Americans can legally download 3-D printed guns starting next month | Hacker News Reader

Americans can legally download 3-D printed guns starting next month

amp.cnn.com

53 pointsdsr1255 comments

I don't see why a CAD file would be any different than normal instructions for building firearms. For example, building a 12 gauge shotgun from 1" and 3/4" steel pipe is cheaper, easier, and probably safer/more effective than the plastic gun from the article. It seems to me the 3D printing part of this made the article popular for clickbait and thus it garnered more attention than the traditional approaches to homemade weapons. I guess my point is that making a CAD file illegal when a PDF instruction file is legal isn't very consistent or logical.

One concern is that it's now cheaper, easier, and faster to mass produce weapons which will evade metal detectors. I don't think any of this should be illegal, but the concerns should be considered.

It’s still illegal to do it, and if you’re making a run of them you’d use a mill, not a 3D printer.

The saving grace, such as it is, is that these firearms are single-shot, and the rounds themselves are still metal and explosive-residue-detectable. While 3D printing has changed manufacturing methods, it's not like the method of deposition changes the strength of the material that much, so it's improbable that these plastic firearms will ever be able to withstand more than one or two shots.

It strikes me as likely that a 3D-printed gun will not be the most effective way to accomplish almost any kind of harm for almost any kind of perpetrator, no matter how situated. And that gives me a little comfort, even if I wish my countrymen were less fascinated with weapons.

The 3-D printed guns are single shot, but the new ghost gunner machine is a CNC mill and I believe uses an aluminum alloy which can handle multiple shots.

The ghost gunner is used to finish metal parts that are fully functional, they will last for thousands of shots.

But they also won't pass metal detectors.

it should be illegal.

> For example, building a 12 gauge shotgun from 1" and 3/4" steel pipe is cheaper, easier, and probably safer/more effective than the plastic gun from the article.

Guns made from metal stock will probably always be more reliable and cheaper than plastic ones.

The issue is that a disposable plastic handgun is less detectable and will leave no useful evidence behind as it can simply be discarded at the crime scene.

(Of course, that's probably hogwash as a plastic feedstock capable of being a gun is probably going to be equally as traceable.)

You can even legally buy copies of the U.S. Army Improvised Munitions Handbook [1], which includes instructions on creating improvised firearms and other weaponry.

The moral panic about 3d printed weapons is complete nonsense. It's been trivial to make firearms out of hardware store and few practical skills. Back in high school we even made little black powder cannons in the metal shop, raiding fireworks for their powder and fuse and using ball bearings as the shot.

You don't even need steel pipe to make a shotgun, they're low enough pressure that for some types of shot you can even use copper pipe.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Field-Manual-Survival-Evasion-Recover...

But I think should admit that open-source 3D-printing/CNC does makes it even easier and harder to stop.

Scalable, too

I know what you meant, but my mind jumped straight to tiny guns.

No it doesn't. Have you ever used a hobby level 3d printer or cnc? Easy isn't the word I would use to describe the process.

What does harder to stop even mean?

I can just imagine crooks struggling to use a 3d printer lmao

P.S. I think this is the link you were talking about

https://gunfreezone.net/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/improvise...

There's an entire industry in the Khyber Pass region in Afghanistan and Pakistan dedicated to making firearms with nothing more than simple hand tools and scrap steel [1]. Firearms are trivial to produce. It's producing ammunition that's the hard part. Specifically, producing propellant for your bullets.

The panic about 3d printed guns is baseless. Any panic about terrorists being able to use something to commit heinous acts is generally baseless panic. As we've seen, all they need is a car or a knife and they can go on a rampage. The only reason we don't have more terrorist attacks isn't because of increased gun control or aviation security or restricted access to fertiliser. The only reason we don't have more terrorist attacks is because there simply aren't many people in the western world who hate it enough to commit terrorist attacks.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khyber_Pass_copy

Interesting! There are videos:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FinRqCocwGE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fRte65F_KRk

Of course firearms were made in pre-industrial times, and it's fascinating to see how: (just how do you chamber a gun accurately by hand?)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qTy3uQFsirk

But how would a technologically savvy first world person do it? These days you can buy a "gunsmithing" lathe for your garage workshop. Check out this video by Shiraz Balolia, CEO of Grizzly Industrial (they sell Chinese made industrial equipment to home shop machinists):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mb-RvRe_9-g

I was going to link to Joe Pieczynski's excellent machining videos on how to make an AR-15, but it looks like there are new YouTube guidelines:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VZAYMzAMwEI

In any case, the information is widely available (and check out his other videos if you want improve your machining skills).

