So...the US Army gets the Sig MCX in .277 Fury?

David Hoback said:

The only real advancement is the Electromagnetic Railgun. Unfortunately, we need to crack the mystery of Cold Fusion before we can make that worth anything.

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Actually, the much more crucial "bit" is a way to reliably dump all the stored power into the various coils and the like.

At the power outputs required, a "simple switch" acts like a resistor in the circuit, as does all the "return" wiring to complete the circuit. Primers and centerfire cartridges are open-ended, and only need simple actions at the closed end.

Adding relays to close proper dimension conductors is not going to improve "lock time" very much, either.

Oh, there are scads of other electrical issues that would want fixing, too. Like how capacitors will "bleed down" id left unattended (but can retain ginormous voltages despite). Keeping them from overheating is an issue, too. Along with the lag time for them to reach charge.

crestoncowboy said:

Thats new. What is the "rebarrel" spec though

My 223 wssm has at least a 10k rounds barrel life. You won't be able to hit a fat bull in the rear from 30 paces.... but the barrel will be alive I suppose

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That's when they get rebarrelled. New rifle would usually group around 2-3 MOA with close to 2 being the norm.

I was roommates with the company armorer and we were in each other's weddings. That along with me being a general gun nut, my experience in the armory was more than just signing my rifles in and out.

Phaedrus/69 said:

I'm curious about the supposed ability to penetrate armor. It does seem that at point-blank range the .277 will defeat Level IV with some reliability. After all, the AP45 (I forget the official designation) seems to wreck armor up close and even the hotter off-the-shelf 5.56 can often penetrate armor from longer barrels. Higher muzzle velocity and better BC would stretch out the distance before the projectile loses the oomph to get through armor. But how much? It seems like a stretch that it can perforate something like Level IV out to 400-500 meters although helmets, probably so. Maybe all the ammo will be tungsten-core? I doubt it as we already don't have enough tungsten now and I believe China is the primary source for the material.

Curiouser and curiouser! It will be interesting to see how many rifles wind up being issued and whether it delivers as hoped in the field.

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I'm very skeptical of the armor defeating ability. Especially at distance. There is off the shelf ceramic plates that will reliably defeat current 7.62 Nato AP rounds at point blank range. The new round is already starting at under 3000 FPS muzzle velocity and is going to bled that velocity off real quick at any extended ranges.

It’s either:

1. An experiment
2. A boondoggle

Phaedrus/69 said:

Yeah, I'm not saying they're lying per se, but I'm dubious. I have two sets of plates, one Level III and one Level IV, and both have been shown to stop threats up to 3,000 fps. Add in some range and environmental conditions and I think it's going to be tough to defeat them. And when the Army says it will defeat "all known and planned" body armor that just seems like a failure of imagination. Literally making the plate 1 lb heavier and adding a bit more ceramic and/or PE would probably stop this round (unless it's going to be tungsten, that changes the equation a bit) and that ignores new technologies like metal foams, advanced polymers, graphene, non-Newtonian materials, Ti, etc.

Besides, in a near-peer conflict the rifle will probably be less important than it is when fighting an asymmetrical insurgency.

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One thing was pointed out to me recently that I hadnt given full thought to before. Even if you had the most indestructible plates you could buy on, they only cover about 15 percent of your body. Plates are all but worthless if you get shot through the side and getting shot by a rifle in the shoulders, neck, head, abdomen, groin, hips, or thighs is a very life threatening injury.

I just don't get the 6.5x51 choice. Sure you will get a little more accuracy and range over the 7.62x51 and they have increased pressure so they get max performance out of a shorter barrel. But would you want to do CQB with that rifle. To me that seems a stretch.

Skeptic13 said:

I just don't get the 6.5x51 choice. Sure you will get a little more accuracy and range over the 7.62x51 and they have increased pressure so they get max performance out of a shorter barrel. But would you want to do CQB with that rifle. To me that seems a stretch.

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6.8mm it’s .277”. Hence, the 277 Fury.

C-grunt said:

That's when they get rebarrelled. New rifle would usually group around 2-3 MOA with close to 2 being the norm.

