Did some research about the company. The owner (seen here) publicly admitted to doing meth on Facebook and has a history of unhinged rants on social media. Additionally, they have been known to produce shoddy work in general and do not respond well to criticism. Not wise for anyone to give them cash.
@@thecupcakeman69 He didnt say they are currently taking pre-orders. He said "I spoke with the owners ABOUT preorders..." which means that 'if' they open preorders. That said, the comment above yours just reinforces the "Maybe dont give these people your money". But SOLGW owner has a (not good) history with his local PD and violent threats and he still runs one of the top ~10 AR boutiques in the country.
You could not have summed up my thoughts better. I don’t wish for anyone to fail, and I truly hope they succeed. But it’s very clear most people MASSIVELY underestimate how difficult success is, let alone on that insane timeline.
I have a very (very, very, very) basic understanding of the concept (not the practice) of stamping. The closest to any kind of manufacturing background I have is some hobby blacksmithing (mostly nails and s-hooks with a few fire strikers thrown in). Even with that limited knowledge, that quote hurt me deep inside.
Having zero knowledge of this, is there a quick, easy, TH-cam comment simple answer as to why this is NOT the case? Looking for serious reply, again, no knowledge of machining
@@dantauche7917 As I commented above, I don't have much background in stamping, but consider the differences in folding a piece of paper vs folding a piece of cardboard. The extra thickness means that they can behave enough differently that you have to use a different approach to get the same result. There is also the issue that stamping is not really folding in most cases. For example, the back of an AK-style top cover has a pyramidal shape that is pressed into the metal by the stamp and die. To get this shape requires stretching the metal in some places. Where and how much will depend on the shape of your flat as well as your other tools, but making a die that matches the outside of an AK top cover and a stamp that matches the inside (I think I used die and stamp correctly there, but forgive me if I didn't) will easily result in tearing along the corners or bunching of material in other places. Paper isn't ductile (stretchable), but metal is, and that changes a lot of things for better or worse.
12:26 There’s a 99.99% chance that BSD was going to see all the online hype and change their tune on pre-orders. I think Ian just saved a lot of people a bunch of money and frustration by making this video. Thank you for always looking out for the community, Ian!
If you've watched for awhile, Ian even did a video on something very similar. A couple engineers and machinists decided to make a gun. They never made guns before and thought " I've done things like this my whole life. How hard could it be?" It had so many little issues you could tell just looking at it they probably never even held a rifle before, let alone fired one.
Ian: "I will buy the first gun off the line, whatever they price it at..." BSD after this video drops: "The VSS repro is $3.4 million, plus $12.99 s/h"
$60 on a video game preorder is nothing. if you cant afford wasting $60 on a bad game you arent in the market for this gun period. poor people are the only ones that worry about preorders
Recently I watched a documentary about a reconstruction of an important local bridge. Schedule and budget was created based on the old existing plans/ blueprints. Work was majorly delayed, because they had to remove a 30cm layer of concrete that was supposed to be 15cm thick only. Half of the layer had to be removed manually, because they found steel reinforcements that were not mentioned in blueprints at all. Having technical data does not necessary mean you have technical data:-D
I've been a machinist for over 25 years. I have no doubt that talented engineers and machinists could re-engineer a firearm. But the fact they are outsourcing the parts and that guy compared folding paper to stamping tells me they know nothing about manufacturing. This project is doomed.
I think even if you brought in a team of experienced engineers and machinists. You would still have trouble coping a gun. Especially if you only plan on making it in small numbers. Sure if you planned on producing thousands. You'd have enough guns to test everything. But a small production run. No way. I worked in a tool and die shop that made and stamped parts for Remington. Even in the 2000s they were making minor tweaks and changes. Still optimizing the gun. There's a lot that goes into making a gun. One of the most surprising. Is using softer steel than you would imagine. Surface hardened cold rolled is what a surprising amount of gun parts are made of. If they can resist the urge to "improve" anything. They'll be miles ahead of everyone else who tried to copy a gun. People talk about how in WW2 there were problems converting metric to English with cannons like the 20 and 40mm. The truth is it's really easy to convert metric to English. Any idiot can do it. The real problem they had with production were American tweaks to the design. Covered up with the ridiculous cover story of they totally just couldn't do simple math. 😂
Vss Vintorez doesn't have huge reliability reputation to be honest. So maybe if something is reversed engineered maybe it's gonna become more reliable lol
To give people a baseline on how difficult this is, Zastava obtained multiple copies of the AK47 in 1959 and it took them 5 years to reverse engineer it. At that time Zastava had been in business for over a century, had multiple experienced engineers and state funding.
To be fair you could argue it was more difficult then because they didn't have the modern computer technology we have now to aid them, but... Even in modern times it does often take several years, Ian is right that 9-12 months is insane
@@richcat1177 even in todays world with "computer tech" it is difficult, time consuming and expensive to make few parts made by different companies work together well... Zastava has its own manufacturing it makes things a lot easier .
I remember starting my first sheet metal project nearly 40 years ago.. the idea that it's a piece of paper that you can fold is quite bizarre.. the dimensional changes.. the corner tolerances.. the tearing.. the work hardening.. the material science etc.. and that's just the start of it.. even if you get it visibly constructed without tearing out a corner, there is no guarantee that it will function at all.. a full understanding of the science is needed and massive amounts of experience and testing.. the stamping may require multiple processes including heat treatments.. just gobsmacked at the how much nieveity is on display
Some people never really worked manual labour, and it shows :P That said, I don't see why they wouldn't subcontract the stamping, or use another manufacturing method.
To their advantage they are making a copy of an existing part. That means much of the engineering of the part has already been done. And it is not overstretching the material or anything like that because the original does not. As for heat treating it is pretty simple: If the part fails when trying to stamp it from raw stock with no heat treatment -> anneal the part to dead soft, and do the stamping, and then harden and temper it according to the material specification you get from the supplier of the steel. But most of the time you do not need to do any heat treatment to sheetmetal for stamping. Mostly it's just mild steel anyway that can not be heat-treated to change the property's much. After all the top cover or any other stamped part does not take a lot of load and can be made from cheap mild steel.
Yea when he said it’s just like folding Paper I instantly knew they had no chance of making this. Unless some how they have a 3 party doing it for them. The complete confidence he said in that statement just shows that they haven’t even take one step in trying to stamp metal or even looked at the process of doing it
It sounds pretty simple, but there has been a long history of sheet metal parts being attempted because they're 'easy' and failing. If theynjust rush in blindly it won't go well.
Yeah, saying that he's developed a "sixth sense" (18:08) for metal working was a huge red flag to me. Sixth sense immediately translates into "I dont understand the science and mechanics behind what I'm doing" in my head. Thats the context Ive most commonly heard that phrase in. Experience is nice and all, but a sound understanding of the process matters a whole lot more.
I think people would be surprised to find out how many people in the firearm industry are actually just dudes with some money, an idea that they know “what right looks like”, and enough confidence to ignore the qualified opinions of people around them.
Somewhere in the USSR, 1947: "Ilya, relax! You fold paper, you can fold sheet metal, it will be no trouble!" A short while later: "Oh no Ilya. Oh no. When comrade Stalin hears of this..."
When I asked them if .338 ARC would fit, they didn't know because they had not tried cartridges derived from 6.5 Grendel. You know, that case that uses the exact same base cartridge as the original 9x39....
So, what, they've gotten some of the technical package after it fell of the back of a truck, & without even doing a sanity check to see if the original cartridge fits they've just edited the CAD to .300 blackout & called it a day? Bold play.
Any idiot who uses .338 ARC for their first firearm run is going to fail quicker than New Coke in 1985. These flash in the pan cartridges are a desperate grasp at parting people from their money in a floundering economy.
I am relieved to learn BSD made it so very, very clear they will not be taking anyone's money in advance, and I'm sure they are grateful to Ian for making us all aware of their quite commendable restraint going forward.
Well according to the comment right above yours, it differs from what Ian said and what you’ve said in your comment? Sounds hinky to me and even if I had the cash, I’d turn and run!
@@ronsorrentino6207 Perhaps statements are being tailored for whoever they're talking to. A person who sees advance payments as a potential red flag may be assured that's not going to happen. Someone who's eager to hand them money, well . . . No hinkiness for me -- my firearms acquisition budget for 2025 will be going wholly towards Jim Kibler's upcoming Hawken kit.
I love that B&T are willing to show small manufacturers at their own booth, that is awesome of them. They deserve credit and I'm glad Ian mentioned it. He also deserves credit for being an advocate and an expert for the rest of us who just see shiny things and want shiny things. PS I'd love to see Ian's take on the P7 Slim by P7Pro. I think its a situation similar to this but Ian would know.
I'm relatively aware of how little skepticism exists in the gun industry. I'm extremely happy with Ian's healthy dose of industrial grade skepticism here. Well done, sir.
isn't it just being rational based on plain old experience? i`m not in the fire arms industry but work for several car manufactures in Europe and regularly receive inquiries of people who want to build "a supercar" and who "just need xyz parts" or "have a ground breaking idea for an engine" and what not. and while i can always appreciate a determined mind, some things are simply not done without a shitload of logistics, money and time behind it. even IF you have above mentioned factors covered, a set deadline will come back to bite you in 9/10 cases. even more so when it`s overly optimistic and if it`s your first and only product. Take Brandon and his AK .50. or the A.I. L96 and to an extend even the M1 Garand when it was being licensed to various manufactures whom were given complete data packages only after it was made made sure it`s as fail prove as possible. in short and what i think is the other guys biggest misjudgement: it`s never just numbers. the moment someone hits me with the "i mean it`s just/how hard can it be" it`s almost a given they are in for an unpleasant wake up call.
