They designed a bullet to defeat near pear armor to 400m, then put the contract out for a company to make it, and put it in a short action rifle.
So the military certainly thinks it's worth it.
From the civilian side, you're basically getting .270win +p performance from a short action, so that's nice for hunters.
>So the military certainly thinks it's worth it.
They also thought the M14 was worth it, for similar misguided reasons. No M5 gunner will ever defeat peer armor at 400 yards—a 10×12 plate is a 2.5 MOA target at that distance, which means it's not happening unless Chang is literally standing out in the open waiting to get shot—and if the bullet doesn't hit his plate, then 6.5 Creedmore or even 5.56 would have done the job just as well.
Black person how many people do you know that actually own plates let alone GOOD ones
Black person how much coke are you on to get to this level of paranoia to think the fricking US military would go to war against its own civilians when the fricking national guard could barely be fricked to pull up to the capitol hill unguided tour
it doesnt beat lvl4 guys that was not a contract requirement. Its designed to overmatch GPMG.
The AP thing was just how army ordnance the incompetent fricks sold it. They should have never been allowed to reform after they were disbanded over the m14, and sabotaging the m16.
>From the civilian side, you're basically getting .270win +p performance from a short action, so that's nice for hunters.
.270 WSM has been around for 20 years.
Not really.
.270 wsm in everything is pretty much dead.
Semi autos can't feed any of the wsms well, something to do with the shoulder angle for magazine feeding (apparently even mag fed bolt actions hang up sometime)
The SAUM family was more reliable in semiautos.
>7.62x51 cant clear near peer armor at 400m with off-the-shelf tungsten AP already
Army doing gay embezzling stuff, nothing new. Swiss P handles level IV out to 350m, HAPI does the same at 450m, and its not like the "sekret sauce pls believe us" AP is gonna cost LESS than either of those two.
Also of note, plates are coming onto the commercial market that stop the heavy-hitter 7.62 tungsten AP options, so its kind of moot.
>Also of note, plates are coming onto the commercial market that stop the heavy-hitter 7.62 tungsten AP options, so its kind of moot.
No one could possibly have foreseen this. It's not like .50 BMG pl8s have existed since the 90s (that we know of) and the obvious punish for developing a rifle and cartridge optimized for existing armor is *slightly better armor*
>well a round going 400+ fps slower, with shittier sectional density and a larger cross sectional area, clearly 6.8x51 can't either
Consider suicide brainlet.
Im saying the solution to most body armor already exists in modern tungsten-core 7.62. Today, with a AR-10 and HAPI rounds, you can crack Level IV plates at 500yards.
6.8 isnt doing anything new on the armor penetration front, its decidedly shaky justification and seems to have sprouted as a sort of backwards justification for the program proceeding.
2 years ago
Anonymous
The rifle was dumb, but I like the beltfed, on paper anyway. Lighter than the m249 with bipod and supressor and a belt of ammo, even if you're down half the ammo. Way, way lighter than a m240. And better ballistics than both.
2 years ago
Anonymous
>the solution to most body armor already exists in aiming for the enemy's dick
yeah
2 years ago
Anonymous
>Nothing personnell kid. psssh, maybe youll have the upper hand someday
2 years ago
Anonymous
>now you have a ~5 lb plate flopping around and hitting you in the dick repeatedly whenever you run anywhere
congratulations, you played yourself
2 years ago
Anonymous
I'd rather be uncomfortable than dead. Especially if I anticipate someone shooting at me
2 years ago
Anonymous
>implying the soldiers of the future aren't into that
That was supposed to be the case, but the IWI shill made a video on israelitetube where he shoots one of those rounds commercially available, and it can't defeat a level 4 plate. I do hope the military round with the higher pressure and a steel penetrator bullet fares better, otherwise the whole point seems pretty moot.
>and a steel penetrator bullet fares better
they're not spending $22/bullet on a hardend steel penetrator. That's more than enough money to be tungsten.
>$22 a bullet
For real? So not ever issued in wide numbers. Not when every guy on the squad has a full load out of 6+1 * $440, plus $2200 for a belt of 100 for the SAW gunners.
one is the standard normal combat round probably with a copper/steel bullet and it costs a couple bucks per shot (price will go down once lake city starts production) The other is called the "special purpose" round and it's like $22/shot right now (again price will go down when lake city starts production). But even so just seeing the early low production prices we can clearly see the "special purpose" round is likely a tungsten AP round.
They're ordering a lot of M5's if they aren't planning to use them.
They're getting like 1000 M250's to replace M249s
They're also getting like 14500 M5's to replace M4's in FY23 alone. With another ~20-30k in FY24 and FY25.
What else are they going to use over 50,000 M5s for in the next 3 years if NOT to replace the M4 in front-line combat units?
