The Right Scoop
I don't find him creepy at all. So far, he hasn't broken any laws, has he? But soon there will be a new law banning all copiers.
Not so creepy, really. His argument comes down to the idea of individuals being able to protect themselves, rather than be at the mercy of a superstate. Print mine in neon green, please.
I don't agree. I think this young man is well read, intelligent and well spoken. He believes in liberty and freedom while also willing to debate in a controlled intellectual way. If he is what you consider "creepy" then we are all doomed.
Folks this is real. The plastic will only last about 5 rounds but that is not the whole story. Since Beck did this advances have been made almost daily. They now have 3D printers that lay down layers of metal. Good for about 100 rounds.
3D printed 30 round A/R magazine:
3D printing with metal:
This is all new within the last 4 weeks. Wait a year and then see what happens. Just the 30 round magazine is enough to shake up the powers that be. The prices of the printers is continuously falling. If you want to get caught up to date on this technology, check out the links at the bottom of the two articles above. By the way, the plans for these items are being passed around free.
Did you catch that challenge thrown out at the end. "Let's find out if we're friends or foes." lol Wonder what that was about?
This technology is some bizarre stuff. You can "repair, invent and reproduce all sorts of mechanical items"
You can do it too!
There is an inernet site where you send your design, they send you the part back.
If you can 3d print a replica, you can then create a mold from that replica, and then a final version of whatever you want. Kinda making something using the "lost wax" technique. You still need to figure out what to make the final version from, but it doesn't have to be the same stuff you use in the printer...
Creating CAD models for those parts and taking them to working prototypes takes brains. He is a bit over dramatic (or deceptive?) because other people have long made 80% machined AR lowers that can be completed by a citizen without going through an FFL holder. He has though, put together an ingenuous "open" play. I do not know however if he will help us or hurt us in the end. Here is why what he does could be a double edged sword......
The AR-15 is a truly open, interchangeable rifle platform. Today, the only part of an AR-15 that the Feds regulate is the lower receiver - a single piece of metal with no moving parts that one can buy for less than 80 bucks. It has a serial number and is purchased through a FFL holder just like a complete rifle. Everything other part needed to build AR rifle can be bought from thousands of small manufactures without Fed regulation.
He just found a way for a citizen to make a lower without the need for an expensive metal foundry or a CNC milling machine. Putting this out "in their faces" could well push the Feds into finding ways (without Congress) to end this modular open market for AR parts - i.e ending the sale of standalone AR lowers, or worse, regulating all rifle major parts like upper receivers and trigger groups.
Sorry but no he doesn't have any brains. Monkeys get trained to do things that make them look smart. He was trained to do things to make him look smart...and I know lots of ignoramuses that have learned CAD.
Real smarts comes from critical thinking skills which he has yet to display.
Your post displayed critical thinking skills in that you saw the loophole in his thinking and you know then Feds will too.
You can bet resins will be controlled, but in the meantime, the back and forth of one upmanship of weapons continues since the days of sticks and stones. The first priority of a human being is 1- survival 2- obtaining the means of survival and 3- improving on the means. If it means civil disobedience because of incompetence or hidden agendas being revealed, so be it. The responsibility of government is to 1- protect its citizens against military harm 2- protect citizens economically (that means don't allow manufacturers to ship jobs to other countries, without even a debate) 3- Guard citizens from enemies within. If it is determined that the government is the enemy, use every means to impeach. If that is not acted upon by the governments' official opposition, then it is a civil right, written into our Bill of Rights, to use every means at our disposal to defend ourselves. Period.
We're entering an age where one can print a gun and even bullets from their homes and use it. This is both frightening and liberating.
After watching this video, I feel like we're at the brink of War and on the cusp of Peace.
Wonder if you can use a magazine/clip made in this way in a traditionally made firearm. If so all the laws mandating only so many rounds become meaningless.
Here's another short clip showing the inventor using a weapon. At the end he is eating lunch. Someone off camera asks him how it tastes, he replies "Tastes like Diane Feinstein's lunch."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=q10Jz2qIog8
His magazine fits a standard AR lower so yes, it could be used in any AR.
Our rulers will make gun laws that make owning 20 or 30 round magazines illegal, so whether we did not turn our magazines in, or if we made some ourselves, we would be still be criminals.
'Radical equality', 'functionalist'
Interesting terms. One wonders if this guy doesn't just want everybody back in caves and 'beyond Thunderdome'. Pretty scary thoughts this guy was trying to mask.
I just heard a bunch of words strung together in one incoherent sentence, I have no idea what he means and I'm not sure he does either.
Ah... ok. He wants to be a Lady Gaga-kind of controversial guy. Nice... he's squirrely and a bit out there. I hate these "intellects", these smart guys who remain purposely ambiguous.
Is he good? Is he evil? Is he a pioneer? Is he a devil? I don't know... he's so controversial... ooooooooo!
This seems like a VERY bad idea. I love Star Trek science... the idea of a replicator is a lovely invention. But to mass produce potentially undetectable guns? Doesn't sit well with me.
He's an anarchist... but he also seems kind of Jim Jonesish.
Bottom line... anything that makes weapons easier for criminals to get their hands on seems to be a bad idea. It usually all comes down to money... if an evil, Muslim high-bidder bought all of this and the know-how... then boom... we have a new terrorist threat.
There are many ways to obtain a "printed" part of a rifle/gun that can be used to manufacture the whole thing.
My worries are these stories will lead to Federal monitoring/regulation of 3D printing. 3D printing is so revolutionary (you can order parts to repair almost ANYTHING you own! Need a carb for your '57 Ford? Print it, etc.) that the Feds would love to be involved. I am sure that crony-capitalists will want to stifle it as well.
For the children of course.
