10 years later...

suprathepeg said:
From what I understand the G11 wasn't successful for technical reasons. German SF (can't remimber name) have used it in limited applications but the key word there is limited which reflects the usefulness of the weapon. Really the Germans could have put it into service if they liked it enough.
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G11 was adopted but the the wall fell and they inheritted a huge dept and couldnt afford to arm everyone with state of the art guns. Hence the G36 was meant to be a cheap alternative and thats why it uses an AK bayonet to also save money.
 
Is it viable to expect ARs to go strong for next 10-20 years? I'm not saying there's anything wrong with it, but things do change and even strong platform like ARs must see change for various reasons. I see so many new tech surfacing, but there isn't anything that actually challenge current firearms, and all those new developments must cost fortune to actually become reality. I think it would be political, if anything, that will force change upon current platforms, and maybe not for the better. Like everyone's saying, firearms like ARs have no clear challenge from anything new, and it will be interesting to see if rifles like SCAR will indeed inherit the throne in the future.
To be honest, I love those new polymer rifles like Masada, but I just don't see them garnering the fame of AR.
 
imagine_74714 said:
Is it viable to expect ARs to go strong for next 10-20 years? I'm not saying there's anything wrong with it, but things do change and even strong platform like ARs must see change for various reasons. I see so many new tech surfacing, but there isn't anything that actually challenge current firearms, and all those new developments must cost fortune to actually become reality. I think it would be political, if anything, that will force change upon current platforms, and maybe not for the better. Like everyone's saying, firearms like ARs have no clear challenge from anything new, and it will be interesting to see if rifles like SCAR will indeed inherit the throne in the future.
To be honest, I love those new polymer rifles like Masada, but I just don't see them garnering the fame of AR.
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I think whatever it is the key will be versitility. It seems they want the same platform for the the personal weapon and the LMG. That and simplicity
 
Nothing will change in a major way for many years. The reality is that there may be better things out there, but they're only marginally better. I was just putting away a pile of gun mags, and they've got the same guns on the cover from ten years ago that we're still using now.

Governments just haven't got the money to risk on these things, there are far more pressing things to buy in the military budget. Should of seen the letters I got back from the MoD when I criticised them over the SA80 upgrade to the A2.

That made entirely no sense to me. We are all agreed the SA80 is rubbish. The MoD wanted to spend £80 million to upgrade so it works, although we still agree that the basic design is not that great.

For £80 million they could have re-equipped the entire armed forces with the Diemaco C7, which made sense to me, seeing as the UKSF use the SFW.

The reason why they didn't do that was purely the amount of re-training that would have been required, as far as I could determine. A cost I thought was minimal, but the MoD didn't.

If you look at the A2 SA80s, yeah, they do now work, unfortunately a lot of them were falling to bits before they were upgraded anyway, and the SUSATs on a lot of them are in rough shape. The only thing saving the Army at the moment is that the Army is now a lot smaller than it was in 1985, so there are a lot of spare SA80s. But as GT says, by 2020, it will be time for new equipment.
 
In 1986 my intake was the last to get the SLR. Later intakes were issued the SA80. We with the long heavy black SLR's were envious until we hefted the bullpups courtesy of the Black Watch rifle team. We were no longer envious after this. The new rifles chambered for the little rounds were just as heavy as our old black rifles. Furthermore they were not exactly balanced correctly, sort of top heavy and threatening to keel over to the right if one wasn't careful.

And a southpaw like me couldn't use one comfortably.

I have read they cannot even use normal NATO rounds. Rather they use underpowered 5.56 which suits the rifles fine. Otherwise only automatic fire will allow proper function with the NATO cartridges.
 
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This is what I'm saying for awhile now. All the so-called new design competting to replace current platforms, are what Cybershooters said, "Marginally better" even then only in lateral sense (?) of comparison. If you have what works now, how would adding a few debatable features sway users of the world?
That makes me wonder, there WAS a major change once in the history of firearm before, but how did it happened? What was the deciding factor back then? Would that same factor happed now? Someone earlier mentioned that versatility/interchageability would be the important factor. I'm not very versed on the history of firearm, so I'm very curious if you guys think precedents are something to figure into what we are talking about here.
 
