Posted on 08/24/2012 8:35:19 AM PDT by marktwain
Cody Wilson has a simple dream: To design the world’s first firearm that can be downloaded from the Internet and built from scratch using only a 3D printer–and then to share it with the world.
Earlier this month, Wilson and a small group of friends who call themselves “Defense Distributed” launched an initiative they’ve dubbed the “ Wiki Weapon Project.” They’re seeking to raise $20,000 to design and release blueprints for a plastic gun anyone can create with an open-source 3D printer known as the RepRap that can be bought for less than $1,000. If all goes according to plan, the thousands of owners of those cheap 3D printers, which extrude thin threads of melted plastic into layers that add up to precisely-shaped three-dimensional objects, will be able to turn the project’s CAD designs into an operational gun capable of firing a standard .22 caliber bullet, all in the privacy of their own garage.
(Excerpt) Read more at forbes.com ...
See #15.
.025 is a lot of windage; much of your propellant is going to blow by the bullet not doing any good, unless you use a fairly soft lead hollow base bullet.
Headspace is another issue. 9mm headspaces on the case mouth, so you need a real chamber for it. .38SPL headspaces on the rim; a much better choice for an improvised weapon.
Not yet, but give it a decade.
If we HAVE a decade...
This implies that if you make the lower receiver (the part that gets the serial number, which is the "firearm"), and then buy the trigger group and upper receiver and install them, then in theory it should be perfectly legal.
Yeah, but the “ink” will cost you a fortune!
There's already a CNC data file for the AR-15 lower receiver (sans auto sear pin hole) out there on the internet. Download it to a flash drive, grab a chunk of aluminum and pop in to a place such as TechShop, et voila!
An AR lower is actually a very interesting project for the 3D printer. There are companies already making them out of polymers, so...
The “ink” is dirt cheap.
Perhaps the upper receiver will become the serial-numbered part, as is the case in many other "2-piece" rifles such as the FN-FAL.
I’ll pass on some plastic zip gun — I value my eyes and fingers too much for that.
I’m a steel and walnut kind of guy.
Neither am I.
It's been about 5 years since I saw some of these in action. They were great for visualization and starting mold formation, but mechanically weak.
That’s never been my experience. Are you talking dirt?
How cheap? A part the size of an AR15 lower would probably cost US$2.00 in materials to print.
What size for a 410/45?
If 3D printing of firearms really happens, watch for regulation of the software and printer.
“When printers are outlawed, only outlaws will have printers.”
The root of the problem, from the perspective of the law-abiding citizen, is an overbearing government. The remedy remains, reduce government to a manageable size. It may take a collapse for that to happen.
Will you settle for a 3D-printed semi-auto AR lower?
Two words: Darwin Award
With that composite one could make a firearm.
I’ve heard of those printers but had no idea they’d progressed so far. Thank you for the explanation!
Why would I buy a 3D printer when all I need is part of a car radio antenna and a clothes pin to make a .22 zip gun?
There are some very tough thermo plastics out there, but, they are molded under pressure. 3D printing would be more suited to making toys at this point
There are a lot of the current generation that never handled a hacksaw, but can run rings around most everyone over 50 with software and computer hardware.
This is about education for wishy washy "liberals" and independents. I have written and talked about how easy it is to make homemade guns. It had some effect, but this seems to be going viral.
I think that is happening because it seems like something out of a science fiction movie, instead of going back to the 19th century, like the workshops in Peshawar, Pakistan.
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