US Army acquires rights to M4

[Starscream]

Okay KevinB I respected a lot of things you said till now, I must say I question you big time now! That is so bulls**t! The reason they were using the Diemacos C8SFW was because they would be more compatible with everyone else they worked with in joint operations.

The G36 is a hands down far better rifle than a standard M4/M16 Colt even with most upgrades in parts, until you get in the specialty market!

All be talking to some of my buddies over there in a few months to specifically ask about that, it came up before, but not for the reasons your mentioning

(Until Tuetonic National Pride made the Hk416 a necessity.) That's a nice anti-German statement their, the reality from I herd was that your beloved C8 SFW never reached their standards.

If it makes you feel any better, the SAS probably have a couple crates of G36 rifles in their inventory somewhere and the L119A1s use HK AG36 rather then the American M203. Not to mention the Americans themselves are switching from the M203 to the M320.

 

[Rich LPS]

I'm going to have to disagree on the G36 not doing well in any Military trials.
The HKG36 is always a top performer in major tests. It won the Spanish, Greek and Lithuanian trials and I think is going to win the Portuguese trials (If it has'nt already).

When HK was owned by British Aerospace there was a move to drop the L85 and go with the G36 before HK was contracted to fix all of the many deficencies in the L85.

I talked to one of the HK Engineers at the last Shot Show for quite a while. He started to tell me how much he hated the G36 and it was forced on the German Army in peace time ect...ect...ect... He then told me that he hates plastic guns. Following that he said that the other tech people in Germany proved him wrong and made a believer out of him. He said that in testing at their plant the G36 out performed every gun for reliability that they tested it against including new AK's. He did admit that a all metal gun is more accurate in his opinion.

He also had praise for the SG550 / SG551. He said that he believed that it was the best system but price had killed it world wide and due to a high price it would never be accepted in large numbers. This was echoed by a Swiss Contact I made. He said that the Swiss Army was paying about 1700 Swiss Francs for a SG550. This is what he describes as 3 times the price of an AR15/M4 system. When you add in the factor that the Swiss are not a NATO country and therefore do not have the same obligation to provide parts and service as another NATO partner would then you quickly see why it doesn't do as well in trials. It's not just weapon performance based. This was holding true in the Portuguese trials where the SG550 out performed every other rifle including the M16. I was also advised that it would never get picked because of the price. They were probably going with the G36.

I perfer the ergonomics of the Swiss Arms and G36 to the AR Series of guns. I believe that there is more human engineering in the Swiss and German guns. I can never figure out everyone insisting that the AR15 has the best ergonomics of all Assault rifles. (This is like someone trying to tell me that the 1911 pistol has the greatest ergonomics of any pistol.)

I will admit that the SG551 is heavier than the M4 but not that much.

My 2 cents,

Rich

 

[paulz]

Also the G-36 is already in the MOD inventory. The MOD police (commisionaire types who guard brit military installations) use it.

 

[greentips]

If it makes you feel any better, the SAS probably have a couple crates of G36 rifles in their inventory somewhere and the L119A1s use HK AG36 rather then the American M203. Not to mention the Americans themselves are switching from the M203 to the M320.

My understanding is that the loading mechanism limits the length of the round that could be chambered in the M203, hence, the switch.

There isn't really a point to reinvent the wheel if someone makes one already that works and meets the requirements.

 

[FPembleton]

Also the G-36 is already in the MOD inventory. The MOD police (commisionaire types who guard brit military installations) use it.

... and every soldier/guard in a BBC tv program!

 

[paulz]

There isn't really a point to reinvent the wheel if someone makes one already that works and meets the requirements.

Which really sums up the topic of this thread quite nicely. The M-4 "works and meets the requirements" for a general issue personal weapon for regular infantry and most service support personnel. The US Army has obtained the rights so they can continue to buy it in quantity, since they aren't planning to replace it in that role anytime soon. The end.

Other specialised users will do as they currently do, ie: buy limited quantities of something else that fullfills their requirements better. Foreign armies will do much the same, only for M-4, substitute their current issue rifle if it is 5.56 and has an optics rail(s).

 

[nza]

As an aside,
We see proposal specs all the time that "seem" to be written specifically with a 'product' in mind, but still have to go through the tendering process, to maintain 'fairness' eventhough, many components seem to be make/model specific.

as a defence contractor, this irks me a little, however, sometimes we get specs for tendering written for our product. =)
it helps that we are on the list of qualified consultants that gives input to the tech spec writers and that we have industry consultants permeating enigma that is the DRDC

the tendering and procurement thing is really a paper-pushing exercise. Whereas, in the beginning of the process, user-needs, requirements, AARs, lessons learned, all get put into some magic black box, and then along the way lowest bid gets the key WITH ALOT OF COMPRIMISE. It is not until, there is alot of squeaky wheels by end-users, after-the-fact when the product they settleed on gets rolled out, will there be immediate action on changing things.

So I guess my .02 is that if the end-users, the blokes sweating in 50c heat, make noise about Non serviceable crap that no joys all the time, and there is enough noise, will the civilian pursestrings holders open up, and by then, they have to pay more than the original submissions for what the end-users really need. Because then they have to go MIL COTS, and we are happy to supply them at market value =). what is it that hi speed lo drag types like to say? buy cheap buy twice.

Its not unique to defence, they are just one of my clients. Having been in long enough to have fielded both the c7 and then the c8 with 203 attached, as an end user, I had no complaints about it. But then again, I was quite content with my elbow flashlight, and rucksuck, and od-->cadpat rollout. Thats not to say I didn't get more force-multplier mission critical items for myself, I just wished I didn't have to pay for it.

I think the procurement system, as it stands, is OK. It works. It just works slowly. However, when things go titsup or there is a lot of squeaky wheels, there seems to be another tier of procurement that the chain has access to, like a contingency fund for stuff they need 'like ####ing yesterday.' They just end up spending more. They = tax payers.

I see this all the time. Writing specs is a pain in the ass, and can take for ever, so it always gets sent to the new guy or the least busy lackey to deal with. They bang something out and it gets rubberstamped with a looks good and off it goes. The other problem is the wrong people are often writing the specs. It's rarely the end user, usually someone in engineering or accounting.



This too I see all the time and it makes me f**king sick. This was how the liberals rolled, for far too long, and we're still dealing with it. Will be for years yet to come, I think.