@Baldimo,
You are nothing if not tenacious. Wrong, too. Almost all the time.
Build An AK-47. It’s Legal And Totally Untraceable.
May 28, 2013 Weapon-Tech 18 Comments
Build AK-47
http://www.militianews.com/built-a-ak-47-its-legal-and-totally-untraceable/
Forget 3-D-printed guns. Inside a “build party” where anyone can make a rifle that no cop will ever know about.
The wooden and steel parts I need to build my untraceable AK-47 fit within a slender, 15-by-12-inch cardboard box. I first lay eyes on them one Saturday morning in the garage of an eggshell-white industrial complex near Los Angeles. Foldout tables ring the edges of the room, surrounding two orange shop presses. The walls, dusty and stained, are lined with shelves of tools. I’m with a dozen other guys, some sipping coffee, others making introductions over the buzz of an air compressor. Most of us are strangers, but we share a common bond: We are just eight hours away from having our very own AK-47—one the government will never know about.
The AK-47, perhaps the world’s best-known gun, is so easy to make and so hard to break that the Soviet-designed original has spawned countless variants, updated and modified versions churned out by factories all over the globe. Although US customs laws ban importing the weapons, parts kits—which include most original components of a Kalashnikov variant—are legal. So is reassembling them, as long as no more than 10 foreign-made components are used and they are mounted on a new receiver, the box-shaped central frame that holds the gun’s key mechanics. There are no fussy irritations like, say, passing a background check to buy a kit. And because we’re assembling the guns for our own “personal use,” whatever that may entail, we’re not required to stamp in serial numbers. These rifles are totally untraceable, and even under California’s stringent assault weapons ban, that’s perfectly within the law.
Among those ready to get going at this “build party” (none of whom wanted their names used) are a father-son duo getting in some bonding time and a well-bellied sixty something with a white Fu Manchu who “loves” the click-ack! sound of a round being chambered. Assembling a Romanian variant is a builder wearing a camo jacket and a hat embroidered with an AR-15 rifle above the legend “Come and take it.” His knuckle tattoos read “PRAY HARD.”
We crowd in as our three hosts, all expert gun assemblers, hand out waivers with a list of questions: Are you a convicted felon? Ever been dishonorably discharged from the military? Addicted to drugs? Mentally unstable? The guy in camo looks up and, to much laughter, says, “So it’s all ‘No,’ right?”
The hosts collect our paperwork without checking IDs. We don eye protection and gloves, and soon the garage is abuzz with the whir of grinders, cutters, and drills. Sales of receivers—which house the mechanical parts, making a gun a gun—are tightly regulated, so my kit comes with a pre-drilled flat steel platform. Legally, it’s just an American-made hunk of metal, but one bend in a vise later and, voilà, it’s a receiver, ready for trigger guards to be riveted on. Sparks fly as receiver rails to guide the bolt mechanism are cut, welded into place, and heat-treated. The front and rear trunnions, which will hold the barrel and stock, are attached to the receivers.
Now I need a hand. A stout guy with caramel skin, tired eyes, jet-black hair, and a penchant for peppering his sentences with F-bombs assists me. He starts hammering the barrel into the front trunnion. “If this were an [AR-15] and we did this, we’d be crying doing so much damage,” he says. “But an AK, you can drop this thing in ****, drag it through the mud, smash it against the ground, pick it up, pull the charging handle, and keep shooting. That’s why they’re so popular.”
Durability and simplicity are why AKs have become the most widely distributed guns on the planet since their 1947 debut. They began proliferating in the late ’50s, when the Soviets permitted “fraternal countries” to manufacture Kalashnikovs at will. Soon they spread from one hot spot to another, their reputation for ruggedness and reliability growing along the way. Now there are as many as 70 million in circulation. Colombian drug lord Pedro Guerrero and Saddam Hussein’s son Uday had them plated in gold. Both Hezbollah and Mozambique display them on their flags.
Many kits come from stockpiles in former war zones. “I can guarantee you this one has bodies on it,” says one of the hosts as I peer down the barrel of a Yugo RPK. It’s lined with grit and soot. My host says the AK I’m building is an Egyptian “Maadi” that came to the United States via Croatia, likely having been shipped there during the Yugoslav wars. He tells me some wooden stocks come with tally marks notched in them.
We prep the metal components in a sandblaster and submerge them in a phosphoric acid solution to protect the steel from corrosion. Finally, we grease and assemble them, semi-automatic firing controls included. Owning a gun that can shoot full auto, like these did in a past life, is effectively illegal under federal law. But you can buy a souped-up stock that will harness each shot’s recoil to help trigger the next, a bit of clever engineering that mimics automatic fire—and stays on the right side of the law. Adding one would be a simple future modification.
The first guy to finish is all smiles, but he has a question: “Say some Johnny Law comes up who don’t know **** about this law, and I’ve got an AK without a serial number—then what?”
“There’s a series of laws that make this legal,” says one of the hosts. “Just print those up and have them with you in case Johnny Law does come by.”
The next morning I do exactly that before tossing my AK in the trunk and heading to a gun store so busy I have to take a number. I pick up a barrel cleaner, a 10-round magazine, and 40 bullets before driving out to Jawbone Canyon, federal land northeast of Los Angeles. I park on a bluff, walk to a spot where I can aim at a mountain of scrub brush and sand, and load five rounds. I empty the magazine in seconds. Their reputation has been rightly earned: AKs are popular because they work—every time.
