3D printers and the universal death of gun control

[MTMilitiaman]

Three dimensional printers are emerging technology that has the potential to affect many different fields and they become more capable and available.

I remember clearly my first experience with gun control. I was an influential 12 year old country boy in 1994 when the first Assault Weapons Ban was passed. I remember the sting well, hot, like a slap to the face, and I have regarded gun control as a blight, a scourge on humanity, every bit the seeping open wound as slavery and genocide. It has been a dream of mine to see the end of gun control in my lifetime, and now it appears not only possible but inevitable that this will occur, and possibly much sooner than my deathbed.

One area where 3D printing technology has the capability to revolutionize an industry is arms manufacturing. Already you can buy a machine, unlicensed and registered, that will allow you to manufacture functioning, high-quality 1911s in your kitchen, basement, or garage. And the machine costs less than many 1911s. Already programs are available to allow you to manufacture many different types of firearms or firearm components. As this technology evolves and becomes more common, individuals will be able to make their own firearms with absolutely no government knowledge or intervention.
Until they require the 3D printers to be registered, right? That only works, at all, until some enterprising individual makes a program that allows you to make a 3D printer on a 3D printer, which is not only possible, but inevitable. Once the government loses the ability to track the printers, they loses the ability to track everything that goes with it, including guns and their components. Complete firearms aren't even the most interesting consideration here. No more paying $25000 for a registered sear. Now anyone with a program available on the internet for free, a small billet of steel, and access to one of these printers can have any component made for any firearm. And the government is 100% impotent in their ability to control any of this. It doesn't even matter if it is illegal because it is so impossible for them to enforce it. It really could be the universal death of gun control.

 

[Odd Job]

There are plenty of ways to make firearms out of readily-accessible materials which themselves are not registered. Criminals do it all the time.
Whether it is done with a printer or from scrap metal.

 

[hso]

Printing requires additional equipment to make a practical receiver, but CNC table top machines can do the job of making parts that are manufacturer quality already.

 

[MTMilitiaman]

Yes, but again, the point isn't the actual manufacturing of firearms. This has been done by various means and with various degrees of success for a long time. Zipguns and such are usually fairly crude, often single-shot, and barely functional. They represent the toothbrush-handle prison shank of the firearms world and have little practical use. For the first time we are seeing technology emerging that among other things, allows us to manufacture our own fully functional firearms. And more to the point, it appears the government is powerless to prevent this. Does this technology represent the end of gun control in our lifetimes? Even now as they taunt us with it, could we be witnessing the practical death of gun control with our very eyes?

 

[AlexanderA]

Consumer 3-D printers make things out of plastic. You would need a whole different level of sophistication to make steel or aluminum gun receivers. You might make a decent plastic AR lower receiver, but a plastic 1911 frame isn't going to cut it.

Small machine shops have long been capable of making firearms. That hasn't stymied gun control, because the authorities attack this at the level of distribution rather than manufacture. You can make all sorts of weapons in your garage, but you're going to attract the attention of the authorities when you start selling them to the public.

The key reason that gun control would fail (if it does) is that there are too many guns already in existence. A flow of 3-D printed guns would be a drop in the bucket compared to the massive inventory of hundreds of millions of existing guns.

 

[edwardware]

For the first time we are seeing technology emerging that among other things, allows us to manufacture our own fully functional firearms. And more to the point, it appears the government is powerless to prevent this. Does this technology represent the end of gun control in our lifetimes?

I think you're on to something, but I also believe you're missing the primary functioning mode of gun control.

For the last 100 years it's always been possible for a reasonably educated engineer or machinist to manufacture whatever the US DoD was handing to GIs that year, in a modestly equipped garage shop. The people who took the trouble to have that level of shop might have been few, but 'today's' gun has never been out of reach for the serious hobbyist. Consumer-grade Additive Manufacturing technology simply lowers the barriers to entry by an order; you don't need a $200k Bridgeport knee mill to make an M-16; a $10k 3D printer will do most of the work for a polymer gun.

