I was in a local chain sports store the other night and picked up 2 pistols a smith and a taurus in the ultralite 38, window shopping.

I noticed that both were very dirty, had been fired and it appeared at least several times from the build up.

The salesguy referred to possibility that the ballistics are being kept by the factories now. Is this true?

I know makers have provided test targets for years, but what caught my eye was , I haven't ever noticed the guns being marketed this dirty or obviously fired before.

what's the deal or was this just a freak occurance?

It's far more likely that the sales staff or owner of the gun shop 'test-fired' the gun themselves; or the gun could be used.

The easiest thing for you to do is contact Taurus to find out what their procedure is (screw S&W!).

George

I agree George, at least that is kinda what I was hoping to be the case and not some new gun rule that I wasn't aware of. I would have poated on the gun-politics board, but they don't want to talk about guns now , just war on that forum.

I also agree about S&W, even though I own some older ones that I wouldn't think about parting with. Its a damn shame what happened there.

All firearms are proofed and fired for function before being shipped. They are not in the cleaning business...just the arms making business.
If you had the good fortune of touring most arms manuf. you would be suprised how cruel they treat your favorites before you get them.
For instance...Sako runs three 30% proof test loads thru each rifle and then it goes next door where it is fired at the indoor range for accuracy. Those poof loads are nasty!
The rifle bores are not cleaned before being boxed.

The salesman is trying to sell you a used gun. Nothing wrong with a used gun -- it just should be identified as such.

I bet the reason is just as suspected...the gun has been fired to aquire several fired slugs for future ballistic fingerprinting....several states probably already have the law in place...and the maunufacturer doesnt know where a gun will end up being sold, so they obtain slugs from each gun that leaves the factory....that in addition to the regular firing for function..will leave residue on the gun...some laws are BS some are understandable...some fall in between....and they wont find agreement no matter what.....I really dont see a problem with a law like the balistic fingerprinting....if I have a loved one shot I want ALL the tools available to catch the guy who did it.....I dont like the idea of registrations across the board.....but a bullet from a fired gun that can be matched to a crime scene bullet is a huge jump on some information about the crime....they may not know who actually has the gun, but they can get some idea of its history.....cant hurt.....its a balancing act guys.....bob

The sales guy is wrong.

The "ballistic fingerprinting" is a red herring. It is not possible with today's computers. The amount of data simple can not be stored in a usable fashon. A single search would take too long. The number of "hits" becomes to large to be of any use to an examiner. If you searched the proposed database you would get thousands of hits. Those need to be examined by human eyes with a comparison microscoped. The imagaging, search mechanisims, and computing power makes a ballistic database of all new firearms impossible.

The systems now used for crime weapons are not as good as they were sold to be. They are unweildy but do occasionally lead to "hits" that are later comfirmed. They work because the people inputting images are selective. The images are catagorized by characteristics that pre-sort the data, that information is input by the operator. You can't flood the system with images and ask the computer to do all the work. It ends up falling all over itself. Keep in mind only certain kinds fired cases input. That keeps the amount of data down and allow the computer to give a useable answer. They target the bad guys, they don't search willie nellie. Bullets are not included because the imageing systems can't handle them.

Goevernment Forensic Ballistic experts studied the proposed national system and found it to be a unworkable. The conclusions were backed up by independant experts, from England. The proposal was dropped. Common sense prevailed, for once. Lets hope it stays dropped. The costs would be astromical and the results intangable.

Some Guy is absolutely right, we were talking about this last night at the gunshop. Another drawback to ballistic fingerprinting is that even if the equipment and manpower were avialable, they still wouldn't get reliable hits, as a gun is used over time, as things are changed, or if a person intentially changes things (aftermarket barrels for pistols for instance), the fingerprint on file no longer matches the gun.

Red

The problem is that ballistics usually works well in matching a pre-selected bullet to a pre-selected gun, so the clueless masses think that it will be equally effective in matching a pre-selected bullet to a non-selected pool of possible suspect guns.

Same thing as having tire tracks at a crime scene that match a suspects car VS comparing those tracks via computer to a database of tires that all new cars came equipped with when they were sold, no matter how many years had passed since then.

My hunch behind the whole "ballistic fingerprint" rigamarole is that a company already has a system for it and is doing this lobbying to get their system sold.

My hunch behind the whole "ballistic fingerprint" rigamarole is that a company already has a system for it and is doing this lobbying to get their system sold.

Right you are!

argueing the points to ballistic fingerprintings good or bad, is a moot effort if some states are requireing it of the fireamrs manufactureres....I think maryland already has the law in effect...I wouldnt doubt if told Califinia already has it also.....what would be the downside for the gun owner if his gun had a slug on a computer data base.......wether the data base was useful or not.......???????? and if it was a combersome tool...the police dept trying to use it would make that decision at the point of use, if they so decided it was a waste of time.....its their time and they have to account for it....so if the public knew they were wasting valuable time on ANYTHING in lue of serving the public emergency needs..they would come under heavy pressure.........we really should look at laws before we whoesale fight them.......granted most are rediculous and written to burden the gun owners of america.....bob

222blr,
You said "wether the data base was useful or not" I don't know about you, but I am not inclined to spend my money on useless things, just because they seem nice. I don't think anyone here would be inclined to let their governments spend very large sums of tax dollars to impliment anything, let alone regestration and "ballistic fingerprinting" systems that simply are not effective at reducing crime.These tax dollars can be put to good use in reducing the crime rate and misuse of firearms by putting more cops on the street, or provide firearm training and safety programs.

You also mentioned that, "I really dont see a problem with a law like the balistic fingerprinting....if I have a loved one shot I want ALL the tools available to catch the guy who did it.....I dont like the idea of registrations across the board." A fired bullet in a database would have little to no value unless the authorities knew exactly who was in posession of the firearm that it came from. What this means is that in order for the fired bullet database to be effective, you would also have to have each firearm regestered to a specific owner.

Weather you like it or not, weather it is feasable or not, or weather it can even be accomplished or not, Ballistic finger printing has started. I live in Maryland and every new hand gun sold here that was produced after Jan 1 2003 is ballistic fingerprinted. The fired shell is provided to the state police by the gun dealer before you can take possession.

ALL manufacturers test (proof) fire all guns they make, but I assume they clean them before shipping! The only people I know who are wasting the taxpayers' time & money "ballistic fingerprinting" firearms so far are the idiots in charge of the states of New York (naturally!!) and Maryland ("The Free State")!! Har Har!! It won't do much good, and will waste an untold fortune of tax money, but I guess it is better than the late (lamented??) Sen. P. Moynehan's idea of putting serial numbers on all bullets (projectiles)!!!

[ 04-10-2003, 21:58: Message edited by: eldeguello ]

This is quickly devolving into a political discussion, but I'll chime in: It's just another attempt by leftists to increase the cost of firearms for us gun owners. Every study (and common sense) indicates that it's a waste of money. But it's a waste of gunowner's money, so it's OK.

I expect that not even the mush-brained proponents of this scheme really think it will solve crimes.

Pertinax

Back to the main question, Ruger supplies a fired bullet with each new gun, but the gun is clean, you said VERY Dirty, sounds like a used gun to me.