@@AlexHalt100 "Just" doesn't do it justice. There are a lot of people that have been in the industry the same amount of time giving things that are cool the grounds for a lot hype that ends up going nowhere. This is a healthy amount of skepticism given out with the right amount of reluctance and qualification to call this reasonable skepticism with all the positive connotations of scientific skepticism and evidence based reasoning. Which is rare, especially in this industry in this country.
The standards have lowered so much that people think a 5.56 barrel that only last 4 or 5,000 rounds is good, or an AK with a trunnion that turns to mush in 2k is acceptable. ....and people that point out how these aren't true representations of the guns they pretend to be get raked in comments and forums. It's sad. No one could get away with it long in decades prior, now it's even promoted as a selling point. "Well it's to keep costs down help arm the poor!" or some such, when in reality another $100-200 gives them original capabilities.
FW has been around for so long that some of the guns featured as "up and coming" have ended up becoming worthy inclusions as a forgotten weapon, notably the Hudson H9.
@@Pilotmario Trust me brother, I know. I was watching this channel since before he had intro bumpers. I remember the cameraman's breathing. it haunts me.
They told me directly that they ask for 50% deposit and non-refundable. They would absolutely take our money. Brice and team are giving different answers
Jeezus Chriiiist. If that's how they operate, all the publicity they got from shot show is going to sink the project before their own manufacturing incompetence has a chance to.
Lol, you know the criticism is going to be truly brutally honest when you start with so many qualifiers. I appreciate your hopeful skepticism, and I also appreciate your warning! Thank you for making this video!
I laughed so hard when I saw him make that face. I can't tell you how many times I've made that face. It's the look of a man who knows more than you do preparing to explain just how little you know, but he's trying to figure out how to not get in trouble saying it.
@@metalhero117 Did you see the one at the end where the guy was saying "well, I've worked with metal before--not guns specifically--" and you could hear Ian's internal screaming?
Ian has been burnt and seen others burned by so many “cool projects” and he’s finally fed up with all the vaporware. I hope future developers use Ian as consultant in the future before unveiling something
@@NickDonzewell psa bought it hyped it up, said it was entering production last year before shot show, and then canceled the project like late last year
I got singed by DS Arms back in the 90s. I pre-ordered quite a few FALs. No money involved, but we were promised a price point. Years past. Years. Finally, rifles started coming off his assembly line. Woohoo! Yeah. No record of my pre-order. Did not receive the promised price. Never did get the rifles I ordered. But, no damage done. I didn't lose any money. And he did make the FALs eventually
@@rhmotes they've had issues getting their AKs to the point where they function reliably, why would anyone want to buy a budget .50? The reason they're so expensive is because they have to be overbuilt for the sake of safety. And even then they can still have issues on rare occasions. The power of that round is just insane
Took Brandon Herrera about a decade to build a fully functioning AK50, from concept to finished product, and he's been building AKs for a long time, so for them to say they'll be producing these that soon is insane.
Well, the VSS shares a lot of similarities with the AK, and a US-made VSS could probably be easily adapted to use standard two-pin AK trigger groups. The AK-50 is a different animal simply because of the forces involved; the receiver wound up sticking out so far behind the trigger that that he just stuck a pad on the rear of it instead of a stock like some kind of half-bullpup, and it uses a telescoping dust cover like the Saiga-12.
That last clip was cold. Yeah, bro. I totally have a 6th sense for like metal and stuff. But other than that, Its just measurements. Oh yeah that top cover rubs the bolt carrier.
Its a hard choice between "stamping is like folding a sheet of paper", "like I just like have a 6th sense about it" and the meltdown comment as to which is the biggest neon illuminated, star spangled and bedazzled red flag of the 3.
I love that clip Ian ends the video with. "I am one with the metal, I know it inside out... oh, that doesn't fit right, that's why it's a bit rough." Clearly shows this guy is way over his head.
This fool doesn't even look 30, so I love how he brags about having worked with metal for ages. Meanwhile all the machinists / toolmakers I know are so grey and work hardened that they might now be more metal-dust than man. They also won't answer any question without half a million caveats and requests for more specific information.
I worked at an Aerospace company for a while and we did machining, stamping, hydroforming ect. and the process to get a new set of stamping dies up and running was mind boggling. Even when we were given dies to use by Boeing or another major manufacturer and explicit instructions on what to do there was a metric buttload of trial and error involved and without one of the guys there that was a wizard with dies/stamping/hydroforming we would not have been able to fill a lot of contract orders. I couldn't believe the rejection rates on some parts and I couldn't believe how much went into a "simple" stamped part.
Thank you, Ian, for inquiring about the stamping process. I couldn't ask these sort of production questions, when I stopped by the booth. I was worried about how they were going to go about it but being the 'other integral suppressor guys in the basement' meant it was going to be rude/sketchy if I started asking a bunch of questions, like that. I really want to see this project succeed. "Competition" or not, they all seem like genuinely nice folks who with the same passions as all the rest of us.
10:14 this answer is a ridiculous oversimplification, wow. I can see why Ian had to make this video: these guys are way out of their depth and no other channel seems to have realised. Thanks for being a source of quality journalism as always!
No, if you look at James Reeves from TFB, he tells the Reps his doubts straight to the dudes face, "JOKINGLY" of course, but DID put it out there as well.....Ian and Reeves are my 2 trusted channels, beyond them, the rest are just whores/shills tryin to get paid from views....
they'd be better off printing (metal) the parts that don't have to take pressure, more finishing process is needed sure, but more appropriate for the scale and more likely to work right
Not trying to glaze here, but really respect the way in which Ian put this video out - a total class act. I too wish nothing but success for the project, however I have also been burnt on speculative projects and know the pain. Theres a wealth of knowledge in this vid!
The cynic in me thinks that what Ian really believes is: 1. The parts in the show gun are Russian and not manufactured by BSD; and 2. BSD is shortly going to advertise pre -sales ... but he's not going to risk a law suit by expressing those suspicions without evidence.
Ye, sounds about right. If they borrowed a top cover why not borrow the rest of the internals too. They clearly don't have the experience to manufacture it as it would seem.
I like how this video is a very polite PSA to BSD and consumers alike; that any form of preorder will be highly dubious, almost as if trying to dissuade BSD from going that route in the future
it's to dissuade potential buyers from giving them preorder money, for what is almost certainly a pipe dream, when they inevitably do go that route in the very near future.
There is also the problem of tolerance stacking: Individual parts will work within their own tolerances but when all parts are placed together, issues arise because the tolerances aren't tight enough for all the parts to work together.
Just look at an AK barrel. Dimensions include a range of fitment from 1-1-1-1 to 4-4-4-4. I don't recall offhand what those individual tolerances are, but it goes to show you that tolerance stacking is real and needs to be accounted for.
There's actually a lot of people out there with too much money to spend. Usually descendants of rich families or cryptobarons, they are the foundation of every successful crowdfunded project. If the projects breaks through, they'll flaunt their badge of early backer, if not, well they didn't need the money anyway. I'm not saying it's wrong, it's just something that owners of crowdfunded projects should know beforehand.
@@lordmetzgermeisterthat's the same misapprehension as thinking casinos are all about people rolling dice to win a million dollars, in the vast majority of cases the real money is in the little people. The key part of crowd funding is the crowd, you're talking more about traditional investment funding types I think.
Is their gameplan to build enough hype, that the public demands this product, then they sell the concept to PSA and they make a couple of bucks for their effort? This has got Sturmgewehr reproduction written all over it. Honestly this is one of Ian's best videos. Thanks for putting it out, even if it means almost certain doom for BSD.
Sounds a lot like the Silicon Valley startup scene/racket. Small group starts a business, develops a bare-bones project, generates hype, then sells it to Google/Meta/Amazon/Oracle/etc. for 8+ figures. (Not that these guys would get 8 figures for this, but you get the point.)
It was a huge eye opener to learn from Forgotten Weapons that a prototype, no matter how impressive, is not production. In video after video examining how various guns came to be, how they disappeared, was far more difficult than any gun-inventor could imagine. And forget guns, there is a huge community of Wildcat Cartridge enthusiasts who encounter these and related issues. Those are just bullets, not an entire gun. Finally, the guy Ian was talking to clearly is in over his head - "When you've worked with metal for so many years, you can intuitively spot a good design......" (or something like that).
having the manufacturing background to properly critique the claims is pretty crucial here, and it's something that most of firearms media largely lacks or ignores
@@themeatpopsicle is it? Because I have none and it immediately all sounded like nonsense and a salesman that was clenching so tight for fear of someone pushing back even the slightest.
@@austinfontenot8955I think he’s referring to what questions to ask because most gun media is “oh what inspired this? Oh what’s the deadline? Oh what’s the MSRP? Oh cool! Thanks for having us here on (insert gun media page)”
Ian is time traveling into the future and making a video of a forgotten weapon that has not yet been forgotten. Not only is it not yet forgotten, but it has not even been manufactured yet. Awesome.
Gun Jesus saving souls and our wallets by putting this public service announcement on the airwaves - Thank you Ian. Not that it matters, but I bought a gun from Ian. He was thoroughly transparent, awesome and even accommodated a stupid request of mine without question. Solid dude in my little experience.
18:10 - That guy either sounds like an absolute metalworking savant and I wish him a long and prosperous career in manufacturing repro's. He'd be a deserving multimillionaire if he can churn out high quality repro's. The alternate interpretation is that he's deep into the depths of Dunning-Kruger and is going to fail like the countless other attempts at reproduction rare firearms. Either way, very curious to see the end of this story. I hope for the best.
