• Welcome to the new COTI server. We've moved the Citizens to a new server. Please let us know in the COTI Website issue forum if you find any problems.
  • We, the systems administration staff, apologize for this unexpected outage of the boards. We have resolved the root cause of the problem and there should be no further disruptions.

A new take on the venerable body pistol

C

Carlobrand

SOC-14 1K
Marquis
http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygre...-worlds-first-entirely-3d-printed-gun-photos/

Why buy it when you can print it yourself - well, assuming you've got a 3-d printer. A TL8 plastic pistol, undetectable by the traditional TL6-8 metal detector if you can find a way to do bullets without metal. Only metal piece is a firing pin.

I'm thinking the 3-d printer would be a good standard equipment for ships - print out whatever spare parts are within the thing's capacity, which should increase in detail and complexity as TL goes up. At high tech, much of your ship's locker may be moot; you just need power sources, specialty chemicals, maybe bullets (or gunpowder, if you plan to make them yourself) and such.

I hadn't realized our tech had reached this point. Primitive replicators!
 
A 3d plastic printer, and a 3d laser sintered metal printer and/or CNC 3D box...
 
Took them long enough.

Nice to see this finally being done. My mentor and Mad Scientist Rustin H. Wright called this one some twenty years ago when the technology was still called stereolithography. Yep, the Establishment is gonna hate on this quick, smells of lack of control and they hate that, sounds too much like genuine freedom.

Can't wait till they realize what the tech can really do. One word: bioweapons. Oh, fun days ahead kiddies.

Yep, sometimes it is fun to watch stuff happen just like predicted as well as a smidge scary.
 
Hmm, you think the US government will be unhappy? The UK government will have a foaming hissy-fit. They'll impose a media-ban on the mere existence of the tech (if they haven't already).

Of course, they'll install the same printing-history spyware in the 3D printers that they currently do in photocopiers...
 
[m;]Some of those posts are bordering politics, please refrain keeping this way[/m;]
 
Icosahedron said:
Hmm, you think the US government will be unhappy? The UK government will have a foaming hissy-fit. They'll impose a media-ban on the mere existence of the tech (if they haven't already).

Of course, they'll install the same printing-history spyware in the 3D printers that they currently do in photocopiers...
Click to expand...

Which explains the high number of brits I've seen on the self-replicating 3d printers boards....

but this is dangerously close to political.
 
To take it to a more neutral realm (politics-wise), any government will feel some measure of fear when individuals can "craft" what that government considers to be dangerous items - it could be guns, or various chemicals (a TL away, yet), or a part necessary for a home radio receiver - at the drop of a hat. So will a lot of manufacturing corporations - of course the things they consider "dangerous" will be whatever they make. It certainly does set up a bit of tension between those with the technology and everyone else.

On the flip side, this will mean there will be a lot of ... crappy stuff out there. I doubt you will ever be able to make a hardened steel part on your desktop 3D printer. You can print out a replacement part for your automobile engine, maybe - but maybe not a good one, meaning you'll have to replace it again and again, or pay someone to make a better one. One thing you *could* do, though - print out molds for things you can make with metal - assuming you can get the required metal to a molten state (a bit tough with steel).

How will companies keep their products from being copied? They will have to insert something into the design that can't be duplicated on the home 3D printer. Then, of course, someone will spend countless days trying to find a way to make the technology do that bit, too. :)

As for bioweapons, I don't think you're going to be able to lay down a 3D cell this way. Maybe a virus, but you're talking nanotechnology there, not 3D printing.
 
Fritz_Brown said:
One thing you *could* do, though - print out molds for things you can make with metal - assuming you can get the required metal to a molten state (a bit tough with steel).

How will companies keep their products from being copied? They will have to insert something into the design that can't be duplicated on the home 3D printer. Then, of course, someone will spend countless days trying to find a way to make the technology do that bit, too. :)
Click to expand...

Will, to give an example, make molds for making Traveller lead figures be seen as violating FFE (or whoever has them) copyrights ?
 
http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygre...-worlds-first-entirely-3d-printed-gun-photos/

liberatorforbes1.jpg
 
McPerth said:
Will, to give an example, make molds for making Traveller lead figures be seen as violating FFE (or whoever has them) copyrights ?
Click to expand...

In the US, at least, copyright is the relevant law for minis. You can make "Backups" but not multiples thereof.

Non-commercial duplication already happens, tho' - not with 3d printing, but making molds off of extant minis.

Either way, however, making new sculpts that are similar isn't banned in the US. A couple of the current crop of Minis companies got started by mimicking Citadel's figure line sans the skulls and eagles. ISTR it being Reaper making space marines with better posing options and lower prices than Citadel...

Oh, and as an interesting side note: take a plastic mini, make a mold off of it in rubber, and you can make the rubber mold needed for decent lead and/or resin casting. Lots of model making sites talk you through the process, too.
 
