3d printed metal gun

I always wonder why the news agencies (and apparently the British police) get so excited about 3D printed guns. CNC machines have been around for years and are just as easy for hobbyists to build or buy as 3D printers. You can mill gun parts on a CNC machine using old fashioned subtractive technology and don't have to worry about trying to laser sinter metal dust without a vacuum chamber, and it is a heck of a lot cheaper than any metal printer is likely to be for a long time.

Indeed - but is that what 'scares the government' - or is it like most other governments around the world that are concerned about the 'perceived' (because, as we've well established, its only perception, not a reality) ease with which anyone could make a firearm - which is what 'scares ordinary citizens who live in the rest of the modernized world where no one feels the need to 'bear arms as a well organised militia"'?  I know from my perspective, that whilst I can go out today and make a deadly weapon with my mill and lathe, what concerns me is 'little johnny' and his 10 yr old mate who decide to 'just print one' on the weekend. Scares the hell out of me. Indiscriminate access to obvious weapons. *shudders*.  (I said obvious, because lets face it, a small marble to the temple can be a 'deadly weapon'... but I'm sure I'm articulating the specific distinction I'm trying to draw here..)

I'm confident that I'd quickly discover 'little johnny' mid-arms manufacture on my lathe, and he'd probably make enough mistakes along the way to render it nothing more than an embarrassment for him. Someone else doing all the design work, so all he has to know is some material and print guidelines... thats taking enablement to another level since he can't just hit 'print' on my mill...

But I do realize, I state this as someone who comes from a country, like most others, that would appear doesn't have an inherent 'fear' regarding our 'elected leaders'... we just get rid of them next election, sometimes even mid-term

Genuine question - Why do you think , outwardly, no other countries citizens give a hoot about a printable 3D weapong except - it would appear - many citizens of the US?

(I'm asking out of sincere interest - it makes my mind boggle the way some people become, evangelical, over access to an arsenal, let alone a 'self-made' one and I'd love to understand the perspective better. So don't come at me, pardon the pun, guns blazing I just notice there seems to be a lot of 'passion' about needing to 3D print a gun, which, escapes me and a lot of others and I prefer not to just remain ignorant about others viewpoints  )

Because, whilst there is every ability for an individual to make a weapon on a CNC... the access to those machines, and the level of skill required to operate them succesfully, means that it automatically rules out large chunks of a post-industrialised nation (not many Aussies would even have lathes and mills 'just lying around' these days..... ).. Both Britain and Australia have quite well regulated weapons laws.. and they have proven themselves in this country to have a dramatic effect on the number of gun deaths let alone 'crime'. The concept that there is not-too-far-off the ability to 'produce beyond the effective legislations controls' is pretty concerning.

People *have* been able to make a gun on a lathe since the lathe was invented. But we haven't, certainly in this country, had issues with 'home made weapons' (pipe bombs mebbe, for the same reasons I'm outlining.. far easier to make )... But given the 'curiosity' of many, and the 'ease' (implied, apparent, factual or otherwise) of 3D Printing it means that the likelyhood of them being used 'not for good' is a hell of a lot greater than the couple of hours and specific skill and materials someone would need on the lathe/mill... (which acts as a brilliant disabler for the technology in effect).

So I think you'll find the issue here (and in the UK) is, not that this is 'new', but in the not terribly distant future, 3D printing technology will be far more of an 'enabler' than a lathe and CNC ever has been for *the vast majority of individuals*...  Thats what the concerning 'game changer' is vs the age old technologies that already enable these problems. Empirical evidence demonstrates that the *existing* technologies *must* have limited application or *everyone* in the US would be doing this *now* and forgetting about the hoopla of 3D Printed Guns If 3D Printing *didn't* make this all easier - DefenseDistributed wouldn't exist, and I assume everyone championing the right to 3D Print a gun would just be out in their back shed making it on a CNC and lathe already ?

First off I won't argue the laws or the numbers but in the UK a murder isn't' a murder unless someone is convicted

most people in the US don't care about 3d print weapons.

The reason i think people in the US and Canada enjoy the idea of making things that go boom is its fun and its legal the same reason you make a rocket or a potato peeler or anything you make it to use or to see ti work or just to show that you can

...progression of the concept

I gotta say I've never seen a slingshot machete before

+1 for adrian

It's true about government creating laws about peoples perception however most peoples perception on 3d printing
have been from the media and just when the whole Cody Wilkinson liberator pistol started to widdle down
this popped up and will start creating more traffic for the media to exploit even though this was created with a half a million dollar printer, the news will spin it as "something that will soon come to the average consumer as the technology progresses everyday"

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government … astic-Guns  sigh and it starts

why do you want to print a 3d gun  to pass control ?

you can do a lot more with duty free zone...

http://www.fastcoexist.com/3022106/the- … ort-stores

wow, metal 3D printed gun!
Does it functions as good as the real deal?

concealing that would be a challenge...

Pentagun?