Since the "Final Rule" eliminated the "points" system, what's the status of angled foregrips?

[berettaprofessor]

I'm entirely confused these days, as to what the "final rule" did to several items. If I have a pistol AR, no brace, short (5") bare buffer tube, can I put an angled foregrip, such as a Magpul AFG, on it legally? What about a red dot? Does anyone know?

 

[12Bravo20]

Without looking into the factoring criteria document, a red dot is perfectly fine since it has infinite eye relief. What is verboten is any optic with a shorter eye relief that precludes using a stock IE: 3-4 inch eye relief.

 

[Balrog]

What you have is a pistol. It is my understanding you can't add a foregrip to a pistol. Pistols are designed to be fired with one hand, per federal law, and adding a foregrip means its designed to be fired with 2 hands.

https://www.atf.gov/file/97256/download

 

[berettaprofessor]

This isn't a vertical foregrip like your letter refers to. It's an angled foregrip, which used to be legal on braced pistols until BATF confused the issue.

 

[Balrog]

This isn't a vertical foregrip like your letter refers to. It's an angled foregrip, which used to be legal on braced pistols until BATF confused the issue.

Thats a good point, but the important statement is this"

"ATF has long held that by installing a vertical fore grip on a handgun, the handgun is no longer designed to be held and fired by the use of a single hand. "

So I am thinking if the ATF decided that the gun is no longer designed to be held and fired with one hand, you may run into a problem. regardless of the angle of the foregrip.

 

[12Bravo20]

There was mentions in the original Brace rule change talking about angled fore grips not being legal on pistols since the definition of a pistol is that it is designed to be fired with one hand. Even small hand stops were talked about being a NOGO for pistols.

I'll have to see if I still have copies of the original brace rule as it was introduced.

I will have to do some further investigation on the subject of angled fore grips and hand stops before giving a definite answer. If it was me, I would play it safe and leave any kind of angle fore grip off.

 

[CapnMac]

Rather stupidly, the "Final Rule" mentions "factoring" despite eliminating the factoring sheet for their own regs. This dichotomy was brought up by any number of people in the public comment period and was never addressed by the agency before pressing forward with the enaction. This has al lthe appearances of a blatant APA violation, and may be an issue in any number of pending lawsuits, which may explain the relative "silence" on the topic.

BATFE has stated, just not for the record, that anything that changes a hand gun for "use by just one hand" to "use by two hands" is, per le, an SBR, and this, illegal without a Form.

Does adding an angled foregrip to a pistol make it verboten? Dunno. Until some one is arrested for it, no body much knows. Which is not how US law is supposed to work.