Tanio Kobayashi

Interview with Tanio Koba16th of October, 2003, 619 hours



The Beginning



Beginning of Tanio Kobayashi’s (67) story lays 40 years ago, when Kobayashi became the first employee of the future model gun giant Model Gun Corporation (MGC), which was at that time just one person company. The main business for MGC in the early days was introduction of American toy guns to Japanese customers who were becoming interested in guns through European and American movies. The popularity of American toy guns was increasing even as customers were not satisfied with the realism of these guns.

In was in that era of post-war Japan when European action movies and their semiautomatic pistols gave something for Kobayashi that would eventually guide him to his passion in life. It became Kobayashi’s dream to be designer for prop guns that could be used in movie industry. At that time there were no prop guns and real guns were prohibited in Japan (as they are today). Fortunately, Kobayashi met President of MGC and job opportunity in Tokyo promptly arrived. As a countryside person, it was a great chance for him and Kobayashi thought that this could be opportunity to realize his dream.


Kobayashi’s first job was to customize the imported toy guns to more realistic appearance. However, soon the President of MGC found out that Kobayashi had talent to make more realistic toy guns (which he christened as “model guns”) almost out of nothing and figured that it would be better to manufacture the guns in Japan rather than obtain them from foreign sources.

Kobayashi remembers fondly all of his previous works -- there is plenty from the last three decades of airsoft and model gun industry.

Before long Kobayashi and MGC were manufacturing their own model guns. All of these model guns were full metal as at that time there were no regulations for manufacturing and selling model guns in Japan. This continued during through the 1960s until in the early 1970s first model gun regulation was established by Japanese police. This regulation prohibited black and silver metal bodies and allowed only white or gold bodies to be used.

Because of the new regulation, interest and demand for model guns started to decline in Japan. It seemed that the industry was doomed with no hope to produce model guns that would be sufficiently realistic in appearance to be interesting for the end-users. Enter Kobayashi and his revolutionary blowback-mechanism that was installed in otherwise unpopular plastic bodies. He turned the supposed weakness to advantage since the blowback mechanism could now work perfectly compared to earlier unsuccessful metal body designs (thanks to the plastic construction). In this Kobayashi’s design there was for the first time perfectly working shell ejecting mechanism that did wonders for realism. Shell ejecting mechanism would, of course, go on to boost the flagging sales of model guns.

This all-new realistic mechanism for model guns started “the second gun boom” in Japan and soon all famous manufacturers were making guns with similar mechanisms.

Airsoft Guns

“The condition for airsoft gun to be a toy gun is not about power. It should be about enjoyment.” – Tanio Kobayashi
Kobayashi’s philosophy was that model gun should not shoot any projectiles, because model gun is completely different from the real gun and it should not shoot anything. The trend of the time took this philosophy to test in 1980s when airsoft guns were becoming increasingly popular and there where lot of safety concerns, because there was no power regulations and many people thought that major accidents where just matter of time.

Kobayashi was against high-powered guns that where extremely easy to make at that time and for the end-users apparently only exciting thing to do was to increase muzzle velocity of the guns (the general muzzle velocity level among players was about 500FPS / 150m/s). Kobayashi wanted to take this trend to another direction by designing features to the guns that would attract attention instead of high power. One fundamental idea for Kobayashi was to design gun that could fire rapidly (of at least 3 to 1 BB ratio to single shot guns) thus eliminating advantage of single shot high power guns. Another problem was the gas hoses and external tanks, which Kobayashi did not like for their clumsiness.

The result of these requirements was MGC Beretta M93R, which was the first fixed slide semiautomatic gas gun that used completely new magazine gas tank system. Before this Kobayashi’s creation, all airsoft guns were single shot manual spring cocking guns or cumbersome gas hose equipped guns. So for the first time the customers could get easy-to-use semiautomatic pistol with realistic gas magazines that improved realism. It can be said that this Kobayashi’s masterpiece was the first gas airsoft handgun in history.

The sales of MGC Beretta M93R were incredible all over Japan going all the way from junior high school kids to corporate executives. The third gun boom, that still lasts today, had started.

The MGC

Most of people outside Japan know MGC by the name only. MGC, at it’s peak as model and airsoft gun manufacturer, was bigger than any other airsoft gun manufacturer existing today.

In the early times MGC provided prop guns to famous Japanese movie companies like Nikkatsu, Ishihara Pro, Touhon and Universal Japan. With every year sales of MGC guns were increasing with MGC President promoting their gun products in creative ways.

MGC employees strongly believed that their company was now providing best products to gun hobbyists in Japan. However, according to Kobayashi, the President of MGC was gradually getting bored of the gun business as more manufacturers were coming to industry and the whole business was going to more mainstream direction. In Kobayashi’s opinion, the President’s lack of passion for model guns was the shortage that ultimately brought down the giant MGC.



After Kobayashi finished his last lineup for MGC, the Glock series (GBB airsoft), he quit the MGC and just few years later MGC was out of business for good. The next step for Kobayashi was to start working independently. Kobayashi become freelance designer, also known as TANIO KOBA.

