3D Printed Weapons

[Syn7]

The $25 Lulz Liberator: The first 3D-printed gun with a rifled barrel


http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/1...-rifled-barrel

I wonder how much of a difference there is with the rifling. If it does work at all, it's probably only the first shot.

[GeneChing]

Our 3D printing discussion has been delegated to our hijacked Syn, printed prosthetic thread. However this is a topic worthy of its own thread now.

DOJ Settles 3D Printed Gun Case, Ghost-Gun Genie Is Out Of The Bottle
Video | Ammoland Inc. Posted on July 11, 2018 by John Crump


Ghost Gunner Gun Making CNC Machine : DOJ Settles 3D Printed Gun Case, Ghost-Gun Genie Is Out Of The Bottle

U.S.A. –-(Ammoland.com)- Cody Wilson had a goal. That goal is to make all gun control irrelevant. Starting on July 27th, 2018, his goal will come to fruition.

The Department of Justice has settled in a landmark case that will allow Defense Distributed to distribute the source files online for 3D printed guns up to .50 caliber. With 3D firearms printing becoming cheaper and better every day this changes the landscape of the 2A battle. The “ghost-gun” genie is indeed out of the bottle as 3D source files will now be free game for all to download.


Defense Distributed Liberator Pistol

In 2013 Wilson and Defense Distributed released the Liberator which was the world's first 3D printed gun. Wilson named the Liberator after the famous single shot World War II pistol that the Allies dropped over Nazi-occupied France. Only a couple weeks after releasing the plans the government demanded that he pull them down from his site claiming the plans violated export regulations as defined in the International Trade in Arms Regulations (ITAR).

The government asserted that Wilson was exporting guns without a license. The government viewed the files that Wilson uploaded to the internet the same way as if he would have exported physical firearms to other countries. Wilson disagreed with this assertion and decided to sue the government on First Amendment grounds for the right to distribute the 3D printed files online for anyone to download.

The first set of lawyers that Wilson hired told him that the case was hopeless, and he would not be able to win. Wilson was unwilling to accept that verdict, so he fired his attorneys and hired new ones working with The Second Amendment Foundation who believed that he could win. It was a David vs. Goliath situation. The suit took five years and nearly a million dollars, but Wilson was vindicated.

The nonprofit Defense Distributed also makes the Ghost Gunner 2 CNC Machine which AmmoLand has reviewed in the past. The Ghost Gunner 2 is a mini CNC machine that lets the user mill out 80% lower receivers for the popular AR-15 and 80% 1911 pistols with just a click of a mouse. The Ghost Gunner 2 enables anyone to make a non-serialized gun in their basement. Defense Distributed started making the Ghost Gunner 2 for the purpose of funding the lawsuit against the DOJ. Defense Distributed has sold around 6,000 of the CNC machines nationwide.


Ghost Gunner Miniature CNC Machine

In the settlement, the government also admits that semi-automatic rifles including the AR-15 are not inherently military weapons.
This admission is a blow to the false narrative pushed by some members of Congress and anti-gun groups that the AR-15 and other modern sporting rifles are “weapons of war.”

That acknowledgment could have massive ramifications throughout the country in states that banned modern sporting rifles through so-called “assault weapons bans.” Those bans are now on shaky legal ground thanks to the government admission about semi-automatic rifles in the settlement.

Cody Wilson, a self-proclaimed crypto-anarchist, told Wired he had planned to release the files no matter how the lawsuit went, if Hillary Clinton had have been elected president and decided to crack down on our Second Amendment rights as listed in the Constitution.

Wilson encourages people to download the files and make improvements. He sees the data as a starting point to something better. The 30-year-old took on the government and won a significant battle not only for our Second Amendment rights but also for our First Amendment rights.

Defense Distributed will distribute the files on the website, defcad.org. Wilson describes defcad.org as a GitHub (a software development site) for guns. Currently, the site lets users sign up for a mailing list to get notifications on site news.

AmmoLand has reached out to Wilson, whom we have interviewed for the site, but as of the time of this writing, Wilson has not returned our request for comment.

