Last week I learned about a new hack: the Zip Gun. A Zip Gun is essentially a home made gun, often using little more than pipe for a barrel and a few other crude parts. You can, for example, build a functioning 12 Gauge Shotgun for $7.00 or a 22 caliber the size of a key fob.
The concept is quite old, and was apparently more popular back in the 50s, before guns were dirt cheap (and the fact that kids had shop class didn't help). Of course, with 3D printable guns, the whole concept of improvised home made weaponry is back to being a popular topic.
Before you run off and build your own arsenal, keep in mind that while the general consensus is that Zip Guns you build solely for yourself are legal, they are also ridiculously dangerous. With just a little error, you could easily end up with an exploding firearm that does far more damage to the shooter, than the shootie. The same goes for 3D printed guns.
Still, I've got to give credit to one brilliant individual who had the chutzpah to make a Zip Gun and then bring it to a gun back back program:
Sergeant Louis Graziano, a firearms and tactics instructor, recalled at the news conference that about three years ago, he heard that a zip gun had been brought to a buyback. He thought that perhaps it had been “sitting around someone’s home for a long time.”
But when he learned that several other zip guns had been brought to other buyback locations within the span of a few days, or maybe even a single day, Sergeant Graziano concluded that someone had figured out a clever way to make $200 a pop.
This individual was taking $5.00 of hardware, making it look more or less like a gun, and then turning it in for a $200 bounty. And he didn't even have to pull the trigger and risk blowing off a hand.
Brilliant. Expect even more of this with 3D printable guns. It's Guns and Capitalism; is there anything more American than that?
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