Sometimes stuff is crazy valuable and you don’t have use of it. If I still had my Noveske SBR lower, I’d sell that, and you KNOW that people will pay for a Gen 2 Noveske lower.
Another jndistry guy posted this a few years ago.
He asked the ATF for clarification “they came back and said that if thebarrelis easily removable then thereceiverneeds to be engraved. If thebarrelis fixed like and AK or an HK any part can be engraved hence the wording "frame,receiverorbarrel”."
This goes back to what I was saying about there being a difference if the barrel is easily removable from the receiver or frame.
Is anyone want to volunteer to mail the ATF a request for an opinion letter on this issue?
Let’s get a ruling. Lol
Does anyone remember the ATF having a fit about manufacturers who were engraving the make model and serial number of the suppressor on the end cap a few years ago?
It seems if you suppressor manufacturers got smart and started engraving the information on the end cap instead of the tube. That way if the suppressor was destroyed all they had to do was save the end cap which was the serial number part. I don’t remember if the ATF managed to write a new rule to change that and make them put the serial number on the tube itself
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The OP asked the question. The only people that are making it complex are the ones who don’t understand the law.
There’s some valid reasons to engrave the additional info on the barrel instead of the lower.
We all have to obsess over somethings, I guess. NFA and where/when/how/if to engrave have been a recurring source of mental masturbation on this forum and elsewhere for decades. Many different opinions here, many different opinions from ATF NFA branch. If your local ATF agent-on-patrol wants to jack you up over the engraving on your SBR, he has all the tools he needs to do it no matter how you engraved.
Or us lawyers who also understand that the way the ATF writes the rule and interprets said Rule and law sometimes varies from the plain language of the law and try to keep our clients from unnecessary scrutiny.
I’m not disagreeing that the plain language would allow the maker information to be engraved on the barrel. The problem is that I know that the ATF sometimes interprets things slightly differently than the plain language.
I can’t find any opinion letters dealing with this issue.
All I can find is one anecdote goal post from 2013 in and which an industry guy called the ATF and they told him he could not do that on AR15 s. From my personal experience with the ATF you can call them 5 times from 5 different days talk to 5 different people and get 5 different answers so I don’t put much weight in that.
As far as requesting an official letter on this from the ATF I think that would be crazy because rarely do letters do what any of us want them to do but they do establish Official Guidelines as to that particular person who requested the ruling.
That is my concern.
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It was proposed and never went anywhere.
I can’t believe this discussion went as long as it did.
Read the regulations. It’s there in B&W. No need for a letter, no need for a call, just follow the laws as written.
Don’t think just about name and address. Think about how many factory firearms comes with the caliber (which is one of the required pieces of info) engraved on the barrel. Heck, for that matter, do like a lot of people and engrave the upper receiver… 
And for those recommending ask the ATF…I’ll be glad to post my most recent (completely unrelated to this topic) back and forth which proves they often have no idea what they’re talking about and give answers based on assumptions like a lot of people in this thread have done.
And FWIW, if engraving the barrel of an AR was even remotely questionable, the ATF would’ve addressed it in ATF Ruling 2013-3.
(Side note…they did add “pistol slide”, when applicable, as an acceptable engraving location)
Amen. Very well said.
Asking the ATF is always entertaining. If you don’t like the answer, call back the next day and ask a different person
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Didn’t read the whole thread, but the first few posts are wrong.
You are fine to engrave your maker info on the BBL in a conspicuous manner.
So looks like I am wrong. I can find nothing that modified the marking rules for ARs.
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Define: “Conspicuous”. That covers a lot of ground. It could mean “visible from any and all angles”, however, this is my understanding:
If an ATF agent could control physics and press “freeze” on your weapon mid-magazine with you shooting at the range, so that the gun is just floating there, and you step away from it, you should be able to, in that configuration, walk around/look over/under/etc. on the gun and be able to point at the text, for the agent to see. No removing the VFG, dropping the mag, or pulling HG’s, if you can “Freeze the gun”, and show the text, you’re G2G if the text is to spec size-wise and content-wise.
That is my understanding. If that works through an MLOK slot, gravy.
I contacted the atf in 2015 regarding some issues. My local field office punted me to atf main, who punted me to the field office, who never got back to me after saying “dunno, we will look it up”. In the end, i just tried to do right and noone cared. It was very offputting to have jumped through hoops that noone cares about even within the organization.
I could define it one way, and you could define it anther. (And yes, that’s your point)
That being said, I have seen the ATF define it once. They may have done it other times, but I found this ruling several years ago when work on some of my how-to guides. It does have to do with marking firearms, but it was specific to the serial number.
ATF ruling 2002-6 includes this snippet:
The above regulations require markings that legibly identify each item or package and require that such markings are conspicuous. ATF has consistently taken the position that “legibly” marked means using exclusively Roman letters (A, a, B, b, C, c, and so forth) and Arabic numerals (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and so forth), and “conspicuous” means that all required markings must be placed in such a manner as to be wholly unobstructed from plain view. These regulations apply to licensed manufacturers and licensed importers relative to firearms, armor piercing ammunition, and large capacity ammunition feeding devices, and to makers of National Firearms Act firearms.
…and also this one:
Similarly, firearms and large capacity ammunition feeding devices which contain required markings obstructed in whole or in part from plain view must be remarked with required markings that satisfy the conspicuousness requirements described above. For example, required markings may not be placed on a portion of the barrel where the markings would be wholly or partially obstructed from view by another part of the firearm, such as a flash suppressor or bayonet mount.
Both 2002-6 and 2013-3 (which I posted earlier) are fairly straightforward, especially for ATF documents, and are worth a read just to become familiar with their content.
Are the “engrave the barrel” proponents saying that one pays the $200 tax and F1 for one’s 5.56 short barrel, and another $200 and F1 for one’s 300 BLKOUT short barrel, and another $200 and F1 for one’s 9mm short barrel, etc.?
No. The $200 is paid once and associated with the serial number.
And that only applies to the maker/MFG. So when you buy an MP5 and they put the SN on top. They have met the requirement. I the end user am free to put a rail mount over it.
Critical Thinking Time: No. Barrels are not firearms.
TANSTAAFL. If you engrave the AR barrel instead of the lower, it stands to reason that any short barreled upper to be used on the registered lower needs to be engraved.
I’ve never heard “conspicuous”. I’ve heard “engraved in a location that can be readily seen without disassembling the weapon”. I have always engraved inside the trigger guard. Certainly not “conspicuous”, but readily visible and a very common location for engraving at Ident Marking.