About John Crump

John is an NRA instructor and a constitutional activist. He is the former CEO of Veritas Firearms, LLC and is the co-host of The Patriot-News Podcast which can be found at www.blogtalkradio.com/patriotnews. John has written extensively on the patriot movement including 3%'ers, Oath Keepers, and Militias. In addition to the Patriot movement, John has written about firearms, interviewed people from all walks of life, and on the Constitution. John lives in Northern Virginia with his wife and sons and is currently working on a book on leftist deplatforming methods and can be followed on Twitter at @crumpyss, on Facebook at realjohncrump, or at www.crumpy.com.

More on the Liberator

[GeneChing]

This will really blow up if there's a mass shooting using a 3D printed gun.

JULY 30, 2018 / 11:43 AM / UPDATED 17 HOURS AGO
U.S. states make last-minute legal bid to halt 3-D online guns
Tina Bellon
4 MIN READ

(Reuters) - Several U.S. states said on Monday that they would jointly sue the Trump administration in a last-ditch effort to block the public from being able to download blueprints for 3-D printable guns.

The blueprints are set to go online on Wednesday, following a June settlement between the U.S. government and Texas-based Defense Distributed that allows the company to legally publish the designs.

The states will ask a federal judge to issue a restraining order and an injunction to block the publication, Washington State Attorney General Bob Ferguson said at a news conference in Seattle.

Along with Washington state, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Oregon, Maryland, and the District of Columbia are working on finalizing the lawsuit and plan on filing it later on Monday, Ferguson said.

The states behind the lawsuit argue that publishing blueprints would allow criminals easy access to weapons. Gun rights advocates say fears about 3-D printed guns are largely overblown, based on current technology.

A series of mass shootings in the United States has brought a long-simmering debate over the country’s gun laws to the fore, with Democrat lawmakers increasingly calling for greater restrictions.

Defense Distributed had challenged an earlier government ban as a violation of its First and Second Amendment rights to free speech and to bear arms. It says on its website that it plans to release the plans by Aug. 1.

In a statement on Monday, the State Department said that the decision to settle the case was made in the interests of the security and foreign policy of the United States and in consultation with the Justice Department.

The Justice Department declined to comment.

But the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump had failed to adequately explain why it settled the case and allowed the publication of the blueprints, Ferguson said.

“Our Congress has carefully crafted laws to protect us and, in one moment, without any consultation with experts, the administration undoes it,” he said.

The U.S. State Department had previously banned the blueprints as a national security risk and a violation of arms trafficking regulations. As recently as April, the government in court filings argued downloadable guns would allow extremist groups and criminals abroad unfettered access to arms.

The government failed to study the impact of its decision and did not consult with other agencies before settling, making its actions “arbitrary and capricious,” in violation of federal law, Ferguson said. He said the settlement also violated states’ rights to regulate firearms.

Gun rights groups have been largely dismissive of concerns over 3-D printable guns, pointing out that the technology is expensive and the guns unreliable. They also say such guns are still subject to federal laws, such as a requirement that all guns contain metal parts, and state laws that require serial numbers.

Defense Distributed is a Texas-based company founded by self-declared anarchist and former law school student Cody Wilson in 2012 as an online, open-source organization developing digital firearm files.

Its files include 3-D printable blueprints for a plastic AR-15 semi-automatic assault rifle, a version of a weapon that has been used in many U.S. mass shootings, as well as other firearms.

Defense Distributed did not reply to a request for comment on Monday. A lawyer for the company during a court hearing on Friday said legal requests to halt the publication of the blueprints were an attempt to litigate a political dispute in court.

Gun control groups on Friday failed to convince a federal judge to intervene to block the publication.

Pennsylvania on Sunday said it had reached an agreement with Defense Distributed to make its firearms plans inaccessible to users in the state. But Pennsylvania is still planning to sue the Trump administration over the issue.

Reporting by Tina Bellon; editing by Grant McCool and Rosalba O'Brien

Random thought - anyone know if they are 3D printing swords and such? We carry polypropylene bokken so I'm just curious if anyone has seen blueprints for those.

[GeneChing]

Judge temporarily blocks release of 3D gun plans
BY AVERY ANAPOL - 07/31/18 06:28 PM EDT 681



A federal judge issued a temporary restraining order on Tuesday blocking the online release of plans for 3D-printed guns hours before the blueprints were set to become available.

