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The $1,200 Machine That Lets Anyone Make a Metal Gun at Home

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Re: The $1,200 Machine That Lets Anyone Make a Metal Gun at Home

#91

Post by hga »

angersock wrote: post #83
hga wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it takes a semi-auto 80% receiver and finished the remaining 20%. (And after that, "Some assembly is required," e.g http://www.brownells.com/.aspx/lid=11004/learn/ .) But if you want to be concerned, look at how utterly simple a full auto (simpler that way, e.g. firing pin is a bump in the bolt face) 9mm Sten gun is: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sten (A semi-auto AR15 is a much more capable weapon, BTW.)

What's darkly funny to me is that those things are illegal. Perhaps the biggest event in favor of keeping such weapons outlawed was the North Hollywood shootout ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Hollywood_shootout , basically IRL Payday), and yet only two people--the robbers--were killed !

Actually not. Only ones manufactured after 1986; there are roughly 250,000 in private circulation (and I can dig up a current case where a police department is selling a vintage 1920s Thompson sub-machinegun so they can buy stuff they need).

ADDED: per the NRA's page on California gun laws, in theory its even legal to have and transport one, although evidently the permits to do so are never granted (well, I assume except for Hollywood...).

2 known illegal uses of legal machine guns in private hands in the US ... one by a cop....

Re: The $1,200 Machine That Lets Anyone Make a Metal Gun at Home

#92

Post by molecules »

RyJones wrote: post #29
viggity wrote: post #21

I'm very much a libertarian, pro-gun kind of guy and I'm glad this project project exists, but I do have to say I'm reluctant about it. There isn't really anything (that I can see) that can stop this movement. I abhor gun registries and most restrictions on firearms but I'm glad that there is at least a small hurdle to acquiring a firearm (purchase permits). Hopefully the trend towards more and more CCW holders incre…

I don't know what a purchase permit is. In Washington, Oregon, and Idaho guns are cash and carry.

Michigan use to require a purchase permit for pistols. You had to go to the Michigan State Police, take a little quiz, and they would issue you a purchase permit. The permit had an expiration date. You bought the pistol with the permit and then had to take the pistol back to the police station for a safety check.

Re: The $1,200 Machine That Lets Anyone Make a Metal Gun at Home

#93

Post by hga »

maxerickson wrote: post #68
hga wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Meth is illegal, full stop. Guns are not, that "legal loophole" is referred to by others as the Constitution, which makes gun manufacturing subject to laws and regulations, but not bans in the US.

Meth is schedule II. I think "illegal, full stop" really only works for schedule I.

Oops! You're right, I was under the incorrect impression it had been put on Schedule I.

Re: The $1,200 Machine That Lets Anyone Make a Metal Gun at Home

#94

Post by JoeAltmaier »

twothamendment wrote: post #88
skrowl wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All of the mass shootings in the US have occurred in "gun free zones" (for example schools) where law-abiding people can't legally bring guns. Regardless of what your TV told you, non-law-enforcement people in the US can't legally walk into a school with a gun. As it turns out, criminals don't really care where they can legally bring guns and will happily walk past a "NO GUNS ALLOWED HERE!" sign. When gun grabbing le…

Regardless of what you write, there are non-law-enforcement people in the US who can legally walk into school with a gun. I don't know about every state, but in Utah if you have a permit to conceal, you are good to go in a school.

I recommend Legal Heat, a site that spells out the current regulations state by state, about where you can and cannot go while carrying a firearm.

Re: The $1,200 Machine That Lets Anyone Make a Metal Gun at Home

#95

Post by beachstartup »

hga wrote: post #35
mentos wrote: post #34

I'm pretty sure the lethal part of the equation isn't metal receivers but gun powder and bullets. Why aren't we limiting the sale of bullets (explosives)? edit: Chris Rock said it best: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Db0Y4qIZ4PA

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Amendment_to_the_United... Except for some "slave states" as I've taken to calling them, you can buy ammo mail order, often with a statement of age or perhaps a photocopy of your drivers license. Powder, bullets, cases and primers by mail, although there may be limits to the amount of powder you can hold before the BATF wants a license, safe(r) storage, etc. And similarly your loc…

you can get ammo shipped to most cities in CA. notable exception is LA (city proper).

