Zip Guns Bite!

[galekowitz]

A Bakersfield police officer was shot in the hand Tuesday morning after picking up a metal cylinder that turned out to be a homemade gun.

http://www.bakersfield.com/news/local/x1303782437/Officer-shot-in-hand-while-examining-illegal-homemade-gun?utm_source=widget_63&utm_medium=latest_entries_widget&utm_campaign=synapse

Unfortunate lesson the officer learned.....

[Dion]

Doesn't say what caliber, which can be anything from a .22lr to a 12G. Ouch!

Videos of zip guns are ALL over youtube. Scary part is, all the builders/users are, like 12 yrs. old. I think the Dad's of these kids need to get a youth gun and work it out of these little pyros.

[kel-tec-innovations]

What if it was a pipe bomb? The officer shouldn't be picking up. Hope he will be okay

[galekowitz]

Updated link to story now has photos.

[SanPedroShooter]

How do you think it works? Do you push that button? What caliber do think, its got a pretty big barrel?

[Spyder]

Article says its 9mm.

[galekowitz]

Article says its a 9mm.

I see the bolt on the side and a spring. The round is placed in the barrel, the bolt is pulled back and locked to the side. When ready to fire the bolt is released by turning it and bang.

[Gio]

Ouch! I hope the officer recovers quickly.

[CHS]

I hate to say it, but sounds like the officer had a HUGE fail moment. He just grabs and picks up a metal cylindrical object without being the least bit careful of it or investigation into what it might be?

[Sky_DiveR]

Coulda just thought it was a meth or crack pipe.

I didn't know people still made those. The last time I saw one was glued on a posterboard at an LEO recruiting booth.

[diginit]

Coulda just thought it was a meth or crack pipe.

I didn't know people still made those. The last time I saw one was glued on a posterboard at an LEO recruiting booth.

There are instructions online on how to make one for 10 bucks and one trip to Home Depo. They shoot glass, nails, rocks, ball bearings, Whatever. Illegal as hell, But people still make them. Do a search.
All the more reason for the public to be legally armed...I'd rather be shot with a bullet than a pipeload of glass at 900 FPS.

[CHS]

Whatever. Illegal as hell

Not really.

$200 tax stamp and they're perfectly legal in California.

[diginit]

Not really.

$200 tax stamp and they're perfectly legal in California.

Registered with a 10 day wait?

[AJAX22]

that version is considered a pen gun in CA and is not legal even with an AOW tax stamp. (at least that was my understanding)



on a seperate note, you can clearly see how the mechanism works, the officer had to be fiddeling with the striker knob for that to have gone off, since it doesn't have a notch to retain it in a ready to rock position.

[CHS]

that version is considered a pen gun in CA and is not legal even with an AOW tax stamp. (at least that was my understanding)

Yes, THIS particular type would be illegal in CA, but I was responding to someone who wasn't describing a pen gun. Or at least wasn't describing a pen gun specifically.