I have guy wanting to trade a lower for some work. How can I tell if this a was a lower removed from a rifle or a build? I want to put a 10' upper and do not want to violate SBR. "Once a rifle, always a rifle"
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Staying Legal ???
- Thread starter OGDogman
- Start date
Can the manufacturer tell you how it was registered when first shipped to the wholesaler / distributor?
Some MFG use different markings and S/N ranges for "rifles" vs. pistols, vs. stripped lowers.
Some MFG use different markings and S/N ranges for "rifles" vs. pistols, vs. stripped lowers.
Still doesn't matter, right? I have numerous stripped "pistol" marked lowers but, by law, if I first assemble one as a rifle, with a stock, it is "forever" a rifle lower and cannot legally be made into a pistol, regardless of what the markings indicate. Just because it is marked as a "pistol" does not prevent it from being assembled as a "rifle". Again, FIRST a rifle, ALWAYS a rifle, right?
Unless you know the actual history of that "pistol" designated lower,
and unless you really know how it was used by its prior owners,
I would not assume that somebody had previously built a long gun out of it as the first functioning firearm using that frame.
Nor would BATF make such a wildly speculative assumption.
If somebody had built it as a pistol and then temporarily reconfigured it as a rifle, then they could restore it to pistol configuration perfectly legally. I don't know that ATF has ever explicitly granted permission to do this except for cases were a gun is sold from the factory as a convertible pistol/carbine kit with multiple barrels and multiple stock options all in one purchase, but I think the caselaw from the Supreme Court (Thompson-Center case) makes it clear that you can do this if you start with a pistol.
and unless you really know how it was used by its prior owners,
I would not assume that somebody had previously built a long gun out of it as the first functioning firearm using that frame.
Nor would BATF make such a wildly speculative assumption.
If somebody had built it as a pistol and then temporarily reconfigured it as a rifle, then they could restore it to pistol configuration perfectly legally. I don't know that ATF has ever explicitly granted permission to do this except for cases were a gun is sold from the factory as a convertible pistol/carbine kit with multiple barrels and multiple stock options all in one purchase, but I think the caselaw from the Supreme Court (Thompson-Center case) makes it clear that you can do this if you start with a pistol.
ATF 877-283-3352 . Maybe they're not too busy
I wish there were personal pleasure tool laws, so the rest of America had to deal with this kind'a bs.