This
Sig is gonna make a killing off of this. They basically own the US Army
I worked for a fed agency that selected the HKP2000 over the P229DAK and Sig sued and won the contract for like 1800 handguns and they had to retool to add the extra digit for the agency serial number. They are scheisters.
so your moronic an have no idea what guns are or how they work. the NGSW 6.8 is a magnum cartridge. more powerful than 762 nato. Its closest competitors are 300wsm in performance. also 762x39 was replaced by the soviets with a meme copy of 556 so you are doubly moronic.
The problem is there's indication that it doesn't actually meet the initial specs. If it doesn't, it can't punch armor at the distance they're talking (or potentially some of the higher plate ratings at all). If that ends up being true then it was truly a useless move.
They're ordering a lot of M5's if they aren't planning to use them.
They're getting like 1000 M250's to replace M249s
They're also getting like 14500 M5's to replace M4's in FY23 alone. With another ~20-30k in FY24 and FY25.
What else are they going to use over 50,000 M5s for in the next 3 years if NOT to replace the M4 in front-line combat units?
The M5 was never meant to replace the M4 in every capacity, its ONLY meant to replace the M4 for the main combat infantry elements.
The entire program is only meant to order ~115,000 M5's and around 20-30,000 M250s.
> The Department of Defense’s budget justification books for the fiscal year 2021 suggested that 29,888 weapons would be procured in FY 2023 (at a cost of $216.4 million), 46,129 in FY 2024 (at a cost of $336 million) and 54,056 in FY 2025 (at a procurement cost of $383.9 million).
>ONLY meant to replace the M4 for the main combat infantry elements
Yeah, only the teams that have to actually assault as manuever elements with more weight for less ammo, and might have needed more bullets for the whole "firing at positions known, likely, or suspected" thing.
Yes, I am biased against battle rifles, at least for the manuever element, and yes I will stop my b***hing if I see an army wide issued .277 bullet that penetrates level 4 plate, at range, without tungsten, because blah blah blah, adapt or die.
It seems ridiculous because half a century of worldwide conflicts have shown that there are certain trade-offs and advantages that battle rifles can offer, and those situational advantages are significant enough that it's worthwhile to give a battle rifle to maybe one guy, per squad. They're actively unlearning history's lessons.
Why not just give every soldier a rocket launcher so they can run around blowing everybody up like TF2?
2 years ago
Anonymous
Actually factual statements here. >why not everyone rockets
I mean...why not?
Half the squad is missile launch systems with MP7s and half the squad is LMGs.
2 years ago
Anonymous
half the squad has grenade launchers so, baby rocket launcher.
2 years ago
Anonymous
dude they should've designed the M5 to take rifle grenades
everybody in the squad would be a designated marksman, assaulter, and anti-armor guy all at once—it's peak Big Army "goood idea fairy" thinking
2 years ago
Anonymous
"Every man a rifleman" hasn't been true for decades but it's a seductive fantasy
>this program replaces the M4 in FRONT LINE UNITS, nothing else.
What happens to the Minimi in that event? Do they increase the complexity of the logistics chain by 50% at the squad fricking level, or do they get rid of light machine guns for the first time since the 1970's?
xm250 is scheduled to replace the m249. One one hand, the ammo belts are closer to the m240s in length and weight. On the other hand, you're getting a spicy ass m240 with supressor and optic for less overall weight than a 249.
2 years ago
Anonymous
On the other other hand, you no longer have an LMG and you've offloaded the automatic rifleman role to guys with what amounts to a .270 WSM Browning Automatic Rifle.
The Army is actively unlearning the lessons of history.
some General wanted it to cement his legacy, put together the right powerpoints with cherrypicked data, ignored all counter-arguments and here we are
anyone who thinks it has ANYTHING to do with real need is a fricking moron who has never spent a day in the Pentagon where these decisions are made
Sometimes it feels like the Pentagon has an equivalent to the "publish or perish" culture you see in academia, where generals are expected to get budget approvals for programs—any programs, no matter how stupid or pointless—if they want to be taken seriously and considered for advancement.
2 years ago
Anonymous
>you no longer have an LMG
how so?
The M250 is lighter than the M249 it's replacing.
Just because it's firing spicy 7.62 doesn't mean it's no longer an LMG.
2 years ago
Anonymous
In that the "light" in "light machine gun" doesn't refer to how much it weighs—the PKM weighs less than a Minimi as well, but nobody calls it an LMG. Light machine guns are chambered in "light" calibers like 5.56 and 7.62×39, in contrast to medium/general-purpose MGs that are chambered in real rifle calibers and heavy MGs that are chambered in real rifle calibers (at minimum) and are generally fired from fixed mounts.
