Just an update to a comment I made in the AMA about the military's new hotness as of two months ago, in response to this question:
https://www.themotte.org/post/296/im-a-gun-guy-ama
what's your take on the NGSW? I'd be interested in knowing your thoughts on the LMG and service rifle aspects of it, as well as your thoughts on the entire program.
To which I replied:
All these "new infantry arms" are a boondoggle for arms manufacturers. Billions of dollars to not replace the M16, or to marginally improve some esoteric aspect of the platform. The M5 is not going to be the standard infantry arm of the US military.
Today's update: https://www.armytimes.com/opinion/commentary/2023/02/28/the-not-really-next-generation-weapons-program/
Pull quotes:
the Next Generation Squad Weapons program is imploding before Army’s very eyes. The program is on mechanical life support, with its progenitors at the Joint Chiefs obstinately now ramming the program through despite spectacularly failing multiple civilian-sector peer reviews almost immediately upon commercial release.
Starting from a highly dubious intellectual, strategic and tactical baseline, the NGSW program is now failing mechanically and ballistically at once. Army came out hard with the program’s aims and expectations, unreasonably so, practically declaring a War on Physics from the outset. Unfortunately, like so many other antecedent programs Army has lost the war again, badly. In terms of weight, recoil, durability and ballistics, expectations vs reality are crashing down on Army right now, hard.
Consider this my victory lap.
And next year, when the Army announces another hundreds of millions of dollars for some new secret-squirrel marketing program, give it six months. They'll be exposed as frauds before too long.
Edit: I should say that my extreme skepticism at the time was a bit uncomfortable. People who know more than me (and thus should know better) were saying the system worked. I didn't have access to any good data, but the math just didn't add up to me. I'm not a weapon designer, but I have a pretty good idea of what the normal ranges for technical specs are. Turns out, it really was all just marketing. Every time I think I'm too cynical, it turns out I wasn't quite cynical enough.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
It all ultimately comes down to unit cost.
Contrary to what US market prices might have you believe (and the worst import laws in the world help keep foreign gun prices high), AR-15s are one of the most expensive modern rifles to make- they require more machine time and labor than any other modern rifle. Sure, forging helps get the rough shape right and saves a good chunk of process time, but you still spend a lot of time drilling and tapping holes and milling into that final shape and that gets expensive fast.
You know what's dirt cheap by contrast? Aluminum and plastic extrusions.
Every modern rifle is made this way. They're not nearly as outwardly blatant about it as the Bushmaster M17s is, but aluminum and plastic extrusions require vanishingly little post-processing time: the tubes need to be cut to length and have a few holes cut into them, and the plastic lower assembly needs nothing else (if it needs to be made in 2 halves, like the KE15 does, it can be automatically welded closed). Install the other parts (doesn't require trained labor, even for the barrels most of the time) and the gun's out the door. The upper half doesn't even need to be aluminum if you're smart about it (Beretta was, HK was not) which means even less cost and weight (for the cost of significantly less sustained fire capability and slightly less durability, like the AR).
So why's the AR not made that way too? Because you can't make an AR any other way without losing its unique advantages. The BCG and buffer has to sit where it does mainly for balance reasons- all piston guns except for the AR are front-heavy, and because they usually pack on a pound and a half for reasons related to that aluminum extrusion the balance is worse than a similarly-equipped AR. The Perun X16 is a really good try, but I think most reviewers are confusing more weight with better overall handling. This isn't even something the KE15/WWSD solves, being that it requires more reinforcement material because the stock and lower are one unit and, if you're not using the thinnest barrel and lightest forend you can manage, compromises the balance just the same.
More options
Context Copy link