Homemade Assault Rifles Found in Traffic Stop in Tennessee
During a routine traffic stop, a man from Tennessee was caught transporting two illegal homemade fully automatic assault rifles. While that sounds like the leader for a poorly written article about perfectly boring semiautomatic assault rifles, in this case it is accurate! Among other (apparently legal) weapons, two rifles, complete with three-position selectors and auto sears, were seized from the vehicle of one Scott Edmisten, who was stopped after driving 25 miles an hour over the speed limit on a suspended license.
Since the details of the stop are available at more traditional news outlets, let’s take a closer look at one of the rifles:
Evident in the photos is a machined AR-15 lower receiver, still in the white, and sporting an enlarged trigger guard. These features are consistent with either a Slickguns or JL Billet 80% lower receiver, but the receiver could also have been made from scratch, if Edmisten or someone he knew had access to a CNC milling machine. Notably, the receiver sports a third pin hole for an auto sear, as well as a three-position selector lever (set to the “AUTO” position in the image). The .308 caliber rifle above it also sports a third pin hole, and its receiver’s shiny black finish may indicate it too was homemade and then finished with a nonstandard process.
Along with the two unregistered machine guns, a .45 caliber semiautomatic pistol, .357 caliber revolver, ammunition, and several knives were seized.
Nathaniel is a history enthusiast and firearms hobbyist whose primary interest lies in military small arms technological developments beginning with the smokeless powder era. He can be reached via email at nathaniel.f@staff.thefirearmblog.com.
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The irony is aimed semi-automatic fire is far more deadly than spray and pray full auto. Full auto has limited usefulness: In the antiaircraft or ground attack role, as suppressive fire to aid in closing with the enemy, and in civilian use it's just plain fun, but you can't hit anything after the first round. Thank god the govt. is dumb or they would ban semi-autos and make full auto legal.
My Franklin Armory BFSIII supports my selector switch with a third position for binary fire. I have already had it mistaken for a full auto AR and had to convince folks it was not. What really spooks some is that it is on a lower I machined from an 80%. No markings whatsoever and a third selector switch position actually drives some uninformed folks over the edge.