why so much $$$$$$

Because registration of new machine guns for the civilian market was halted in 1986.

Every year, there are more and more people with more and more money chasing a fixed supply of machine guns. It's economics 101; the same reason original '63 Stingrays and Honus Wagner baseball cards never get any cheaper.
 
Because they are worth it!:D

Nah, just like Tamara said. Good old supply and demand warped by an obnoxious and illogical law.
 
Because

Because it's been 22yrs since thier production was banned, not long enough for the original owners of such items to die, but long enough for thousands of potential new owners to turn 21 and decide they want these.
 
When you purchase a full-auto firearm, for example a full-auto AR15, here's the break down of what you are paying for:

AR15 host gun - $1,100
M16 Auto parts $ 120
DIAS (sear) - $ 10
Government Tax Stamp $200
Paperwork that will keep you out of prison for owning it $13,000

Think about it - how much are you going to have to pay that lawyer to defend you if you get caught with a full-auto unregistered M16? And, what do you think your chances will be that he will get you off? And, what do you think your chances will be that you get to keep your gun or any of the parts you paid for?

$13,000 starts to look like a pretty darn good deal, doesn't it!
 
FOPA '86 was a slow-motion ban on full-auto.
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He's exactly right, unfortunately. The anti's couldn't outright ban the ownership of NFA firearms, but if they ban the sale of anything produced after a certain date (in this case 1986), then eventually all of these will be broken beyond repair and once they're all gone, we will no longer have any full-auto firearms to own (legally).
 
He's exactly right, unfortunately. The anti's couldn't outright ban the ownership of NFA firearms, but if they ban the sale of anything produced after a certain date (in this case 1986), then eventually all of these will be broken beyond repair and once they're all gone, we will no longer have any full-auto firearms to own (legally).
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Technically correct, but in reality we are talking hundres of years from now. It's all made out of metal, and as long as the seriel numberd part of the gun / sear is ok, then it can be "fixed".

Are you telling me that if someone had their $14,000 serial numbered Registered DIAS destroyed, that they won't make a replacement and slap a seriel number on it? Of course I would never do such a thing.....
 
Are you telling me that if someone had their $14,000 serial numbered Registered DIAS destroyed, that they won't make a replacement and slap a seriel number on it?
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I've wondered about that and how often it actually happens, since ATF can always bring in a metallurgy expert to tell the age if they really wanted to nail you.
But if I were a RDIAS owner I think I'd be investing in many of the upgrades to reinforce and make it last before letting it go kaput.
 
I've wondered about that and how often it actually happens, since ATF can always bring in a metallurgy expert to tell the age if they really wanted to nail you.
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I doubt that ATF has the ability to do this - these things were made out of common aluminum and/or stainless steel. And, why would they? If you've got the paperwork and it's registered to you I don't see them going through the trouble of even trying. How would you like to be the BATF lawyer explaining this crap to a jury?

For that matter, can someone machine an AC556 receiver with a little square milled out so that the seriel number from the broken receiver can be welded in place? Just how far can you go to fix a registered full-auto receiver? I don't think this has really been tested yet, but as the prices of AC556's, DIAS's get into the $20,000 and $30,000 price range, I think this kind of thing will eventually happen.

People might be willing to walk away from a $3,000 investment in a firearm, but who's going to be willing to walk away from a $30,000 + investment in a firearm that goes kaboom?
 
Ever take a full auto to your friendly neighborhood gunsmith?

You're looking at this backwards. "Why would they bother" should be replaced with "what's to stop them from" changing a small rule here or there and confiscating your gun. If you've had your head in the sand you might believe they're just trying to keep us all safe from the bad guys with machine guns, but that's NOT what the former revenooers are there for, and it will get MUCH WORSE over the near future.
 
Ever take a full auto to your friendly neighborhood gunsmith?
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Why actually yes I have. My local small town non-NFA gunsmith got my MAC-10 rat-a-tat-tat-ing like a champ. :D

"what's to stop them from" changing a small rule here or there and confiscating your gun.
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Oh oh, is that the Jack-Booted Thugs stacking ouside my door to kick it in and Ellian Gonzalez me? :rolleyes:

ATF agents are just like soldiers, most are just normal people doing their job, with a family back home and have no interest in harassing regular people for grins & giggles. There's good and bad apples everywhere including the ATF.

I've met many ATF agents and have yet to find one who wasn't polite & professional towards me and genuinely interested in helping me stay within the law.
 
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I was thinking about the legalities of if your lower is destroyed on an AR, then contact a manufacturer and order another with your own serial number, same as the old one...destroy the old one and you have a brand spankin new lower registered to fire full auto...
 
I was thinking about the legalities of if your lower is destroyed on an AR, then contact a manufacturer and order another with your own serial number, same as the old one...destroy the old one and you have a brand spankin new lower registered to fire full auto...
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Uhhh..... I think someone already tried that (olympic I believe) and ATF wasn't exactly thrilled at it.

You could probably get away with it if you found someone willing to do it but I doubt you'd want to advertise doing it.
 
Hopefully most folks here at least are familiar with JPFO's production, "The Gang", so that I am not forced to try to explain here yet again about how the ATF should not exist.

Old broken machine gun parts ARE machine guns, and you will go to jail for giving them to somebody the ATF doesn't approve of. I have NO personal experience at this, I'm passing on the OVERWHELMING opinion of folks who I believe did know what they were talking about. Of course there's no consistency to it, that's part of the danger of this rogue gov't agency.
 
And unfortunately, like most folks just doing their job, they will violate your constitutional rights because their boss told them to.
 
I was thinking about the legalities of if your lower is destroyed on an AR, then contact a manufacturer and order another with your own serial number, same as the old one...destroy the old one and you have a brand spankin new lower registered to fire full auto...
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I got this of AR-15.com:
http://www.ar15.com/forums/topic.html?b=6&f=17&t=264216
Prior to about 1999, you were required to sibmit a Form 5 to transfer your NFA item to any repair facility, including the original manufacturer; a second Form 5 had to be submitted and approved before the manufacturer could ship it back to you. So BATFE has records of all of the transferables which were ever returned to the manufacturer (many even plainly state "receiver replacement" as the reason).

The Big 3 firearms makers that would on request replace receivers of transferable MGs are Olympic, Colt and Bushmaster. So they simply cross-reference for those.

Receiver replacement happened a lot in the late '90s after passage of the so-called Assault Weapons Law. Because that law simply banned manufacture of AWs after a certain date, existing preban guns were not affected, and BATFE allowed replacement of damaged or faulty parts including receivers.

A lot of owners thought this meant they could also legally replace MG receivers, but the way the two laws were written was not the same. FOPA '86 –– which included the MG ban –– covered all machine guns, and made them all illegal for civilian ownership. But proof that the MG had been made and registered prior to May 19, 1986 was an affirmative defense against prosecution. Since the registered part of the MG is the receiver, that piece of metal must have existed as a registered MG prior to the '86 date. In the law's (and BATFE's) view, a replacement receiver –– even with the same serial number –– manufactured after that date is a post-'86 MG and cannot be owned by civilians.

When BATFE found out about Olympic's receiver replacement program, they shut it down. Colt never openly acknowledged that it would replace receivers, though there are obvious examples out there (the receiver forgings have features not available until after '86). Bushy didn't do as many replacements, but as we all know, they are out there.
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