2 years ago
Anonymous
>the PKM weighs less than a Minimi as well
No the frick it doesn't it's like a 20lbs gun. M249 is like 15lbs > the "light" in "light machine gun" doesn't refer to how much it weighs
How does it feel to be wrong? > A light machine gun (LMG) is a light-weight machine gun designed to be operated by a single infantryman > early light machine guns fired full-powered rifle cartridges, modern light machine guns often fire smaller-caliber rifle cartridges than medium machine guns – generally the same intermediate cartridge fired by a service's standard assault rifle
The new infantry cartridge is the 6.8x51, it IS a full power rifle caliber, but that is not what defines an LMG.
2 years ago
Anonymous
[...]
This
M249 is an LMG because it's using the 5.56 like the M4 and can be used by a single man.
M250 is also an LMG because it's using the 6.8 like the M5 and can be used by a single man.
It doesn't matter whether the 6.8 ammo is full powered or not.
>he said LMG instead of SAW, his argument is invalid
It's a lighter gun in a more powerful cartridge feeding from shorter belts that the gunner will necessarily carry fewer of due to the size and weight of the ammunition. Even if you accept that modern technology will finally make battle rifles relevant, nothing about the M250's design will magically make it any easier to create worthwhile suppressive fire with less ammo that pushes the gun around more and needs more frequent pauses to reload.
2 years ago
Anonymous
>nothing about the M250's design will magically make it any easier to create worthwhile suppressive fire
A more realistic schedule or repair and replacement would.
2 years ago
Anonymous
This is the Army we're talking about. There are probably M4 buffer springs in service that are older than we are.
2 years ago
Anonymous
>the PKM weighs less than a Minimi as well
No the frick it doesn't it's like a 20lbs gun. M249 is like 15lbs > the "light" in "light machine gun" doesn't refer to how much it weighs
How does it feel to be wrong? > A light machine gun (LMG) is a light-weight machine gun designed to be operated by a single infantryman > early light machine guns fired full-powered rifle cartridges, modern light machine guns often fire smaller-caliber rifle cartridges than medium machine guns – generally the same intermediate cartridge fired by a service's standard assault rifle
The new infantry cartridge is the 6.8x51, it IS a full power rifle caliber, but that is not what defines an LMG.
This
M249 is an LMG because it's using the 5.56 like the M4 and can be used by a single man.
M250 is also an LMG because it's using the 6.8 like the M5 and can be used by a single man.
It doesn't matter whether the 6.8 ammo is full powered or not.
2 years ago
Anonymous
This is a Madsen gun, the ur-LMG. It does not fire an intermediate cartridge. They're called LMGs because they are considerable lighter than MMGs or HMGs, they can be ported by one man and have an integral bipod.
>more energy >more recoil
???
are you a newfriend or can’t into conceptual physics?
You don't understand pressure, internal ballistics in general, or the operating principles of gas guns half as well as you think you do.
2 years ago
Anonymous
>a spicy ass m240 with supressor and optic for less overall weight than a 249.
I cannot wait to see how fast these flimsy ass things beat themselves to death.
2 years ago
Anonymous
Schlomo needs to sell parts too.
2 years ago
Anonymous
FN MAG is fricking sheet metal held together by rivets, because that's how FN did it. Not sure if it's extruded or machined aluminum, but I don't think the frame will be an issue until the retaining pin holes wallow out.
Not my job, but if it was, I'd be more concernee about chambering a machine gun in a magnum caliber, with supressor, that lacks a quick change barrel.
2 years ago
Anonymous
>that lacks a quick change barrel
by request of the army, SIG offers the design with a quick change barrel to other militaries internationally and it was originally part of the XM250 until the army told them to take it out.
2 years ago
Anonymous
ffs
I genuinely feel like drawing random COTS guns and tanks and shit out of a hat would be better than letting the military make its own procurement decisions.
That's probably how it'll shape up once the M4s get rolled back out in 20-30 years once they find out the hard way that battle rifles were never a good idea and still aren't, but they've said that they're replacing the M4 with this bullshit and I see no reason to doubt them.
It's a steel base brass cartridge that generates 100,000 psi. Which blows my fricking mind. I don't think even the magnum hunting cartridges generate that much; I can't recall seeing anything over 50-60K for any load data I ever looked at. So. Massive felt recoil, massive wear and tear on the working internals, and case separations galore. I find it difficult to believe they'll actually build the fricking thing, much less field it.
It's because brass starts to fail around 65-70k PSI.
Below that it expands to fit (and seal) the chamber, then after it shrinks back down (for easy extraction). At higher pressures though the brass expands too much and can rupture and break the seal causing a loss of pressure and potentially damaging your gun, or even you depending how safely the gun was designed.
