Just got my JW15A Backpacker today...and I like! It is a Chinese gun through and through, and rough around the edges..but for the money, a fun gun for sure. With a small window of time to shoot before dark tonight, I squeezed-off about 30 rounds offhand, and here are my initial impressions of this gun;
1.Size is awesome, quick to shoulder
2.Trigger is very decent, predictable after only a few shots
3.Sights a bit wonky, but serviceable. I could see the rear one being an issue if it ever got bumped.
4.Magazine (10-shot) nasty and sharp. Thought I cut myself loading it with semi-frozen fingers, and think I will if I shoot it much before giving it some TLC.
More comments on this magazine~my intention is/was to use CB longs with this gun or rather, see how well it liked them. So, in researching this little rifle, I heard from owners who told me it loads/cycles/feeds .22 longs just fine. Even CZ owners (this gun is a clone) reported the same~no problem. Well, my magazine will load CB longs just fine, and reliably feed the gun if there are 4 or fewer rounds in the magazine when I insert it. 5 or more rounds~no go. What appears to be happening is that the nose of the bullet isn't high enough for the round to be grabbed by the bolt coming forward. Worse yet, it seems to end-up pushing the nose of the bullet down...jamming it in that downward position. Once you're down to 4 or fewer bullets, I guess the spring tension is reduced and you can see the bullet instantly positions itself properly. We'll see what happens when I clean-off/de-burr all the rough edges. One more thing~the floor/bottom of the magazine is a strip of metal appears to retain the spring...but there is little holding it. When I first picked-up the rifle, I thought it looked strange..sticking out that far. A gentle push, and I was able to re-insert it. Not sure if this is supposed to be like that, but it seems as though I could pull that right out easily, and have the magazine fly apart.
Thinking I might need to source some (better-built) CZ magazines. I'll let you know how the clean-up changes things.
Overall, I'm very pleased with the gun...and see that it has great potential as a casual plinker.