Anyone who has followed the AK50 project will know Ian speaks the truth on how hard it is to fully design and engineer a gun, and that was just scaling up a normal AK, not a clean sheet design.
@@c6q3a24 Ever tried to copy something without original specs or tooling? It took the Russians themselves six years to get this gun ready for production, one year or less for a reproduction is extremely unlikely.
I’m sad now. I thought these guys were manufacturing prototypes as of writing. Thanks Ian for your transparency, knowledge, opinion, and some of behind the scenes of what one of the business owners was saying. They have their work cut out for them. Firearms engineering is a lot different than gun smithing and machinist taking measurements.
Love the expression on your face as you asked questions and the response from the questions. You can see that you are confused as to how they will manage this project.
apparently he uses meth or has had problems with it in the past. I'd be surprised if that isnt in play here. Considering his demeanor, the sunglasses indoors and the crazy ass response he made to this video, he is giving off a lot of indicators of actively using.
In the early 2000's, l paid about $2000 for a clone Merwin Hulbert pocket army revolver, with a lot of options- .44-40 and .44spl cylinders, 7", 5.5",and 3.25" barrels, boy, that was a dream outfit. It was at the shotshow, and l read about it in several publications. Of course it didn't go anywhere, and l was informed l may get some of the money back. Years later l was contacted, and told I'd be getting a check for the total amount in a couple months, and a foreign company had bought out the bankrupt company. I did in fact get the full amount back, but unfortunately, no new Merwins have been produced.
Back in the early days of the Second World War, my father was in charge of the Experimental Workshops of the Department of Aircraft Production in Australia. One of the issues he had to solve was the production of cover plate that went between the wings and fuselage of a particular aircraft. The failure rate of the production was 98%, meaning for every 100 manufactured, only two items could be used due to not meeting the required tolerances. My father had to "re-invent" the manufacturing process and the best he could achieve was a 98% pass rate. He had enormous resources and experienced personnel to help him. These people have a huge obstacle to overcome, and I wish them success.
Ian, thank you for your insight, honesty and integrity. We know you WANT this gun to be great but you have to call it like it is. This is what makes Forgotten Weapons the best gun related TH-cam channel and we appreciate it.
Considering how even _countries_ have issues with copying stuff to a reasonable level of quality, even when they have thousands of original parts to base measurements off of, I would certainly not expect a small entrepreneurship to succeed at it, not without years and years of excruciatingly difficult (and expensive) work.
As I commented elsewhere, Zastava obtained multiple copies of the AK47 in 1959 and it took them 5 years to reverse engineer it. At that time Zastava had been in business for over a century, had multiple experienced engineers and state funding.
@@noneofyourbusiness2133 Honestly, how much of that was just ensuring it's part-interchangeable with a regular AK? That's essentially a sampling problem, not a tolerance problem. If they just wanted something that looked like an AK, 5 years is probably too long for a legitimate manufacturing company like that.
Fantastic video on the technical aspects of prototype, off-tool samples and production process. In prospective, the AK-50 took Brandon 8 years, for a single prototype (3 iterations). Some (not all) important items during R&D for engineering projects like this: 1. Technical drawing creation and review, proper GD&T, and statistical tolerance accounted for (cpk, ppk). 2. Finite element analysis, 3. Comprehensive tolerance stack-up accross vital sub-assemblies, 4. Design failure mode effect analyses, 5. Functional, durability and environmental testings, And, all of the above are JUST R&D, without any procurement and manufacturing involvement. Imagine the possibility of (at least) all three departments involved working in perfect harmony, and then you mix in Murphy's Law. All I can say to BSD is best of luck on your passion project, and may it one day see the mass production market. .......But NOT in 9 months.
A very thoughtful and diplomatic assessment of their situation. I hope they accept your wise words and drop the project, and find an easier first project for their team.
I'm a mechanical design engineer, and for a time, I worked as a quality engineer doing bubble drawings and QC lab work on "defense" projects. The idea that you can get all the tooling set up, secure every supplier for every part, then have it all come in and go together on the first try like butter in that timeframe is absolutely insane. And on top of that there's the laundry list of the regulatory requirements and red tape associated with every piece of material and every shop that touches a firearm project for the US commercial market. It costs a fortune.
Ergo - this needs 1) a genuinely experienced firearms engineer and 2) an investor who knows well what he's getting into, so it doesn't go down as a BS VSS...
Oh I am glad someone is speaking up about this. BSD has a pretty bad track record regarding customer satisfaction and order fulfillment's. When I first seen the videos rolling out about the "vss" I started giggling. Do your research online first before trusting your hard earned money to a company like BSD.
Engineering tolerances are a hugely misunderstood topic. When Packard started manufacturing Merlin aircraft engines in WW2 it took a year of intense back and forth with RR in England to deal with that one single issue.
Ian is trying to protect the consumer from abandonware. Have seen this happen time and again. Good on him, this is proper firearm journalism in a way. Well, done Ian. Love it. Saw this and sort of was shocked, now I can temper proper expectation.
Top cover is indeed a significant undertaking. So much so that even soviets didn't trust it to be robust enough to mount iron sights there in their AK lines. Sako fine tuned it enough to make it possible, but with significant cost.
Well, did they even try? Making the top-cover fit well enough to repeat a zero is certainly difficult, but it's not clear to me they ever tried to do that.
@@TheFanatical1AK12 (2012) has picatiny and doesn't hold zero for shit, AK12 (2016) does it a bit better but still much, much, worse than the dovetail mount on the AK74, my comment is based on opinions expressed by both sides of the Ukrainian war.
@@Kruchmann To be fair the dovetail mount is an extremely solid mounting for optics. The VSSM top cover with picatinny also seems to be rather solid and is milled so it would probably be easier to manufacture for this American reproduction. (It is less iconic and looks worse in my opinion though.)
@ The AK12 is not a Soviet rifle? I'm asking if they ever even contemplated mounting the sights on the cover, not whether someone kludged one on at a later date. "Didn't trust" is not the same thing as "we never bothered to try"
I think people see Soviet guns, stamped sheet metal, braided wire springs, and think they're easy to manufacture or very simple guns. It took 10 years, a whole team of engineers, and the backing of a large state *just to change the standard receiver of the AK-47 from milled to stamped*. No functional change, just to make the stamped receiver as good as the milled one. CAD has come really far in the past 10 years. It's not impossible to take measurements and get a lot of work done before anything has been built in steel. Let's assume they've hacked Tula and stolen the blueprint, so all of that has been taken care of and they're so good that converting it to .300 BLK isn't a problem. Outsourcing the manufacturing alone will be a tremendously expensive process in engineering resources. There's so many problems that will crop up unrelated to the firearm in question. I know Ian just mentioned it but even things like how much waste material a process will have, how reliable a machining operation is, etc all factor in and they're all invisible costs until you hit them. Making jigs, remaking jigs; those costs are something you bear until you start making money and they're all very expensive.
A Massive, Massive Thank You to Ian for a 100% Logical, Honest, Concerned dissertation on the process of setting up to manufacture a brand new firearm. Legendary. Classroom stuff. Engineers and Lawyers can not fault this video.
Was going to bring up k factor but I figured nobody would know what it is. By rights, I have no experience myself in sheet metal stamping (which is why I don't do any), but goodness me, it's not like folding paper!
I mean, on a modern gun that is relatively simple and almost entirely machined, a team can basically just over-spec the tolerances to +/- .0005 on any suspected critical parts or details taken from a nominal CAD drawing or a reverse engineered sample. Run them on a decent machining center or turn mill that can readily hold that over a few dozen parts, be prepared to do a little TLC on assembly, and anyone can just YOLO a few small prototype batches together. And since those are almost assuredly going to have problems unrelated to tolerance anyway, the team can work out where tolerances need to be kept tight or where they can loosen them up and have good parts, all while working through other problems prior to reaching anything like a full production run. It's full production where you have to have that dialed in. The VSS is not a modern gun that is simple and designed to be made entirely on modern CNC machining centers.
A thick piece of paper. 🤓 Tin knocker assembly line workers tapping with their hammers like little elves. My brother had a crowd watching him hand make steel ductwork in the back of an R.E. Michel in FL over a decade ago. Its just not done down here so no-one has the skills. The reactions were from amazement to eye-rolls at all the extra work compared to fiberboard, flex duct, a knife and tape.
Having seen some of the owner's Facebook posts, I fully expect he's going to end up in prison at some point. It sounds like a schizophrenic rant with him saying he wants to kill police
I like the honesty that Ian has. These kind of videos can be helpful for anyone who is thinking of starting their own project like this. BTW! I live in Sweden and as someone who is planning to start collection of black powder firearm and have never owned a gun before, I like that there are channels like Forgotten Weapons and others that can help newbies like me get into this type of "hobby" before I waste tons of money for nothing. I'm looking for what laws there are to own and purchase firearms in my own country and what I need if I want to buy them from other countries and import the weapon (and IMO swedish laws have some "grey areas" when it comes to owning and using blackpowder weapons) Great Channel! Ha en underbar dag allihop!
tolerances, materials, heat treatment and overall experience in production are definitely very important if you want to mass-produce VSS at it's original manufacturing cost (cheap). but since this guys already stated that it will be pricey, i'm pretty sure they are aware of their lack of manufacturing optimization. they hope to solve all problems by the power of outsource and CNC )
I fail to understand why Ian or the manufacturer didn't mention outsourcing the stamping (which looks like it'll be a disaster if they do it themselves).
