FAQ's

November 29, 2011

Pistol to Rifle or Short Barreled Rifle: What is permitted and what is restricted under the NFA

There have been many question on converting a pistol to a rifle and back to a pistol. The ATF recently issued a ruling regarding this to help clarify what is permitted and what is not. If you would like to read the full ruling it can be found here. ATF Ruling 2011-4.pdf

In summary the ATF made the following findings.

Held, a firearm, as defined by the National Firearms Act (NFA), 26 U.S.C. 5845(a)(3), is made when un-assembled parts are placed in close proximity in such a way that they:

(a) Serve no useful purpose other than to make a rifle having a barrel or barrels of less than 16 inches in length (e.g., a receiver, an attachable shoulder stock, and barrel of less than 16 inches in length); or (b) Convert a complete weapon into such an NFA firearm, including – (1) A pistol and attachable shoulder stock; and (2) A rifle with a barrel of 16 inches or more in length, and an attachable barrel of less than 16 inches in length.

November 15, 2011

Can I make an AR-15 type pistol for my personal use?

by David M. Goldman

We received a copy of the following response dated August 30, 2010 from a reader of the blog that felt that this may be useful to others. If you want to download a copy of the letter it has been provided in a PDF format for your reference ATF Response – AFG on AR Pistol.pdf

The letter states:

This refers to your recent correspondence to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) regarding the manufacture of a firearm. Specifically, you asked about the lawfulness of manufacturing an AR-15 type pistol for your personal use. Your letter was forwarded to ATF’s Firearms Technology Branch (FTB), Martinsburg, West Virginia, for reply.

November 14, 2011

Can I change an AOW to a Shotgun and back to an AOW?

by David M. Goldman

We recently received a copy of a letter dated November 2, 2010 that addressed this issue. The person wanted to know if they had manufactured an AOW with various-length barrels, could a stock and longer barrel be added later for the purpose of hunting or other legal uses.

The ATF first responded with As background, the National Firearms Act (NFA), 26 U.S.C. Section 5845(e), which defines “any other weapon” to include-

… Any weapon or device capable of being concealed on the person from which a shot can be discharged through the energy of an explosive, a pistol or revolver having a barrel with a smooth bore designed or redesigned to fire a fixed shotgun shell, weapons with combination shotgun and rifle barrels 12 inches or more, less than 18 inches in length, from which only a single discharge can be made from either barrel without manual reloading, and shall include any such weapon which may be readily restored to fire . Such term shall not include a pistol or a revolver having a rifled bore, or rifled bores, or weapons designed, made, or intended to be fired from the shoulder and not capable of firing fixed ammunition.

November 10, 2011

Can I let someone else shoot my Silencer?

by David M. Goldman

This is a common question which has two answers. First I will address the legal answer.

The NFA restricts transfers of weapons. Normally we would not think of loaning a firearms or placing it in the hands of another person as a transfer, but under a more complete analysis, letting someone else use your silencer or other NFA firearm, is in fact a transfer and a violation of the National Firearms Act.

The NFA defines a transfer and the various derivatives of such word, to include selling, assigning, pledging, leasing, loaning, giving away, or otherwise disposing of.

November 9, 2011

Can I take Title II Firearms back and forth between Texas and Colorado?

by David M. Goldman

We are often asked about traveling to another state with NFA firearms. If you own property in multiple states like Texas and Colorado or regularly travel between Texas and Colorado with NFA Firearms, you can do so, but should and in some cases must obtain prior authorization from the ATF to take these firearms over state lines.

Note:Texas and Colorado are just used as an example of two places that you may regularly travel to and from. A Texas Gun Trust prepared by a Texas Gun Trust Lawyer® would be valid in Colorado and a Colorado Gun Trust prepared by a Colorado Gun Trust Lawyer® would be valid in Texas

There is no charge to obtain the authorization for interstate travel from the ATF. Your Gun Trust should have specific instructions on how to do this and if it does not you may want to have your gun trust reviewed by an attorney to see if it is a gun trust or just a generic revocable trust. Many so-called “Gun Trusts” and those provided by gun stores, found in the internet, created by software, or even some from lawyers, actually provide instructions to break the law. If you gun trust mentions stocks, property, homes, or other non-firearms related items, it may be a clue that you have a generic trust.

