The Future of Small Arms

[Pagan priest]

Regarding the SALVO trials and such, has anyone experimented with short bursts of duplex/triplex bullets? Or some other method of firing multiple projectiles per bullet combined with multiple bullets? Mmmm, not quite the automatic shotgun, something with a bit more managable recoil.

 

[Golan2072]

Originally posted by Corejob:
If you opt for the bulpup design, forward or bottom ejection takes care of the primary complaint about 'handedness'. Caseless ammunition eliminated the problem all together. While there seems to be a certain advantage to having a 'weight forward' weapon for snap shooting, it occurs to me that there is no reason one couldn't design a slightly suzzle heavy bullpup to address the issue.

Any RL example for forward/bottom ejection in bulpup rifles?

 

[mike wightman]

There's the FN2000 thet ejects spent cases from near the muzzle
link
and the P90 that drops it straight down
link.

 

[Uncle Bob]

Beat me to it. Also the neostead shotgun.
Not bullpups, but bottom ejection was used by the Lewis and Degtyrev LMGs. Maybe by the FG42 auto rifle, but I don't remember clearly.

Bullpups still have length-of-pull issues and trouble getting good trigger feel (I have heard both the P90 and the F200 criticized for "mushy" triggers. That was always the problem with the Steyr AUG) And two of the reasons the US Army did not consider a bullpup for SCARS, the XM8, and I doubt we will see one in the OICW Increment 1 shoot-out.

 

[far-trader]

The Neostead also has another interesting feature. It feeds from dual magazines that can be manually selected or set to feed alternating. Tactically very useful.

 

[Uncle Bob]

Originally posted by Corejob:
The PDW seems like a better police weapon, or perhaps something for executive protection and the like - particularly if you are concerned about body armor. It is as compact as an SMG but has almost the hitting power of an assault rifle. Also, the fact that it fires a unique cartridge isn't a problem.

I am not sure I agree with you here. The PDW rounds used by FN and HK have less than 450J, about the same as the 9x19mm NATO and 1/4 5.56x45 or 7.62x39 assault rifles.

Yes, they can penetrate soft armour, but they sacrifice wounding power compared to the 9mm SMG.

 

[Jame]

That Neostead looks like the stormtrooper rifle from Star Wars...

 

[veltyen]

I am not sure I agree with you here. The PDW rounds used by FN and HK have less than 450J, about the same as the 9x19mm NATO and 1/4 5.56x45 or 7.62x39 assault rifles.

Or you could go with the best of all worlds and use a 9x19 with a strengthened breach to handle over-pressure rounds.

There is a bunch of Russian SMG/PDW weapons that have this philosophy. Capable of taking standard 9mm ammo or being kitted with high power 9x19 rounds.

http://world.guns.ru/smg/smg59-e.htm for example

 

[Anthony]

A significant potential advantage of the PDW over a 9mm is that it the ammo is considerably smaller and lighter, and the recoil is substantially less, which should combine to allow superior rate of fire. Depending on the actual gain in rate of fire, that may make up for reduced lethality per projectile.

 

[Andrew Boulton]

Originally posted by Jame:
That Neostead looks like the stormtrooper rifle from Star Wars...

Nah, they were Sterling SMGs.

 

[Uncle Bob]

Originally posted by Anthony:
A significant potential advantage of the PDW over a 9mm is that it the ammo is considerably smaller and lighter, and the recoil is substantially less, which should combine to allow superior rate of fire. Depending on the actual gain in rate of fire, that may make up for reduced lethality per projectile.

In a snall machine pistol with ROF of 1500+ RPM like the Berretta 93 or MAC 11 it almost makes sense. A 3 rd burst will have the recoil of a 357 magnum, but at close range you should still get multiple hits. No good for a police wespon with that many bullets missing, but useful for a military PDW.

The window of usefulness may be closing. Marines in the recent operation "Matador" have encountered insurgents in body armor. One report gave some "hard", rifle proof srmor.

 

[Uncle Bob]

Accuracy...
When you aim at a target your actual point of aim tends to wander around. Much of the skil of the marksman is timing the trigger break to happen when the point of aim "wanders" across the tsrget point.

A fire control system for the OICW prototypes (similar to the one for the XM25) did not fire right away. When you pulled the trigger it obervered your point of aim for a fraction of a second, assumed the point you really wanted to hit was at the geometric center of the area you were drifting around, and the next time the muzzle crosses that point, BLAM.

It also had a feature where it would watch the background and if anything moves (like someone rushing from cover to cover) the sight highlights the moving object for the gunner.

These features could enhance a conventional assault rifle/LMG.