The steel head on the new round allows for a higher pressure because the point of failure is at the base of the cap where the pressure is the most extreme, so the steel can much more easily withstand the extra pressure, and making the rest of the cartridge from normal brass still allows the cartridge to expand to seal and contract for extraction
It's not even really a "new" thing, it's just now a major manufacturer has managed to convince the US military to give it a go. The steel head brass hyrbid cartridge as an idea goes back decades to handloaders.
Only the military cartridges produce over 80k PSI, and if you actually take 5 seconds to look at the cartridge you'd see that it has a stainless steel base specifically so the case doesn't separate. The all-brass cartridges don't go over 60k PSI.
That's not really how it works, you just adjust the gas piston to allow more gas bypass to reduce how much force is used to cycle the action.
This is basically the same mass as any gas-piston platform AR-10 type gun, the only changes you need are a stronger bolt face and locking lugs, and a thicker barrel.
There is no significant difference in recoil compared to say a .308 or 6.5CM AR-10 gun.
They publically said they want 6.8x51 to be a calibre they can refine and develop further over the next several decades. A larger cartridge allows you a MUCH greater capacity to play around with different loadings, different propellents, different pressures, etc, etc. You instead wanted them to use 6.5x39? Why? Because it's your preferred meme caliber? It's fine, but it just doesn't have the case capacity for 80-100k PSI loadings, even if you gave it a steel case head like the 6.8x51 is using, you're still MUCH more limited by the cartridge capacity potential.
Go look at an RDP belt, gompare it to any disintegrating link belt, and you'll understand why 6.5 grendel , with it's .220 Russian parent case, wouldn't make the cut.
>I'm sad they picked something that could push 140gr @ 3200fps from a 16" barrel rather a garbage round doing 130gr 2500 fps from a 24" with a shitty case head and shape because it's based off of homosexual .30 commie
Hell, if people really hate SIG they'll hope this is how it goes, we all saw how Colt fell flat once they realized their cash cow was finally done with.
>thinks colt dell flat recently
Black person, colt has been garbage for 50 years, it gets drained of assets, sold, then bought up for someone else to run some sort of tax scam on it, rinse and repeat.
It's happened like 7 times since the 60s.
They went bankrupt basically in the 60s or 70s, name was sold to some finance firm, who fleeced it, and sold it, and so on so fourth.
It was constantly being used for scenes and scams then sold, it's government contracts the only thing keeping it afloat on paper.
They should've just went with an AR chambered in .243
Give it an 80gr projectile with a steel core, would probably go around 3,000 fps out of an 16 inch barrel.
It's innovative in terms of design if not technology, like building a mass produced car with a V-10 engine. It's also stupid and embezzlement is probably involved somewhere, like building a mass produced car with a V-10 engine.
Its a money spending scheme and a way to have the military use a weapon most civilians are unfamiliar with in a cartridge no one else has, kind of like pla saying 5.8 is supperior to 5.56 but it just makes it impossible for a civilian to get ammo and a gun
They would've gone for the True Velocity composite cartridge bullpup or the Textron polymer-cased telescoped cartridges in an AR if that were the case.
Going with a brass/steel hybrid cartridge in an standard .308 AR sized gun is about as close to the existing M4 you can get while retaining the larger 6.8x51 round.
> The Army chose the 6.8 mm round following the publication of the 2017 Small Arms Ammunition Configuration Study. > the 2017 report called for an intermediate caliber, something falling in the 6 mm range.
just a way to make some israelites rich
fpbp
based /k/ommandos
They designed a bullet to defeat near pear armor to 400m, then put the contract out for a company to make it, and put it in a short action rifle.
So the military certainly thinks it's worth it.
From the civilian side, you're basically getting .270win +p performance from a short action, so that's nice for hunters.
>So the military certainly thinks it's worth it.
They also thought the M14 was worth it, for similar misguided reasons. No M5 gunner will ever defeat peer armor at 400 yards—a 10×12 plate is a 2.5 MOA target at that distance, which means it's not happening unless Chang is literally standing out in the open waiting to get shot—and if the bullet doesn't hit his plate, then 6.5 Creedmore or even 5.56 would have done the job just as well.
>he thinks it isn’t designed to contend with the largest purchasers of lvl iv plates recently... the American public
Meds
Mediterraneans barely have any rights at all and they certainly don't have many level 4 plates.
Glow
It clearly is; I was just addressing its stated purpose. Americans probably own more Lv4 plates than China and Russia combined.
How does that change the issue that it won't work? It literally cannot do what it is proposed to do.
Black person how many people do you know that actually own plates let alone GOOD ones
Black person how much coke are you on to get to this level of paranoia to think the fricking US military would go to war against its own civilians when the fricking national guard could barely be fricked to pull up to the capitol hill unguided tour
it doesnt beat lvl4 guys that was not a contract requirement. Its designed to overmatch GPMG.
