A blogger called Haveblue posts to his website that he has used a Stratasys 3D printer to make the lower receiver of an AR-15. The plastic part works—at least for a few rounds.
2012
Haveblue AR-15 Lower Receiver
2013
2012
Haveblue AR-15 Lower Receiver
LIBERATOR
2014
2019
2015
imura
zigzag
SONGBIRD
FMDA
2020
2021
2020
2021
FGC-9
PLASTIKOV
FMDA DD-19.2
2024
2024
FTN Suppressors
Urutau
Hoffman AR-15 lower
2023
ORCA
2017
AP-9
X
X
DIY gunmaker Cody Wilson releases a design for the first fully 3D-printable, single-round handgun, naming it for the one-shot pistols Allies air-dropped behind enemy lines in World War II.
2013
LIBERATOR
27-year-old Yoshitomo Imura is arrested in Kawasaki, Japan, with a collection of plastic guns including the ZigZag, a 3D-printed, six-shot revolver of his own design.
2014
IMURA ZIGZAG
Engineering student James Patrick releases a CAD file of a fully 3D-printed pistol that’s more reliable than the Liberator and more closely resembles a traditional handgun. “The first legitimately scary 3D-printed gun,” Wilson calls it. (He means it as a compliment.)
2015
SONGBIRD
A digital gunsmith known as Derwood releases a new hybrid specimen, a partially printed semiautomatic with a metal bolt and barrel that accepts a standard magazine of ammunition rather than individual rounds.
2017
AP-9
A 3D-printed-gun designer going by the name Free Men Don’t Ask, or FMDA, releases a printable Glock-style frame designed to be combined with commercial Glock parts. The FMDA model, as it would come to be known, is soon one of the most popular ways to 3D-print an untraceable handgun.
2019
FMDA
Pseudonymous gunsmith Jstark1809 revises the AP-9 to create a reliable, mostly printable semiautomatic with no commercial gun parts. The first truly global ghost gun, it’s been adopted by neo-Nazis, Irish republicans, and Myanmar rebels fighting the country’s military junta.
2020
FGC-9
In another milestone for globalized ghost guns, Gunsmith IvanTheTroll releases the first viable, printable lower receiver for a variant of an AK-47, a rifle whose components are some of the most ubiquitous in the world outside the US.
2020
PLASTIKOV
A 3D-printed-gun group known as the Gatalog releases a more practical version of the FMDA on its website with premade, commercially available metal rails for the slide that sits on top of the frame—so practical that Luigi Mangione would allegedly use a variant of one in the New York murder of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson.
2021
FMDA DD-19.2
Gunmaker Hoffman Tactical releases a model for a far more durable 3D-printable AR-15 with a wing of plastic reinforcement on the component the stock screws into, which often broke in previous models.
2021
HOFFMAN AR-15 LOWER
Hoffman Tactical releases a model of an AR-15 with as many 3D-printed components as possible, including the barrel nut, upper and lower receiver, hand guard, and stock
2023
ORCA
A designer named pla.boi releases files for printable silencers designed to be wrapped in a carbon fiber tube and hockey tape for reinforcement. Mangione allegedly screwed one onto the muzzle of the gun he used to kill Thompson.
2024
FTN SUPPRESSORS
A gun designer who goes by the name Joseph the Parrot releases the Urutau, a revamp of the FGC-9 that uses a “bullpup” design to create a more compact rifle with a longer barrel for better accuracy, the most futuristic 3D-printed gun to date.
2024
URUTAU
The Evolution of 3D-Printed Guns
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3D Renders by Defcad
Haveblue AR-15 Lower Receiver
imura
zigzag
LIBERATOR
SONGBIRD
AP-9
FMDA
PLASTIKOV
FMDA DD-19.2
Hoffman AR-15 lower
ORCA
FTN Suppressors
Urutau
FCG-9