Well usually you want to be on par or somewhat better then your enemy/perspective enemy. So maybe watch what the chinese are doing.
 
Teapot said:
In 1986 my intake was the last to get the SLR. Later intakes were issued the SA80. We with the long heavy black SLR's were envious until we hefted the bullpups courtesy of the Black Watch rifle team. We were no longer envious after this. The new rifles chambered for the little rounds were just as heavy as our old black rifles. Furthermore they were not exactly balanced correctly, sort of top heavy and threatening to keel over to the right if one wasn't careful.

And a southpaw like me couldn't use one comfortably.

I have read they cannot even use normal NATO rounds. Rather they use underpowered 5.56 which suits the rifles fine. Otherwise only automatic fire will allow proper function with the NATO cartridges.
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Frankly I hated the SLR too. Too damn long.

There are two different rounds in use the L2A2 and the L17A1, they're both the same power, but they use different powder. L2A2 is used in the SA80, the L17A1 is used in the Minimi, SFW, C7s the Marines and Paras have got, etc. Never been clear on why there are two rounds, people tell me they're advised not to use L2A2 in their Minimis except in an emergency, I assume it's something to do with peak pressure and cycling the guns reliably.

I've shot both rounds, couldn't tell any difference in accuracy or recoil.
 
I must tell you guys that I feel for the Brits as I have heard the SA80 is a big POS . All of the SF Brits have Diamaco M16's and I always felt that ALL of the Brit troops should have the M16. The SA80 has the internal workings of the AR180 [ So does the German G36 ] The US , Canadians , Aussies and Brits should bring back the days of the "Rifle Steering Commitie " to share one common rifle and ammunition. It would make things alot easier for the upcoming global war . The US screwed up by adopting the M14 instead of the FAL . I think at least 1 .308 battle rifle should be issued per squad for all of our Infantry ground troops. Just my .02 Jerod
 
300Spartans said:
Laser guns in 2017 with anti-matter grenade launcher rigged.
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Quater gram of Anti-Matter roughly equals 5000-metric tons of TNT. And you need to suspend it between magnetic fields. I don't think I would want to carry something like that around.
Laser's fun, though.
 
Jerod said:
The US , Canadians , Aussies and Brits should bring back the days of the "Rifle Steering Commitie " to share one common rifle and ammunition. It would make things alot easier for the upcoming global war .
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Like the UN this is pipe dream that is usurped by politics. The brits don't seem to be doing too bad with what they have just like us, despite each weapon's shortcomings. What matters is that your team works not your individual soldier.
 
I think you will see more specialist weapons like .50 cal sniper rifles. light machine guns and grenade launchers.
Jerod ,the soviets had one guy in every squad with an SVD in 7.62/54 not as a sniper but to give the squad the ability to be effective out to 300 meters.
The only reason western armies don't do this is they already have snipers and grenadiers who can do that.

There is a great futurewar page on the canadian DOD site that even has a fiction story set in afganistan 2025 to illistrate some ideas. CSIS also has a great essay on things like the tactical use of google earth type sites in future spying or battle scenarios and the US just released a well written report on
counter insurgency tactics.

My guess is that the most sucessfull fighters will use AK's and M4's but in ways that take advantage of advances in comm and survailance gear.
The first Stryker unit that gets it's comms hacked is as good as dead.
How long it takes the US to develop a way to deal with that will be terribly important.

In WW2 the germans used their tanks integrated with the air and infantry this is what we have to do in order to have an advantage with the same equipment.
 
so the consensus of this thread is that there will not be any radical new development within next 10 years or so, but rather reconfiguring or current platform. I think that makes sense. Maybe in 50 years...
 
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