@@CyberChrist I think his line is that you can't rely on the manufacturer to intimately know your project, and so have to have a baseline of knowledge. I assume there arent many subcontractors in the US who have a lot of experience in russian stamping techniques, so the company will have to solve those.
@@CyberChrist Outsourcing comes with its own fauna of challenges, specially for complex parts. Subcontractors usually cut corners (sometimes literally) and usually work with a Minimum Viable Product mentality. In the company I work for, we usually subcontract simple parts like laser cut sheet metals or basic milled/turned parts like pins, bushings, and so on. Anything with any significant complexity to it which has to be precisely interfaced with another part has to be made in house. Any simple part can be made by a competent machinist/metal worker, but once you start to introduce a lot of features which relies on Geometric dimensioning and tolerances like concentricity, parallelism, squareness, flatness, things start to get out of hand, even with CAM. Not having the engineer/designer readily available during the early phases of manufacturing to get the kinks out will end up in delays, wasted material, incorrect parts, and add a lot of costs overall.
there were two other companies in the last 15 years that claimed they will make VSS, showed functioning prototypes, showed purchased manufacturing equipment gathered lots of excitement and we still have not a single VSS for sale that is not russian kit gun. I am afraid i have to agree with Ian. i wish them the best but they are up against a very-very steep hill and learning curve, even if we don't take financial aspects into account. best case for them, to develop manufacturing data set with all kinks worked and then sell themselves out to PSA or somebody else with a big cash purse. alternatively next best thing for us i they go bankrupt and sell data package to some very skilled all-in-house manufacturer like SMG or Robinson or Geiselle.
Ye, a VSS reproduction manufacturer would be extremely cool but it just seems like an extremely tough task. Especially with the current geo-political climate and how Russia has tightened down on trying to classify their military equipment.
The owner has 100% swayed me from any purchases ever due to what I’ve seen in groups on Facebook from him. Good luck in the future, I’m just not sold on his work at all. Maybe PSA could pick it up and do a better job!!!
I dunno about that. PSA has it's own production tolerance issues that make it off their line to your door. Production tools wear out $$$ and tolerance checks get more expensive for every part out of a thousand you confirm is "to spec". Things PSA isn't exactly renowned for. I'd be more interested seeing Aero Precision take a swing. They already make nearly _half_ the AR parts on the market, just for other companies. Rebranded with a designer name, a "tax" you pay for. Yet they're still fairly affordable.
I think the best course for this project is to just be a specialty made as ordered option from them. The market is here but it's just not big enough to have an all out full production of them, everyone always has high hopes for their niche/ unique offerings but get way too much hype from people who don't even have the money to purchase these premium items. Out of everyone saying they'll buy the item it's always less than 0.1% of them will actually even seriously consider it. This always happens and Ian has spoken on it before, people need to give serious feedback and be honest with manufacturers so they don't basically doom these projects right out the gate. Thank you Ian for making this video and being extremely realistic with your outlook. And if the guys developing this project are reading this please don't put yourselves in a bad spot trying to please people, do this at your own pace and be realistic with the outcome. The market is small and the amount of people willing to go through the registering process and pay the money needed to justify the manufacturing cost is even smaller. Hope all goes well for you and honestly great work.
I spoke with the owner about preorders yesterday…. I was told they would be $3.5k non refundable…
Well, that was fast.
Did some research about the company. The owner (seen here) publicly admitted to doing meth on Facebook and has a history of unhinged rants on social media. Additionally, they have been known to produce shoddy work in general and do not respond well to criticism. Not wise for anyone to give them cash.
That's horse pucky...
If I'm told non-refundable...I keep my money.
Who did you talk too? I asked as well and they said they aren’t taking preorders I’m calling 🧢
@@thecupcakeman69 He didnt say they are currently taking pre-orders. He said "I spoke with the owners ABOUT preorders..." which means that 'if' they open preorders. That said, the comment above yours just reinforces the "Maybe dont give these people your money". But SOLGW owner has a (not good) history with his local PD and violent threats and he still runs one of the top ~10 AR boutiques in the country.
As an experienced manufacturing engineer if you gave me the Russian TDP tooling and 9-12 months. I could easily get this project run into bankruptcy.
Outstanding
You're hired
GIVE THIS MAN A GOVERNMENT CONTRACT NOW!
sounds like someone is going for a government job
The Elbonian defence minister wants to get in touch with you 😁
Pre-forgotten weapon
Prepare to be forgotten weapons
Savage 💀
Ian has moved on to spawn camping them at shotshow now.
Got em
"They must first be known before they can be forgotten."
You could not have summed up my thoughts better.
I don’t wish for anyone to fail, and I truly hope they succeed. But it’s very clear most people MASSIVELY underestimate how difficult success is, let alone on that insane timeline.
Hi Brandon
Brandon, I miss the old Brandon
Don't dash my hopes up on the rocks like the babes of yore, Brandon.
Agreed, I won't my breath, but I'm rooting for 'em.
Hello future ATF Director Brandon!
The sunglasses indoors told me everything I needed to know
If that didn't his meth use would.
Gotta hide those bloodshot eyes.
@@axmajpayneExactly what went through my head when I read this comment lol
lol
"You know who wears sunglasses inside? Blind people and assholes."
Larry David
"When you see a flat piece of paper you can understand how to make a template, and fold it. It's just-" *Laughs in Tool and Die Maker*
Don't be a dick. He's one with the metal. A magical wizard, if you will. Otherwise known as insane
I have a very (very, very, very) basic understanding of the concept (not the practice) of stamping. The closest to any kind of manufacturing background I have is some hobby blacksmithing (mostly nails and s-hooks with a few fire strikers thrown in). Even with that limited knowledge, that quote hurt me deep inside.
Hahahaha yep, stamping makes my poor little machinist brain hurt. Wizard shit
Having zero knowledge of this, is there a quick, easy, TH-cam comment simple answer as to why this is NOT the case? Looking for serious reply, again, no knowledge of machining
@@dantauche7917 As I commented above, I don't have much background in stamping, but consider the differences in folding a piece of paper vs folding a piece of cardboard. The extra thickness means that they can behave enough differently that you have to use a different approach to get the same result.
There is also the issue that stamping is not really folding in most cases. For example, the back of an AK-style top cover has a pyramidal shape that is pressed into the metal by the stamp and die. To get this shape requires stretching the metal in some places. Where and how much will depend on the shape of your flat as well as your other tools, but making a die that matches the outside of an AK top cover and a stamp that matches the inside (I think I used die and stamp correctly there, but forgive me if I didn't) will easily result in tearing along the corners or bunching of material in other places. Paper isn't ductile (stretchable), but metal is, and that changes a lot of things for better or worse.
12:26 There’s a 99.99% chance that BSD was going to see all the online hype and change their tune on pre-orders. I think Ian just saved a lot of people a bunch of money and frustration by making this video. Thank you for always looking out for the community, Ian!
Those odds seem a little low to me.
I just hope anyone that would consider pre paying for a prospective firearm sees this video unless they have so much money it doesn’t matter to them
They already did try and take preorders. I have screenshots of Brice making an initial order list and talking about a timeframe on taking deposits.
If you've watched for awhile, Ian even did a video on something very similar. A couple engineers and machinists decided to make a gun. They never made guns before and thought " I've done things like this my whole life. How hard could it be?" It had so many little issues you could tell just looking at it they probably never even held a rifle before, let alone fired one.
Sunglasses inside? I’d run for the hills
Ian: "I will buy the first gun off the line, whatever they price it at..."
BSD after this video drops: "The VSS repro is $3.4 million, plus $12.99 s/h"
Wouldn’t surprise me, Bryce has to pay for his meth habit somehow.
How to save your company with ONE simple trick...
Deal! if you throw in a queen size My Pillow.
hopefully that means they cover the tax stamp...
If you know of this con man you know that 3.4mil is far too low. Easily 5x that plus 20% of purchase for shipping
Genuinely wish them the best of luck because Gun Jesus knows they’ll need it.
As with video games, the same lesson applies to guns it seems. NEVER PRE-ORDER ANYTHING!
@@mq5731as a software dev I second this
Video games taught me, "no preorders." Applies to guns, too.
Remember 2042
the one and only pre-order i ever did for a gun, ended up being a complete rug-pull. never got the money back.
$60 on a video game preorder is nothing. if you cant afford wasting $60 on a bad game you arent in the market for this gun period. poor people are the only ones that worry about preorders
@@bobbob-g8p who tf preorders the standard edition
Didn't someone do preorders for a fg42 or stg44 reproduction that didn't materialize.
Recently I watched a documentary about a reconstruction of an important local bridge. Schedule and budget was created based on the old existing plans/ blueprints. Work was majorly delayed, because they had to remove a 30cm layer of concrete that was supposed to be 15cm thick only. Half of the layer had to be removed manually, because they found steel reinforcements that were not mentioned in blueprints at all. Having technical data does not necessary mean you have technical data:-D
There's technical data, and there's *accurate* technical data.
Hence why as built drawings are crucial in construction, especially for modifying structures that predate 3D modeling and BIM coordination.
I've been a machinist for over 25 years. I have no doubt that talented engineers and machinists could re-engineer a firearm. But the fact they are outsourcing the parts and that guy compared folding paper to stamping tells me they know nothing about manufacturing. This project is doomed.
I think even if you brought in a team of experienced engineers and machinists. You would still have trouble coping a gun. Especially if you only plan on making it in small numbers.
