SBRs and SBSs: Clarification of ATF’s rules
While the Ruling has not yet been published, ATF Deputy Chief Steve Albro stated that the Ruling holds that a pistol may be converted to a Title I rifle (non-SBR) and back to a pistol without having to register the firearm as a Short-Barreled Rifle under the NFA. However, if the firearm starts life as a rifle, the Ruling further holds, that it cannot be converted to a pistol without registering it as a Short-Barreled Rifle under the NFA.
Update: The ruling is up.
August 3rd, 2011 at 3:11 pm
Ok so if I have a Dan Wesson .44 mag pistol, a 16 inch barrel, and a stock that fits where the pistol grip is, I can swap out and make a 16 inch .44 carbine, right? And then swap it back with no need to register.
Catch is, how long before the ATF reverses themselves and kind of forgets to tell anyone?
August 3rd, 2011 at 3:11 pm
Clear as mud.
August 3rd, 2011 at 3:56 pm
Yup. So if I take my Thompson Contender that I bought originally as a rifle, go buy a pistol barrel and pistol grips and swap them in, I’m a federal criminal. But if I, instead, go buy the exact same parts tomorrow, but assemble them as a pistol first, then I can swap to my heart’s content, as long as I never hit an illegal combination as an intermediate step.
Pretty idiotic, but then again the laws they’re trying to implement regulations for are pretty idiotic.
August 3rd, 2011 at 4:07 pm
Saw an interesting combo at a rifle league event in WA state a couple weeks ago:
Pistol registered AR-15 lower with “pistol use only” marked on it.
8″ barrel AR-15 upper with “pistol use only” marked on it.
A rubber endcap on the buffer tube, which according to the BATFE letter is too small to qualify as a stock.
Magpul AFG attached to the short rail farm, because a VERTICAL foregrip on a pistol would be illegal.
End result: Absolutely Not A SBR, A Thing Forbidden By State Law Even With Tax Stamp, Nosirreebob.
The law is an ass.
August 3rd, 2011 at 4:19 pm
The law is usually an ass.
Yea, one of the local stores in Washington made a point of just selling Thompson Center frames. The customer can buy his own barrel and stock/grip.
The way this ruling reads, you must assemble it as a pistol first to avoid legal harassment.
Very silly.
August 3rd, 2011 at 4:22 pm
So, in “NFA for Dummies” terms…
does this mean that…
I CAN put a 10/22 rifle stock on my Ruger Charger with its 10″ barrel…
I CAN NOT put a Charger pistol stock on my Ruger 10/22…
???
Dann in Ohio
August 3rd, 2011 at 4:28 pm
Ohhhh!!!! Dan in Ohio,
I hope you’re funnin.
August 3rd, 2011 at 4:33 pm
Man, that was confusing.
And did anyone else think it was odd that this came from Ken Melson and not the Firearms Tech Branch chief John Spencer?
August 3rd, 2011 at 4:38 pm
No. That’s an SBR.
You can do that, if it’s over 26 inches overall.
August 3rd, 2011 at 5:36 pm
Dan,
The way it works is:
You CAN put a full-length barrel on your charger, and then put it in a 10/22 stock (in that order)
You CAN NOT put the charger stock and 10″ barrel on your 10/22
August 3rd, 2011 at 5:40 pm
So long as they’re staying busy making silly rules and endless lists, generally clogging things up and harassing people to no good end, their charter is being fulfilled.
August 3rd, 2011 at 6:51 pm
I never thought I would be happy with an ATF ruling, but this one is actually good news for gun owners.
I predict there will be no more AR-15 stripped lowers sold as rifles, they will all be pistols now. and you will then be able to put it together as a pistol or a rifle.
As long as the receiver was ORIGINALLY designed as a pistol, you can go back and forth. Unfortunately, many people will be confused, and might think you can start with a rifle and go to a pistol (WHICH YOU CANNOT, without getting the tax stamp).
Only downside (besides the confusion) is that there will be many people aged 18-21 who will less “rifles” to buy.
