Airsoft Government Arsenal SDMR Rifle

By Diego

With a limited host of marksmen weapons available, the Philippine Marine Corps created what would be called the Marine Scout Sniper Rifle, or MSSR built using an M16A1 base. Now retired Major General Johnathan Martir was the one who oversaw the project.

Seeing the success of these Marine made marksman rifles piquethe interest of Government Arsenal, a state-owned defense and industrial wing of the Department of National Defense. They would continue to research and develop the next generation of MSSR rifles and deriviatives. The then Colonel Martir would be taken by Govt. Arsenal to oversee the later models of marksman rifles.

As the trial rifles were successful, subsequent generations and variants were tested and fielded, such as one with an integral suppressor, but the modern iteration of the MSSR, the Gen. 5 MSSR, with its Daniel Defense picatinny rail, is the standard marksman rifle of the PMC.

Other branches took note of the MSSR’s success, and in 2015 special units of the Philippine Army trialed and later added the Scout Designated Marksman Rifle, or SDMR, to their inventory. The MSSRs and SDMRs have been in service since their debut, including the Battle of Marawi.

Here, we have an airsoft clone of the SDMR. My dad got the base rifle for my little brother around late 2015, and started life as a Classic Army TRX rifle with an 11” rail and what seems like an 11.5” barrel. Anyways, he didn’t mind seeing it become an SDMR, and liked his compact G&G rifle, so around late 2019, we got virtually all the parts needed for it. Repro 12 inch Daniel Defense rail, Harris style bipod, muzzle brake with three cuts, barrel extensions to get it to 16 inches and the Magpul Ladder rail panel replicas. Of course, an OD green paint job throughout, barring the moving parts, buffer tube and locking ring of the DD style rail. At this point the gun was mostly done, save for a Magpul STR style stock.

Not many changes happened the following year, we put a grey dust cover and an M16A2 style pistol grip, but other than that, the missing piece, the stock, was missing. Until recently.

A few days ago the stock showed up, from Aliexpress and I couldn’t be happier. Now to fix up the hop and internals to make it a decent long range shooter.

We used a Classic Army M4 as a base, but remember any standard M4 pattern rifle will work. 16 inch barrel preferred but you can always exetend it too.

Build Kit List:

M4 base

-Angel Custom Flash Hider Type A

-Madbull DD rail, 12 inches

-ACOG 4x32 replica

-M16A2 style pistol grip. Hogue style grips and M16A1 grips less common but seen.

-Magpul STR style stock

-OD green paint job. Avoid the dust cover, selector, bolt catch, forward assist, receiver pins, pistol grip, buffer tube, and of course the barrel. Just the rail, and lower and upper receiver itself.