Sure if you planned on producing thousands. You'd have enough guns to test everything. But a small production run. No way.
I worked in a tool and die shop that made and stamped parts for Remington. Even in the 2000s they were making minor tweaks and changes. Still optimizing the gun.
There's a lot that goes into making a gun. One of the most surprising. Is using softer steel than you would imagine. Surface hardened cold rolled is what a surprising amount of gun parts are made of.
If they can resist the urge to "improve" anything. They'll be miles ahead of everyone else who tried to copy a gun.
People talk about how in WW2 there were problems converting metric to English with cannons like the 20 and 40mm. The truth is it's really easy to convert metric to English. Any idiot can do it. The real problem they had with production were American tweaks to the design. Covered up with the ridiculous cover story of they totally just couldn't do simple math. 😂
@@edwardscott3262 They will find that out quickly.
Your definitely correct
Yup, his hand waving of the stamp process is concerning
Vss Vintorez doesn't have huge reliability reputation to be honest. So maybe if something is reversed engineered maybe it's gonna become more reliable lol
To give people a baseline on how difficult this is, Zastava obtained multiple copies of the AK47 in 1959 and it took them 5 years to reverse engineer it.
At that time Zastava had been in business for over a century, had multiple experienced engineers and state funding.
To be fair you could argue it was more difficult then because they didn't have the modern computer technology we have now to aid them, but... Even in modern times it does often take several years, Ian is right that 9-12 months is insane
@@richcat1177 even in todays world with "computer tech" it is difficult, time consuming and expensive to make few parts made by different companies work together well... Zastava has its own manufacturing it makes things a lot easier .
@@richcat1177 But to compensate for that computer tech the people who are trying to reverse engineer the VSS here have almost no fire-arms experience.
5 years to just reverse engineer it or 5 years until start of production.
And China reverse engineers something in a week.
I remember starting my first sheet metal project nearly 40 years ago.. the idea that it's a piece of paper that you can fold is quite bizarre.. the dimensional changes.. the corner tolerances.. the tearing.. the work hardening.. the material science etc.. and that's just the start of it.. even if you get it visibly constructed without tearing out a corner, there is no guarantee that it will function at all.. a full understanding of the science is needed and massive amounts of experience and testing.. the stamping may require multiple processes including heat treatments.. just gobsmacked at the how much nieveity is on display
Some people never really worked manual labour, and it shows :P
That said, I don't see why they wouldn't subcontract the stamping, or use another manufacturing method.
To their advantage they are making a copy of an existing part. That means much of the engineering of the part has already been done. And it is not overstretching the material or anything like that because the original does not. As for heat treating it is pretty simple: If the part fails when trying to stamp it from raw stock with no heat treatment -> anneal the part to dead soft, and do the stamping, and then harden and temper it according to the material specification you get from the supplier of the steel. But most of the time you do not need to do any heat treatment to sheetmetal for stamping. Mostly it's just mild steel anyway that can not be heat-treated to change the property's much. After all the top cover or any other stamped part does not take a lot of load and can be made from cheap mild steel.
Yea when he said it’s just like folding Paper I instantly knew they had no chance of making this. Unless some how they have a 3 party doing it for them. The complete confidence he said in that statement just shows that they haven’t even take one step in trying to stamp metal or even looked at the process of doing it
It sounds pretty simple, but there has been a long history of sheet metal parts being attempted because they're 'easy' and failing. If theynjust rush in blindly it won't go well.
Yeah, saying that he's developed a "sixth sense" (18:08) for metal working was a huge red flag to me.
Sixth sense immediately translates into "I dont understand the science and mechanics behind what I'm doing" in my head. Thats the context Ive most commonly heard that phrase in. Experience is nice and all, but a sound understanding of the process matters a whole lot more.
The owner of BSD is having a meltdown on Facebook over Ian’s legitimate criticism of his doomed project
Where at??
Thanks for pointing this out. I am now aware that he has publicly posted about doing "crystal". Amazing.
@@_ArsNova Dudes a methhead? Oh boy.
Dude sounds like everyone’s friend who is an “entrepreneur” that just needs $20 to get by till their first client pays them
He looks like he’s trying to emulate Andrew Tate in looks and speaking which SCREAMS scam artist
Bruh those SUNGLASSES tell you he's Shady AF.. Lol
lol he's a literal, actual, and active meth user.
That was a hell of a closing quote. Developing gun tolerances and safety based on vibes is an interesting concept.
hahahaha
If the video was a wooden box, that quote was the dull thudding of the lid being nailed shut.
@@christopherreed4723 wooden box is an oddly roundabout way of saying coffin...
I think people would be surprised to find out how many people in the firearm industry are actually just dudes with some money, an idea that they know “what right looks like”, and enough confidence to ignore the qualified opinions of people around them.
Ian's face when he said it... "you should stop talking now"
Somewhere in the USSR, 1947: "Ilya, relax! You fold paper, you can fold sheet metal, it will be no trouble!"
A short while later: "Oh no Ilya. Oh no. When comrade Stalin hears of this..."
Njet problem, tovarisch Ženja, we just make whole receiver solid block steel.
@Tunkkis tell comrade Stalin full production will begin in 7 months!
"Comrade Schmeisser? It seems we have finally found a use for your skills" [Insert Montage Of Figuring Out The Knacks Of Stamping Process]
@@TheArklyte Maybe BSD will be able to commune with his spirit for advice before their project joins him in the afterlife.
Believe it or not... straight to Gulag.
This is the sort of deep dive I have come to appreciate from FW. Thank you sir.
Spawn camping forgotten weapons before they are even known is crazy work 💀
Who else just watched James's video and immediately came here to watch this?
That would be me.
I added this to my que as soon as James mentioned it
Here
🙋🏻♂️
Cue "Curb Your Enthusiasm" theme
When I asked them if .338 ARC would fit, they didn't know because they had not tried cartridges derived from 6.5 Grendel. You know, that case that uses the exact same base cartridge as the original 9x39....
😬
Yahhh, mmmmmmm, yeaah....I dunno.
So, what, they've gotten some of the technical package after it fell of the back of a truck, & without even doing a sanity check to see if the original cartridge fits they've just edited the CAD to .300 blackout & called it a day?
Bold play.
oh man 💀💀
Any idiot who uses .338 ARC for their first firearm run is going to fail quicker than New Coke in 1985. These flash in the pan cartridges are a desperate grasp at parting people from their money in a floundering economy.
I am relieved to learn BSD made it so very, very clear they will not be taking anyone's money in advance, and I'm sure they are grateful to Ian for making us all aware of their quite commendable restraint going forward.
Well according to the comment right above yours, it differs from what Ian said and what you’ve said in your comment?
Sounds hinky to me and even if I had the cash, I’d turn and run!
@@ronsorrentino6207 Perhaps statements are being tailored for whoever they're talking to. A person who sees advance payments as a potential red flag may be assured that's not going to happen. Someone who's eager to hand them money, well . . .
No hinkiness for me -- my firearms acquisition budget for 2025 will be going wholly towards Jim Kibler's upcoming Hawken kit.
He’s taking preorders now
He’s accepting pre orders now
@gerald5344 yes, but now, as of right now, be assured that the potential red flag that is advanced payments is assuredly happening right now.
This video is the reason Ian truly deserves the moniker “Gun Jesus”. Outstanding video, truly passionate in his love of the art.
I love that B&T are willing to show small manufacturers at their own booth, that is awesome of them. They deserve credit and I'm glad Ian mentioned it. He also deserves credit for being an advocate and an expert for the rest of us who just see shiny things and want shiny things.
PS I'd love to see Ian's take on the P7 Slim by P7Pro. I think its a situation similar to this but Ian would know.
P7Pro has made a few small batches for the HKPro forums, iirc. You might search there!
Experience with lying and betrayal in business goes a long way
I'm relatively aware of how little skepticism exists in the gun industry. I'm extremely happy with Ian's healthy dose of industrial grade skepticism here. Well done, sir.
isn't it just being rational based on plain old experience? i`m not in the fire arms industry but work for several car manufactures in Europe and regularly receive inquiries of people who want to build "a supercar" and who "just need xyz parts" or "have a ground breaking idea for an engine" and what not. and while i can always appreciate a determined mind, some things are simply not done without a shitload of logistics, money and time behind it.
even IF you have above mentioned factors covered, a set deadline will come back to bite you in 9/10 cases. even more so when it`s overly optimistic and if it`s your first and only product.
Take Brandon and his AK .50. or the A.I. L96 and to an extend even the M1 Garand when it was being licensed to various manufactures whom were given complete data packages only after it was made made sure it`s as fail prove as possible.
in short and what i think is the other guys biggest misjudgement: it`s never just numbers. the moment someone hits me with the "i mean it`s just/how hard can it be" it`s almost a given they are in for an unpleasant wake up call.
@@AlexHalt100 "Just" doesn't do it justice. There are a lot of people that have been in the industry the same amount of time giving things that are cool the grounds for a lot hype that ends up going nowhere. This is a healthy amount of skepticism given out with the right amount of reluctance and qualification to call this reasonable skepticism with all the positive connotations of scientific skepticism and evidence based reasoning. Which is rare, especially in this industry in this country.
The standards have lowered so much that people think a 5.56 barrel that only last 4 or 5,000 rounds is good, or an AK with a trunnion that turns to mush in 2k is acceptable.
....and people that point out how these aren't true representations of the guns they pretend to be get raked in comments and forums.
It's sad. No one could get away with it long in decades prior, now it's even promoted as a selling point. "Well it's to keep costs down help arm the poor!" or some such, when in reality another $100-200 gives them original capabilities.