September 11, 2011

Benefits of Gun Trust over LLC in Most States

by David M. Goldman

We are often asked about the advantages of a Gun Trust by one of our Gun Trust Lawyers® over a LLC. I have compile a quick list of the most common advantages.

no federal or state tax or reporting requirements with a trust
no annual fees with a trust

September 7, 2011

Medical Marijuana and Firearms Transfers

by David M. Goldman

With the growing list of states that have some type of legalized marijuana use, it is important not to transfer a firearm to anyone who is a user of marijuana or medical marijuana (which are both illegal under federal laws). Chris Chiafullo at FFLGuard has an interesting article on how transferring a firearm to someone you believe is an unlawful user of marijuana (even if it is legal in your state) is an improper transfer and could subject you and the person who receives the firearm to criminal penalties.

If you have a Gun Trust, you should also be cautious about having a co-trustee that uses medical marijuana as it could create liability for you and the other people involved with your trust. If you have a trustee in one of the following states, you may want to check on their medical marijuana usage: Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Delaware the District of Columbia, Hawaii, Maine, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, New Jersey, Oregon,Vermont, Rhode Island, and Washington have legalized the medical use of marijuana in some form or fashion.

Gun Trust Lawyer®, David Goldman is a counsel of FFLGuard and provides information and legal advise regarding Class III issues. For more information on FFLGuard or to join FFLGuard call 1-888-FFL-GRD1 or visit FFLGuard.com

July 17, 2011

North Carolina, NFA, Trusts, & Machine Guns

by David M. Goldman

The NFATCA had an article about a revision to NC Law that will put to rest the controversy over the use of Trusts and also apparently drop the Machine Gun Permit for residents of the state of North Carolina North Carolina HB650 was signed into law on June 23rd, 2011 and will become effective on December 1st 2011

H650 [Ratified] Page 5

SECTION 8. G.S. 14-288.8(b) reads as rewritten:

June 27, 2011

GEOGRAPHIC DISTRIBUTION OF NFA APPLICATIONS FOR PROCESSING BY ATF

by David M. Goldman

The ATF National Firearms Act (NFA) Branch is pleased to announce that as of July 2011, ATF Forms 1, 2, 10 and ATF Form 5320.20 will be assigned to a legal instruments examiner for processing according to the State of the applicant’s address. The NFA Branch also will begin assigning ATF Forms 3, ATF Form 4 and 9 applications to examiners by the State of the transferor’s address. Applications already pending at the time of the change will continue to be processed by the examiner to whom they were previously assigned. Historically, applications in the NFA Branch have been assigned to legal instruments examiners alphabetically based on the name of the transferor or applicant. A chart showing the new assignment distribution is below.

The ATF expects this change in the assignment of applications to better enable NFA examiners to develop State law expertise and more knowledgeably and effectively respond to our customers during an era of unprecedented and ever increasing application volume. Please contact the NFA Branch at 304-616-4500 with any questions about this change.

NFA Examiner Assignment Distribution (effective July 2011)

June 22, 2011

Schedule A or Assignment Sheet

by David M. Goldman

Recently I received a question from a client that I thought I would share. His dealer questioned the use of the Assignment Sheet because they were not familiar with it and stated that the Gun Store’s lawyer said it was not necessary. ( A full detailed explanation is included in our detailed instructions and users manual) Here is a brief explanation for those who are not using our Gun Trust documents.

While the lawyer is correct, the ATF has confused the issue of funding a trust with documents which evidence the trust and mistakenly requires either a Schedule A or Assignment sheet or they reject the trust as invalid. While most trusts contain a Schedule A or a Schedule of Assets there are several issues with using a Schedule A in regards to the flexibility of our trust and privacy.

You can put a schedule of assets in the trust, but then you would have to keep it updated and if you decided to put your regular firearms in the trust, you would be creating a de facto registration of your firearms. Most gun owners do not wan’t to provide the ATF a list of all of their firearms and as such we have elected to use the “Assignment Sheets”. Our choice has increased privacy and allows for additional flexibility for the use of the trust without unnecessary disclosures.