But Gun Control has never been successful in limiting the availability of technology, strictly speaking. Rather, it's success has been in criminalizing that technology to the point that no one believes any good can come from being armed, therefor no one is.

For example: if you ask a Bob-Hunter in Podunk, USA if suppressors should be legal, his answer is likely informed by his belief that only assassins would want such a thing; ditto M1 Thompsons and that M2 .50BMG I've always wanted. These items have been forbidden for so long that 'everyone' assumes that only criminals would want them. Go to Podunk, German with the same suppressor question, and the reaction will likely be surprise that anyone would hunt without a suppressor; how could you be so rude?

This is why I'm open and enthusiastic about my hobby. When my coworkers vote, I want them to remember that the engineer they sit next to at work is enthusiastic about accuracy, external ballistics, and bolt return velocity in an AR vs an M-1. I'm the 'good guy' who loves to engineer inside guns; and in many cases I'm the only 'good' gun guy they know.

 

[JeeperCreeper]

I think this is a more philosophical and theoretical debate than a practical one.

The government has no issues attempting to control/restrict/regulate things that the government had issues with. If they find these practices to be an issue, expect an attempt at legislation.

The thing about law-abiding citizens, is that they follow laws even if they aren't happy about it.

If .gov puts regulations on manufacturer of self-made firearms, you won't see wide spread use... Because it will be illegal.

It's not hard to make a full auto gun, but law-abiding citizens don't, by definition. Same with making bombs. And even drugs.

Unless of course we are talking about the criminal element, which is a poor talking point when it comes to legislative action.

Death of gun control? No. It will just be another angle for those to attack from.

 

[Hokie_PhD]

I agree with OP that technology is making gun control harder. It’s just not 3D printing but low cost lathes and mills allow anyone who wants to learn to fabricate what can’t be done in 3D. A little more effort and these basic machines can be upgraded to CNC fairly cheaply. and that adds a level of sophistication that can produce high quality items (weapons included)

 

[George Dickel]

I would think barrels would be the problem area. It would require some specialized equipment to bore out a steel bar and rifle it.

 

[Hokie_PhD]

I would think barrels would be the problem area. It would require some specialized equipment to bore out a steel bar and rifle it.

Rifling a barrel is the hardest part. But I believe Grizzley sells a lathe that many gunsmiths use. So I suspect it’s learning how to do it vs the tools.

 

[LiveLife]

Consumer 3-D printers make things out of plastic. You would need a whole different level of sophistication to make steel or aluminum gun receivers. You might make a decent plastic AR lower receiver, but a plastic 1911 frame isn't going to cut it.

I think many of you are totally missing the point of OP. There are ALREADY METAL 3D printers making metal gun/tool parts better than MIM quality.

A flow of 3-D printed guns would be a drop in the bucket compared to the massive inventory of hundreds of millions of existing guns.

Unless large number of 3D metal printers produce large number of parts on 24/7 basis.


Direct Metal Laser Sintering (DMLS) Technology



World's first 3D printed metal 1911



500 round endurance test

 

[ontarget]

Interesting thought OP. But lets say HRC got elected, 2018 the left wins everything, and by Feb. 2019 we are all ordered to turn in all guns. Since posessing a gun would then be a felony, wouldn't it just be easier to not turn them in and face the same consequences as we would for printing one after the fact?

 

[AlexanderA]

Interesting thought OP. But lets say HRC got elected, 2018 the left wins everything, and by Feb. 2019 we are all ordered to turn in all guns. Since posessing a gun would then be a felony, wouldn't it just be easier to not turn them in and face the same consequences as we would for printing one after the fact?

Exactly what I was trying to say. The sheer number of guns extant makes confiscatory gun control impossible. Never mind more being built in home workshops.