August 3rd, 2011 at 9:05 pm
So you’re saying, when John Hinckley, Jr. shortened that 10/22 into a pistol, it was illegal? Throw the book at him!
August 3rd, 2011 at 9:17 pm
dg… That would be find except stripped lowers are now sold as “other” and no longer “pistol” or “rifle”
August 3rd, 2011 at 9:19 pm
I’m sorry Uncle…
I was being a little tongue-in-cheek with my previous comment…
The absurdity of laws that say I can have a .22LR or .223 pistol with an 8″ or 10″ barrel, but I can’t have the same basic gun as a rifle with an 8″ or 10″ barrel just reminds me of the how stupid gun laws truly are…
Now on a serious note (reminiscent of the 1994 assault weapons ban), can I have a bayonet lug on my 8″ barrel .223 pistol? lol
Dann in Ohio
August 3rd, 2011 at 10:13 pm
Something tells me the Boys with the Kninkov Pistols will love being able to have an …AK-74 Rifle?
You know, I really don’t understand why they did this, unless the next ruling is to Ban Pistols, but if you have one, it’ll be okay to turn it into a Rifle.
IF you can, then it must be Registered, Taxed, kept in a Safe Place, show Proof of Competency, and any other Anti-Gun Regs you can think of.
August 3rd, 2011 at 11:41 pm
“Something tells me the Boys with the Kninkov Pistols will love being able to have an …AK-74 Rifle?”
Why? Nothing changes for them – they would have to lengthen the barrel to 16″ one way or another, or else it’s a SBR.
“You know, I really don’t understand why they did this, unless the next ruling is to Ban Pistols, but if you have one, it’ll be okay to turn it into a Rifle.”
People wrote letters asking about it, because the law as written is actually pretty clear that turning a rifle into a pistol is not legal. The explosion of carbine kits for Glocks and AR pistols with their vagaries made for lots of uncertainty.
What I expect to see from this is a lot more unregistered SBRs because of people hearing the gunshop version of this ruling, which is “Hey Vern, you can put a stock on your Glock now!” We’re already seeing it in this comment thread, and in every forum thread I’ve seen on it so far, subguns excepted. It’s almost enough to make one break out the tinfoil.
August 4th, 2011 at 9:27 am
The law, as written and passed by Congress, states that a short gun (“handgun” in appearance, with either a rifled barrel < 16", a smoothbore barrel < 18", or overall length <26") made from a gun that had been a shoulder fired gun ("rifle" or "shotgun") is AUTOMATICALLY either an SBR or SBS (depending on whether it was a "rifle" or a "shotgun").
This rule simply acknowledges a 1992 Supreme Court ruling (US v. THOMPSON/CENTER ARMS CO) that ATFE has been ignoring since it was decided. ATF had told T/C that their Contender kits, with a receiver (which had never had a stock mounted on it), short barrel, pistol grip, AND a "carbine" barrel and a stock that replaced the grip (with long barrel and stock, the gun met the barrel and overall length requirements of a standard rifle) was "constructive possession of a Short Barrelled Rifle, since one could buy the kit, and combine the short barrel and stock, and have an unregistered SBR.
T/C did it the right way — they registered ONE kit as an SBR, then sued ATF for a refund of the "making and registering" tax. Case went all the way to SCOTUS, who told ATF that SINCE it didn;t start out as a "rifle", it was only an SBR is either the person DID assemble it in an SBR format, or they could ONLY assemble it in an SBR format — so long as every stock had a corresponding long barrel so that the gun could be assembled in a legal format without any parts that would make an SBR left over, it was legal. (Which is why if you have a "pistol", "SBR", or "AOW" AR15 AND a "rifle" AR15, you DO NOT want to have more short barrelled uppers than you have receivers you can legally mount them on — otherwise your left-over 10" pistol upper plus your complete 20" Bushmaster rifle add up to "constructive possession" of an SBR.)
