How will METAL 3-D printing affect the firearms market, do you think?

Question

To clarify, I am NOT talking about the polymer 3-D printers or "plastic guns" or the "undetectable firearms act" or that sort of thing. I am talking about 3-D printing done in stainless steel (also known as "sintering"), in which a Class 2 Manufacturer has actually "printed" an entire, functioning, 1911, RIFLED BARREL INCLUDED, without machining:

http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2013/11/07/fully-3d-printed-metal-1911-pistol/

For the first time, we can make custom replacement parts for out-of-production guns. Entire blueprints can be "printed" in stainless steel without the need for expensive tooling. Manufacturing really CAN be "on demand custom".

So...where do you see this technology being the most applicable? Marketable? How do you think it will affect the existing firearms market, including rifles for hunting?

How about that old broken Martini-Henry you can't find a part for? Suddenly, in 5 days you can have a new part and bring a piece of scrap back to serviceable rifle again?

How do you think the law will handle it (Besides badly, I mean). How do you see the media spinning it??

And now that 3-D metal printers have become smaller (tabletop) and CHEAPER than 3-D polymer printers:

http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2013/11/16/the-mini-metal-maker-an-exclusive-look-at-the-worl.aspx

What will this do for the hobbyist?

Look into your crystal balls, experts...what do you see? I ask specifically for you to speculate. No wrong answer. I'll pick a best based upon my own whimsical brain pan, but I like details and predictions based on facts and patterns of facts.

Answer 1

Without machining? .....I call my welder a machine. That is all a "printer" is doing is tiny spot welds of stainless steel welding controlled by a multi-axis CNC pantograph-like structure from a remote location. I know that you know that you can`t get something out of nothing.(I hope so)

What makes the name "printer" so scary is that some folks seem to think that a devious person in China can send a convict in a Los Angeles prison cell a key or better yet...an AK-47. No, I did not forget the cartridges. They leave out the fact that the Printing is done by a very elaborate and specialized machine that still requires....guess what....materials. Stainless steel wire for just one.

Sintering is still not as strong as steel bar stock, but a sintered form could be placed in forging dies in a 500+ ton press and be as strong as a Garand receiver.

e.g. ceramic nozzles that go in a pour pot of molten steel have nozzles that are pounded to compact the zirconia(type of claylike material) free of voids before they are fired. Stainless steel sintered parts are just little balls of stainless steel fused together. Could be hygroscopic unless compacted.

I do see a whole new world of technology getting ready to emerge, but not ready to "Buck Rogers" yet. Just like anything else..the price will be out of reach for the ordinary consumer for a few years. I remember when calculators and LED watches were over $100. 10 years later selling in Fast Stops for $2.

$2...is just about what my input may be worth. Good question for a change.



A 3-D printer printing a house of little poops of concrete and imagine a tad smaller makes it a lot easier to see how a pistol frame could be printed from little poops of LASER molten stainless steel. There will be an inert gas flow also to keep the stainless from turning black with oxidation.http://cdn.zmescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/3d-printed-housse.jpg

Answer 2

When I was a kid, I would never have thought I would carry a little device, half the size of a pack of Marlboros that could essentially connect me to all the knowledge of the world. If someone told me I could pick up the same device, take a video, and send it to a friend living in another country, I would have thought it was a fantasy. That the same device can locate me anywhere in the world within about 10 feet? CRAZY!



I bet we are closer to this technology being a reality than you might think.



It would be amazing for industry to have a functional prototype of some object only a few minutes after the part was designed. It would also be amazing for anyone to be able to "print" a replacement part for something at home.



It's already illegal to manufacture illegal items, so from a theoretical perspective, the legality is already covered, but you just KNOW some jack-*** is going to use it to attack a bus load of kids on their way home from school. I never know how to deal with that uncomfortable reality. How do you regulate the crazies and psychos while leaving normal people with the freedoms enumerated in our Constitution?

Answer 3

The way I see it, we're still fifty to a hundred years away from being able to 3D print functional versions of all of the parts to a gun in metal.



But to replace a few low-stress parts? That could be pretty great. Replacing a trigger guard or a rear sight from an old gun, or even just making certain parts that are not under a lot of stress, could be a niche for metal 3D printers.



EDIT: The reason I believe we are so far away from a completely 3D-printed gun is that metallurgy has not advanced far enough to contain tens of thousands of pounds per square inch of pressure from a 3D printer.



If metallurgy catches up with design, we might see entire guns made on a 3D printer. Until then, only low-stress parts will be SAFE for use in guns, in my opinion.



EDIT #2: Wow. Didn't realize that, Lime. One has to wonder how durable a printed gun will be, though. I wouldn't trust it for at least a few more years. Maybe we'll see printed guns in the next 10 years.



P.S. HOW MUCH FOR ONE OF THOSE??!! The gun, not the printer.

Answer 4

3-D Printers don't really offer much over surplus CNC's, which usually can be had for less money to boot.



And, with CNC's, the integrity of the metal isn't as compromised as it is with sintering (little control over heat treatment).



As far as making custom parts and such, again, that has been a possibility long since 3-D printers, but hasn't taken off. The cost prohibition is with labor, not the method of manufacture.







3-D printers offer an ability to do many amazing things, but you have to remember, guns and gun parts were designed without 3-D printers. That means that the most efficient way to reproduce them is also, probably, without 3-D printers.



When we start having gun designs with features that only 3-D printers could do, then we would likely have a great use for them.

Answer 5

I saw the story on the 1911 guys. This is not in any hobbyist ballpark. This is industrial level equipment by any stretch. From a production standpoint, it is a neat idea.

Answer 6

In terms of the industry I don't see very much going on. As per legality and future litigation it has made the policies of those who hate freedom essentially dead. Which is why it scares the anti-gunners so much it makes some crap their pants because it makes their policy seem pointless. But then again we have always known that bands mean nothing. Because eventually we will figure it out ourselves.