I was roommates with the company armorer and we were in each other's weddings. That along with me being a general gun nut, my experience in the armory was more than just signing my rifles in and out.

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We would typically get 3 MOA out of a standard M4A1. Of course, when better ammo is in play and the guns got upgraded with things like higher end optics, enhanced triggers, improved rails like the Daniel Defense or Geiselle, and a well trained shooter- things changed. M4/M16 barrels almost always go out of spec with chamber throat erosion before accuracy begins to fall off. I have had mine fail the gauge several times when it was still grouping. If one of these guns stops grouping or throwing bullets into the target sideways (and its pretty fast and amazing when you see it- I had a personal AR with a GI barrel go from decent groups to sideways strikes inside of 1 magazine) and its a mil gun, what has happened is whoever is in charge of calibration and getting weapons gauged isn't doing his job. A M4 barrel on a team gun would generally last between 1 year to 18 months,

David Hoback said:

6.8mm it’s .277”. Hence, the 277 Fury.

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You are right my typo. l'm not sure that .277 Fury will be the military designation though.

Nature Boy said:

It’s either:

1. An experiment
2. A boondoggle

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Why not both?

FL-NC said:

We would typically get 3 MOA out of a standard M4A1. Of course, when better ammo is in play and the guns got upgraded with things like higher end optics, enhanced triggers, improved rails like the Daniel Defense or Geiselle, and a well trained shooter- things changed. M4/M16 barrels almost always go out of spec with chamber throat erosion before accuracy begins to fall off. I have had mine fail the gauge several times when it was still grouping. If one of these guns stops grouping or throwing bullets into the target sideways (and its pretty fast and amazing when you see it- I had a personal AR with a GI barrel go from decent groups to sideways strikes inside of 1 magazine) and its a mil gun, what has happened is whoever is in charge of calibration and getting weapons gauged isn't doing his job. A M4 barrel on a team gun would generally last between 1 year to 18 months,

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Well you definitely have more experience there than I do. Plus Im pretty sure all of the new guns/barrels I tested were M16A4s. I got out before my unit switched over to all M4s. We had a few per platoon, but the majority were still rocking the musket.

Elkins45 said:

Why not both?

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An experimental boondoggle?

All jokes aside, it seems silly to me to put such a high pressure cartridge into anything that needs reliability. Especially with so short of a barrel as what there talking about. Ear damage anyone?

I'm not a military man, so my opinions are just conjecture, but we've seen this same situation play out with the M14 and the FAL - it turned out the the rifles were heavy and recoiled too much for controlled full-auto fire. It was determined that a lighter faster bullet that you could carry more of was a better solution - eg, the intermediate rifle cartridge.

IF this goes through, $5 says that in less than 20 years you'll have another military official with this brilliant idea of taking what we have, but scaling it down smaller for . . . less recoil and more capacity per lb of ammo. While sometimes the military makes good decisions (the Garand, the M16 - and actually the M16 was only good after teething problems), often times they don't (the Krag & the M14).

Phaedrus/69 said:

we already don't have enough tungsten now and I believe China is the primary source for the material.

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From (potentially fickle) memory, South Africa is a source.

Nature Boy said:

It’s either:

1. An experiment
2. A boondoggle

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@Elkins45 beat me to "Both"
What better way to boondoggle than with an experiment?

mgmorden said:

you'll have another military official with this brilliant idea of taking what we have, but scaling it down smaller for . . . less recoil and more capacity per lb of ammo.

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Like, say, a 4.8x40 or a 6x45, perhaps? The PLA ditched their 4.8x39 for 5.45x39, and not 7.62x54r or a rebranded 8mauser.

So is the idea of having a standard NATO rifle cartridge falling by the wayside? I’m no fan of the 5.56, but it seems like an odd time to disregard the NATO issue, given the current events in Europe.

Zendude said:

So is the idea of having a standard NATO rifle cartridge falling by the wayside? I’m no fan of the 5.56, but it seems like an odd time to disregard the NATO issue, given the current events in Europe.

