Update on ammo marking

A few weeks ago I reported on the naive gun control idea of putting tiny serial numbers on bullets and their casings.  A few days later I obtained more information which didn’t help their case much.  Today I ran across the web site of the technical people behind this idea.  As a quick side note the following was found on their web site which is data that I have desired for some time:

In 1992, approximately 5.4 billion bullets were sold in the US alone. It is safe to assume that this number is trending upward. We estimate that 8-10 billion bullets were sold in the US in 2002.

More to the point are the technical details and the picture of a bullet with a serial number:

They put the same serial number on the bullet many times to increase the chances of one being readable after the bullet has been fired.  Also of interest is the tests they have done.  The tests are not nearly as rigorous as those claimed by the California Department of Justice.  I presume California did their own tests and these people didn’t post those results.

These people still live in a fantasy world.  Here is one of answers to a “FAQ“ (ACS means Ammunition Coding System):

The ACS can be circumvented by any of the following methods:

  • Someone could cast their own bullets and load them themselves.
  • A person could buy a coded bullet, disassemble it, file the number off, and reassemble the cartridge/bullet combination.
  • Someone could buy a lifetime supply of ammunition before the ACS goes into effect.

However, we would argue that the person who is going to hold up the corner convenience store is unlikely to do any of these things. Since the vast majority of gun crimes are crimes of passion, few people will ever consider a premeditated attempt to circumvent the proposed system.

In one sentence they are talking about holding up a “corner convenience store” and the next they are claiming the ammo serial numbers won’t be circumvented because “the vast majority“ of crimes committed with firearms are “crimes of passion”.  Do they think hold ups are crimes of passion?  And crimes of passion are usually easily solved because of the lack of planning.  In the case of crimes that are difficult to solve (well planned) the ACS will be circumvented.  In the cases where ACS will help, no help is really needed.

Another option for people wanting to circumvent it would be to use the coded ammo for practice and only use their supply of unencoded ammo for normal “carry”.  They also don’t address the hand loader that buys bullets by the thousands (I buy them in boxes of up to 2500) and puts them in brass casing that have been reloaded many times and often picked up off of the range fired by someone else multiple times.  California’s approach to the handloader is to make them exempt from the requirement which would be a major security hole.  And assuming that they could put serial numbers on every bullet and shell casing in this country other major security holes in this scheme are the black market that would be created in stolen ammo and ammo smuggled in from other countries.

As I said in an earlier posting the only thing this scheme could really succeed at are “… to demonize and increase the expense for people exercising their inalienable rights.“