Homemade 3D-Printed 12-Gauge Shotgun

What started as a political art project became the Liberator 12K, a prototype homemade 3-D printed 12-gauge shotgun.

Jeff Rodriguez brought two versions of the Liberator 12K to SHOT Show in Las Vegas, where he showed them off to enthusiastic crowds at Mark Serbu’s booth. There was a six-shot, revolver-style, pump-action 12-gauge shotgun, and a single shot break-action shotgun. He built them both in his basement to prove that anyone can make a working firearm with readily available parts.

All of the metal parts were purchased at Home Depot while the rest was 3-D printed thermoplastic polymer.

“A 3-D printer is basically a glorified hot glue gun on a robot,” said Rodriguez. “It’s fantastic for building prototypes.”

The six-shot revolver style action rotates using zig-zag grooves on the outside of the cylinder. Pumping the shotgun turns the cylinder with a metal pin on an actuator rod.

The single-shot break-action shotgun is similar minus the six-shot cylinder. Rodriguez fired three Brenneke Black Magic slugs from the single-shot shotgun as documented in this video. “And I’m still in one piece and doing alright,” he said.

He’s not sure what he wants to do with his design yet. He may offer the plans for free online, or perhaps even produce a commercial product. Mark Serbu, who was featured in our Select Fire show last year, often has DIY firearms on display at his booth. Some of them have even gone into production.

For years, he had a young Youtuber from Missouri called Royal Nonesuch at his booth. Royal was well known for testing his homemade guns on his now banned Youtube channel. He showed us some of them in this video. Unfortunately, Royal was not in attendance at this year’s SHOT Show.