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Well, we didnt exactly ask their opinion first when we switched away from 7.62X51 either.
Gotta remember a lot of the newer Nato members still haven't completely divested themselves of former Soviets munitions either, though the current unpleasantness may speed that up as they will be totally cut off from Russian tech support/parts/ammo.
The Hungarian official analogous to our Secretary of State just said yesterday that the Biden admin basically has no relationship with them at all. Poland and the Baltic States have said similar things recently.
Ironically, despite their nuclear posturing, Russias very poor conventiontal war fighting performance probably diminishes the realpolitik significance of NATO.
This, plus the refocus on China as the our primary threat tells me DoD isnt really too concerned about NATO standardization any more.

adcoch1 said:

Ear damage anyone?

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Both the rifle and SAW are designed from the ground up to include standard suppressors.
Honestly, I think we would see an exponential increase in infantry combat effectiveness if they started by spending the dough on suppressing ALL the currently issued M16/M4s first rather than a new gee-whiz cartridge.

Zendude said:

So is the idea of having a standard NATO rifle cartridge falling by the wayside?

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Carefully glossed over in all the press releases.
And a giant argument against this getting any "full" adoption by DoD.

NIGHTLORD40K said:

a lot of the newer Nato members still haven't completely divested themselves of former Soviets munitions either,

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That's a complicated process. There are Phases in the membership to allow for new members time/budget to join in.
That's one of the reasons the Poles can't just give some of their MiGs to Ukraine; they are now fully integrated with NATO comms and EW and ECM gear, and the cockpit displays rebuilt enough to be entirely dissimilar to the non-NATO versions. Poland is fully fit up with 5.56 and 7.62 and .50bmg for their forces.
The first step in membership involves getting your forces trained up in English (for common commo). They also get a package of Signals stuff, so as to be able to communicate. There's typically a big exchange where you send your up-and-comers to various NATO schools to get trained up as trainers.
Second step is logistics support. Which has to do with local procurement of NATO arms & gear (sometimes referred to as the buy/adapt stage). This usually sees deployment of Existing forces to go "embed" with the new member and help spread the Knowledge around.
Third stage is joining in on Joint Exercises to test how well all the parts fit together.
Lithuania is in the middle of that process right now.

NIGHTLORD40K said:

spending the dough on suppressing ALL the currently issued M16/M4s first rather than a new gee-whiz cartridge.

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This is a good idea. Marines tested it at the Regimental level, and for all the arms, including the 240s.
It would add a zero to the current experimental program, but the utility has already been demonstrated.

eons ago i qualified on both the m14 and m16 but never fired a rifle with deadly intent at any mammal so feel free to discount my opinion as a rifle user. however, as a longtime taxpayer and longtime federal employee of the national security establishment, count me as skeptical of procuring an exotic, completely new, military round when we have huge production/inventory capacity of, and history with, 7.62 and 5.56 ammo and platforms. neither of these time-tested rounds may be ideal but there is a certain quality to mass quantities. and, if anyone hasn’t noticed, our nation is broke, and the pentagon’s track record of sound, cost-effective, decision-making and on-time/on-target procurement is, uh, consistently spotty to say the least...

It makes perfect sense to me, with all the money we are printing the military industrial complex will demand their fair share.

C-grunt said:

I'm very skeptical of the armor defeating ability. Especially at distance. There is off the shelf ceramic plates that will reliably defeat current 7.62 Nato AP rounds at point blank range. The new round is already starting at under 3000 FPS muzzle velocity and is going to bled that velocity off real quick at any extended ranges.

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I'm in this boat. There is a Kentucky Ballistics video where he shoots a number of deer rifles at body armor and even magnums didn't get through modern plates. Granted, it's not the most scientific thing with Scott shooting plates held together by duct tape, but it proved the point.
The ballistics seem legit with the really high pressure achieving those velocities out of a short 13" barrel. Honestly though, I think a good test of the actual effectiveness would be to somehow acquire some Chinese or Russian body armor, stand it up and pop it with a 6.8 Western solid bullets. 6.8 Western effectively duplicates 6.8x51 but with heavier bullets. See what kind of damage you get. And when I say Russian body armor, I mean the actual armor, not the cardboard plates they're issuing in Ukraine.
I suppose that the military may have something fancy up their sleeves maybe with sharp, hardened steel or tungsten penetrators in the bullets but I just don't see it happening.