Gun companies balk at US Army's new requirement

Polymer cases had melting and head separation problems the last company that tried to market them. (Natec, was it?)

Scarecrow said:
Shouldn't we be onto hand held rail guns or lasers by now? Case-less ammunition seems like a great idea too, especially with new technologies out there. Just seems like there hasn't been much advancement in small arms since the 50's.
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Solutions need to be found for the energy requirements and increased wear those technologies would present. And, even then, the resulting weapon would be in the tens (if not hundreds) of thousands dollars range, which I'm sure the brass wouldn't want to see being issued to regular infantry.
 
The US Army and other forces constantly ask for things that don't and sometimes cannot exist.

If they wanted a boot that weighed less than a tennis shoe and was twice as good as any existing boot they'd get a bunch of tenders that didn't meet the weight specs (too heavy), and some that did, but didn't meet the quality specs (too crappy). They would then order 10 million dollars worth of a non spec (too crappy) product and pretend it worked while soldiers complained about it for the next decade. Natick Labs would then get a raise, and a pat on the back.
 
redbonefish said:
How pathetic when some of the biggest gun makers can't even match the lowly Russians.
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I agree. US gun makers are definitely behind the ball on producing overly complicated, extremely expensive, and difficult to maintain weapons systems that hardly achieve the desired outcome.

This whole thread is ridiculous. Arm chair engineers a plenty. :rolleyes:
 
Agent Law said:
Polymer cases had melting and head separation problems the last company that tried to market them. (Natec, was it?)


Solutions need to be found for the energy requirements and increased wear those technologies would present. And, even then, the resulting weapon would be in the tens (if not hundreds) of thousands dollars range, which I'm sure the brass wouldn't want to see being issued to regular infantry.
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Current CTA casings work well, and do not suffer melting issues from the lastest stuff I have seen.


Biggest problem in my mind

1) US Mil (and NATO) need to determine what is the individual rifle man round required of.
2) Design the round
3) have industry compete a weapon for the round desired.


Right now the competition is effectively for a 5.56mm M855A1 firing weapon.

Yes AAC is going to enter the .300BK, they are doing so at enormous expense as each weapon they/Remington Military enters needs to be supplied with ammo (and a LOT of it in different types).
 
I can't believe knowledgable shooters are wading into this one with such aplomb. Anyone that's taken the very basic physics in science or high school could tell this is virtually impossible. I'll say virtually.

Anything has recoil, even if it's barely detectable. Even your rimfire .22. Even though due to inertia the rifle is recoiling much slower than the bullet is travelling, it still impacts the shooter. This can be evidenced by a heavier, yet slower projectile printing higher than the faster moving one out of the same gun.

Greentips knows what's going on, but even to keep 2 bullets 6 inches together in a burst is pretty good at 100 yards. 2 in one hole? Ha! So to say one hole, to be generous can we say a center to center spread of half the bullet diameter? What's that .112 inches? I wish I had a rifle half that accurate.

Of course we're talking no wind, a match barrel, tight undersize chamber, top quality components, clean barrel, the enemy having a picnic at the perfect range while perfectly oblivious to the sniper with a jeep parked on his rifle to keep it from moving around. :onCrack:

Of course I'm not opposed to technological advacement, but let's be serious.
 
I think that part of the problem with previous attempts at polymer cases is with adapting them to conventional ammunition configurations. With CTA, there is no need for an extractor groove, and thus a metal base that can separate. CTA gun designs generally use a chamber separate from the barrel that either slides or rotates out of alignment so that the spent case is pushed out the front by the new round being fed from the back.
 
tactical lever, 'hyper burst' is not for two rounds in one hole, but to ideally get a second round within a small area (1-2") of the previous to hopefully defeat the hard plate that has been weakend by the first - and also in a short sucession that a plate is already flexing from the first impact and will fail at the second.
Also for non armored foes it will send a second round right into the area which is being damaged from temporary strech tissues and cause it to tear - causing much greater wounding.


However the round speed presentation is far beyond what a USGI magazine is capable of, and would require a whole resdesign of the platform from the ground up.
 
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KevinB said:
tactical lever, 'hyper burst' is not for two rounds in one hole, but to ideally get a second round within a small area (1-2") of the previous to hopefully defeat the hard plate that has been weakend by the first - and also in a short sucession that a plate is already flexing from the first impact and will fail at the second.
Also for non armored foes it will send a second round right into the area which is being damaged from temporary strech tissues and cause it to tear - causing much greater wounding.


However the round speed presentation is far beyond what a USGI magazine is capable of, and would require a whole resdesign of the platform from the ground up.
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I thought the 2 rounds in one hole, as the OP stated the goal was, to be perhaps more figurative than literal. Still, without doing the math on what it would take, still sounds like pi in the sky to me. I could only imagine what kind of horrible jams something like that could and would probably have.

Not to say that the conclusion to pursueing this would be totally fruitless, but as far as the application they have it mind.....well you would know better than I, but I think it's a pipe dream.
 
Keep in mind the hyperburst setting was not a threshold requirement but an objective.
Thresholds are needs, Objectives are non critical wants.

It would be a nice addition, but is not being forced on anyone, nor are they will to compromise on other features to have it.


I had a neat discussion about the G11 recently with Army testing folks who still have one, their view was it was akin to the Avro Arrow (my analogy - but followed the same line of reasoning) great system in theory, but not all the collective issues where fixed, and it would have bankrupted Hk and Germany (plus a lot of US DoD dollars that went into it) to see it thru to completion.

On to the comment above on CTA, not all CTA guns have revolving push thru chambers, I've seen conventionally actioned CTA guns, all that is different is the chamber design. However for the LMG type systems, the push thru rotating chambers seem to over the best so far.
 
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