Re: The $1,200 Machine That Lets Anyone Make a Metal Gun at Home

#97

Post by hga »

diydsp wrote: post #89
hga wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, it takes a semi-auto 80% receiver and finished the remaining 20%. (And after that, "Some assembly is required," e.g http://www.brownells.com/.aspx/lid=11004/learn/ .) But if you want to be concerned, look at how utterly simple a full auto (simpler that way, e.g. firing pin is a bump in the bolt face) 9mm Sten gun is: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sten (A semi-auto AR15 is a much more capable weapon, BTW.)

Sorry, i forgot to mention the numerous modifications which can make an AR-15 automatic. It's true this device alone doesn't make an automatic weapon, but it certainly catalyzes the process of making an untraceable automatic weapon. Once you have made an untraceable semi-auto AR-15 with this device, you can then make it untraceable auto with numerous ways.

It turns out the BATF has a metric in terms of tools, skill and time needed to turn a semi-auto gun into full auto, and has banned ones that fall below that threshold, like MAC-10 and -11 clones with fixed firing pins in the bolt face.

And, no, it doesn't catalyze this, or at least no more than allowing the sale of millions of finished AR-15s. Those are a lot closer than a 80% receiver and a pile of parts, "Some assembly required".

Re: The $1,200 Machine That Lets Anyone Make a Metal Gun at Home

#98

Post by Osiris »

ctdonath wrote: post #73
tjradcliffe wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your comment implies that there are two classes of people, "gun owners who understand firearms" and "non-gun owners who do not understand firearms". A casual glance at the deplorable accidental and unintentional discharge rates in the US statistics should make it immediately clear that gun ownership and understanding firearms have absolutely nothing to do with each other. I say this as a non-gun-owner who was taught…

A casual glance at the deplorable accidental and unintentional discharge rates in the US statistics should make it immediately clear that ...there isn't a substantial problem therewith. Not zero, of course, but by your line of reasoning cars should be outlawed immediately because of the actual accidental & unintentional harm rates therewith ... and the same issue with guns being orders of magnitude less. The problem…

Cars kill tens of thousands of people a year. Human drivers should absolutely be outlawed, as soon as the technology is feasible to do so.

Re: The $1,200 Machine That Lets Anyone Make a Metal Gun at Home

#99

Post by CapitalistCartr »

The author has no understanding of CNC machines and didn't do his homework. This is all completely wrong:

"Like any computer-numerically-controlled (or CNC) mill, the one-foot-cubed black box uses a drill bit mounted on a head that moves in three dimensions to automatically carve digitally-modeled shapes into polymer, wood or aluminum."

CNCs use drill bits for drilling, but not cutting. They use a carbide router bit. Look like a drill bit, but isn't. His machine might use a drill bit, but it's not the norm and "any CNC" doesn't.

CNC routers, or mills, divide into those that cut steel and those that cut everything else, not "polymer, wood or aluminum". From this article, I can't tell nearly as much as I'd like to about this machine, and I do this for a living.

Re: The $1,200 Machine That Lets Anyone Make a Metal Gun at Home

#100

Post by rgrieselhuber »

na85 wrote: post #82
InfiniteRand wrote: post #71

There is a potential here for there to be a change similar to the 18th century. Suddenly, non-governmental forces or fledgling governments can quickly equip a lightly armed force. For the last 1-2 centuries you needed a manufacturing infrastructure under your control, but a 3-D printer device like this (if I am understanding the article correctly, and perhaps I am not). In the 18th century, relatively low-cost and re…

>eventually there will become some expensive but exceptionally effective weapon only large governments can afford or supply This already exists. Ubiquitous air presence via unmanned drones armed with air-to-ground rockets, missiles, or guided bombs. Sometimes I feel like libertarians and NRA types seriously believe that they (a bunch of angry right-wing hunters or whatever) could actually throw off what they feel are…

> This already exists. Ubiquitous air presence via unmanned drones armed with air-to-ground rockets, missiles, or guided bombs.

Your other comments aside, this actually isn't too far outside the realm of possibility for sufficiently motivated and skilled independent manufacturers. What militaries really have a monopoly on is superior supply chains and logistics. The advanced weaponry is icing on the cake.

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