Blueprints for 3D-plastic gun downloaded 100,000 times in 2 days before the State Department orders the site to take down the weapon designs



Defense Distributed posted video on Sunday of founder shooting all-plastic gun made on an $8,000 3-D printer



Pistol uses only one metal piece - a small nail for the firing pin

Blueprints for the weapons were downloaded 100,000 times in two days

Most downloaded in Spain, then the U.S., Brazil, Germany, and the U.K.



The State Department has demanded the site take down the blueprints



Blueprints for the first-ever plastic gun produced on a 3-D printer, that can pass through metal detectors, have been downloaded over 100,000 times since it was posted to the web on Monday.



Designs for the 'Liberator' pistol were posted online by Defense Distributed but on Thursday the U.S. State Department ordered the website to take down the blueprints, on the basis that the plans could violate export regulations.



The blueprints, that could be produced on 3-D printers costing as little as $1,000, were seen as a breakthrough because no one has previously designed such a weapon that could withstand the pressure of firing modern ammunition.

Scroll down for video.



Bang: This is the moment Defense Distributed founder Cody Wilson successfully fired the first working plastic gun made by a 3-D printer

Surprisingly, most downloads of the plans did not come from inside the U.S. but from Spain.

The U.S. is second, ahead of Brazil, Germany, and the U.K., according to Haroon Khalid, a developer working with Defense Distributed, who reported the statistics to Forbes.

The State Department Office of Defense Trade Controls Compliance ordered Cody Wilson, the 25-year-old founder of the site, to remove the online blueprints for the 3D-printable 'Liberator' handgun, Forbes magazine reported.

The State Department office is reviewing whether the files violate export control laws for weapons, known as the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR), since the plans were downloaded overseas.



Wilson, currently a law student at the University of Texas in Austin, says his group will comply with the State Department directive.



Crude: The Liberator plastic gun is a simple single-shot weapon that fires a small .380-caliber bullet

On Sunday, the group Defense Distributed posted a video of founder Cody Wilson firing the 'Liberator' plastic pistol.



Mr Wilson made the schematics for the weapon available for free online this week - meaning everyone with a high-end 3-D printer can create their own version of the gun.



In response, New York Senator Chuck Schumer announced that he plans to introduce legislation that will ban the weapons because they can pass through metal detectors at airports and court houses without being picked up.



'We’re facing a situation where anyone - a felon, a terrorist - can open a gun factory in their garage and the weapons they make will be undetectable. It’s stomach-churning,' he said.

Video: Watch the successful firing of the first working plastic gun



Plastic: Sixteen of the 17 parts that make up the Liberator are plastic, constructed by a 3-D printer. A small nail is used for a firing pin

Sixteen of the 17 parts in the Liberator pistol are made from tempered plastic molded inside the Stratasys Dimension SST 3D printer. The final piece of the weapons - the firing pin - is a common nail.



Mr Wilson told Forbes.com that he hopes to make weapons available to anyone who wants them. It is a bid, he says, to keep governments accountable to the people.



'You can print a lethal device. It’s kind of scary, but that’s what we’re aiming to show,' he said. 'Anywhere there’s a computer and an Internet connection, there would be the promise of a gun.'

The name of the gun - Liberator - comes from a simple World War II pistol that was designed by the U.S. military to made cheaply and air dropped in large numbers into occupied Europe and concentration camps.



Like its World War II predecessor, the Defense Distributed pistol is a crude weapon. It holds only a single shot and uses an inaccurate smooth bore.



Shocking: New York Senator Chuck Schumer plans to introduce legislation that would ban plastic guns made from 3-D printers

3-D PRINTING TURNS DIGITAL PLANS INTO PHYSICAL OBJECTS

3-D printing is poised to revolutionize engineering and reforge industries from medicine, to construction to aerospace.

The process, also called additive manufacturing, creates a three-dimensional solid object from a digital model.

The feat is achieved by laying down layer upon layer of plastic. The layers are then joined together to create the final shape.

The machine takes blueprints from computer aided designs and 'slices' them into digital cross-sections that the machine uses as a guideline for printing. The process of addictive manufacturing has been in use on a large industrial scale since the early 1980s.

However, since 2010, an entire industry has sprung up around personal 3-D printers, which are increasingly small, increasingly powerful and increasingly affordable.

Defense Distributed used a higher-end $8,000 model to build its 3-D gun.

However entry-level desktop models can cost $500 to $1,000.

The technology is used in a huge range of industries from construction to aerospace. Engineers hope 3-D printing will begin an era of 'instant prototyping' that will allow product developers to forge and tinker with prototypes quickly and inexpensively.



The group has successfully fired it with a .380-caliber pistol round.



However, an attempt to shoot a slightly larger 5.7 x 28mm defense cartridge blew the gun to pieces.

Currently, the Liberator can only be made through highly specialized processes on an $8,000 3-D printer.



Mr Wilson says he hopes to adapt the model



The technology behind 3-D printing is not new and has available for industrial applications for decades.



It is only since about 2010, though, that 3-D printers have become cheap enough, simple enough to use and compact enough for most consumers to purchase.

Schumer says the accessibility of 3-D printers makes plastic guns a security threat.

'Guns are made out of plastic, so they would not be detectable by a metal detector at any airport or sporting event,' Schumer said, according WCBS 880 .

'Only metal part of the gun is the little firing pin and that is too small to be detected by metal detectors, for instance, when you go through an airport.

'A terrorist, someone who’s mentally ill, a spousal abuser, a felon can essentially open a gun factory in their garage.'

Schumer wants to renew a previous ban on undetectable weapons while the new bill would add a ban on plastic high-capacity magazines.

'People have made silencers, stocks, triggers and lots of other gun parts. They can then upload these digital blueprints to the web and then anyone with one of these printers - and the printers cost about $1,000 - can make one,' Schumer said.

Current law bans all-plastic weaponry.



Defense Distributed weapons have just one large metal piece in the handle, to get around the law.



Schumer says the metal can be swapped out and replaced with plastic.



Production: In an instruction video, the 3D printed gun is shown being printed layer by layer using technology that could soon become commonplace in the home