U.S. District Judge Robert Lasnik, an appointee of former President Clinton, issued the temporary nationwide injunction on Tuesday afternoon, The Associated Press reported.

The order comes in response to a lawsuit from eight Democratic attorneys general seeking to block the Trump administration from allowing access to the downloadable plans.

The administration recently settled with gun activists to end a legal battle over the plans, allowing the group, Defense Distributed, to make the plans available for download starting Wednesday. The judge's temporary order puts that on hold.

President Trump tweeted Tuesday morning that he was "looking into" the issue and that the 3D printing of guns "doesn't make much sense."

Thousands of people have already downloaded plans for the 3D printed guns, according to a Tuesday BBC report. Though plans were not supposed to be made available to the public until Aug. 1, plans for nine different models of guns were reportedly uploaded online on Friday.

More than 1,000 people downloaded the plans to 3D print AR-15-style semiautomatic rifles over the weekend, Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro’s (D) office told CNN.

White House spokesman Hogan Gidley on Tuesday declined to reveal Trump's stance on 3D gun-printing, but he added it is illegal to own or make a wholly plastic gun, including any made with a 3D printer.

Gidley said the Trump administration "will continue to look at all options available to us to do what is necessary to protect Americans while also supporting the First and Second amendments."

Senate Democrats, spearheaded by Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.), on Tuesday afternoon introduced legislation to prohibit blueprints for 3D-printed guns from being posted online.

“These 3D-printed plastic firearms can evade our detection systems and are a direct threat to our national security,” Nelson said.

The government ordered gun rights activist Cody Wilson, the head of Defense Distributed, to take down the 3D gun plans he posted online in 2013. He then sued the government in 2015.

Now I'm wondering about 3D printed nunchaku because they are banned like guns in a few states (including my own).

[GeneChing]

Is code really 'free speech'?

Gun rights activists post plans for 3D firearms after judge's order blocking them
Code Is Free Speech, a coalition of five U.S. groups, said the ban on publishing blueprints for 3D guns violates the First Amendment.
by Alex Johnson / Jul.31.2018 / 10:20 PM ET / Updated Jul.31.2018 / 10:33 PM ET


Software engineer Travis Lerol takes aim with an unloaded Liberator handgun, which can be made entirely with parts from a 3D printer and computer-aided design files downloaded from the Internet, in July 2013.Robert Macpherson / AFP - Getty

A coalition of gun rights advocates challenged a federal judge's order temporarily barring a Texas company from publishing blueprints on the web to make untraceable 3D-printed guns by publishing similar blueprints itself on Tuesday, saying such publications were protected by the First Amendment.

After years of litigation, U.S. District Judge Robert Lasnik issued a temporary restraining order earlier in the day blocking Defense Distributed of Austin, Texas, from relaunching on Wednesday with blueprints for plastic firearms that can be "printed" by machines using computer-assisted design, or CAD.

During the Obama administration, publication of plans for 3D guns was barred under an interpretation of federal export laws that ban the foreign distribution of firearms.

Defense Distributed challenged the interpretation, and in June the State Department reversed course. It issued a letter last week agreeing that making such blueprints public didn't violate the export law.

In a seven-page ruling issued Tuesday in Seattle, Lasnik acknowledged that the First, Second and Fifth Amendments to the Constitution raised legitimate questions about banning publication.

But Lasnik wrote that it was up to the courts to rule on those issues and that in the meantime, the eight state attorneys general who have sued to make the ban permanent "are likely to suffer irreparable harm in the absence of preliminary relief." He scheduled another hearing for Aug. 10.

In response, five gun-rights activist groups based in California and Washington state posted a website called Code Is Free Speech, along with what it advertised were CAD blueprints for several high-powered firearms, including the AR-15 semiautomatic rifle, the AR-10 battle rifle and the Beretta 92FS semiautomatic pistol.

A spokesman for the coalition didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.

By publishing the plans, the coalition said in a statement, "we intend to encourage people to consider new and different aspects of our nation's marketplace of ideas — even if some government officials disagree with our views or dislike our content — because information is code, code is free speech, and free speech is freedom."