Parts for autos and guns need to be made of materials capable of withstanding high heat and pressure... resins and plastics can't do everything.
frame repairs on many vehicles (recalls) being done with a 2 part epoxy and a plate of 1/8" steel.
composites make up a lot of an aircraft.
theres a time and place for it all, ceramics been in rotors and wheels for years.
Of course, and those 3D printers exist. Plastic 3D printing is the cheapest and most used by the private citizen, but there are many substances that are used in 3D printing. Eventually, those industrial-level 3D printers will become more and more affordable to the common citizen. Do a search on 3D printing - it is amazing.
But my point is more of a concern that government regulations will smother a budding industry that will save the common user money and increase their well-being, not on the functionality of plastic guns.
You can order a barrel, you can order a blank firing stock that can then be drilled and machined to work as a fully-functional rifle - all that is true regardless of the 3D printer.
Amazing technology.
Wow, It reminds me of the movie "Weird Science" wonder if you can make a hot chic with this machine.
That just reeks of radical anarchism. Would love to be a fly on the wall, but it feels like any association with that guy would end in a Breitbart.
So can weapons be mass produced using a 3-D printer? That's a bit scary. Of course right now finding ammunition is a problem for a lot of weapons....
Very intelligent but misguided young man. Thank God right now the equipment to make it is very expensive.
to be clear he did not print a complete gun ... he did not print a chamber and barrel ...
He printed the Lower Receiver and a magazine, neither of those parts have to stand up to the stresses a barrel and Upper Receiver (where the chamber is located).
It is a bad idea, someone has tried this before, using one of these 3-D printers to make a lower receiver for their AR-15. It was a catastrophic failure, as it came apart when they fired the first round.
Exactly. 3D printing is a process of bonding synthetic materials together. Plastics and polymers have their place, but there is a reason gun manufacturers only use polymers in certain parts of the firearm. I hesitate to explain because it seems obvious.
I will see it as a revolutionary breakthrough when I see a 100% polymer gun rip through 50,000 rounds of ammo (of whatever size or caliber), without failure. Until then, forging, stamping, cutting and drilling metals will still be the name of the game.
Polymer AR-15 lower receivers work fine, but the type of polymer and forming process are designed for the stresses involved. A 3D printed one is far from that and would have all sorts of problems.
What makes the idea interesting is that we citizens can of course make our own weapons without going through an FFL Buying an 80% AR15 lower receiver is legal and a better place to start. However it does requires access to a milling machine and a drill press (which btw would also be needed to machine one of these 3d jobs to accept the trigger assembly, saftey, and mag release anyway)
80% reciever
http://www.ar15-kits.com/index1.html
DIY
http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2010/02/22/diy-ar-15-lower-receiver-tutorial/
I would advise checking into the Federal Laws around manufacturing that lower, if you print it to the stage of a "blank" and subsequently drill it to finish it you are still manufacturing what is considered a "restricted" item.
Damn.... you are tempting me to build a polymer AR Ken :D
I like polymer. I've both an all metal Sig pistol and a polymer Sig with a modular fire control assembly. Both are excellent guns and I am impressed with the design simplicity of the polymer Sig.
Here is a cool story
Before we get into this, let me offer my qualification, 3 years an armorer in the 101st Airborne Division. I have seen a lot of beat to hell ARs in my time, this is pretty special.
On Saturday while mowing a large field, I went over a terrace, hit two holes in succession and launched my AR out of its fender rack. When the butt came down it missed the butt boot, slid down the fender, missing the rear tire but not the 6 foot Bush Hog, Bush Hog being pulled behind. Thus we have an AR Modified by Bush Hog.
The heavy blades, starting at the top, struck the scope front bell, bending the scope up 1/4 inch, shattered the front of the upper receiver, shattered the forend, struck the gas block, wrapped the gas tube around the barrel, bent the 16" barrel in three directions, struck the QC for the suppressor DXing the lock pin, ripped the butt stock out of the lower, bent the tube key, lost the plungers and springs, sheared the rear take down pin, put the bolt carrier 1/3 out the rear, ripped the magazine out of the lower and dinged the top round.
On Sunday I flushed and cleaned up the remains with mineral spirits. I had to cut the barrel off in front of the scope with a saws all to get it out so I could examine the upper receiver.
Once I got the upper off the New Frontier polymer lower I was shocked, it showed little evidence of any abuse. I hammered out the key, and the butt stock screwed back on, then locked up tight. So I replaced the 5 parts (2 springs, 2 plungers and a pin) went down to the gun show and bought a new upper. Stuck it all together with a cheapo Chicom scope I had laying about and it functioned. Not even the trigger pull had changed and the mag locked up and fed ammo. Save the polymer rear pin being sheared by the upper coming open, the lower was not hurt at all.
Sent the pictures to New Frontier, they said lifetime warranty, where do we send a replacement? No, there is nothing wrong with the lower, but could I get a new polymer pin, yep, and it is on the way.
http://www.perfectunion.com/vb/ar-15-talk/91141-damage-testing-polymer-lower-ar.html
A woman rattling off weapon stats is sexy as hell. Be careful. I might get all worked up........
..........again.
"All that being said this is highly reminiscent of the "Plastic Pistol Panic" that followed the introduction of the Glock."
I was thinking the same thing. Physics are physics, and it is gonna take some precisely machined steel to project 55 grains of lead at 2000fps.
I have seen a couple of polymer lowers offered for sale, but have yet to see one match the durability of a standard metal lower and the functional longevity of these polymer lowers is still suspect. All that being said this is highly reminiscent of the "Plastic Pistol Panic" that followed the introduction of the Glock.
Having been an armorer I was wondering how they would get their hands on steel strong enough to handle the pressure of a fired shot.
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