It looks like the trigger already broke off.

My interpretation of what I read is that this thing is just a publicity stunt and hasn't even been tested. Probably too afraid to try it.

To my knowledge, none of the plastic "toy" guns produced on the cheaper 3d printers has survived for long during testing.

I certainly wouldn't trust it to protect me when needed. Nor, if an assassin, would I trust it to get the job done.

Of course, this isn't to say that technology like this won't mature, and with it, laws, detection, and other issues will have to be address; so discuss away but for now, you'll have to excuses me for laughing if you pull a plastic gun and point it at me.
 
CosmicGamer said:
Of course, this isn't to say that technology like this won't mature, and with it, laws, detection, and other issues will have to be address; so discuss away but for now, you'll have to excuses me for laughing if you pull a plastic gun and point it at me.
Click to expand...

If it fires successfully even once, it'll be your last laugh.
 
McPerth said:
[m;]Some of those posts are bordering politics, please refrain keeping this way[/m;]
Click to expand...

Is a good point. I was more interested in where this might lead techwise within the game, not the political ramifications. I was surprised that the tech had matured this far this quickly. I'm wondering what kind of a tech level progression we can craft out of this, 'cause as far as I know, there's nothing like this tech in the game.

As for political ramifications - well, this is just one more reason the local government wouldn't want you landing outside of the starport. Who needs to smuggle when you can land in some remote area with a cargo hold full of basic chemicals and a TL15 3-D copier and just start making illegal stuff for the local underworld?
 
Not exactly.

SpaceBadger said:
Wow, that is some really high DPI printing!
Click to expand...
It might well be possible, but mostly it isn't about the hard tech aspect as the process aspect. The same process will work on just about anything humans can construct. And since I have seen the GCAT ice cream machine I can (with the pointer from Rustin) extrapolate how easy it can be to manufacture all sorts of interesting things that will make a whole bunch of people nervous.

It brings to mind Admiral Heinlein's quote about armed societies, if true we should have a pretty polite society after that five years of anarchy you get when you change governments. :D
 
Call me stupid, but I don't see "3d" "printers" as some miraculous discovery.

Some have suggested that 3d printers should be on ships for making parts. For years we've played with ships having machine shops with automated computerized control and design software being part of engineering. So no radical difference in gaming here.
Carlobrand said:
Who needs to smuggle when you can land in some remote area with a cargo hold full of basic chemicals and a TL15 3-D copier and just start making illegal stuff for the local underworld?
Click to expand...
You could import a 3d laser cutter or much lower tech machining tools and build the weapons.

After all, that TL 15 machine is so smart it
1) Has a database that stops you from designing items that will break any patents or laws.
2) Won't produce output at all without being linked in.
2a) Typically people don't make their own designs, they download properly registered designs. You need to be linked in and perhaps pay the holder of the rights to that design a fee before producing output. Kind of like instead of paying a fee for downloading an app you had to pay a fee each time you open the app.
2b) Any new design is submitted to the appropriate agencies. This, after all, is a feature for your own protection and ease of use. It automatically registers your new designs, puts it on the download site, and allows you to charge others for it's use if you wish.
 
Last edited:
aramis said:
Which explains the high number of brits I've seen on the self-replicating 3d printers boards....
Click to expand...

A lot of those Brits with 3D printers are shed dwelling boffins also known as Model Engineers. They've embraced them to cheaply produce gears in unusual sizes and ratios for use in model locomotives, model cars and tanks.....errr model ones that is.

Reminds me of the guy who built a life-sized Supermarine Spitfire in Airfix kit form.

And now I'm reading that you can print yourself a car in three and a half months....

Okaaay I see a plan forming.....

<clears out shed to make room for....equipment>

:rofl:
 
Mr. Ellis: [in woodwork class] What is that, Tomkinson?
Tomkinson: [standing before an enormous ship he's assembling] It's a model icebreaker, sir.
Mr. Ellis: It's a bit big for a model, isn't it?
Tomkinson: It's a full-scale model, sir.
Mr. Ellis: [annoyed] It's not a model if it's full-scale, Tomkinson, it's an icebreaker.
Tomkinson: Yes, it's good, isn't it, sir? It's got three engines, an enormous...
Mr. Ellis: No no no, that's not the point. That is not a model. It'll be hell if this comes out at speech day exhibition. You're a very stupid boy building icebreakers like this, Tomkinson.
Tomkinson: [deflated] Yes, sir.
Mr. Ellis: Now I won't say anything to the headmaster if you can get it down to a minimum of four foot.
Tomkinson: But sir! There's fifteen hundred tons of steel in this...
Mr. Ellis: Do you want to come and see the headmaster with me?
Tomkinson: No, sir.
Mr. Ellis: Well, melt it down at once.
Click to expand...
A quote from...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

sabredog
New Body Pistol
Replies
10
Views
3K
sabredog
sabredog
Back
Top