[deadsy]

I'm not sure what the big deal is. Individuals have been smithing guns since their invention. Hillbillies in the Ozarks could make rifled barrels. People with a manual or cnc mill in their garage are making ar15 lower receivers from billet aluminum. The 3d printing technique takes a lot of the skill out of it, but at the moment all you are getting is a low quality plastic gun. As a practical matter I don't think the swapping of gun part cad files is a significant vector for the creation of guns that are used to do bad things.

[BrianEatWorld]

I'd agree with you on the model in question, but I could see costs going down, quality improving and designs shifting to cater to the limitations of the medium over time to the extent that more lethal firearms are being produced.

For this particular model, its an interesting question of margins. If you are someone who is looking to willfully harm people, you could download these CAD files, find a printer and be armed without ever showing up on enforcement radar and without the need for links to underground dealers. However, your lethality will be limited.

[testbro]

Given that all a 3D printer will produce is plastic (ignoring SLS as it's much further away on the radar), the number of shots is limited before it fails. That's in addition to the requirement to buy ammunition first. Something from Home Depot probably poses a greater threat and would be equally undetectable.

I can't imagine anyone opting to buy a printer, calibrate it and print a terrible gun when they could just buy a hammer (or improvise a firearm out of a piece of pipe).