FosTecH, like Franklin Armory, made a ‘firearm’ that blatantly challenged the definitions the ATF must work with under the NFA and the GCA. This could always come back to bite them but I do applaud their efforts in highlighting the NFA absurdity.
The Origin-12 SBV was just such a firearm. The SBV’s are now NFA regulated SBS/DD items and must exist under an AOW stamp or SBS stamp. The receivers, in the opinion of the ATF, must all be redone and the originals destroyed.
FosTecH has news on this front
In short, if you own an Origin SBV (not a regular Origin shotgun) you must swap the current illegal firearm with an NFA variant or a non-NFA Origin 12. FosTecH is assisting owners in this transition as much as feasible to get everyone who patronized FosTecH and their neat 12 gauge weapon compliant under the NFA/GCA.
This is, however, a process that will take a long time. If you would rather not wait there is the option to dispose of the firearm.
Again, this ruling only applies to SBV ‘firearm’ models of the Origin 12 and not regular shotguns or anything already under the auspices of the NFA that has been taxed and stamped.
Opinion
Short version. The NFA and GCA are obsolete headaches for everyone involved.
Longer version. The NFA and GCA are rulesbooks that the ATF desperately want updated and that politicos are terrified to touch. This means that the Federal LE branch charged with minding the dusty tomes and the rules within them are working out of 1934 and 1968 for the most part and innovators within the firearm industry are under no such limitation… until they are because that is what a review determined.
This costs the time and money of the businesses involved, the time and money of the ATF, and most of it is because politicians don’t want to push the needle.
If we want it to end we must put in the long efforts toward legislation like the Home Defense and Competitive Shooting Act. Get firearms off the NFA , dismantle it until it can be removed from the duties of the ATF. Dismantle the ATF until its duties can be folded under the FBI. It’s not like the jobs themselves are going much of anywhere, the ATF/FBI/ABCDEFG agents and employees are always going to have work to do. But think of the increase in spend efficiency when they don’t have to waste time on stuff like this because… it’s just a gun. Not a SBS/GCA/EIEIO or whatever else the 34’/68′ rulebook is close enough to.
