But it (kind of) is, specifically with regards to US law. I mean, that's the point. There is a huge market for AR-15 upgrade parts, and everything else can be acquired easily with no regulation.
And yes, this could be made at home with old technology, but it requires a fair amount of dedication and skill. Downloading a file and clicking 'print' is a significantly different process.
> But it requires a fair amount of dedication and skill
To specifically address that point, you could use a 5 axis machining center and a standardized control sequence ('G-codes') to do the exact same thing.
I think the bigger difference is the amount of funds that needs to be put on the table for the machine itself.
Once you have the rig set up for a part the major operations are mounting the blank, hitting 'start' and removing the finished part (assuming it can be made in one pass).
That's extremely expensive equipment that you're not going to have at home without a lot of dedication and investment.
You could always send something off to eMachineShop.com, but that's still not really comparable to the not-so-distant future where we'll all have easy access to local 3D printers.
>That's extremely expensive equipment that you're not going to have at home without a lot of dedication and investment.
You can stamp AK receivers with little more than a hydraulic shop press and a simple jig, followed by either riveting or welding things in place. That's totally within the realm of many home workshops, and people have been doing so for years.
Perhaps so, but the point is that manufacturing receivers is already fairly trivial compared to the rest of a firearm since it's a low stress part, and that this is already well-covered legal ground.
Even if 3D printing reaches the ubiquity of everyone having the equipment at home, 3D printers will not be capable of producing full, functional firearms.
Perhaps so, but the point is that manufacturing receivers is already fairly trivial compared to the rest of a firearm since it's a low stress part
I still don't really agree with that. A stamping machine isn't particularly easier to come by than a good boring machine, in my opinion. The whole process of creating a rifle isn't terribly high-tech, as demonstrated by the vast number of cheap AK-variants flooding the world. It is still, however, beyond the skill and motivation of most people.
Even if 3D printing reaches the ubiquity of everyone having the equipment at home, 3D printers will not be capable of producing full, functional firearms.
I completely disagree with that. Given sufficient time, it seems inevitable that we will have 3D printer medium capable of containing the high pressure of even a rifle.
> Given sufficient time, it seems inevitable that we will have a 3D printer medium capable of containing the high pressure of even a rifle.
Materials science doesn't magically provide you with new materials and and structural side effects just because you give it enough time.
The physical properties of 3D printed stuff, be it full metal parts or plastics are typically a notch below that of the same substance when used in a reductive setup (ie, milling, turning, drilling etc).
The reason for that is that depositing the material layer by layer from a grain or a wire (or a fluid) means that you have to fuse all those layers. Essentially a solid, defect free chunk of a hardwood tree is about as good as it gets when you are composing from parts (molecules in that case).
And the hardest of hardwoods can just about compete with the softest of the metals used for structural elements (but are still a notch above most plastics).
Cast metal (also an additive process) still requires some re-work, and 3D printed parts that have to be made to a certain precision require (skilled) re-work as well.
It is possible that you are right but at the moment that is pure speculation and I don't think it seems inevitable at all.
The one exception I would like to make to all this is a single-shot, single-use firearm. That might be possible, something that would just need one round, and which you'd dispose of after firing. The accuracy would be horrible (no way to sight it in) and it would be a pretty bulky thing compared to its efficiency but I think that might be possible, even with todays printers. Extrapolating from that to future materials you might get more accuracy but I doubt you'd ever go over that single shot unless the gun is to be as much a risk to the user as it is to the target.
On another note, a fake gun is sometimes just as effective as a real one, and printing fake guns is definitely a possibility.
> A stamping machine isn't particularly easier to come by than a good boring machine, in my opinion.
A basic shop press which is sufficient to stamp AK receivers can be had for under $200. That's not even in the same league as basic CNC equipment, and hardly out of reach for anyone that decided they wanted to homebrew a receiver.
>I completely disagree with that.
As 0x12 also notes, you're being hugely optimistic about the material sciences involved. Even when using steel, barrels are either milled or hammer-forged, not cast, to achieve sufficient strength.
Even when you're talking about small parts, like extractors, MIM[1] parts are absolutely notorious for being prone to breakage or being out-of-spec.
Color me highly skeptical that plastic-based additive printing is going to catch up to or surpass what we know about metalworking any time soon.
Fine, so cast it using the lost wax method and clean it up. There are literally a hundred different ways in which you could make this part for pennies and some of those methods would be much more rapid and much cheaper than 3D printing.
Are you seriously trying to suggest that carving the part plug, building a box, acquiring appropriate sand, packing the part into the sand, acquiring and melting metal, pouring said metal, then finishing the part's surface is anything like the ease of downloading, printing, and waiting?
Yes, building a 3D printer is an investment now. But cheap, common 3D printers are going to become a reality, and soon.
But it (kind of) is, specifically with regards to US law. I mean, that's the point. There is a huge market for AR-15 upgrade parts, and everything else can be acquired easily with no regulation.
And yes, this could be made at home with old technology, but it requires a fair amount of dedication and skill. Downloading a file and clicking 'print' is a significantly different process.