FEATURE BRINGING OUT THE BIG GUNS
BRINGING OUT THE
BIG GUNS! HAVING A MAN ON THE GROUND IN TAIWAN, AIRSOFT ACTION IS ABLE TO BRING YOU REPORTS FROM COMPANIES THAT MAY OTHERWISE GO UNNOTICED INTERNATIONALLY. PENGHU ARMS FACTORY IS ONE SUCH COMPANY AND HAVING DISCOVERED THEM, STEWBACCA SOON MADE ARRANGEMENTS TO FIND OUT MORE ABOUT THE COMPANY – AND THE STUNNING AIRSOFT REPLICAS THEY PRODUCE!
P
engHu is Taiwan’s western county of islands in the Taiwan Strait off the coast of the main island’s southerly city of Tainan and is akin to the Florida Keys, with raised highways and bridges interconnecting the major islands of the small lowlying Archipelago that represents part of Taiwan’s first line of defence in this somewhat tumultuous waterway - both in terms of actual local weather and the tense politics of the region. Undoubtedly, like most others, the only time I’d ever heard of it before I came to Taiwan was in the movie “Spy Game”, where the islands are mentioned as the staging area for a US fleet which is eventually used to mount an incursion into nearby Southeast China to effect a rescue of the main protagonist. Other than that, I hadn’t much prior knowledge of the area. Likewise, I hadn’t heard of “3D Military Movie Props Ltd.” beforehand either. I first encountered its proprietor, Well Hsu, shortly after I arrived in Taiwan and attended the Hooha shows (organised by local magazine Combat King Monthly) where I happened upon his booth. He was exhibiting his early prototypes of their Browning M2HB HPA powered airsoft heavy machine guns, as well as an airpowered mortar system that was comically launching
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foam projectiles across the exhibition hall at intervals. His immediately welcoming and jovial nature and interest in extolling his (already impressive) products easily overcame our initial language barrier issues at the time - I’ve since developed my Chinese and he has also greatly improved his English - and I would continue to see him on occasion at various trade shows in Taipei, Taichung and Kaohsiung. Initially, through my work with TacticalTwo, I garnered the attention of Eric from Combat King Monthly himself and I began working with him to produce English language versions of his annual “Airsoft & Airgun Consumers Guide” (a yearly almanac of all the major new product releases) and Well’s own offerings from 3DMMP soon became a regular feature in its “Special Weapons” section towards the rear.
HEADING TO PENGHU
I would soon find myself being hosted by Well and his family on my first trip to PengHu. Alongside 3DMMP and Penghu Arms Factory (PAF), he also runs five themed guest houses around the island chain. Since moving to the islands nearly thirty years ago (following his military service on Kinmen, where he was an RoC army firearms instructor) and he has been using his connections with the local military