 

[Odd Job]

The UK is a worst case scenario test bed for the OP's hypothesis. Guns are heavily restricted to the point that you need a license for any firearm that you intend to shoot.
And it has been that way for a long time.

Where do you think the criminals are getting their guns from? They are either smuggled into the country from abroad, stolen from legitimate gun owners or "manufactured" from otherwise inert (in the legal sense of the word) materials. An example of this is converting a blank-firing gun or an antique which was previously exempt from registration.
If a person is embarking on the illegal procurement of firearms at quantity, even in a restrictive scenario such as the UK, there are cheaper and faster ways to do it than printing.

Now let's look at the US. There are millions of guns in circulation, legitimately held guns all under the radar.
Even by the best efforts of a tyrannical government, those guns could not be located and confiscated in any worthwhile length of time.

So if I wanted a gun in the US, do you think I would be looking to print one or simply buy one face-to-face from a shady character, or even better steal one?

The US is saturated with guns (and the knowledge to create and modify them) from inert materials already in existence. I'm not saying a printer has no role in the production of illegal firearms, I'm just saying it is greatly over-stated given the circumstances in the US.

As others have said, the restrictions are legal, not physical. Otherwise I would buy my own guns in the US and shoot those every time I visit.

However since I do not qualify to purchase firearms in the US I don't do it. I don't want to go to jail.

 

[Odd Job]

To put it more simply, the guns you envisage being printed, are already in existence.

 

[Hokie_PhD]

Odd Job you missed OPs point. While everything you say is true. The point is that anyone can make a gun with some relatively inexpensive technologies, so the claim that gun control and consfication will make us safer is moot.in fact it’s a BOLD FACE LIE. One we need to expose, and discredit.

If estimates are accurate. Every man woman and child in the US could be amed today. I suspect with all of the 80 percents, stashed guns etc, that if all of the guns that are in general use got confiscated tomorrow, that the stashed guns, 80 percents and parts would be enough to arm a significant part of the population.

The left doesn’t get that they’ve sold more guns by their actions than not. I know I didn’t own one gun before Obama was elected. My first was purchased prior to the election that re-elected him as I was afraid of unrest. I wasn’t alone.

As I learned more about guns and made friends. I can count at least a few that have enough to arm a small group. And that’s before we get into mags, ammo and reloading components.

So yea 3 D printing, CNC, etc will allow us to make guns you’re right there are plenty out there “in case of the worst case”. So the gun laws that the most staunch anti gunners want will do nothing but cause problems like they don’t imagine.

 

[LiveLife]

I didn’t own one gun before Obama was elected. My first was purchased prior to the election that re-elected him as I was afraid of unrest. I wasn’t alone.

Several gun stores in my county during Obama years sold more guns in those years then all the decades they have been opened COMBINED!

 

[buck460XVR]

There has always been ways of making firearms by individuals, just ain't been easy. Easier to buy or steal them,especially for criminal types. Always been hard to enforce the possession of firearms by restricted individuals, still the laws exist. Just as possession and the manufacture/growing of illegal drugs is hard to enforce. Still the laws are there and we spend millions to enforce them. Having a 3D printer is not going to eliminate gun control, just produce another way for folks to commit a crime, if they use it to manufacture and possess illegal firearms. The war on drugs is proof positive that just because the laws are hard to impossible to enforce, the laws are still there. When the majority of folks and the representatives they elect are in favor of controls, they will continue to be there. Kinda how it works in our country. Only way to eliminate those controls is when the majority of folks in this country and their elected officials want them eliminated. Before they eliminate all forms of gun control because of the easy access to 3D printers, they will put restrictions on 3D printers, their use and their ownership. Once the Black Market price of the printer, the materials and software needed to produce firearms becomes more expensive than buying those same firearms from one's LGS or off the street, the demand for those guns produced by 3D printers is gone. Like illegal drugs, firearms illegal in the USA will always be produced somewhere in the world and smuggled in, as long as there is demand and enough money to be made. I highly doubt if 3D printing will have any substantial impact on gun control at all.