I’m left wondering: Seeing how easy this is, are build parties monitored? Do hand-built weapons ever surface in crimes? Are the cops worried? When I call local law enforcement representatives from Los Angeles, Orange County, Santa Ana, and Garden Grove, they say they’ve never heard of such a thing. “That doesn’t happen here,” says Bruce Borihanh, an LAPD spokesman. But a cursory browse of online gun forums is enough to show that, well, clearly it does. There seems to be one about every month. Plus, I just attended one less than an hour’s drive from his office.
I’m reminded of what one of the build party hosts said before I left: “Remember that thing I told you about why people do this: These builds can happen only because they aren’t blown out to the public and law enforcement.”
People are selling AKs like mine on Armslist.com—the eBay of firearms—for as much as $1,600. In most states, there are no records tracking such private sales. California residents have to go through a certified dealer to sell them legally. But since this AK is untraceable to begin with, who’s to know how I choose to unload it?
Between you, me, and Johnny Law, here’s what happened to my homemade AK. Back in my garage I use a grinding wheel to cut the receiver in half and the other components into pieces. I put the scraps back in the cardboard box the kit came in and leave it for the garbage truck.
Written by Bryan Schatz.
Shoemaker Ready to Risk it all for Militia Movement
http://www.apfn.org/apfn/shoemaker.htm
"In the beginning of a change, The Patriot is a scarce man,
brave, hated and scorned. When his cause succeeds, however,
the timid join him, for then it costs nothing to be a patriot."
-- Mark Twain
Shoemaker ready to risk it all for militia movement
By Stephen A. Martin
The Hawk Eye
. Arms: 'Burned out' leader says he will resist arrest
'violently and immediately.'
OQUAWKA, Ill. -- Calling on his followers to kill the "enemies of freedom,"
Western Illinois Militia leader Dan Shoemaker said he's prepared for a
fight June 17.
Shoemaker has scheduled an armed one-man demonstration for that day on the
public squares in Galesburg, Ill., and Monmouth, Ill., to protest laws that
limit where firearms can be carried -- a demonstration law enforcement
officials say they're prepared to stop.
"I'm stating for the record that all members of the Western Illinois Militia
now have the uninfringed right to keep and bear arms," Shoemaker told those
gathered at a rural Oquawka farm Saturday. "I will risk all that I have to
publicly demonstrate that freedom."
Shoemaker said that right is derived from the U.S. Constitution and its
Second Amendment guarantee of a right to bear arms. Gun control advocates say
that right only refers to the ability of states to arm their National Guards.
Opponents of gun control say it was intended to apply to all citizens.
Illinois law prohibits carrying a weapon within a city unless it is unloaded
and disassembled or put in a case.
After five years of leading the group, estimated at between 50 and 200 members,
Shoemaker said he is "burned out" and tired of what he called a "hot,
psychological war" between police and his self-styled group.
"On June 17, perhaps I will again be renewed," he said.
But he said it's equally likely he'll be killed -- and that's something he's
ready for, if necessary.
"I will live free or die," he said.
If his protest results in the latter, he said, the authorities should be
warned about what could happen next.
"For five years I have held good soldiers back," he said. "On June 17, I
will be the point man. If the enemies of freedom attack, there will be no
one to hold them back."
Shoemaker spoke to a half dozen uniformed members of his group, who
carried various assault-style weapons from variations of the AK-47 to
semi-automatic versions of the U.S. Army's M-1 and M-16. Others were
ressed in jeans and T-shirts, and supporters said there were other
militia members who either were hiding in the surrounding woods
keeping a lookout against authorities or had deliberately decided
not to be present.
Most said they intended to be "in the area" during the June 17
protest, but declined to say exactly where.
Shoemaker said he's seen other groups in the self-described patriot
movement dispersed or otherwise rendered ineffective.
In one case, he said, a militia leader and his family were found dead
at the bottom of a lake after being handcuffed and having plastic bags
fastened over their heads with duct tape.
Shoemaker blamed the deaths on government agents threatened by the
man's teachings, and asked how such a man -- a former special forces
commando in the U.S. Army -- could have been overpowered by his assailants.
"They probably knocked on the door ... and showed their badges," he said.
He said that's why he'll refuse to give up his gun if police attempt to
arrest him Saturday, and why he'll resist "violently and immediately."
"They have pushed us far enough," he said. "It is time for us to draw
the line."
Shoemaker said none of those who formed the militia group with him in
1995 are still active members. Most left after three years -- the length of
time he said it takes for most people to give up after what he described
as systematic harassment by authorities.
Every day, he said, he wakes up and wonders if those authorities will
be coming to his house to harass or imprison him.
"I think, damn, they're not coming today," he said.
The demonstration, set to take place at 9 a.m. in Galesburg and later
that morning in Monmouth, will bring the fight to those authorities and
force them to decide, he said.
Shoemaker said they can decide to allow his protest, which he equated
with upholding the constitution, or to stop it.
He called on law enforcement officials not to create a situation where
"open warfare" could break out on the streets of the two cities, but
said any agency that opposes constitutional freedom should be wiped out
to the last man.
"Don't stop killing the enemy until they are all dead," he said.
Shoemaker spoke from a make-shift stage next to an American flag,
where he introduced the men who would take over in the case of his
capture or death.
Kenny Butler, the militia's next-in-command, asked those gathered to
look at the hummingbirds that flew around the feeders hanging from trees
in his yard.
"I'd sure like to keep what I've got out here," he said. "But the way
we're going, I'm afraid I'm going to lose it."
