I've been interested, in a mainly academic sense, in handguns for years. I'm intrigued by the skill required to accurately hit a target with a gun steadied only by the muscles in the body. Using a rifle is easy compared with a pistol and, to me, fairly boring (although you can't help but be impressed by the stamina of Biathletes, who shoot after cross country skiing!).

As a teenager I had a couple of .177 air pistols, but for many years my interest faded until in late 2000, I noticed a display of remarkable replicas in a local model shop. These turned out to be airsoft pistols and I acquired a 'springer' from eBay and started to get interested in them.

Airsoft pistols are NON-LETHAL replicas, firing small (usually 6mm) plastic balls at low velocities (typically around a quarter the velocity of 'real' airguns, which fire metal pellets or ball bearings).

On this site, I'll attempt to explain some of the different types of airsoft pistols and, perhaps, try and distance the serious sport of airsoft (not much different to target pistol shooting or paintball, so beloved of corporate team building days) from the media frenzy about 'BB guns'. I'm not going to go into the rights and wrongs of BB guns in the hands of stupid teenagers on the street (Think I've made my position clear), but

I'll also take the opportunity to talk about my transient collection of airsoft pistols.

If you've any comments, information or questions, drop me an e-mail.

Cheers.

Snowman