Canadian firearm ownership

[sdh1911]

Could any of you fellows north of the border explain to me what are the restrictions on gun ownership in Canada, i.e. Semiauto, handgun etc. Many thanks-SDH

Information

Warning: This is a relatively older thread This discussion is older than 360 days. Some information contained in it may no longer be current.

[mitchell]

id tell ya all of it but im too lazy to type all the BS down It would be a very long explanation our laws are very confusing and retarded. Ill tel you semi auto restrictions for i do not know the barrel restriction lengths for handguns.

Non restricted centerfire semi autos are ones that have a barrel length of 18.5 inches and below that they are restricted.
Some semi autos that have a barrel length longer than 18.5 inches could be restricted because they look scary... AR15
Converted autos are prohibited
semi auto centerfires can only have 5 round magazines except for garands and i think the rare weird enfield out there
rimfires have no round limit.

I think i got most of it... im sure the other guys can fill u in if i forgot some

[tiriaq]

Probably best if you went to the official website. The laws and regulations are complex. www.cfc.gc.ca.

[Cantom]

Could any of you fellows north of the border explain to me what are the restrictions on gun ownership in Canada, i.e. Semiauto, handgun etc. Many thanks-SDH

It's so complex that almost nobody understands it.

We have never been able to carry handguns here, pretty much ever. Some people used to handgun hunt long ago...
However, if you do everything right, you can still own lots of neat stuff...

[Claven2]

For handguns, barrel must be longer than 4.25" and can not be .32 or .25 caliber. Make sense? It shouldn't. Those restrictions were brought in because the feds calculated it would take about 50% of all handguns off the legal market and see them turned in for destruction. They were generally correct in that assumption.

Almost anything else in a handgun we can own, but can only shoot them at the range.

To sum up rifles: Anything semi auto with a bbl shorter than 18.5" is restricted. All AR15's are restricted. Some scary looking stuff like FN-FAL and AK47 are prohibited.

Prohib = you had to have one before it was prohibited in order to still own them and acquire them today.

Restricted = almost anyone can have them if they pass screening and belong to a shooting club or officially collect.

Non-restricted = anyone with a basic firearms license can acquire and use it.

[sdh1911]

Boy, do I feel stupid. I was always under the impression that you guy's had it real bad, kinda like here in my home state of New Jersey! The only thing I'd have problems with is the AR thing, I must admit, I love playing with the mouse gun. How's the situation for a genuine schooled and licensed gunsmith?-SDH

[Cantom]

Boy, do I feel stupid. I was always under the impression that you guy's had it real bad, kinda like here in my home state of New Jersey! The only thing I'd have problems with is the AR thing, I must admit, I love playing with the mouse gun. How's the situation for a genuine schooled and licensed gunsmith?-SDH

We do have it real bad, just not as bad as England or Australia.

[tiriaq]

There are gunsmiths who are able to make a decent living. Others do some gunsmithing, working from a retail sale business. I ran a little part time shop for over twenty years. It was never going to replace my regular job.
As far as federal law goes, the US situation is better. Once state laws are considered, the Cdn. situation may not be too bad in comparison to some jurisdictions.

[cannonball]

Excuse me, gentlemen, ..on the risk of getting bashed. The regulations in Canada sounds quite sound. You can own almost everything if you pass the license exept saturday night specials and sprayguns. The world don´t consists of gunenthusiasts alone. After all we are not talking about toys.
Wolf

[Claven2]

cannonball, I don't want this thread to become politically charged, but I will put forth that the premise behind our gun laws can be seen as flawed. Essentially, the government is passing laws to restrict freedom to the most law abiding segment of society, that being the ppl who have successfully undergone restricted weapons screening, have complied with all the storage regs, and belong to registered shooting clubs, etc.

What I mean to say is that criminal types don't register anything and don't care what caliber their handgun is or the length of the bbl. In fact, most criminals actually prefer 9mm and up and use Glocks, so if the Feds wanted to deprive criminals of handguns, they chose the wrong criteria

Realistically, our gun laws are not about "crime prevention", but are much more about the slow social engineering taking place to eliminate guns from popular culture completely over time. History shows these restrictions get more restrictive with each successive Parliament, not less so. It's not rational, but banning guns buys urban votes, regardless of how ineffective the policy is at curbing crime.

And by the way, what exactly IS a Saturday Night Special? That term was bandied about alot in Canada to say .25ACP & .32ACP = BAD, INACCURATE thug calibers. Then someone pointed out to the gov't that our Olympic teams shoot .32 ACP because it's so accurate. Some MAJOR backpedalling happened to specifically exempt the models of guns the Olympians use. Also, some very high quality guns were caught in the ban, like any S&W with a 4" barrel. That's hardly a thug gun or a cheap spanish hand grenade