sand down the HFC mags if needed. To load the UHC mags, pull down the little thing on the side to compress the spring and lock it in place, pull out the little “funnel” that fits on top of the bb chamber, and finally pour BBs in to it. Replace the funnel by reinserting it into the mag and lastly press the button on the bottom of the mag to depress the spring (do this only after you insert it in to the MP5, otherwise you will experience a BB shower). There is another bad thing about the mags, they don’t have a “BB stopper” meaning after you load it and press the button or flip the mag upside down without sticking it into the gun prior to doing this the BBs will fall out. If you are going to reload your mag while there are still BBs in there and you do not pull down the spring first, the BBs will shoot out into your mag well and sometimes get stuck in little cracks. Overall this gun is great, it’s accurate and has range and speed, a very good gun for its price. You can do better if you're willing to shell out around $50 more but this spring gun dominates the $70 and below range.

Reliability:
The gun seems quite sturdy, however the gun is entirely plastic and the mags feel flimsy. Since the silencer is plastic and not a permanent fixture (you stick it in a slot and twist it 90 degrees), I do not recommend giving it any stress if you want it to last long. The front sight post seems to be a little shaky, but it doesn’t seem to affect accuracy a great deal. I’ve had numerous bumps and small drops, and the gun still keeps on kicking, it’s a great gun and quite sturdy (with the exception of the silencer). I’ve had one jam before and it was easily fixed by taking apart the gun, which was quite easy. The internals were also very simple and easy to comprehend. The magazines feel like weak, thin pieces of plastic which I doubt can withstand much stress, however, you will not be placing much stress on them. If you take out the mag while there are still BBs in there and you do not compress the spring, the BBs will shoot out of the mag, and sometimes will get stuck in cracks (I've done this many times too -Shriak). This is a pain since it will rattle around your gun if it isn’t taken care of. Sometimes you will be able to see the BBs, so I’ve heard, and you can pry them out. But from my experience when this happens you would need to take apart the gun (which is incredibly easy to do) and remove the BB(s). Overall, the gun is very reliable, and the only bad things that can happen is if you mistreat the mags and the gun severely. The mags aren’t that expensive and can be easily fixed with some duct/electrical tape if needed.

Modifications/Upgradeability:
The gun, as I mentioned in the reliability section, is very easy to take apart. Just a few screws the removal of the stock, flip it so the right side of the gun is facing down and then lift it apart. The gun is in two halves with the internals on the right side. The internals are all plastic though, so it is hard to upgrade the spring into something very powerful without breaking something, that is unless you have the ability to obtain metal reinforcements or replacements. You can put a slightly more powerful spring in there or some spacers, but those will both decrease the life of the gun and the spacers would decrease spring life too. However, since the gun is cheap and very easy to take apart, exterior upgrades are numerous and very easy to do. You can add a Red Dot Sight, add accessories, make custom silencers, paint jobs, scopes, etc.

What is the final verdict? This is a GREAT gun, you can’t go wrong buying this. This review may seem overall negative, but the gun is great! Even with those problems, you can’t go wrong with the price ($40). There is no other gun I know of that can beat this gun in price and have comparable accuracy, speed, range, and reliability. The only gun that comes close to this is the Hardball II.

Appearance/Realism: 7/10
Function: 7/10
Reliability: 8/10
Modifications/Upgradeability: 6/10
Bang for the buck: 9/10