The AP thing was just how army ordnance the incompetent fricks sold it. They should have never been allowed to reform after they were disbanded over the m14, and sabotaging the m16.
>From the civilian side, you're basically getting .270win +p performance from a short action, so that's nice for hunters.
.270 WSM has been around for 20 years.
this.
277 furry is a solution no one needed, just yet another moneygrab for sig
.270 wsm is
1. Too fat
2. Been dead for 18 of those 20 years.
Are there any semi autos in 270 WSM?
yes
You can get a Benelli R1 chambered for it too.
Not anymore, at least not new anymore I don't think.
But yes, they were available for a number of years and you can still find them for like $1k used in .270 WSM.
Not really.
.270 wsm in everything is pretty much dead.
Semi autos can't feed any of the wsms well, something to do with the shoulder angle for magazine feeding (apparently even mag fed bolt actions hang up sometime)
The SAUM family was more reliable in semiautos.
>They designed a bullet to defeat near pear armor to 400m
Don't hold your breath too long awaiting that ship to arrive, anon.
Breh this homie really bought the Army’s bullshit.
No, 6.8 can’t defeat near peer armor at 400m with a steel penetrator.
You're moronic, they made some tungsten penetrator 6.8
>7.62x51 cant clear near peer armor at 400m with off-the-shelf tungsten AP already
Army doing gay embezzling stuff, nothing new. Swiss P handles level IV out to 350m, HAPI does the same at 450m, and its not like the "sekret sauce pls believe us" AP is gonna cost LESS than either of those two.
Also of note, plates are coming onto the commercial market that stop the heavy-hitter 7.62 tungsten AP options, so its kind of moot.
>Also of note, plates are coming onto the commercial market that stop the heavy-hitter 7.62 tungsten AP options, so its kind of moot.
No one could possibly have foreseen this. It's not like .50 BMG pl8s have existed since the 90s (that we know of) and the obvious punish for developing a rifle and cartridge optimized for existing armor is *slightly better armor*
>well a round going 400+ fps slower, with shittier sectional density and a larger cross sectional area, clearly 6.8x51 can't either
Consider suicide brainlet.
Im saying the solution to most body armor already exists in modern tungsten-core 7.62. Today, with a AR-10 and HAPI rounds, you can crack Level IV plates at 500yards.
6.8 isnt doing anything new on the armor penetration front, its decidedly shaky justification and seems to have sprouted as a sort of backwards justification for the program proceeding.
The rifle was dumb, but I like the beltfed, on paper anyway. Lighter than the m249 with bipod and supressor and a belt of ammo, even if you're down half the ammo. Way, way lighter than a m240. And better ballistics than both.
>the solution to most body armor already exists in aiming for the enemy's dick
yeah
>Nothing personnell kid. psssh, maybe youll have the upper hand someday
>now you have a ~5 lb plate flopping around and hitting you in the dick repeatedly whenever you run anywhere
congratulations, you played yourself
I'd rather be uncomfortable than dead. Especially if I anticipate someone shooting at me
>implying the soldiers of the future aren't into that
>t. mad they can't shoot my dick off
That was supposed to be the case, but the IWI shill made a video on israelitetube where he shoots one of those rounds commercially available, and it can't defeat a level 4 plate. I do hope the military round with the higher pressure and a steel penetrator bullet fares better, otherwise the whole point seems pretty moot.
The commercially available rounds are lead and copper, at ~200fps slower than the military tungsten core rounds.
>and a steel penetrator bullet fares better
they're not spending $22/bullet on a hardend steel penetrator. That's more than enough money to be tungsten.
>$22 a bullet
For real? So not ever issued in wide numbers. Not when every guy on the squad has a full load out of 6+1 * $440, plus $2200 for a belt of 100 for the SAW gunners.
>It costs four hundred thousand dollars to fire this weapon... for twelve seconds.
No, they've got 2 rounds, XM1184 and XM1186
one is the standard normal combat round probably with a copper/steel bullet and it costs a couple bucks per shot (price will go down once lake city starts production) The other is called the "special purpose" round and it's like $22/shot right now (again price will go down when lake city starts production). But even so just seeing the early low production prices we can clearly see the "special purpose" round is likely a tungsten AP round.
My theory…the armor they want to defeat is CONUS.
This
I worked for a fed agency that selected the HKP2000 over the P229DAK and Sig sued and won the contract for like 1800 handguns and they had to retool to add the extra digit for the agency serial number. They are scheisters.
It's a massive cope. It's literally just a meme variation of 7.62x39 they commissioned because they couldn't admit 7.62 was better than 5.56.
>What is .300 Blackout?
