3D Printer manufactured gun.

Interesting in light of current events.


http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-22421185

 

So lets do the math....

Printer = $8000, materials - lets be generous - $100 and time, effort etc and you end up with a piece of crap firearm

I can take my PAL for $400, buy a gun for $500 and I am $7200 ahead of the game with a decent gun that actually fires consistently

Those restrictions are REALLY inmpacting ownership......

 

Yeah that stood out for me, I know next to nothing about firearms but overall it doesn't look like it's an immediate concern.

5-10 years down the line though and who knows.

 

Crappy fire arms kill people just as well as good ones.


Also, these could theoretically be mass produced in countries that have 3d printers and strict gun laws.

 

Hypothetically, you could buy one 3D printer and use it to print another 3D printer, and continue exponentially. Then you could mass produce guns for less than retail.

I think the ability to produce synthetic drugs without any knowledge of chemistry will have a bigger impact on society than the guns anyway.

 

Let me redo the maths for you.

Printer and materials < $5000

Making untraceable, easily replaceable guns that can bypass metal detectors - a criminal's wet dream.

 

No they do not. They CAN kill, but a crappy gun is less accurate, less reliable and prone to misfiring

And you have a lot of people armed with crappy guns....

It si still cheaper, quicker and far more effective to go through the regulated channels. This 3D printer guff is senseless scaremongering and is also being hijacked by the NRA nutbar fringe to argue against stricter gun controls.

In the meantime I will go and buy myself a $300 compound bow and kill as many as I like...but silently

 

Where do you get the < from?

I'm still up on the deal financially, and an undectable firearm is a TERRORISTS wet dream...most criminals could give a poop to be honest and will simply use a pseudo legit channel to procure their firearms far easier than this. It's the ammo that makes the gun dangerous too, and they haven't got around that bit yet

 

Well hypothetically you'd need to invent a 3D printer that could print circuit boards and silicon chips and resistors and heating sinks and all the other complex electrickery that makes a 3D printer work.
And seeing as they print in plastic type sustances that ain't gonna happen.

The main use for 3d printers will replacement parts for machinery and goods.
Oh and I dare say some bloke has already laser scanned his old chap and printed that out.

 

I tried a "mold your chap" DIY kit once, but there wasn't enough mold (I wish I was kidding).

 

"The thought of using a 3D printer to fabricate PCBs is tantalizing and the good news is that it’s a reality."
http://hackaday.com/2012/05/22/3d-printed-circuit-boards-using-conductive-ink/

"No, we’re not talking about printing the actual microprocessor. Asked when this will happen, ten Have laughs. “I don’t really know about that one,” he says. But he notes that some microprocessors are built with graphene, a typical 3-D printing substrate."
- http://www.wired.com/wiredenterprise/2011/11/3d-printing-autodesk/

It appears the experts think it's going to be possible soon.

 

From being a tech nerd who knows how much you can buy or build a 3D printer for/

Oh well then, since it's only terrorists who might benefit from such a thing, we shouldn't be so worried about the implications.

Technology improves. Within a year, someone will have perfected it. The only plus is that since this could potentially hurt gun manufacturers, the NRA will probably support legislation to ban them.

 

It's interesting technology - that's about it

The fact terrorists - who have MILLIONS behind them and will not worry about dropping a few grand on printers- are currently not using it is probably a good indication it is not much of an issue.

 

The concept was only proven TODAY

That's like saying that because armies weren't using fighter jets in the 15th century, they're not going to be a factor in the future.

 

Fair point - That said I still think it's being hyperbolized chronically, and feel that if a plastic undetectable gun were viable we would have seen one long before now.

Too unreliable, too unpredicatble and too inefficient to be a factor in the grand scheme of things

 

6 months ago everyone was saying it would never happen. Today, they were all proven wrong.

You don't need to be able to fire 100 rounds to hijack an airplane. You only need it to fire once.

 

You don't need a gun at all - a box cutter sufficed hence the hyperbole is entirely misplaced

 

Interesting thread. I have to say the gun in the article doesn't look like anything that would stand up to much use.

On a side note - I saw a story on the American TV show VICE where they did a bit about election violence in the Philippines - and they were talking about the gun culture there. One thing they showed were some basically backyard factories where guys were making 1911 clones out of scrap metal. One guy said he was using metal from an old ship. Not sure how great the guns they were making actually were, but to me they looked a lot better than the all plastic thing shown in the printer article.