It said it hopes to "promote the collection and dissemination of truthful, non-misleading speech, new and evolving ideas, and the advancement of the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms."

It specifically thanked Defense Distributed for its "courage, passion, innovation, and inspiration."

Defense Distributed had already agreed to stop uploading new files pending court rulings in New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

NJ Attorney General Gurbir Grewal
✔
@NewJerseyOAG
#BREAKING: Cody Wilson backs down. After NJ takes him to court, Wilson agrees not to post any new dangerous 3D printable guns until our September hearing. Court orders him to keep his word. The fight for public safety continues.

12:34 PM - Jul 31, 2018
4,227
1,685 people are talking about this
Twitter Ads info and privacy

The 3D plastic guns, which fire conventional bullets, would be untraceable if they were used in a crime, because there's no serial number. And plastic guns could more easily slip through metal detectors.

But some gun rights supporters told NBC News that it's unlikely that criminals would bother trying to make their own guns.

"I think it makes little practical difference in the Unites States, because with a black market, people who shouldn't have guns are still able to buy them anyway," said David Kopel, professor at the University of Denver law school.

President Donald Trump indicated Tuesday that the controversy had taken him by surprise, saying on Twitter that allowing publication of blueprints "doesn't seem to make much sense!"

Donald J. Trump
✔
@realDonaldTrump
I am looking into 3-D Plastic Guns being sold to the public. Already spoke to NRA, doesn’t seem to make much sense!

5:03 AM - Jul 31, 2018
48.2K
29.6K people are talking about this
Twitter Ads info and privacy

After the president's tweet early Tuesday, State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said there had been "a lot of misinformation and a lot of misunderstanding about this issue."

"The reason that the State Department got involved, our only equity in this, is because of our role in controlling foreign access to U.S. defense technology," Nauert said.

Nauert said the State Department agreed to change the rules on publication of 3D weapons blueprints on the advice of the Justice Department.

"This has obviously gone through a legal process," she said. "We were informed that we would have lost this case in court or would have likely lost this case in court based on First Amendment grounds. We took the advice of the Department of Justice, and here we are right now."

[GeneChing]

...at least it's Taiwan. So now there's a Chinese connection?

Cody Wilson, 3D printed-gun designer, jailed in Houston on sex assault charge following arrest
Trevor Hughes, USA TODAY Published 11:23 a.m. ET Sept. 23, 2018 | Updated 6:48 p.m. ET Sept. 23, 2018


(Photo: Kelly West/AFP/Getty Images)

The Texas-based activist who gained international attention for developing and distributing plans for largely untraceable 3D printed guns has been extradited to the United States from Taiwan to face charges he sexually assaulted a teenager.

Cody Wilson, a "crypto-anarchist" and owner of Defense Distributed, is being held at the Harris County Jail in Houston, Texas, following his arrest Friday in Taiwan, court records show. U.S. Marshals brought Wilson, 30, back to Texas to face charges that he paid a girl $500 for sex in Austin, where he lives. Wilson is being held on a $150,000 bond and is expected to be transferred to Austin later.

Austin police Cmdr. Troy Officer said Wednesday that Wilson left the United States after a friend of the 16-year-old girl had told him that police were investigating the accusation that he had sex with her. A conviction on the sex-assault charges would bar Wilson from possessing firearms.

The Taiwan newspaper The Liberty Times reported that police pinpointed Wilson's exact whereabouts in Taiwan by proposing a business deal with his company on his website and then monitoring when and where he signed the contract online. The newspaper said he cooperated calmly with authorities upon arrest.

After a federal court barred Wilson from posting printable gun blueprints online for free last month, he announced he had begun selling them for any amount of money to U.S. customers through his website. The blueprints allow people with 3D printing machines to make their own firearms, which are largely untraceable and not subject to typical gun-sales limitations and requirements.

Nineteen states and the District of Columbia sued to stop an agreement that the government reached with Defense Distributed, arguing that the blueprints could be obtained by felons or terrorists. The initial legal battle became moot after the Trump administration reversed an earlier ruling by the U.S. State Department and agreed to allow him to post the blueprints online.