A sit down with Ed to talk EDgun Leshiy 2

Fueled on Ed’s reputation and brand trust that EDgun has created with the Matador, Leshiy, Lelya, and Veles offerings, the excitement around the Leshiy 2 is palpable.  It’s a powder keg really, in the form of compressed air (sorry, had to!), ready to explode once the first pellets leave the barrels of those lucky initial few whom secured theirs for a July/August delivery.

While we wait, I asked Ed to [virtually] sit down and talk about the project, which is a dangerous act on my part, as getting between him and production of this little airgun is a dangerous act in itself… but I’ll take one for the team for you guys!

The EDgun Leshiy 2 felt like it came out of nowhere, as the ultimate pack airgun goes semi-auto, moving from the tank single shot Leshiy Classic to the semi-auto Leshiy 2! It’s taken the industry by storm, selling out in mere minutes not once, but twice over at EDgun West.

While the details are slowly emerging, that didn’t seem to matter, as the initial buyers knew the inevitable… yet another gem delivered by Ed and his team.

If you’ve ever met Ed, you know… he’s an intimidating guy. It’s not something he puts off on purpose, the dude is just an incredibly smart guy, and you don’t want to ask a dumb question… like the time I sent him a video of me putting the barrel in backwards (oops!). I’ll save that for another day! Anyways, my first question was a softball, or so I thought… I quickly regretted it in the moment, but in retrospect, I learned a lot about how Ed’s brain works… and most importantly how that translates into something I get to blast critters with!

EGL: The Leshiy Classic is an iconic airgun, but almost immediately people began to ask for things… almost a wishlist. What made you finally say ok, and begin the project?

Ed: To be completely frank I can say that the “wishlist” from the people was the last thing that moved us to a new project. [insert initial shame ;)] Yes, that is the business, yes, we earn money on what we are doing, but the most interesting thing for us is the creation itself. I would describe it as the engineering challenge like “I wonder if I can?”. Remember like Raskolnikov said by Dostoyevsky [oh thank god for google] “I am a trembling creature or whether I have the right...” So, only this question always moved us forward, that is the key. And only after that we consider the “wishlists”, the “market needs”. It takes time. We need time to see what we could make better. We need time to find and get used to new technologies. We need time to start thinking in a different way. That is the evolution of development.

While some have tried their hand on being a product that excites both air gunner and firearms shooter (mostly targeting power), the Leshiy 2 seems to fit right into that middle ground of say a close range to 200 yard mid to small game gun…

EGL: was that the category you were trying to fit the Leshiy 2 into as part of your design process?

Ed: While power is certainly a factor, it’s not the only thing. I will tell you [see video below] I have personally taken the 350mm in .30 up to about 305m/s [~1000fps or ~98fpe] with a 44gr JSB. Getting power is easy, but my goal is always efficiency. What’s important to me isn’t just the power output, but how efficiently I can deliver it. CC per joule is my main concentration. I want that to be 9-10 joules per CC on anything I make. This way I’m delivering the customer a very efficient gun. What you use it for is your business.

I found that super interesting, and a great way to measure an airgun that I’ve never thought of. Every time I speak with Ed, I walk away with some little nugget like that. While the end product is obviously what I’m excited about… the process is super interesting to me.

EGL: How long have you’ve been working on the design?

Ed: Design, in fact that is almost the last thing we are working on. The design is defined by the construct, by the scheme we decided to use. And only having the idea what it should be we create the design. Remember what Roden answered when he was asked if it is difficult to make the sculptures? [back to google I go] “No, that is easy you just take the piece of marble and just cut off the excess volume of it…” So, we are almost in the same process, but vise versa, we take the idea and ramp up the necessary:-)

I’m 99% positive that was Ed telling me that was poorly crafted question, so rather than follow-up, I just read between the lines… “design was pretty simple, and a short process. What took time was creating solutions to engineering obstacles along the way.


The initial videos and photos I’ve seen… the design of Leshiy 2 is perfect for me. It checked every box.

EGL: While it’s clear you hit on few wishlist items from your customers (multi-shot, larger air cylinder)… what were your personal design goals with the Leshiy 2?

Ed: As I told earlier, the wishlist is the last part of the process, and what moves us to create something new. As engineers we enjoy the creation as the process itself. And only when we reach the goal, when we see that the gun turns to be interesting, for us, first of all, we start thinking about the customers, what would they want to have in this gun, what would they be interested and so on. To tell you truth some things which we offer are made ONLY for customers. Me, personally don’t need or don’t like it, but I follow the principle in this case “When you go fishing use the bait the fish likes, not the bait you like…” That is why at the final part of the creation we start to consider the “wishlist” and can take something from it, and not destroy the main idea of the project.

While if history holds true, just like every other new gun release, Ed will do a full video on the internals, but I, and I know many others are really excited to know what’s under the hood so to speak. There’s been a few videos out there, but it’s clear (to me at least) the person doesn’t have a clue how it works. No one does that better than Ed.