FW has been around for so long that some of the guns featured as "up and coming" have ended up becoming worthy inclusions as a forgotten weapon, notably the Hudson H9.
@@Pilotmario Trust me brother, I know. I was watching this channel since before he had intro bumpers. I remember the cameraman's breathing. it haunts me.
They told me directly that they ask for 50% deposit and non-refundable. They would absolutely take our money. Brice and team are giving different answers
Jeezus Chriiiist. If that's how they operate, all the publicity they got from shot show is going to sink the project before their own manufacturing incompetence has a chance to.
did you ask how much the 50% is?
@FrAnC3sCoN123, the prices for the models they touted at SHOT are between 6500-7000 depending on options. 50% of your chosen setup
@@daylan233 oof thanks. ive seen alot of talk about it but never seen a price mentioned anywhere.
@@FrAnC3sCoN123
7500-8500 full price
Lol, you know the criticism is going to be truly brutally honest when you start with so many qualifiers. I appreciate your hopeful skepticism, and I also appreciate your warning! Thank you for making this video!
The Dunning Kruger vibes of this project are unfortunatly off the charts...
Ian knows they could also raise capital by suing for libel lol. Love how elaborately careful the phrasing is.
That's certainly a part of it, Ian is no fool. But I'd also like to think he genuinely tries to be fair to them. He is the gun Jesus, after all.
Ian, you are a better man than I in how you masked your expression of horror at the description of metal stamping as like "folding a sheet of paper".
I laughed so hard when I saw him make that face. I can't tell you how many times I've made that face. It's the look of a man who knows more than you do preparing to explain just how little you know, but he's trying to figure out how to not get in trouble saying it.
I do a lot of stamped part design. I cringed so hard at that comment 😂😂
@@metalhero117 Did you see the one at the end where the guy was saying "well, I've worked with metal before--not guns specifically--" and you could hear Ian's internal screaming?
@ "I've developed a sixth sense for it" brooooooo NOOOOOOOOO
He started raging on facebook over this video too. Full bore sperg behavior
@@metalhero117 I mean, this is the gentlest and most constructive seal clubbing that Ian could manage.
Ian has been burnt and seen others burned by so many “cool projects” and he’s finally fed up with all the vaporware. I hope future developers use Ian as consultant in the future before unveiling something
How many years is HMG behind schedule now?
agreed.
I do give Ian credit here, he is giving them a chance if they produce a viable product.
Ian put the WWSD rifle project together pretty fast and focused. They need to reference their guy in the future.
@@NickDonzewell psa bought it hyped it up, said it was entering production last year before shot show, and then canceled the project like late last year
I got singed by DS Arms back in the 90s. I pre-ordered quite a few FALs. No money involved, but we were promised a price point. Years past. Years. Finally, rifles started coming off his assembly line. Woohoo!
Yeah. No record of my pre-order. Did not receive the promised price. Never did get the rifles I ordered.
But, no damage done. I didn't lose any money. And he did make the FALs eventually
Just like the Palmetto Armory STG project. I won't hold my breath
already came out and admitted its been permanently shelved a while back, just didn't make it a huge announcement.
or the .50
@@wolfhausindustries I know.
@@rhmotes they've had issues getting their AKs to the point where they function reliably, why would anyone want to buy a budget .50? The reason they're so expensive is because they have to be overbuilt for the sake of safety. And even then they can still have issues on rare occasions. The power of that round is just insane
Don't forget it was HMG at first a DECADE ago.
Took Brandon Herrera about a decade to build a fully functioning AK50, from concept to finished product, and he's been building AKs for a long time, so for them to say they'll be producing these that soon is insane.
Yea and Brandon doesn't even have production available for it yet just a one or two off prototypes
But be fair he does spend 12-14 hours a day doing his hair
Well, the VSS shares a lot of similarities with the AK, and a US-made VSS could probably be easily adapted to use standard two-pin AK trigger groups. The AK-50 is a different animal simply because of the forces involved; the receiver wound up sticking out so far behind the trigger that that he just stuck a pad on the rear of it instead of a stock like some kind of half-bullpup, and it uses a telescoping dust cover like the Saiga-12.
@@WardenWolf brother Ian literally said that it shares no similarities to AKs outside the shape and controls, did you even watch the video?
It’s hardly a finished product and it’s never going to come to market ever
My favorite thing about you Ian is how honest you are, even if it means offending someone.
That last clip was cold.
Yeah, bro. I totally have a 6th sense for like metal and stuff. But other than that, Its just measurements.
Oh yeah that top cover rubs the bolt carrier.
I have met people like that in other industries. It's going to be a long road ahead.
@@profosist You mean, a very short road to the end of the line 😅
@@LC-xl6gv I meant learning wise if they are really going to do it at the stage right now where they don't know what they don't know
It would be painful to maintain a polite and professional conversation.
Its a hard choice between "stamping is like folding a sheet of paper", "like I just like have a 6th sense about it" and the meltdown comment as to which is the biggest neon illuminated, star spangled and bedazzled red flag of the 3.
I love that clip Ian ends the video with. "I am one with the metal, I know it inside out... oh, that doesn't fit right, that's why it's a bit rough." Clearly shows this guy is way over his head.
Don't worry, he's got a sixth sense for it
@@thelegendaryklobb2879 He has studied the fold so hard he can even se the dead folds.
@@thelegendaryklobb2879 While you were out partying, he was studying the 20 ton press.
This fool doesn't even look 30, so I love how he brags about having worked with metal for ages. Meanwhile all the machinists / toolmakers I know are so grey and work hardened that they might now be more metal-dust than man. They also won't answer any question without half a million caveats and requests for more specific information.
@@sir_vixexactly, whether it’s software or metal work the more experienced folks always know that their is so much they still don’t know.
The clip at the end sends my sketch-o-meter through the roof
Did it fully engage your sixth sense?
@@SpaceFrawgAs someone who actually works with metal, I know that sixth sense is an angle grinder melting the skin off my knuckles
@@AJ-ri5ee
... I see dead people :)
* movie The Sixth Sense
It definitely engaged my 🐂 💩 meter!!
@@AJ-ri5ee I thought that weird feeling I get from squatting over my Harbor Freight QC-reject lathe for forty minutes was the sixth sense.
I worked at an Aerospace company for a while and we did machining, stamping, hydroforming ect. and the process to get a new set of stamping dies up and running was mind boggling. Even when we were given dies to use by Boeing or another major manufacturer and explicit instructions on what to do there was a metric buttload of trial and error involved and without one of the guys there that was a wizard with dies/stamping/hydroforming we would not have been able to fill a lot of contract orders. I couldn't believe the rejection rates on some parts and I couldn't believe how much went into a "simple" stamped part.
Thank you, Ian, for inquiring about the stamping process. I couldn't ask these sort of production questions, when I stopped by the booth. I was worried about how they were going to go about it but being the 'other integral suppressor guys in the basement' meant it was going to be rude/sketchy if I started asking a bunch of questions, like that.
I really want to see this project succeed. "Competition" or not, they all seem like genuinely nice folks who with the same passions as all the rest of us.
10:14 this answer is a ridiculous oversimplification, wow. I can see why Ian had to make this video: these guys are way out of their depth and no other channel seems to have realised.
Thanks for being a source of quality journalism as always!
BSD's rep is pretty terrible to begin with...
Ian’s face when he heard that is priceless too, lol
The audible scoff and attitude from the BSD guy is insane. Treating stamping parts like it's child's play. Uh, no lmao
No, if you look at James Reeves from TFB, he tells the Reps his doubts straight to the dudes face, "JOKINGLY" of course, but DID put it out there as well.....Ian and Reeves are my 2 trusted channels, beyond them, the rest are just whores/shills tryin to get paid from views....
they'd be better off printing (metal) the parts that don't have to take pressure, more finishing process is needed sure, but more appropriate for the scale and more likely to work right
I am enjoying how many times you said, "BUT since they AREN'T taking money..."
Completely heading off them trying to do that.
This is a very honest and realistic review of the concept.
I love Ian's attitude in this. Such a solid guy for doing this.
Not trying to glaze here, but really respect the way in which Ian put this video out - a total class act.
I too wish nothing but success for the project, however I have also been burnt on speculative projects and know the pain. Theres a wealth of knowledge in this vid!
Always be suspicious of someone wearing sunglasses indoors 📠
The sunglasses fit perfectly with the flippant answers to complex questions.
@@robwoodring9437facts tho lol
Joe Cool.
Nah bro, being from the South, he talks too fast and when stumped, he talks faster...not a good sign or tell.
@robrusso3062 Ha ha, that's exactly what I was thinking
I love how Ian still goes to shot show and gives companies like these a reality check and calling out their bs.
The cynic in me thinks that what Ian really believes is:
1. The parts in the show gun are Russian and not manufactured by BSD; and
2. BSD is shortly going to advertise pre -sales
... but he's not going to risk a law suit by expressing those suspicions without evidence.
Yes, this.
they are almost certainly all Russian parts.
Ye, sounds about right. If they borrowed a top cover why not borrow the rest of the internals too. They clearly don't have the experience to manufacture it as it would seem.
Yup, if you read between the lines it's very obvious what he really thinks
When Ian first mentioned the parts looked Russian, I thought it was a compliment. Later in the video I realized what he was actually saying.
The owners response to Ian’s video told me everything I needed to know.
I like how this video is a very polite PSA to BSD and consumers alike; that any form of preorder will be highly dubious, almost as if trying to dissuade BSD from going that route in the future
it's to dissuade potential buyers from giving them preorder money, for what is almost certainly a pipe dream, when they inevitably do go that route in the very near future.