Since 1992, ATFE has claimed that the T/C ruling had NO "general" application, but was specifc to that ONE case. Just like they pretend that the courts never shot down their "once a machinegun, ALWAYS a machinegun" theory in 1994's Vollmer v. Higgins, 23 F.3d 448 (D.C.Cir. 1993)
Vollmer had taken 175 HK94's, added legally registered DIAS – (a Drop In Auto Sear that was registered before the May 1986 cutoff can be added to a legal semiauto, even after May 1986) to make them fully automatic. They then altered the lower recivers so they duplicated the "swing down" style of the standard full auto HK MP5 receiver. This meant that the lower receivers were now IDENTICAL to a standard full-auto MP5 receiver. ATF said Vollmer now had 350 "machineguns", only half of which were legally registered — 175 legally registered "machinegun conversion kits" (which, under the statute are explicitly classed as "machineguns" in their own right) and 175 unregsitered "machinegun recievers' (ditto).
Solid reasoning on ATF's part, actually — if someone removed the DIAS from the converted HK94's, they could drop in an unmodified (and unrestricted) MP5 trigger pack, and move the DIAS to ANOTHER HK94. . . thus having TWO guns that functioned in full auto.
So, Vollmer cut and rewelded, and returned one of the modified receivers back to the same configuration as a legal HK94 receiver, and asked ATF to approve the transfer of this HK94 with a regisered DIAS installed. ATF said, "Uh, uh! 'Once a machinegun receiver, ALWAYS a machinegun reciever!'" Vollmer sued, lost the first level, and got that ruling overturned on appeal.
The appeals court said that if Vollmer's restoration of teh "machinegun receiver" to semiauto configuration was legally still a "machinegun" by itself, then EVERY HK style semiauto receiver that was mechanically teh same was ALSO a "machinegun", and it would be ridiculous for ATF to claim that for decades, they had authorized the illegal importation, manufacture, and transfer of tens of thousands of "unregistered machineguns".
ATF ignores THIS court decision, too, claiming it is only specific to this one case. They didn't appeal further, because the LAST thing they wanted was to have SCOTUS agree the "Once a machinegun, always a machinegun," rule was wrong — that would have thrown a LOT of convictions into doubt.
August 4th, 2011 at 9:57 am
Now if we can just shoot down the absolutely absurd “readily restored” definitions that ATFE uses:
1. That you can “readily RESTORE” something to a configuration it has NEVER had. . . myself, I would define that as “readily CONVERTED”; and
2. That operations that take a full working day (eight hours) in a “properly equipped machine shop” qualify as “readily”. (See United States v. Smith, 477 F.2d 399, 400-01 (8th Cir. 1973))
Hells Bells, you can make a machinegun from SCRATCH in a lot less time than eight hours, with a lot less equipment than a “properly equipped” machineshop, ESPECIALLY since “machinegun conversion kits” (DIAS, Lightning Links, full-auto trigger packs, etc.) and bare machinegun receivers are legally “machineguns” all by themselves.
A Lightning Link type device can be made for many guns during a smoke break with a Dremel.
Starting with a Honda exhaust system (or a chain link fence post), you can hand drill and Dremel a full-auto Sten receiver in minutes as well.
It only takes ONE hole to reclassify a legal semiauto AR15 or AK design receiver as a “machinegun reciever”.
An AR15 DIAS is mechanically absurdly simple.
(I’m not even going to count the “shoelace conversion kit for a Garand” ruling — AFAIK, that was quietly withdrawn recently; probably because it, with the photos of the “registered shoelace” (registered on a Form 2 by an FFL/SOT manufacturer) with a metal tag holding the S/N and other NFA requirements, have become a mini-meme online, and it was embarassing to ATFE.)
August 4th, 2011 at 1:57 pm
I KNEW there was a reason that each and every one of the AR-15 lowers I’ve built up over the years had a pistol buffer tube screwed into it for just a minute before I removed it and installed whatever is on it now..
“Yes officer, this receiver was originally built as a pistol.”