Why is the new US battle rifle being designed by Germany?

[chevrofreak]

Look at the POS that we got stuck with the last time the military adopted a US designed weapon

Seriously though, the Robinson Armament XCR would be my weapon of choice if I were in the poop.

 

[The Rabbi]

Is anyone else scratching his head over that last post??

Beretta--designed probably in the 1920s
FN--Who designed the Hi Power again?? What year was that??
SIG--designed in the 1940s or so.
Walther PPK--blow-back design from the 1920s if not earlier.

Pistols are basically the same variations they have been for 50+ years. They can fool with grip safeties, manual safeties of all kinds, extractors, barrels but all in all there is only so much to do there. They can innovate in material and in manufacturing process but little in the basic action.
We have seen tremendous innovation in cartridge design and bullet design though, and that is where the design improvements seem to have come from.

 

[LiquidTension]

Somebody needs to hurry up and design some portable energy weapons Phased plasma rifle in the 40 watt range, perhaps?

 

[Master Blaster]

Can you dump your AR-15 in a pit filled with muddy water, stomp on it a few times, pull it out, pour a single canteen down the barrel, and then safely fire the weapon?
You can do that with your AR-15, I wouldn't. I've seen it done with G36's before.

Bring your G-36 around, and I'll watch while you try it.

The g-36 and Xm-8 have been fielded in the millions for 30 years proving their reliability by which army exactly??????

 

[MechAg94]

I downloaded a video a while back showing the original 1950's 30 caliber Armalite being dunked in mud. Did a cold test as well. I think it was from Armalite's web site.

 

[PMDW]

nevermind

 

[jefnvk]

1911 patterns - old and didn't Browning have to go to Europe with some guns!

Never quite got this obsession with having to replace something because it's design is old

But anyway, the 1911 (the pistol we oughta be using right now) was designed by Browning for the US Army, and Colt produced it. The design he took to FN, IIRC, was the A5.

Also, I don't get the obsession with having an automatic rifle version of these service rifle contenders. When has that ever happened in the past? The M60 and 249 are there own independant platforms.

+1. I can see standardization, to a point. Sniper/rifleman/smg role, OK, that can probably be built on the same platorm. But why do we need to require it to be a machine gun as well?

Also, can anyone tell me exactly why the M16 is being replaced? At first, I thought we were going to a new caliber, but that looks out of the question. Swapable to differnt roles? Two pins on an AR, I can go from SMG, to rifleman, to sniper, and back. Not being able to be dunked in a slurry of mud and then fire safely? I don't think most guns would.

 

[Jeff White]

This article has been OBE

That means overtaken by events. I haven't got my American Rifleman in the mail yet, but given the lead time that goes into producing a magazine, I would bet the article and the information in it is several months old.

The Army recently issued a request for designs for a new prototype small arms system. Not quite back to square one, but pretty close.

The proposal called for a 5.56x45 weapons sytem. We're several years away from seeing a replacement for our current weapons systems.

Jeff

 

[Bartholomew Roberts]

Barrel does laster longer. Seen an G36 eat through circa 15,000 rds (no cleaning) with no decrease in accuracy, nor a single jam. The books I've seen on the M16 say the barrel should be changed out after 8,000 rounds.

Barrel life has nothing to do with the weapon system and everything to do with the technology used to make the barrel. If you make a G36 barrel the same way you make an M16 barrel, it will last as long as an M16 barrel. If you make an M16 barrel the same way you make a G36 barrel, it will last for 15,000 rounds as well.

The XM8 certainly has a lobbying edge in the competition; but this is a long way from a done deal and there is still some significant innovation and improvement being applied to the AR system.

 

[Bobarino]

barrels: the XM8 uses piloygonal rifling which is supposed to decrease wear, be easier to clean, form a better gas seal behind the bullet and slightly increase velocities over standard land and groove rifling. HK claims 20,000 rounds between cleaning and 20,000 round service life for the barrel which means you never have to clean a barrel! right? after 20k rounds, just replace it.

U.S. factory: http://hkpro.websolv.com/ubbthreads...=243837&page=1&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=&fpart=1

here's a thread on HKPRO.com about it with pictures of the sight currently. (4-18-05) construction is still going on but it appears to be slow going. perhaps when the weather/ground dry out a bit they can make some better progress.

contract: who knows? what i do know is that even if HK doesn't get the XM8 contract, they'll have a U.S. factory that needs to pay for itself. part of me (but not a very big part) wants them to lose the contract so they will have to use that plant to build guns for us civvies to pay for their big new shiny plant. slap a semi-auto trigger pack and a 16" barrel in that XM8 and flood the market. ah one can hope right?