There is also the problem of tolerance stacking: Individual parts will work within their own tolerances but when all parts are placed together, issues arise because the tolerances aren't tight enough for all the parts to work together.
Not the place I expected to run into the Dirty 30.
Just look at an AK barrel. Dimensions include a range of fitment from 1-1-1-1 to 4-4-4-4. I don't recall offhand what those individual tolerances are, but it goes to show you that tolerance stacking is real and needs to be accounted for.
I salute everyone who can afford a $7500 gun made of ink and paper.
Its probably people who only think they can afford it, lots of credit being taken to have this
There's actually a lot of people out there with too much money to spend. Usually descendants of rich families or cryptobarons, they are the foundation of every successful crowdfunded project. If the projects breaks through, they'll flaunt their badge of early backer, if not, well they didn't need the money anyway.
I'm not saying it's wrong, it's just something that owners of crowdfunded projects should know beforehand.
If you can save $7500, you can afford it lol
@@lordmetzgermeisterthat's the same misapprehension as thinking casinos are all about people rolling dice to win a million dollars, in the vast majority of cases the real money is in the little people. The key part of crowd funding is the crowd, you're talking more about traditional investment funding types I think.
I'm glad that the HMG/Palmetto STG will have a friend to keep him company in limbo.
Ian again being the voice of deep experience, skill, and professionalism. Classy, kind, and honest, but also brutally clear and to the point.
Is their gameplan to build enough hype, that the public demands this product, then they sell the concept to PSA and they make a couple of bucks for their effort? This has got Sturmgewehr reproduction written all over it.
Honestly this is one of Ian's best videos. Thanks for putting it out, even if it means almost certain doom for BSD.
Sounds a lot like the Silicon Valley startup scene/racket. Small group starts a business, develops a bare-bones project, generates hype, then sells it to Google/Meta/Amazon/Oracle/etc. for 8+ figures.
(Not that these guys would get 8 figures for this, but you get the point.)
This would honestly be one of the few instances it would actually work. While their quality control varies wildly they could at least pull it off.
"I can't disclose that" I feel like a lot of agencies in a lot of places just spat out their coffee
It was a huge eye opener to learn from Forgotten Weapons that a prototype, no matter how impressive, is not production. In video after video examining how various guns came to be, how they disappeared, was far more difficult than any gun-inventor could imagine. And forget guns, there is a huge community of Wildcat Cartridge enthusiasts who encounter these and related issues. Those are just bullets, not an entire gun. Finally, the guy Ian was talking to clearly is in over his head - "When you've worked with metal for so many years, you can intuitively spot a good design......" (or something like that).
having the manufacturing background to properly critique the claims is pretty crucial here, and it's something that most of firearms media largely lacks or ignores
@@themeatpopsicle is it? Because I have none and it immediately all sounded like nonsense and a salesman that was clenching so tight for fear of someone pushing back even the slightest.
@@austinfontenot8955I think he’s referring to what questions to ask because most gun media is “oh what inspired this? Oh what’s the deadline? Oh what’s the MSRP? Oh cool! Thanks for having us here on (insert gun media page)”
Ian is time traveling into the future and making a video of a forgotten weapon that has not yet been forgotten. Not only is it not yet forgotten, but it has not even been manufactured yet. Awesome.
Gun Jesus saving souls and our wallets by putting this public service announcement on the airwaves - Thank you Ian. Not that it matters, but I bought a gun from Ian. He was thoroughly transparent, awesome and even accommodated a stupid request of mine without question. Solid dude in my little experience.
18:10 - That guy either sounds like an absolute metalworking savant and I wish him a long and prosperous career in manufacturing repro's. He'd be a deserving multimillionaire if he can churn out high quality repro's. The alternate interpretation is that he's deep into the depths of Dunning-Kruger and is going to fail like the countless other attempts at reproduction rare firearms.
Either way, very curious to see the end of this story. I hope for the best.
B&T already pulled out of the project after finding out the dudes past and how many issued he has.
@@Leodigarius It didn't sound like B&T ever was part of the project. They just made a suppressor to order.
@@Leodigarius Did you watch the video?
The look on Ians face when he mentioned the piece of paper as a stamping reference says it all.
Anyone who has followed the AK50 project will know Ian speaks the truth on how hard it is to fully design and engineer a gun, and that was just scaling up a normal AK, not a clean sheet design.
This is a 100% direct copy... slightly easier.
@@c6q3a24a direct copy they likely donr have the whole TDP for
@@c6q3a24only if they have the original specs or numerous actual firearms to get those specs from!
And the AK50 is just a one-off
@@c6q3a24 Ever tried to copy something without original specs or tooling? It took the Russians themselves six years to get this gun ready for production, one year or less for a reproduction is extremely unlikely.
I’m sad now. I thought these guys were manufacturing prototypes as of writing. Thanks Ian for your transparency, knowledge, opinion, and some of behind the scenes of what one of the business owners was saying. They have their work cut out for them. Firearms engineering is a lot different than gun smithing and machinist taking measurements.
Love the expression on your face as you asked questions and the response from the questions. You can see that you are confused as to how they will manage this project.
Owner is pretty rude and obnoxious in NFA groups on FB. Wouldn’t surprise me if that indicates other issues.
Ares Armament all over again
apparently he uses meth or has had problems with it in the past. I'd be surprised if that isnt in play here. Considering his demeanor, the sunglasses indoors and the crazy ass response he made to this video, he is giving off a lot of indicators of actively using.
Guntubers going to shotshow for themselves.
Ian going to shot show for us.
In the early 2000's, l paid about $2000 for a clone Merwin Hulbert pocket army revolver, with a lot of options- .44-40 and .44spl cylinders, 7", 5.5",and 3.25" barrels, boy, that was a dream outfit. It was at the shotshow, and l read about it in several publications. Of course it didn't go anywhere, and l was informed l may get some of the money back. Years later l was contacted, and told I'd be getting a check for the total amount in a couple months, and a foreign company had bought out the bankrupt company. I did in fact get the full amount back, but unfortunately, no new Merwins have been produced.
It's too damn good to be made again. Nobody could afford it
Back in the early days of the Second World War, my father was in charge of the Experimental Workshops of the Department of Aircraft Production in Australia. One of the issues he had to solve was the production of cover plate that went between the wings and fuselage of a particular aircraft. The failure rate of the production was 98%, meaning for every 100 manufactured, only two items could be used due to not meeting the required tolerances. My father had to "re-invent" the manufacturing process and the best he could achieve was a 98% pass rate. He had enormous resources and experienced personnel to help him.
These people have a huge obstacle to overcome, and I wish them success.
Ian, thank you for your insight, honesty and integrity. We know you WANT this gun to be great but you have to call it like it is. This is what makes Forgotten Weapons the best gun related TH-cam channel and we appreciate it.
This is the kindest, most helpful video that BSD could ever hope for.
"I will believe it when it gets to retail" is always the best policy.
Considering how even _countries_ have issues with copying stuff to a reasonable level of quality, even when they have thousands of original parts to base measurements off of, I would certainly not expect a small entrepreneurship to succeed at it, not without years and years of excruciatingly difficult (and expensive) work.
As I commented elsewhere, Zastava obtained multiple copies of the AK47 in 1959 and it took them 5 years to reverse engineer it.
At that time Zastava had been in business for over a century, had multiple experienced engineers and state funding.
@@noneofyourbusiness2133 Honestly, how much of that was just ensuring it's part-interchangeable with a regular AK? That's essentially a sampling problem, not a tolerance problem. If they just wanted something that looked like an AK, 5 years is probably too long for a legitimate manufacturing company like that.
@@TheFanatical1it’s funny you say that, because Yugo ak’s don’t have a lot of interchangeable parts with AKM’s. Some will “fit” but won’t be correct.
Fantastic video on the technical aspects of prototype, off-tool samples and production process.
In prospective, the AK-50 took Brandon 8 years, for a single prototype (3 iterations).
Some (not all) important items during R&D for engineering projects like this:
1. Technical drawing creation and review, proper GD&T, and statistical tolerance accounted for (cpk, ppk).
2. Finite element analysis,
3. Comprehensive tolerance stack-up accross vital sub-assemblies,
4. Design failure mode effect analyses,
5. Functional, durability and environmental testings,
And, all of the above are JUST R&D, without any procurement and manufacturing involvement. Imagine the possibility of (at least) all three departments involved working in perfect harmony, and then you mix in Murphy's Law.
All I can say to BSD is best of luck on your passion project, and may it one day see the mass production market.
.......But NOT in 9 months.
"We're taking a ✨️vibes✨️ based approach to manufacturing."
-BSD guy
Thank you for EDUCATING the community. Your work doesn't go unnoticed.
I appreciate you making this vid, was seeing a lot of content about the gun but all of it seemed like hype.
Dude with sunglasses is a Temu Herrera.
A very thoughtful and diplomatic assessment of their situation. I hope they accept your wise words and drop the project, and find an easier first project for their team.
I'm a mechanical design engineer, and for a time, I worked as a quality engineer doing bubble drawings and QC lab work on "defense" projects.
The idea that you can get all the tooling set up, secure every supplier for every part, then have it all come in and go together on the first try like butter in that timeframe is absolutely insane.
And on top of that there's the laundry list of the regulatory requirements and red tape associated with every piece of material and every shop that touches a firearm project for the US commercial market. It costs a fortune.
Ergo - this needs 1) a genuinely experienced firearms engineer and 2) an investor who knows well what he's getting into, so it doesn't go down as a BS VSS...