 

[endersig]

Originally posted by Corejob:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Captain Jonah:
Re Flechettes. Reducing size and increasing speed of projectile to penetrate armour. Ok so you have a round that will penetrate Class IV body armour and the odd passing brick wall. The human body (bones aside) is considerably less solid that a wall. If the round is stable on impact you have a round that will make a small and very painfull but not debilitating flesh wound.

You'd think that, but that turns out to not always be the case. One can design rounds that penetrate hard armor, but become unstable and tumble in tisue. The two media are distinctly different (solid vs. liquid-like). The current US military M855 round is designed to defeat light armor, and yet it still tumbles in tissue. The problem is that lethality is effected because energy is lost defeating the armor </font>[/QUOTE]Acutally, the military has a round that is both armor piercing and Anti-Personel. to put it simply, it is a bunch of metal fillings. When it comes into contact with something hard (say, tank armor), the fillings compress and fuse into an armor piercing round, but if it hits something soft (like, a body) it penetrates, then explodes, transfering all energy to said flesh bag. Also, the docterine of current military weapons is that of non-lethal, but dehabilitating wounds. What takes more resources to care for, a wounded man, or a dead man?

 

[endersig]

What I would like to see is someone update the old CT equiment lists. SMG and Assualt rifles (ect.) are all much lighter and more powerful than was predicted in the 70's. We have an SMG that weighs 3 KG's, fully loaded! It needs to be updated... badly.

 

[veltyen]

Considering the plurity and extensive selection choice available on earth (TL8 Pop 9) for firearms it might be much more worthwhile to just illustrate classes rather then rewrite the equipment tables.

 

[Anthony]

Originally posted by endersig:
Acutally, the military has a round that is both armor piercing and Anti-Personel. to put it simply, it is a bunch of metal fillings. When it comes into contact with something hard (say, tank armor), the fillings compress and fuse into an armor piercing round, but if it hits something soft (like, a body) it penetrates, then explodes, transfering all energy to said flesh bag.

Bog. Where did you get this (completely incorrect) belief? Making a wild guess that you're talking about frangible ammunition, it's crap vs armor.

Also, the docterine of current military weapons is that of non-lethal, but dehabilitating wounds. What takes more resources to care for, a wounded man, or a dead man?

A common myth. Completely false, however. The doctrine of current military weapons is that 99+% of bullets don't hit anything, so you should design your gun to carry as many bullets as you can while still having enough lethality to be intimidating. Lethality of small arms is mostly irrelevant to the military, since almost no-one gets killed by small arms.

 

[Uncle Bob]

I think he may be confusing the LwMas BMT "blended metal technology" bullets. These have been demonstrated to the military in carefullly staged events. Most ballisticians consider this the equiuvilent of snake oil.

 

[Anthony]

Hm... yeah, a bit of reading about BMT bullets does give me a distinctive 'snake oil' vibe.

 

[Uncle Bob]

The LeMas BMT APLP vs 6.8 mm Challenge
"DocGKR" is Doctor Gary Roberts.

 

[endersig]

Originally posted by Anthony:
</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by endersig:
Acutally, the military has a round that is both armor piercing and Anti-Personel. to put it simply, it is a bunch of metal fillings. When it comes into contact with something hard (say, tank armor), the fillings compress and fuse into an armor piercing round, but if it hits something soft (like, a body) it penetrates, then explodes, transfering all energy to said flesh bag.

Bog. Where did you get this (completely incorrect) belief? Making a wild guess that you're talking about frangible ammunition, it's crap vs armor.
Pardon me, I put into present test what I meant to be future. It is an attempt at a more multi-purpose bullet than our current ones. And, frangibles are for use of things like airplanes... not what I am talking about.
The military is also designing a sort of smart bullet. It hasn't done particullarly well yet, but it can correct itself about an inch by flexing the bullet right. Unfortunately, these flexible bullets don't really hurt anything yet, but it is a start.

[qb]Also, the docterine of current military weapons is that of non-lethal, but dehabilitating wounds. What takes more resources to care for, a wounded man, or a dead man?

A common myth. Completely false, however. The doctrine of current military weapons is that 99+% of bullets don't hit anything, so you should design your gun to carry as many bullets as you can while still having enough lethality to be intimidating. Lethality of small arms is mostly irrelevant to the military, since almost no-one gets killed by small arms. </font>[/QUOTE]I realize that the rounds per kill is very low, but that is why we have smaller non-lethal rounds, unlike other assualt rifles. Few are going to get killed by the (i believe) .223 bullets fired by a M-16, but an AK-47, with its bigger bullets does more damage (without compromising amount of bullets) If this was completely false, then why do we use such small bullets?