And 7.62x39 isn't even in the same category of this round, moron. Go back.
A way of forcing americans to buy American for the same product at 2-3x the cost
At least we make way more than 2-3x what you do.
>meme variation of 7.62x39
Do what? 6.8 NGSW is a significantly hotter, faster cartridge than x39
thanks for outing yourself dipshit, now git
>7.62x39
Are you fricking moronic?
7.62x39 has ~45-50k PSI and ~150 grain bullet at 2100fps from a 20" barrel
6.8x51 has ~80k PSI and a ~140 grain bullet at ~2950fps from a 16" barrel
They're not even close to similar.
so your moronic an have no idea what guns are or how they work. the NGSW 6.8 is a magnum cartridge. more powerful than 762 nato. Its closest competitors are 300wsm in performance. also 762x39 was replaced by the soviets with a meme copy of 556 so you are doubly moronic.
congrats on having the stupidest post of the day.
Fricking idiot.
The problem is there's indication that it doesn't actually meet the initial specs. If it doesn't, it can't punch armor at the distance they're talking (or potentially some of the higher plate ratings at all). If that ends up being true then it was truly a useless move.
A way to get new hardware in inventory to replace all the clapped out shit
There is absolutely no way they will be replacing 5.56x45 with this.
They will just be replacing 7.62x51 with this.
M14s/AR10s/HK417s - replaced
M240s - replaced
M4s - going nowhere
Refute me.
>refute me
no.
They're ordering a lot of M5's if they aren't planning to use them.
They're getting like 1000 M250's to replace M249s
They're also getting like 14500 M5's to replace M4's in FY23 alone. With another ~20-30k in FY24 and FY25.
What else are they going to use over 50,000 M5s for in the next 3 years if NOT to replace the M4 in front-line combat units?
>1,000
>14,500
>50,000
How many M4s are there? I'm assuming it's a seven, possibly eight digit number?
The M5 was never meant to replace the M4 in every capacity, its ONLY meant to replace the M4 for the main combat infantry elements.
The entire program is only meant to order ~115,000 M5's and around 20-30,000 M250s.
> The Department of Defense’s budget justification books for the fiscal year 2021 suggested that 29,888 weapons would be procured in FY 2023 (at a cost of $216.4 million), 46,129 in FY 2024 (at a cost of $336 million) and 54,056 in FY 2025 (at a procurement cost of $383.9 million).
>ONLY meant to replace the M4 for the main combat infantry elements
Yeah, only the teams that have to actually assault as manuever elements with more weight for less ammo, and might have needed more bullets for the whole "firing at positions known, likely, or suspected" thing.
Yes, I am biased against battle rifles, at least for the manuever element, and yes I will stop my b***hing if I see an army wide issued .277 bullet that penetrates level 4 plate, at range, without tungsten, because blah blah blah, adapt or die.
It seems ridiculous because half a century of worldwide conflicts have shown that there are certain trade-offs and advantages that battle rifles can offer, and those situational advantages are significant enough that it's worthwhile to give a battle rifle to maybe one guy, per squad. They're actively unlearning history's lessons.
Why not just give every soldier a rocket launcher so they can run around blowing everybody up like TF2?
Actually factual statements here.
>why not everyone rockets
I mean...why not?
Half the squad is missile launch systems with MP7s and half the squad is LMGs.
half the squad has grenade launchers so, baby rocket launcher.
dude they should've designed the M5 to take rifle grenades
everybody in the squad would be a designated marksman, assaulter, and anti-armor guy all at once—it's peak Big Army "goood idea fairy" thinking
"Every man a rifleman" hasn't been true for decades but it's a seductive fantasy
the virgin QN-202 vs The Chad Pike
>they’re producing
Nothing because afaik the lawsuit filed by the program competitors is still not resolved.
It was dropped a month ago
50,000 is not a lot of guns lol
in a single year or two for a program that was only ever supposed to produce like 120,000 guns?
Again you fricking morons, this program replaces the M4 in FRONT LINE UNITS, nothing else.
M4 will still be used very widely for decades even if the army buys every single M5 they say they will.
>this program replaces the M4 in FRONT LINE UNITS, nothing else.
What happens to the Minimi in that event? Do they increase the complexity of the logistics chain by 50% at the squad fricking level, or do they get rid of light machine guns for the first time since the 1970's?
xm250 is scheduled to replace the m249. One one hand, the ammo belts are closer to the m240s in length and weight. On the other hand, you're getting a spicy ass m240 with supressor and optic for less overall weight than a 249.
On the other other hand, you no longer have an LMG and you've offloaded the automatic rifleman role to guys with what amounts to a .270 WSM Browning Automatic Rifle.
The Army is actively unlearning the lessons of history.
