A company called Defense Distributed is pushing for weapons that can be created on a 3D printer. They have already designed, printed and fired a weapon made completely on the printer. Many concerns have arose due to this movement since for the first time a computer file can be shared over the internet that can allow people to create weapons with very little technical skill on the subject. Defense Distributed states on their website that they are only trying “to defend the civil liberty of popular access to arms as guaranteed by the United States Constitution and affirmed by the United States Supreme Court, through facilitating global access to, and the collaborative production of, information and knowledge related to the 3D printing of arms; and to publish and distribute, at no cost to the public, such information and knowledge in promotion of the public interest.” So far this movement is legal since a person is allowed to create a gun for their own use.
A 3D printer is composed of many different parts, some of which include a heating bed, micro controller, electronics board, firmware, motors, extruder, and a skeleton. These components cover a lot of different fields of science. Some of these components will be modified from their traditional design for the specific purpose of this project.