'Wiki Weapon Project' Aims To Create A Gun Anyone Can 3D-Print At Home

[nabraxas]

8/23/2012

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.

 

full story:

http://www.forbes.co...-print-at-home/

Edited August 24, 2012 by nabraxas

[Snowfella]

Media going down the sensationalist road again I'd say. There's already cad drawings available online for printing or milling weapons components but they don't seem to care mentioning that. Plus if you live in the states you already 100% legally build your own firearm from scratch without it needing to be registered in any way, only regulation on that is that you can't sell it on.

So, $1000 3D printer and they are trying to prove they can make a handgun that can fire just once? Give me $50 worth of material and access to a lathe and I could do that in under an hour. Hell it will even fire more than once and could be made in just about whatever caliber you feel like.

[ThunderIdeal]

PM'd

lol jk

i don't mind guns, say what you will. my beef is with the ridiculous array of technology available to government, military, law enforcement etc. the average person has ethics, organisations may not.

[nabraxas]

Give me $50 worth of material and access to a lathe and I could do that in under an hour.

i agree, but it still takes abit ov skill.

i posted about something they mention on the second page ov the article before, but i think this is a much more likely scenario:

In September of last year, a user uploaded designs for a printable lower receiver and magazine for an AR-15 semiautomatic rifle to the 3D printing software platform Thingiverse. The lower receiver in particular stirred controversy, as the receiver is legally considered the main body of the firearm and its sale and distribution are regulated. With a 3D-printed receiver, a gun enthusiast could purchase and assemble the other components without any limitations from gun control laws.

Just a month ago, a 3D-printed lower receiver was put to the test by Michael Guslick, who wrote on an AR-15 enthusiast web forum that he was able to assemble a working model of the rifle with a receiver printed on a Stratasys model printer and to fire 200 rounds without any sign of wear on the printed piece.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2012/08/23/wiki-weapon-project-aims-to-create-a-gun-anyone-can-3d-print-at-home/2/

i don't mind guns, say what you will. my beef is with the ridiculous array of technology available to government

i don't mind guns either, but i'd hate to see Australia go down the American route ov guns for all.

And those Americans that say they need guns to fight Government oppression are deluded. Just ask the Waco survivors.

Yeah coming from England it still unnerves me to see cops carrying guns here, let alone security guards.

But gun control here has worked.

Historically, Australia has had relatively low levels of violent crime. Overall levels of homicide and suicide have remained relatively static for several decades, while the proportion of these crimes that involved firearms has consistently declined since the early 1980s. Between 1991(the gun buy back after Port Arthur) and 2001, the number of firearm-related deaths in Australia declined 47%.

Mouzos, Jenny and Rushforth, Catherine (2003). Trends and Issues in Crime and Criminal Justice No. 269: Firearm related deaths in Australia, 1991–2001. Australian Institute of Criminology. ISBN 0-642-53821-2; ISSN 0817-8542.

And that's despite the rise in population during that decade.

[quarterflesh]

I love not having a gun to defend myself when someone breaks in.

[nabraxas]

someone breaks in

is that much ov a problem in Vietnam?

would it be that hard to get a gun there if it was?

[Snowfella]

I'd probably have to say that I'm on the other side of the fence, guns legally owned and carried in the line of duty doesn't make me the least bit nervous. Probably since I'm ex army and have myself carried during duty. The only way it makes me change the way I behave is that I tend to keep alittle bit closer an eye on my surroundings if I'm near say armaguards restocking an ATM, I ain't a threath so they won't direct anything at me but I do make sure I'm not going to end up between them and a potential threath!

As for US vs Australia when it comes to guns, big difference there is the US constitution that clearly states that every citicen has the right to own and bear arms. No such thing down here so it will never become an issue.

And as for this

Historically, Australia has had relatively low levels of violent crime. Overall levels of homicide and suicide have remained relatively static for several decades, while the proportion of these crimes that involved firearms has consistently declined since the early 1980s. Between 1991(the gun buy back after Port Arthur) and 2001, the number of firearm-related deaths in Australia declined 47%.

 

Isn't that just proof that the gun buyback affected nothing? Sure the level of gun related homicide and suicides have declined since the buyback but with the overall levels not changing it's just proof that guns don't kill people, it's people that kill other people.

[Sallubrious]

Isn't that just proof that the gun buyback affected nothing? Sure the level of gun related homicide and suicides have declined since the buyback but with the overall levels not changing it's just proof that guns don't kill people, it's people that kill other people.

 

Guns don't kill people, bullets do.

Sorry I couldn't resist that.

That was a joke that buyback campaign, only the honest people handed their guns back and the crims kept theirs, so gun crime statistics didn't change much.

Most of the crimes I hear of and read about involve hand guns anyway, not rifles which made up the vast majority of those handed in for the buyback scheme.

[r2pi]

But gun control here has worked.

Mouzos, Jenny and Rushforth, Catherine (2003). Trends and Issues in Crime and Criminal Justice No. 269: Firearm related deaths in Australia, 1991–2001. Australian Institute of Criminology. ISBN 0-642-53821-2; ISSN 0817-8542.

 

And if you mark on those graphs (or more recent ones) when major gun control legislation was introduced, namely 1997 and 2002, you will see they had no discernible effect on the previously existing decline.

All they did was restrict civil liberties and win politicians more votes by whipping up mass moral panic. As drug users, people on here should be well aware of that topic. The same point applies to "boat people" and, well, pretty much every manufactured issue they whip up in order to make it sound like they stand for something other than re-election.

[Anodyne]

That was a joke that buyback campaign, only the honest people handed their guns back and the crims kept theirs, so gun crime statistics didn't change much.

 

As I recall, quite a few of the weapons that were handed in and "destroyed" later turned up in various crimes, as the police had sold them on. So crims might've actually ended up with more guns.

From Terry Pratchett's Night Watch:

There had been that Weapons Law, for a start. Weapons were involved in so many crimes that. Swing reasoned, reducing the number of weapons had to reduce the crime rate.

Vimes wondered if he'd sat up in bed in the middle of the night and hugged himself when he'd dreamed that one up. Confiscate all weapons, and crime would go down. It made sense. It would have worked, too, if only there had been enough coppers - say, three per citizen.

Amazingly, quite a few weapons were handed in. The flaw though, was one that had somehow managed to escape Swing' and it was this: criminals don't obey the law. It's more or less a requirement for the job. They had no particular interest in making the streets safer for anyone except themselves.

Some citizens took the not unreasonable view that something had gone a bit askew if only naughty people were carrying arms. And they got arrested in large numbers...The rate of arrests shot right up, and Swing had been very pleased about that.