Guess what, if you go in your garage and make a can with even one baffle inside and a hole in each end big enough for a bullet you’ve built a silencer (however shitty). If you don’t have a class III license you just broke the law. Furthermore, I’m pretty sure 3D printing an impractical but illegal silencer is within the reach of most makers.

Technology is going to continue to make breaking all manner of laws easier for stupid people. I’m not sure what, if anything should be done about this (generally speaking).

> make a can with even one baffle inside

Actually, you don't even have to do that. The ATF has ruled in the past that it the device is intended to reduce the report, it's a suppressor.

> Furthermore, I’m pretty sure 3D printing an impractical but illegal silencer is within the reach of most makers.

It's within reach of everyone with access to a soda bottle and a roll of duct tape.

---

Gun laws in the US are Byzantine. There are all kinds of things that fall under the same law as suppressors (National Firearms Act of 1934) that make no sense at all. For instance - installing a vertical grip on a pistol, or installing a barrel of less than 16" on a rifle.

Using any of the items on this page on an AR-15 lower receiver that is configured as a rifle _or was sold by a dealer in the past while configured as a rifle_ is a felony and carries the same penalty as possessing an unregistered machinegun: https://palmettostatearmory.com/ar-15/barreled-upper-assembl...

Right now, people are commenting this will enable 3D-printed plastics, but there are mildly expensive (about $1000-$3000) 3D metal printers, and with a bit of metal-working and gun-smithing skill it should be possible to mass manufacture good-enough, metal guns from those files.

So, this lowers a bit the money and skill needed for it, but it's not braindead easy or dirt cheap yet. A decently organized gang will print its own guns in the near future, or paramilitary groups, or insurrectionaries.

In the US it’s so ridiculously easy to obtain a firearm I don’t know why anyone would bother. A home made (3D printed) firearm is just as likely to kill its operator as anyone else.

It's on the Internet, so this goes beyond the US. I'm thinking gun-controlled areas or conflict areas.

I'm also thinking how this potentially shuts down for the FBI entrapping wannabe-insurrectionaries by posing as weapons dealers.

Or how non-American gangs will have vast quantities of guns at their disposal, and how that will necessarily change police policy.

And how determined and savvy, but dangerous, individuals will more easily (this is the key thing here: more easily, lower barrier of acquisition) get their hands on guns in gun-controlled areas and go on rampages.

This will make gun control much more difficult.

In conflict areas, of which I’m familiar, AK47’s are often easier to obtain than fresh produce.

And in gun-controlled areas? They would have to control the printers and the digital blueprints as well.

You mean like Chicago?

Two notes. I talked with a farmer in Holland a few years ago - I noticed home-made shotguns on the wall, and a home made 22LR. He said he made them more to have them made from plain stock than out of his desire to own guns. He said he could go to the docks in Rotterdam any day and buy a Kalashnikov if he wanted one.

I don't think Rotterdam is a conflict area, no matter how stiff the traffic was last month.

Realistically, how effective would a 3D printed firearm be? I was under the impression that PLA/ABS plastics are simply not that strong of a material.

Not very.

However, with printed metal (which exists today) it's very possible to print something more reliable, or mods for an existing gun, etc.

The receiver for the AR series of rifles does not need to be that strong. It doesn't handle any of the pressure of firing the cartridge; it's really just a mount for the rest of the components. The other components are not considered the actual firearm -- in a legal sense -- so you can just buy those without running into licensing issues (well, maybe local ones). Just add a barrel, a trigger group and other stuff and you're good to go.

Printing something that handles chamber pressures is a lot more challenging.

