Marking Receivers for 9mm Handguns – Case Study
Marking Application: Marking Receivers for 9mm Handguns
Marking firearm parts with serial numbers is an important marking application. There are various laws and regulations in place to ensure these marks are made properly. This includes regulations set by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives that determines the minimum depth of marks made on firearms.
In this case study, we look at a solution provided to a customer who had trouble meeting that requirement while marking receivers for 9mm handguns.
To meet Federal Firearm License depth requirements, a customer needed to mark serial numbers on 9mm receivers. The mark had to be at least 0.003” deep. At the time, they were using a pin marker and a CNC mill to mark the receivers. Although the marks were initially deep enough, the receivers were put through a finishing process that made the marks shallower.
To fix this, the customer wanted to make marks that were deeper than necessary to ensure they still met the 0.003” requirement after finishing.
Part Material and marking Requirements
The receivers for the 9mm handguns were made of aluminum.
To ensure the mark still met requirements after finishing, our customer wanted the mark to be 0.007” deep – over twice as deep than necessary. The marks needed to be clean and easy-to-read. Roughly 300 receivers had to be marked every day.
Firearm Marking Solution
Scribe marking machines are capable of creating a deep enough mark to meet our customer’s requirements. These machines are excellent alternatives to our Styliner pin markers; their drop-and-drag technology makes cleaner marks than pin markers while also producing much less noise than a pin marker.
Marking Machine For Marking Receivers for 9mm Handguns
For this marking application, we recommended a 3×4 column-mounted Scribeliner.
The Scribeliner can easily make clean, deep, permanent marks in aluminum, and can do so fast enough to meet the customer’s cycle time. With this machine, our customer relied less on their CNC mill for marking, freeing it up for other jobs. Additionally, the Scribeliner reduced the number of receivers rejected due to shallow marks basically to zero, saving the company additional time and money.