Sometimes it feels like the Pentagon has an equivalent to the "publish or perish" culture you see in academia, where generals are expected to get budget approvals for programs—any programs, no matter how stupid or pointless—if they want to be taken seriously and considered for advancement.
>you no longer have an LMG
how so?
The M250 is lighter than the M249 it's replacing.
Just because it's firing spicy 7.62 doesn't mean it's no longer an LMG.
In that the "light" in "light machine gun" doesn't refer to how much it weighs—the PKM weighs less than a Minimi as well, but nobody calls it an LMG. Light machine guns are chambered in "light" calibers like 5.56 and 7.62×39, in contrast to medium/general-purpose MGs that are chambered in real rifle calibers and heavy MGs that are chambered in real rifle calibers (at minimum) and are generally fired from fixed mounts.
>the PKM weighs less than a Minimi as well
No the frick it doesn't it's like a 20lbs gun. M249 is like 15lbs
> the "light" in "light machine gun" doesn't refer to how much it weighs
How does it feel to be wrong?
> A light machine gun (LMG) is a light-weight machine gun designed to be operated by a single infantryman
> early light machine guns fired full-powered rifle cartridges, modern light machine guns often fire smaller-caliber rifle cartridges than medium machine guns – generally the same intermediate cartridge fired by a service's standard assault rifle
The new infantry cartridge is the 6.8x51, it IS a full power rifle caliber, but that is not what defines an LMG.
>he said LMG instead of SAW, his argument is invalid
It's a lighter gun in a more powerful cartridge feeding from shorter belts that the gunner will necessarily carry fewer of due to the size and weight of the ammunition. Even if you accept that modern technology will finally make battle rifles relevant, nothing about the M250's design will magically make it any easier to create worthwhile suppressive fire with less ammo that pushes the gun around more and needs more frequent pauses to reload.
>nothing about the M250's design will magically make it any easier to create worthwhile suppressive fire
A more realistic schedule or repair and replacement would.
This is the Army we're talking about. There are probably M4 buffer springs in service that are older than we are.
This
M249 is an LMG because it's using the 5.56 like the M4 and can be used by a single man.
M250 is also an LMG because it's using the 6.8 like the M5 and can be used by a single man.
It doesn't matter whether the 6.8 ammo is full powered or not.
This is a Madsen gun, the ur-LMG. It does not fire an intermediate cartridge. They're called LMGs because they are considerable lighter than MMGs or HMGs, they can be ported by one man and have an integral bipod.
You don't understand pressure, internal ballistics in general, or the operating principles of gas guns half as well as you think you do.
>a spicy ass m240 with supressor and optic for less overall weight than a 249.
I cannot wait to see how fast these flimsy ass things beat themselves to death.
Schlomo needs to sell parts too.
FN MAG is fricking sheet metal held together by rivets, because that's how FN did it. Not sure if it's extruded or machined aluminum, but I don't think the frame will be an issue until the retaining pin holes wallow out.
Not my job, but if it was, I'd be more concernee about chambering a machine gun in a magnum caliber, with supressor, that lacks a quick change barrel.
>that lacks a quick change barrel
by request of the army, SIG offers the design with a quick change barrel to other militaries internationally and it was originally part of the XM250 until the army told them to take it out.
ffs
I genuinely feel like drawing random COTS guns and tanks and shit out of a hat would be better than letting the military make its own procurement decisions.
The M250 replaces the M249
Both the M5 and M250 use the same cartridge.
That's probably how it'll shape up once the M4s get rolled back out in 20-30 years once they find out the hard way that battle rifles were never a good idea and still aren't, but they've said that they're replacing the M4 with this bullshit and I see no reason to doubt them.
NIG already lost the xm110a1 program to the HK417.
yeah
It's a steel base brass cartridge that generates 100,000 psi. Which blows my fricking mind. I don't think even the magnum hunting cartridges generate that much; I can't recall seeing anything over 50-60K for any load data I ever looked at. So. Massive felt recoil, massive wear and tear on the working internals, and case separations galore. I find it difficult to believe they'll actually build the fricking thing, much less field it.
It's because brass starts to fail around 65-70k PSI.
Below that it expands to fit (and seal) the chamber, then after it shrinks back down (for easy extraction). At higher pressures though the brass expands too much and can rupture and break the seal causing a loss of pressure and potentially damaging your gun, or even you depending how safely the gun was designed.
The steel head on the new round allows for a higher pressure because the point of failure is at the base of the cap where the pressure is the most extreme, so the steel can much more easily withstand the extra pressure, and making the rest of the cartridge from normal brass still allows the cartridge to expand to seal and contract for extraction
It's not even really a "new" thing, it's just now a major manufacturer has managed to convince the US military to give it a go. The steel head brass hyrbid cartridge as an idea goes back decades to handloaders.
