Quote Originally Posted by ICantSpellDawg View Post
3d printing is that big thing that we've been wondering about. It will destroy the economy of China... and probably the rest of the world. But the possibilities are endless, guns, household parts, car parts, computer parts, etc.

As far as bullets go, getting smokeless powder will be tricky. You can print the casing in polymer and will be able to print the projectile, but the only powder that you will be able to get no matter what is black powder, which will render an AR15 completely ineffective due to the soot - the primer will be easy enough, but you won't have an effective modern weapon. This is the next problem, but I'd imagine that printable rail guns or some other magnetic accelerator aren't too far behind.

While Gauss guns would be the holy grail of this sort of technology they just are not feasible for hand held weapons without radical changes in our ability to generate power - to get the same velocity as a standard firearm you need a massive amount of energy to generate a large enough magnetic field - right now the best we can a manage for a hand held gun would be similar in velocity to a air gun - and would have a fire rate similar to a crossbow

personally I find that comforting because they are really easy to make...

The technology is far better suited to static or mounted emplacements where larger generators (and longer barrels) can be employed

I believe DARPA has a coilgun department so maybe they will crack it someday