Bobby

 

[Warbow]

Can you dump your AR-15 in a pit filled with muddy water, stomp on it a few times, pull it out, pour a single canteen down the barrel, and then safely fire the weapon?

You can do that with your AR-15, I wouldn't. I've seen it done with G36's before.

Although it's quite cheesy, there is a video like that which made the rounds a month or two ago. The owner of the company took one of his production LEO M4A1 style rifles (full auto) and put a little over 1,000 rounds thru it in under 15 minutes. He cooled it off every couple hundred rounds by tossing the entire rifle into a nasty puddle of very muddy/sandy water (completely submerged) and let it sit for around 15-20 seconds. After each "bath" he just let the water drain, no fresh water was poured down the barrel, then kept firing.

There was a total of one malfunction which was claimed to be caused by the Beta C-Mag in the rifle at the time. Even though the rate of fire was getting quite sluggish near the end due to all of the sand in the action, it still worked.

 

[jefnvk]

what i do know is that even if HK doesn't get the XM8 contract, they'll have a U.S. factory that needs to pay for itself. part of me (but not a very big part) wants them to lose the contract so they will have to use that plant to build guns for us civvies to pay for their big new shiny plant.

Just think about the semi MP5's and UMP's

 

[PMDW]

Quote:
what i do know is that even if HK doesn't get the XM8 contract, they'll have a U.S. factory that needs to pay for itself. part of me (but not a very big part) wants them to lose the contract so they will have to use that plant to build guns for us civvies to pay for their big new shiny plant.


Just think about the semi MP5's and UMP's

Hah!

It'll never happen.

 

[MoeMentum]

Because Daisy and Crossman said no.

 

[jefnvk]

Hah!

It'll never happen.

I know of many that said the same thing about the P90.

 

[Owen]

Most American gun companies are small. The cost to develop a new assault rifle is 10 - 30 million dollars. In an industry where the big boys only make profits in the 2 to 5 million dollar range, that's a nice big chink of money.

HK was owned by British Aerospace when they developed the G36.

HK was was privately held when they developed the G11. The resulting bankruptcy caused them to be bought by BAE.

FN is owned by the the Waloon region of Belgium, and is viewed as a jobs program in a welfare state by that government.

No American gun company has the financial wherewithal to develop an assault rifle with a technical data package that will survive examination by Picatinny Arsenal.

FN Manufacturing has about 15 employees that do nothing but government paperwork, plus 5 government employees that walk around doing nothing but audits. The paperwork package for the M240B bipod is about 250 pages, and needs to be generated for every delivery. Those packages are then added to all the other packages for that month's shipment to the government.

You should see the specs for interchangability. Yikes.

If you were a CEO, would you risk your company's existence by developing a weapon for the government without a solicitation? Are you willing to have government auditors living in your building day in and day out? Are you prepared to do all this, knowing that you only have a few years before the government starts going out for competitive bids? You realize that once the government goes to competitive bids, your design becomes public domain?

 

[Feanaro]

I know of many that said the same thing about the P90.

Not to hijack the thread but unless something changes, I really doubt HK will be coming out with civvy MP5/HK9X firearms. The HK94 went over like the proverbial lead fart with 15,600 or so units being imported. With a few people already making MP5 clones, HK might not be able to market it. They may not even have the tooling anymore. They could very well have sold it when they killed the MP5. It's hard enough to compete with the ARs, M14, and FALs out there. But they have other people making their own rifles.

Besides, HK doesn't even have a factory yet. When they actually build something other than an office, I'll get my hopes up a liddle bit.

Edit: might as well stay partly on topic. Not many companies in the U.S., that I can think of anyways, have a deal of recent experiance designing assault rifles. Colt might make M-4s but when was the last time they came up with a decent design? Sure, they build great products but the last few things they designed got pummeled. Most of our manufacturers come up with redesigns of sporting rifles and shotguns. There are exceptions of course, like the XCR. But HK has them beat in experiance, manufacturing capacity, and capitol.

 

[swingset]

Since when did we ever use exclusively American designs, anyway?

From our founding we have been using European arms in this country.