Wheres my .280 british 6mm load for an M4A2?
Only the military cartridges produce over 80k PSI, and if you actually take 5 seconds to look at the cartridge you'd see that it has a stainless steel base specifically so the case doesn't separate. The all-brass cartridges don't go over 60k PSI.
>recoil has to do with chamber pressure
>more energy
>more recoil
???
are you a newfriend or can’t into conceptual physics?
That's not really how it works, you just adjust the gas piston to allow more gas bypass to reduce how much force is used to cycle the action.
This is basically the same mass as any gas-piston platform AR-10 type gun, the only changes you need are a stronger bolt face and locking lugs, and a thicker barrel.
There is no significant difference in recoil compared to say a .308 or 6.5CM AR-10 gun.
Would a 6.8 ~110gr round necked into a 556 hybrid case be kinda sick? Could use stanag mags and probably have a higher velocity than 6.8spc.
It's called .277 Wolverine. It's a wildcat cartridge. 90% of 6.8 SPC for half the cost.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.277_Wolverine
>hybrid case
He was clearly talking about something like .277 Wolverine but running at 80k psi like the NGSW round.
That's what they should have done instead of 6.8x51mm
I'm pissed they didn't pick 6.5 grendel. It's actually pretty good in a short barrel
Why the frick are you "pissed"?
They publically said they want 6.8x51 to be a calibre they can refine and develop further over the next several decades. A larger cartridge allows you a MUCH greater capacity to play around with different loadings, different propellents, different pressures, etc, etc. You instead wanted them to use 6.5x39? Why? Because it's your preferred meme caliber? It's fine, but it just doesn't have the case capacity for 80-100k PSI loadings, even if you gave it a steel case head like the 6.8x51 is using, you're still MUCH more limited by the cartridge capacity potential.
Go look at an RDP belt, gompare it to any disintegrating link belt, and you'll understand why 6.5 grendel , with it's .220 Russian parent case, wouldn't make the cut.
>I'm sad they picked something that could push 140gr @ 3200fps from a 16" barrel rather a garbage round doing 130gr 2500 fps from a 24" with a shitty case head and shape because it's based off of homosexual .30 commie
Sig is gonna make a killing off of this. They basically own the US Army
so it was ok when colt did it?
Hell, if people really hate SIG they'll hope this is how it goes, we all saw how Colt fell flat once they realized their cash cow was finally done with.
>thinks colt dell flat recently
Black person, colt has been garbage for 50 years, it gets drained of assets, sold, then bought up for someone else to run some sort of tax scam on it, rinse and repeat.
It's happened like 7 times since the 60s.
how tf did they go bankrupt
they assumed the military HAD to buy from them.
They went bankrupt basically in the 60s or 70s, name was sold to some finance firm, who fleeced it, and sold it, and so on so fourth.
It was constantly being used for scenes and scams then sold, it's government contracts the only thing keeping it afloat on paper.
They should've just went with an AR chambered in .243
Give it an 80gr projectile with a steel core, would probably go around 3,000 fps out of an 16 inch barrel.
It's innovative in terms of design if not technology, like building a mass produced car with a V-10 engine. It's also stupid and embezzlement is probably involved somewhere, like building a mass produced car with a V-10 engine.
it's just modern real frickin nato 7.62x51 but we're too proud to admit we fricked up by moving to intermediate calibers
>has the muzzle energy of a 7.62 nato
>is it a meme?
lmao
Its a money spending scheme and a way to have the military use a weapon most civilians are unfamiliar with in a cartridge no one else has, kind of like pla saying 5.8 is supperior to 5.56 but it just makes it impossible for a civilian to get ammo and a gun
If they wanted a weapon that most civilians were unfamiliar with they wouldn't have gone with the MCX Spear.
They would've gone for the True Velocity composite cartridge bullpup or the Textron polymer-cased telescoped cartridges in an AR if that were the case.
Going with a brass/steel hybrid cartridge in an standard .308 AR sized gun is about as close to the existing M4 you can get while retaining the larger 6.8x51 round.
some General wanted it to cement his legacy, put together the right powerpoints with cherrypicked data, ignored all counter-arguments and here we are
anyone who thinks it has ANYTHING to do with real need is a fricking moron who has never spent a day in the Pentagon where these decisions are made
No. Just buy a 270.
No
is this considered an intermediate or full sized?
Depends who you ask
> The Army chose the 6.8 mm round following the publication of the 2017 Small Arms Ammunition Configuration Study.
> the 2017 report called for an intermediate caliber, something falling in the 6 mm range.
It's basically a magnum caliber—depending on the numbers you look at, it's somwhere up around .270 Win or .270 WSM.