I did a search and didn't see this anywhere. If it's a duplicate, I apologize.
Len Savage has been back and forth with the ATF a bunch in the last couple years, and is working with JPFO to produce a documentary revealing the problems with the agency.
His most recent encounter appears to be over his company's "BM-3000", an RPK redesigned to use a full auto M11/9 receiver as a fire control group. The idea is that the RPK components don't constitute a function gun, and thus aren't affected by the NFA (much like AR uppers). But a person can buy a legal M11/9 for next to nothing by NFA standards, attach it to the upper assembly, and have a full-auto belt-fed for a fraction of the cost of a real RPK. Pretty cool, huh?
Well, he submitted one to the ATF, and in July 2005 got a letter back from them stipulating that his BM-3000 was not a gun or machinegun. So, he could sell them without serial numbers, records, of FFL/ATF involvement. Cool.
Then in April of this year, he got another letter from them saying that they'd changed their minds, and the BM-3000 is a machinegun. Because it "facilitates" the firing of more than one round per trigger pull.
Savage replied courteously, acknowledging their change, and asked what this meant for people who had bought BM-3000s in the year or so when they were declared legal. ATF told him on August 9th that all those BM-300s are now considered illegal machineguns, and must be abandoned to the police. And that Savage had to provide them with names and addresses of anyone who bought one (something Savage had no legal requirement to keep on record).
Take a look at the correspondence here: http://www.autochart.com/savageBM3000.htm
(It's only a handful of pages total, and easy - though frightening - reading). If this new ATF maneuver stands, they would assume the power to reclassify anything at any time, based on a radically different standard of what constitutes a machinegun.
Len Savage has been back and forth with the ATF a bunch in the last couple years, and is working with JPFO to produce a documentary revealing the problems with the agency.
His most recent encounter appears to be over his company's "BM-3000", an RPK redesigned to use a full auto M11/9 receiver as a fire control group. The idea is that the RPK components don't constitute a function gun, and thus aren't affected by the NFA (much like AR uppers). But a person can buy a legal M11/9 for next to nothing by NFA standards, attach it to the upper assembly, and have a full-auto belt-fed for a fraction of the cost of a real RPK. Pretty cool, huh?
Well, he submitted one to the ATF, and in July 2005 got a letter back from them stipulating that his BM-3000 was not a gun or machinegun. So, he could sell them without serial numbers, records, of FFL/ATF involvement. Cool.
Then in April of this year, he got another letter from them saying that they'd changed their minds, and the BM-3000 is a machinegun. Because it "facilitates" the firing of more than one round per trigger pull.
Savage replied courteously, acknowledging their change, and asked what this meant for people who had bought BM-3000s in the year or so when they were declared legal. ATF told him on August 9th that all those BM-300s are now considered illegal machineguns, and must be abandoned to the police. And that Savage had to provide them with names and addresses of anyone who bought one (something Savage had no legal requirement to keep on record).
Take a look at the correspondence here: http://www.autochart.com/savageBM3000.htm
(It's only a handful of pages total, and easy - though frightening - reading). If this new ATF maneuver stands, they would assume the power to reclassify anything at any time, based on a radically different standard of what constitutes a machinegun.
