printingtherevolution

Well, carrying a realistic replica of a gun anywhere else than on your property will also get you in trouble in Germany. Not so sure about science-fiction guns with light effects. It really depends on how close they are to a toy.

Yeah, I was too lazy to design my own grip, so I just modified one that was available

I think the restrictions he is refering to could regard both, airsoft and pellet guns. In Germany both fall under the same category legally and can shoot up to 7,5 Joules, but only the controlled and commercially available ones, as said before. Well, I think it mainly leads back to "Defense Distributed" from the US, who basically wanted to go up against the strict gun regulation policies coming into place in the aftermath of the mass shootings overthere. I mean this guy literally said that he wants to do everything in his power to make "printable" firearms a reality. Now since plastic is used, the main argument was that these guns are practically not traceable by scanners at airports. Personally, I do believe that most of that is fiction. Polymers might be able to make up large portions of a gun, but essential functional parts simply cannot be made from plastic. So most of this discussion is not really relevant in highly regulated countries in Europe. In the US, however, you can purchase essential metal gun parts seperately without leaving too much of a paper trail. Thats simply not possible in Europe to my knowledge. Lets also not get carried away here, please. The main idea is to make futuristic toy guns. Essentially, it doesnt even have to be airsoft, you could also put more LEDs or other lights in a barrel and control them with an Arduino unit. For instance different buttons that let you choose the firing sequences or you could even record sounds and play them by hitting a button. This would make a great toy for your kids if its just a light gun.

That sounds even more harsh than in Germany, although relatively the same in some regards. Maybe they changed the law because I met some airsoft players from the Netherlands at an event in the Czech Republic last year and they all said that they have a ban on airsoft guns. Either way, in Germany it is doubtful if you can make your own airsoft guns. If you are above 0,5 Joules its forbidden anyway, you would have to get a gun smith to assemble the thing and put a stamp with an "F" for "Free weapon" on it. Also these guns are restricted to semi-automatic fire only. Guns below 0,5 Joules are still controversial as they are recognized as "toys" and not specifically mentioned in the gun laws, but when manufacturing an airsoft gun you have to modify it to only shoot 0,5 Joules and since you are a private citizen without a license you are practically not allowed to start the building process. Even if the end result is a toy, any intermediate goods are illegal. Anyway, I do this in Austria, so I dont care, but I wonder what the restrictions regarding manufacturing would be in other countries. Yeah, even if you just make a pellet shooting gun it could still produce quite negative publicity for you.

Regulated as in forbidden or just classified as items similar to firearms and thus not available to minors for instance? Fortunately, my printer is in Austria. Austrians dont really care about airsofts as they are mostly considered toys. Yup, I will be ordering a spool of black colorfab XT and see how it performs. How is the feedback so far from customers concerning clogged up nozzles and warping in case of colorfab XT?

Well, technically this still qualifies as a toy in most countries. Even in Germany, if its below 0,5 Joules. However, dont you guys in the Netherlands have a general ban on airsoft guns? As for Designspark mechanical, I just read a short description. So its free and mainly aimed at product designers/engineers, right? Does it automatically export in .stl? Again, concerning the gears, some cheaper brand airsofts actually use nylon gears and I think they have about M80-M100 springs in there. Those are still considerably weak springs, but they rip the teeth off the gears in a relatively short time. The only thing that I imagine could be printed in Nylon or Colorfab XT if you strengthen it with acetone or something is the gearbox shell. Maybe if you reinforce it at the front where its under stress due to the piston movement.

Of course, I imagine the melting point is somewhere between ABS and PLA? Well, the "core" of the gun is a gearbox that is commercially available. It normally goes into the airsoft version of a P90. I only designed everything around it basically. In airsoft terms that gearbox is called a version 6 gearbox. Its not as widely used, but I thought that it would be best for a bullpup design like this, with the magazine in the back. For the improved version, I think I will use a version 3 gearbox because the thing itself and its spare parts are more commonly available. It wouldnt make much sense to print gears, the gearbox shell, cylinder, cylinderhead and such out of plastic. Unless, of course you plan on building something that only shoots about 5 meters with very poor accuracy because the spring would have to be so weak, at least below a M80 spring, so the parts lost for more than a few rounds. Not even nylon gears wont last that long. I will give it more thought. Moreover, I also need to think about using a better CAD program for more elaborate designs. For this build I mainly used Tinkercad. Its great for beginners and the workspace is so simple. However, for complex shapes it just wont cut it. I also have access to AutoCAD at my company, but I hate it terribly. A friend of mine suggested TurboCAD platin. Any thoughts on that?

I will look at different options if this really becomes something that I want to devote more of my spare time to However, Ultimaker might like it better if I bought a second printer :-P

I am not sure yet. I will probably be working on an improved version of this as I dont like the stock of the gun and I am also thinking about using different screws as the current ones with the nuts on the other side are kind of hard to unscrew and sometimes the nuts wont grip. Moreover, I have already made the lower and upper receiver easily separable for changing the barrel or hop up unit easily, but its a pain to get to the gearbox. There is so fewww futuristic airsoft guns. I might make the improved version of this open source, but then also start a kickstarter campaign for a more elaborate design for sale. I have posted this in an airsoft thread on reddit and some people went crazy. Although the design is rather bulky, a lot of them said I should make custom airsoft guns for sale haha Technical question, which is the most robust material that the Ultimaker 2 can reliably print with? Colorfab XT by any chance? I dont want to print in ABS as it warps terribly and clogged up my nozzle. This gun is printed completely in PLA by German Reprap, but I fear it might break if I ever go out and play with this gun and put it under stress.

Thank you! My Ultimaker 2 is also finally back in working order. Received the new print bed and it prints flawlessly again. By the way I took the inspiration for the LED strip in the gun from you guys at Ultimaker. Amazing what a little LED strip can do, the video doesnt do the effect any justice and it even flickers when you fire since its hooked to the same lipo battery :-P

Hey guys, I thought I would share my latest project with you. In this video I show you how I succesfully designed and 3D printed a working airsoft rifle, the M-1 Enforcer. It features a commercially available gearbox in a bulky bullpup design and does take Standard M4 Airsoft Magazines. Moreover, it also has a fire-selector, rail space, a light module, seperable lower- and upper receiver and much more! Note: This is 100% my own design and I had no previous CAD experience before working on this! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LjSJtZwYtdI

haha I wish the force was stronger with my Ultimaker 2 though. Currently printing with lots and lots of hairspray on my PLA prints as the temperature sensor failed. Hope the new printbed reaches me soon.

Thank you

Hey guys, I recently printed the X-Wing and Tie Interceptor from the Star Wars universe. Hope you enjoy this time-lapse video Best regards

Things got even worse now, the motors sound weird all of a sudden and the main fan is going up to pretty high rpm right away. Doesnt sound very healthy at all. I think I may have found the initial cause for my problems: The LED strips. Actually the cables that connect them came loose and the insulation was damaged. I noticed this first on the right side when they started flickering. At first I just used some tape to get it away from that rubber band from one of the axis. Today I decided to look at the cables again as I thought that they may have caused some electrical interference. The insulation was completely ripped off on the left side. So I took the LED strip out and soldered new cables on and isolated them with shrinktube. Unfortunately that did not help though. Could it be that because the insulation was damaged that there was a short that affected other components? If so, I am very dissatisfied. Selling a machine for 2300 Euros only to have it damaged by some loose cables of poorly attached LED strips. I am trying to get the entire machine replaced through my retailer since I am not confident that a new heated bed is going to solve anything if the mainboard for instance has been affected by the short of those loose cables.