From the Brown Bess to the 1861 Enfield to the Krag, to the P17 Enfield, on and on. And, unlike today, some of those arms were manufactured overseas.

 

[c_yeager]

You can blame American gun control for this. The fact is that it is simply economincly unfeasable for an American company to design a military-capable weapon. In the past there was always the prospect of civilian sales to fall back on in case the weapon wasnt immediatly adopted by the military. Today, there is a DAILY risk that any newly designed weapon would become outright banned from civilian sale. Unlike many foreign weapons manufactures, American companies depend on civilian sales for their survival in place of military contracts. It is MUCH safer for Remington/Winchester etc. to continue making their money on shotguns and poitically correct hunting rifles/cowboy/target guns. Why would any large company take the risk of eating all of their R&D costs due to the very likely possibility of being legislated out of business.

This is EXACTLY the reason that Ruger such a pain when it comes to getting hi-capacity magazines for their Mini-14. They know that it only takes one well publicised incident in which someone with a 25rnd magazine attached to their rifle kills a bunch of people to get themselves on the banned list. The risk of getting the Mini-14 banned is simply far greater than the profit that could be made by selling the magazines. And this is the case when it comes to ALL of our domestic arms manufactures. The risk/reward ratio is just too great to be worth taking for a large company.

 

[cracked butt]

Who says American gun manufacturers aren't innovative?

Remington, winchester, Ruger, and savage have figured out that if they put cheap flimsy plastic stocks on rifles, they can market them as 'all weather' and charge the same as if they were stocked with an expensive walnut one.

Remington and winchester have come out with a whole slew of new cartridges in a battle to claim that their own cartridge is 1/16" shorter and 40 fps faster than their competitors similarly named cartridge.

Remington has came out with their 597 and 710 rifles over the last few years.

Ruger has 'upgraded' the MkII pistol to a MKIII by putting a magazine disconnect safety in it. Ruger has also upgraded their Mini-14 by doing something to it that noone has figured out yet and raised the price.

All of the American manufacturers have figured out how to install an integral safety lock in their firearms.

S&W has made innovative deals with the government to keep themselves from getting sued out of existance.

Who says American manufacturers aren't up to the task of designing and building America's next sturmgewehr?

 

[jefnvk]

In the past there was always the prospect of civilian sales to fall back on in case the weapon wasnt immediatly adopted by the military.

Case in point: The Thompson SMG.

 

[Kestrel]

Ruger can't get the contract, because they can't print an entire manual on a barrel only 12.5" long...

Ruger can't get the contract, because the government rejected their 5-round magazine limitation...

Ruger can't get the contract, because they didn't want to build something light enough to be carried all day...

Ruger can't get the contract, because they can't get the rifle's trigger pull below 15 pounds...

Winchester can't get the contract, because they shortened and fattened the cartridge so much, the magazine had to be 3" wide and 1.5" deep front-rear...

Remington can't get the contract, because each time a tester called the service center, they were given a different answer or told that Remington does not have that model - the model they are holding in their hands...

Remington can't get the contract, because the testers couldn't see around the bulge of the integral safety on the rifle...

Colt can't get the contract, because their union employees were always on strike or asleep or on break each time there was an RFP meeting...

Colt can't get the contract, because they keep changing their mind as to whether or not they are actually manufacturing something...

 

[corncob]

Thanks, Owen, for the reality check.

I agree, it is a cost-of-doing-business/risk-vs.-reward problem. Personally, I'll be shocked if the M-16 ever gets replaced. In government terms, holdong these periodic design contests or whatever costs approximately nothing. And it keeps those who do it employed. The nature of the bureaucratic beast is only to continue existing--no more. It is a mistake, in my opinion, to assume that these little exercises indicate a likelihood of future action on the part of the government.

I gotta say, though, that thinking of Robinson out there throwing down with the biggest of the euro-socialist quasi-government behemoths with little or no chance of reward warms my little cynical individualist heart. That guy is awesome. I swear if I could shoot right-handed I'd buy something from him on principle.

 

[ny32182]

I already own a VEPR K (well worth the money) and if the XCR lives up to the hype of what they say it can do, a 16" fully ambi-controlled 5.56 model will be sitting in my safe next year.

EDIT: and I'm a lefty.

 

[another48hrs]

...as well as why we gave the finger to Poland, an ally of ours who was going to produce AKs for Iraq and we instead gave the contract to China.

Yeah Poland didn't get the contract, but it was the Bulgarians who got the contract.