 

[LiveLife]

I took Original Post in the context of what happened during the prohibition.

When people have the means to produce banned product and they want it, they will find ways to produce them.

Just look at the decades of ways people grew pot even though it was illegal.

 

[buck460XVR]

Just look at the decades of ways people grew pot even though it was illegal.

Yep, but it didn't kill the laws/controls against it. Only killed folks growing it, those enforcing the laws and some folks that carelessly wandered into a hidden grow.

 

[MachIVshooter]

Already you can buy a machine, unlicensed and registered, that will allow you to manufacture functioning, high-quality 1911s in your kitchen, basement, or garage. And the machine costs less than many 1911s. Already programs are available to allow you to manufacture many different types of firearms or firearm components.

No.

Machines exist which are somewhat affordable that can finish out partial receivers, onto which you assemble the rest of the firearm using production parts. That's quite different from fully manufacturing. Put it this way; "manufacturing" an AR-15 from an 80% receiver and rifle kit takes me about an hour total on my manual machines, 40 minutes if I we're cruisin'. Manufacturing an AR-15 from raw materials is a 250-300 hour proposition for me, and I'm using good equipment that cost tens of thousands of dollars used.

A machine that could be used to fully manufacture a firearm from raw materials by a minimally skilled person is a 7 axis millturn, which start at around $200K for one large enough to make a rifle barrel. Another few thousand in tool holders and tooling, and then you need the CAM files.

Point is, the cheap machines that allow a person to "manufacture" an unserialized personal firearm are wholly dependent on current laws in the United States that only regulate the serialized frame/receiver, and which allow a 99% complete (seriously, they are, from a machining standpoint) to be sold as an unregulated part. Likewise, using a 3D printed polymer frame/receiver to do this only works as long as we are able to purchase the barrel, bolt/slide and all the other parts the same way we would a tablet or blender. If the US were ever to enact the kind of gun laws in many other nations which do regulate these other parts, the ease with which "home builds" can be done is a thing of the past. Do you know how difficult it is to bore and rifle a barrel, even with a large lathe? I do, and that's why I generally buy take-offs, blanks and liners for my builds.

People have long been building unserialized, undocumented firearms in their garages from common hardware store bits. Crude, sometimes dangerous, but functional and, more importantly, mitigated gun control the same way.

What we really have to watch is ammunition control. Making gunpowder, priming compound, primer cups, anvils, cartridge cases and bullets from scratch is a whole other level of capability. That black pipe shotgun is just as useless as the completed 80% AR build or 100% scratch built high quality firearm if you can't get ammo. Even with my capabilities and knowledge, I'd be hard pressed to make decent ammo from raw materials and available chemicals.

 

[Hokie_PhD]

Yep, but it didn't kill the laws/controls against it. Only killed folks growing it, those enforcing the laws and some folks that carelessly wandered into a hidden grow.

Not true at the state level the laws have been repealed.
This hasn’t happened at the federal level although it was close.

Personally I don’t have a dog in the pot fight as I see issues with both sides.

That said, I do see problems with INFRINGING a core right that’s key to our Bill of Rights. And I see it as not only good thing that people could make weapons if necessary but as a duty to our Constitution to fight to defend our rights.

 

[MachIVshooter]

Rifling a barrel is the hardest part. But I believe Grizzley sells a lathe that many gunsmiths use. So I suspect it’s learning how to do it vs the tools.

Grizzly machines are hobby grade at best, no serious 'smith uses them. Tolerances are mediocre when new, and don't last, and the machines sound like a bucket of bolts when they're running. Southbend, LeBlonde, Clausing, Hardinge, Laguna and other American or European makes are head and shoulders above Grizzly. Some of the Taiwanese made Jet stuff is pretty decent, and often look practically identical to the Grizzly machines, but made to much better specifications and tolerances. I'll take an old Atlas or Logan home shop grade lathe over the new Chinese junk every day and twice on Sunday.