Oh I am glad someone is speaking up about this. BSD has a pretty bad track record regarding customer satisfaction and order fulfillment's. When I first seen the videos rolling out about the "vss" I started giggling. Do your research online first before trusting your hard earned money to a company like BSD.
:classically trained Form1-enjoyers snicker quietly to themselves in unison:
Great to meet you at the show!
Engineering tolerances are a hugely misunderstood topic. When Packard started manufacturing Merlin aircraft engines in WW2 it took a year of intense back and forth with RR in England to deal with that one single issue.
Ian is trying to protect the consumer from abandonware. Have seen this happen time and again. Good on him, this is proper firearm journalism in a way. Well, done Ian. Love it. Saw this and sort of was shocked, now I can temper proper expectation.
Top cover is indeed a significant undertaking. So much so that even soviets didn't trust it to be robust enough to mount iron sights there in their AK lines. Sako fine tuned it enough to make it possible, but with significant cost.
Well, did they even try? Making the top-cover fit well enough to repeat a zero is certainly difficult, but it's not clear to me they ever tried to do that.
It's costly. That's the problem.
@@TheFanatical1AK12 (2012) has picatiny and doesn't hold zero for shit, AK12 (2016) does it a bit better but still much, much, worse than the dovetail mount on the AK74, my comment is based on opinions expressed by both sides of the Ukrainian war.
@@Kruchmann To be fair the dovetail mount is an extremely solid mounting for optics. The VSSM top cover with picatinny also seems to be rather solid and is milled so it would probably be easier to manufacture for this American reproduction. (It is less iconic and looks worse in my opinion though.)
@ The AK12 is not a Soviet rifle? I'm asking if they ever even contemplated mounting the sights on the cover, not whether someone kludged one on at a later date. "Didn't trust" is not the same thing as "we never bothered to try"
I think people see Soviet guns, stamped sheet metal, braided wire springs, and think they're easy to manufacture or very simple guns. It took 10 years, a whole team of engineers, and the backing of a large state *just to change the standard receiver of the AK-47 from milled to stamped*. No functional change, just to make the stamped receiver as good as the milled one.
CAD has come really far in the past 10 years. It's not impossible to take measurements and get a lot of work done before anything has been built in steel. Let's assume they've hacked Tula and stolen the blueprint, so all of that has been taken care of and they're so good that converting it to .300 BLK isn't a problem.
Outsourcing the manufacturing alone will be a tremendously expensive process in engineering resources. There's so many problems that will crop up unrelated to the firearm in question. I know Ian just mentioned it but even things like how much waste material a process will have, how reliable a machining operation is, etc all factor in and they're all invisible costs until you hit them. Making jigs, remaking jigs; those costs are something you bear until you start making money and they're all very expensive.
The 80’s called, they want your thumbnail back.
PS: It’s fabulous
A Massive, Massive Thank You to Ian for a 100% Logical, Honest, Concerned dissertation on the process of setting up to manufacture a brand new firearm. Legendary. Classroom stuff. Engineers and Lawyers can not fault this video.
I admire the fellow’s boldness and confidence. I do not envy his pocketbook when that boldness writes checks he didn’t think through.
Machinist here, fitment tolerance , k factor, and metallurgy will certainly play a role in the functionality of the firearms.
Was going to bring up k factor but I figured nobody would know what it is. By rights, I have no experience myself in sheet metal stamping (which is why I don't do any), but goodness me, it's not like folding paper!
I mean, on a modern gun that is relatively simple and almost entirely machined, a team can basically just over-spec the tolerances to +/- .0005 on any suspected critical parts or details taken from a nominal CAD drawing or a reverse engineered sample. Run them on a decent machining center or turn mill that can readily hold that over a few dozen parts, be prepared to do a little TLC on assembly, and anyone can just YOLO a few small prototype batches together. And since those are almost assuredly going to have problems unrelated to tolerance anyway, the team can work out where tolerances need to be kept tight or where they can loosen them up and have good parts, all while working through other problems prior to reaching anything like a full production run.
It's full production where you have to have that dialed in.
The VSS is not a modern gun that is simple and designed to be made entirely on modern CNC machining centers.
"Like folding a piece of paper" - LAUGHABLE
A thick piece of paper. 🤓 Tin knocker assembly line workers tapping with their hammers like little elves.
My brother had a crowd watching him hand make steel ductwork in the back of an R.E. Michel in FL over a decade ago. Its just not done down here so no-one has the skills. The reactions were from amazement to eye-rolls at all the extra work compared to fiberboard, flex duct, a knife and tape.
Having seen some of the owner's Facebook posts, I fully expect he's going to end up in prison at some point. It sounds like a schizophrenic rant with him saying he wants to kill police
Ah, the meth fueled rants... I'm kind of surprised that ATF hasn't shut him down with how open he's been about using and trafficking meth🤔
Nah that’s based, fuck cops, will he go to prison? Eh maybe it this turns into money laundering scam sure.
Meth will do that to ya. Surprised more people aren’t aware of their background.
Maybe that's how he intends to fund the project?
Yikes 😬
After the Hill & Mac/PSA let down, thanks for being critical and cautious and then sharing with your audience. We appreciate your integrity!
Thank you Ian for making and posting this video. You are right. We must always be leery of hype.
I like the honesty that Ian has. These kind of videos can be helpful for anyone who is thinking of starting their own project like this.
BTW! I live in Sweden and as someone who is planning to start collection of black powder firearm and have never owned a gun before, I like that there are channels like Forgotten Weapons and others that can help newbies like me get into this type of "hobby" before I waste tons of money for nothing. I'm looking for what laws there are to own and purchase firearms in my own country and what I need if I want to buy them from other countries and import the weapon (and IMO swedish laws have some "grey areas" when it comes to owning and using blackpowder weapons)
Great Channel! Ha en underbar dag allihop!
tolerances, materials, heat treatment and overall experience in production are definitely very important if you want to mass-produce VSS at it's original manufacturing cost (cheap).
but since this guys already stated that it will be pricey, i'm pretty sure they are aware of their lack of manufacturing optimization.
they hope to solve all problems by the power of outsource and CNC )
Was it actually cheap to manufacture originally or was it just made where labor was cheap?
I fail to understand why Ian or the manufacturer didn't mention outsourcing the stamping (which looks like it'll be a disaster if they do it themselves).
@@CyberChrist absolutely 💯 agree 👍
@@CyberChrist I think his line is that you can't rely on the manufacturer to intimately know your project, and so have to have a baseline of knowledge. I assume there arent many subcontractors in the US who have a lot of experience in russian stamping techniques, so the company will have to solve those.
@@CyberChrist Outsourcing comes with its own fauna of challenges, specially for complex parts. Subcontractors usually cut corners (sometimes literally) and usually work with a Minimum Viable Product mentality. In the company I work for, we usually subcontract simple parts like laser cut sheet metals or basic milled/turned parts like pins, bushings, and so on. Anything with any significant complexity to it which has to be precisely interfaced with another part has to be made in house.
Any simple part can be made by a competent machinist/metal worker, but once you start to introduce a lot of features which relies on Geometric dimensioning and tolerances like concentricity, parallelism, squareness, flatness, things start to get out of hand, even with CAM.
Not having the engineer/designer readily available during the early phases of manufacturing to get the kinks out will end up in delays, wasted material, incorrect parts, and add a lot of costs overall.
there were two other companies in the last 15 years that claimed they will make VSS, showed functioning prototypes, showed purchased manufacturing equipment gathered lots of excitement and we still have not a single VSS for sale that is not russian kit gun. I am afraid i have to agree with Ian. i wish them the best but they are up against a very-very steep hill and learning curve, even if we don't take financial aspects into account. best case for them, to develop manufacturing data set with all kinks worked and then sell themselves out to PSA or somebody else with a big cash purse. alternatively next best thing for us i they go bankrupt and sell data package to some very skilled all-in-house manufacturer like SMG or Robinson or Geiselle.
Ye, a VSS reproduction manufacturer would be extremely cool but it just seems like an extremely tough task. Especially with the current geo-political climate and how Russia has tightened down on trying to classify their military equipment.
The owner has 100% swayed me from any purchases ever due to what I’ve seen in groups on Facebook from him. Good luck in the future, I’m just not sold on his work at all. Maybe PSA could pick it up and do a better job!!!
I dunno about that. PSA has it's own production tolerance issues that make it off their line to your door. Production tools wear out $$$ and tolerance checks get more expensive for every part out of a thousand you confirm is "to spec". Things PSA isn't exactly renowned for.
I'd be more interested seeing Aero Precision take a swing. They already make nearly _half_ the AR parts on the market, just for other companies. Rebranded with a designer name, a "tax" you pay for. Yet they're still fairly affordable.
I think the best course for this project is to just be a specialty made as ordered option from them. The market is here but it's just not big enough to have an all out full production of them, everyone always has high hopes for their niche/ unique offerings but get way too much hype from people who don't even have the money to purchase these premium items. Out of everyone saying they'll buy the item it's always less than 0.1% of them will actually even seriously consider it. This always happens and Ian has spoken on it before, people need to give serious feedback and be honest with manufacturers so they don't basically doom these projects right out the gate.
Thank you Ian for making this video and being extremely realistic with your outlook. And if the guys developing this project are reading this please don't put yourselves in a bad spot trying to please people, do this at your own pace and be realistic with the outcome. The market is small and the amount of people willing to go through the registering process and pay the money needed to justify the manufacturing cost is even smaller. Hope all goes well for you and honestly great work.