It could be a good intimidation tool for stick ups. All it takes is one shot so most people will be scared enough to comply as they would when faced with any other gun or weapon.

On the flip side, the barrel doesn't last fore more than one or two shots if you're lucky. You can't reload fast and have a single shot. I can see it being a useful tool for an assassination. But that single shot better count otherwise you're either captured, dead or you lose the target.

Is the "proof of function" really important? Most muggers and store thieves don't find themselves needing to fire warning shots, despite the existence of toy guns, due to most people's rational risk aversion.

That's actually a fair point, I hadn't considered this angle. Although I suppose it's not a new danger per se, I'm sure people have robbed convenience stores using Airsoft guns and similar.

I think you’ve been able to do this with toy guns for a while now..

Wouldn't you be way better off buying one of those realistic airsoft guns and painting the tip? Plus in many jurisdictions should you ever be caught, crimes committed with a gun require serving more years.

It's on the internet. It won't be just "Americans".

Nice that TFA mentioned Cody Wilson's interesting politics, too. He certainly lives them...

How are they going to get bullets in gun-controlled places?

The same way they do now, presumably.

What way is that?

Probably the same way they get guns.

Wow great victory for freedom of information.

Not at all fear mongering by this Gardiner person:

    Gardiner fears it will make it easier for terrorists and people who are too dangerous to pass criminal background checks to get their hands on guns.

    "I think everybody in America ought to be terrified about  that."

    The fact that high end 3-D printers are still too expensive for most people doesn't ease her concerns.

    "The people who make them will be state actors or well financed criminal cartels who have the ability to execute well organized criminal attacks in the United States and elsewhere," she said.

How well financed can a state actor or cartel be if they have to print out shitty plastic guns?

It's a pretty nice setup for assassinations

Print a gun, use it, drop it, GOTO 10

You can do that with a normal gun.

Sure, but it's a lot harder to take a normal gun through a metal detector.

You got some plastic bullets then?

Stone of sufficient hardness might work, or plastic pellets.

It depends where you aim too. A girl was shoot carelessly in the eye with a pellet gun at a drinking party in the woods and had to relearn how to speak and read and walk.

There's a whole continuum of damage that can be done by accident or malicious intent.

Buy a crate of used cold war surplus pistols or assault rifles and use them as disposable. For a cartel or state actor that's trivial, no need to bother with flimsy plastics.

Even scarier: attach it to a drone

A drone capable of carrying the weight of a useful firearm and dealing with the recoil is a potential weapon in its own right.

If you were thinking of a lightweight one-shot deal that sends the drone flying in pieces away from the point of firing according to Newton's third law, then I question the operator's ability to aim it properly. Every minute of angle you're off in your aim at the start is 1 inch of error at 100 yards, and that's if all else is perfect.

With a lightweight armed drone lash-up, I think you'd end up with a system with an inherent accuracy measured in whole degrees, not minutes.

The 2nd part is an interesting problem.

Print the barrel and drone casing together, so that you can eliminating syncing (/tying) the two together, which should enhance aiming significantly and allow you to link your software aiming to the hardware firing line a lot easier. Of course if the barrel can't turn, then the operator needs to select a body for the drone that matches its height to target, or that can accurately turn the drone body by a few degrees. Otherwise you need a bit of extra hardware that will be able to turn the barrel to a precise number of degrees.

After that use a very basic onboard camera to id the target by a human operator. The drone can find the center of mass of the target object (e.g. head sphere), the operator confirms and then the drone merely flies close enough to eliminate missing and fires. The only issue of course being if the target is moving too much or is occluded at any point, at which time you'd need more advanced image recognition, or further operator adjustments.

> Print a gun, use it, drop it, GOTO 10

I thought the same thing but you have to get up close for it to be of any use so I don't see it being a popular option as it offers less chance of escape. Though, for the average criminal, they are better suited for stick ups.

FYI: It's really annoying to read quotes when you have to move the scrollbar left and right all the time. Please avoid using codeblocks for quotes. Just put a "> " at the start of each quoted paragraph.

Noted.

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