You could bore and rifle a pistol barrel on a decent sized engine lathe (remember, you need either twice the center distance as your barrel length, or a through bore large enough for the barrel stock), but it requires much more than just the basic lathe. First you need a coolant through gun drill and high pressure coolant system. Then you have to make a fixture that will rotate your rifling broach at the specified twist. This is either gears that are at a ratio to the carriage rack on the lathe, or a stationary part with a helix. Either is pretty involved to make. Alternately, you can use a rifling button, which will impart it's own twist. But pulling them through requires a pretty decent amount of force, and making a button that will actually work is no easy task, also requires special fixtures on a mill that will give you that helix, just male instead of female. Then you have to be able to harden the tool steel button to the point where it will actually do it's job.

Yes, some people have punched holes through short pieces of mild steel stock on drill presses and used hand made jigs to index the barrel and rotate the cutter that is manually pushed and pulled through the bore. But the results are usually mediocre at best, and the time involved significant. Boring a decently straight, consistent diameter and reasonably smooth hole through a piece of any real length chromoly or 400 series stainless to produce a respectable barrel is a whole 'nother ball game.

 

[Hokie_PhD]

I didn’t say Grizzly was my first, second or third choice. But I know they have a model marketed to gun smiths. I have no clue how good or bad they are. But they exist.

All that said, I suspect they have several “grades” as they’ve grown from a cheap importer to a company with a full line.

Now if I only had space and time to restore an old South Bend ;-)

 

[MachIVshooter]

I didn’t say Grizzly was my first, second or third choice. But I know they have a model marketed to gun smiths. I have no clue how good or bad they are. But they exist.

All that said, I suspect they have several “grades” as they’ve grown from a cheap importer to a company with a full line.

They have a couple "gunsmith" models, which differ from the engine lathe in that they have four screws 90° apart at the rear of the spindle. A friend of mine had the 12x36" G4003G. The paint started coming off almost as soon as it was unboxed, the compound and cross slide handles either rotated themselves from vibration or were so tight you couldn't turn them with any degree of smoothness with no "sweet spot", and the smoothest finish achievable required starting with 120 grit paper. He sold it and bought a 1960's Cincinatti Tray Top 18x72 which, even being heavily used and well worn after 50 odd years, produces tighter tolerances and superior finishes.

I tried using that Griz a couple times, and it was an exercise in frustration, especially having spent so much time on my Hardinge.

My current machines are the Hardinge HCT, My 17x60 Rahn-Larmon that's nearly a century old, a Southy Heavy 10L (not in service at the moment) and a little Atlas 618 that I actually do use for a lot of finish work, including suppressor baffles. I even modified the little Atlas with a custom large hand wheel on the compound for improving my ability to put accurate & smooth finishes on suppressor baffles without trashing my hands and forearms on the tiny stock crank. I also have a couple antiques, an 1896 Seneca 9x36 Treadle machine and an 1880's Barnes #4-1/2, but I don't really use those. Anyway, point is, most smiths who are serious are buying older, quality machines, even if they need a little work. For what I put into my Rahn-Larmon, I could have bought a brand new Grizzly of similar size. But I promise the parts made on it wouldn't be of the same quality.

Now if I only had space and time to restore an old South Bend ;-)

How big a machine do you want? The older cone head critters of 9" or so swing aren't much bigger than an Atlas 10F. But if you're after a 16x60 or something, yeah, that's a project! Also, compared to Grizzly, Southy machines are Cadillacs, but they're kinda lower end on the spectrum of serious professional lathes. Likewise with Bridgeport mills*. The nice thing about Southbend and Bridgeport, though, is the sheer quantity of machines produced, ergo they are common and popular still, and well supported for repair parts and upgrades.

*The brand new line of Bridgeport mills are made by Hardinge group, and are excellent quality.