Kobayashi and Tokyo Marui

“I was grilled by Tokyo Marui in a good meaning.” – Tanio Kobayashi
Kobayashi has designed the mechanism for almost all of the Tokyo Marui gas blowback pistols. His first work for Tokyo Marui was to develop gas blowback system for Tokyo Marui, which can be now seen in Desert Eagle, M92 series, Tactical Master and G26 series. It will be seen also in the forthcoming Marui SIG P226. Usually it takes about 6 months to complete design of new gas blowback system, but with Tokyo Marui it was not the case. Every time Kobayashi submitted his design to Tokyo Marui the reply was the same: “Make it better”. This kept continuing for some time and Kobayashi had rows with Tokyo Marui whether or not the system was good enough. Finally, after two years, Kobayashi’s design was accepted and his ordeal was over.
Tokyo Marui told Kobayashi that what they make is different from MGC’s products, because they (Marui) want to attract all customers and not only the “maniac” ones. In Tokyo Marui it is known that “maniac” can accept less perfect systems since they will find a ways to make them work and improve them, but ordinary customers do not behave in this way.

Kobayashi is now assured that Tokyo Marui’s gas blowback system is the best in the world. His main reasoning for this is the level of reliability and durability this gas blowback system is capable of. After all, his two years of dueling with Tokyo Marui was not for nothing.

Tokyo Marui future gas blowback designing will be done without Kobayashi’s expertise, because he thinks that they now have enough skills within the company to develop his gas blowback system further. Kobayashi will, however, utilize perfecting lessons he got from Tokyo Marui to his future gas blowback designs.
The characteristics of real designer

“I will never be satisfied about my design until I’m dead.“ – Tanio Kobayashi

Kobayashi tells that he always thinks about his designs of past, current and future. It’s his dedication in life and what keeps him young even in the old age. Kobayashi strives to improve his designs every time he takes on new project. With energetic passion in his eyes, but with confidence of experienced man, Kobayashi vows that he will keep improving his designs until end of his life. Kobayashi goes on to explain that he never forgets designs that were less successful in the market or had some problems in mechanism.

His lifelong history for designing airsoft guns and their mechanisms can be seen at his office where many important guns of the last three decades rest quietly on the walls.

Passion for Heckler & Koch

When Kobayashi was young he really liked Mauser guns and these days he thinks Hecker & Koch (H&K) is the modern counterpart of Mauser. During his designing career H&K has been firmly his favorite brand of real weapons. While working in MGC Kobayashi designed H&K MP5K (semi-gas & semi-battery operated airsoft gun), H&K P7 (gas blowback airsoft gun) and later in Tanio Koba H&K USP (gas blowback airsoft gun).

Kobayashi excitedly tells us about various real H&K mechanisms and handguns. For him H&K guns are the most exciting because of their unique features. They have same features that excite him as a designer, so the connection between the two is obvious.

Sincerely for the hobbyists
“How it is, I’m not a dealer, but a designer and a craftsman” – Tanio Kobayashi
It is both refreshing and amazing to see somebody so pure like Kobayashi among all the rivalry and politics that exist in airsoft gun industry. Kobayashi does not regard himself as part of the ‘business’, but as designer and part of the user community. Kobayashi explains that the purpose of his Tanio Koba company is to be outlet for designs that Kobayashi thinks are important to be released. It can be said that his products are aimed for the smaller group of customers that big manufacturers do not see financially profitable.



Tanio Koba released Ruger 10/22 gas blowback rifle some years ago, which stems from the popularity of Ruger 10/22 among beginner shooters in United States. Kobayashi’s opinion is that system in Ruger 10/22 is not enough and one of his next goals is to develop rifle blowback mechanism that is at least three times stronger than what is in Ruger 10/22. For those readers that haven’t experienced blowback in Ruger 10/22, it is actually quite strong for rifle, so tripling blowback recoil of Ruger rifle would be groundbreaking when it comes to GBB rifles. The new mechanism might be released already on next year and will not be based in Ruger 10/22, but different rifle model.

Another design improvement Kobayashi is working on is improved gas blowback system for cold weather, which exists especially in European countries. Having seen the Taiwanese made gas guns that are popular in Europe and USA Kobayashi feels sorry for overseas hobbyists that have to use these products. In his analysis both the quality and gun performance in cold weather are poor. Foreign hobbyists in mind, Kobayashi is planning to design system that would use less gas and thus less vulnerable to cold weather.

Kobayashi is now working with French airsoft distribution company Cybergun™ (ex-3 Pylonnes) to provide them new design that would allow Cybergun™ to move into manufacturing of airsoft guns.

At the same time, Kobayashi is mysteriously speaking about route to provide European hobbyists with cheaper priced products that have higher quality. He is interested in this concept, because Japanese products are too high priced in Europe. Further to his aim, Kobayashi now wants to teach Taiwanese factories how to manufacture better quality gas blowback guns, so that users in Europe can have more reasonable products than ever before. Kobayashi brings example of KSC’s Glock series that are made in Taiwan for KSC. In his opinion even Taiwanese manufacturers can make great product, if quality control is enough.

Going to more deeper reasoning, but in simple explanation, Kobayashi thinks that culture for guns in Europe is much more healthier than what it is in United States and Japan. What he refers to is the difference in general attitude for question what should be the purpose of gun.

“In Europe there is a culture for guns, so the attitude toward real gun is healthy in nature. That’s what makes Europeans attitude to toy guns healthy as well.” - Tanio Kobayashi

In Kobayashi's personal opinion, he is not needed anymore in domestic Japanese market, because Tokyo Marui is making such high quality gas blowback guns. It is time for him to move on to pastures of new, perhaps a last adventure to bring his massive designing experience to aid hobbyists and end-users in overseas.

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