[aziator]

http://estripes.osd.mil/bin/download.php?filename=MID20527&edition=mideast

You will have to download it or something, I cant paste Adobe in to the forum. It is an interesting take by those that make desicions.

 

[roughneck2zero]

Those who make decisions just responded with "the bullet is fine, our troops need better placement". What about the M193. I think it was intended for use on soft targets (like people not wearing body armor).

That's exactly why everyones wanting at least 6.5 or 6.8 . This argument goes back to the 1950's. Many people were against using the little varment .223 round as a military combat calilber. Our military had been using 30 cal before.

Anyway, keep your head down over there...
cheers

 

[MrChem]

I have had several former students come back from Iraq and say the same thing. It takes multiple rounds to the chest and sometimes they still don't go down. Or if they do, they get back up. The U.S. had it right up through Korea. Use a 30 cal rifle cartridge and a 45 cal for a sidearm. Heck, in a lot of states you can't even hunt deer with a .223 so how the heck are you supposed to bring down an enemy soldier? The US should standardize a 6.5 or 6.8 for its rifles and bring back more of the M-14's in the meantime.

 

[Phalanx]

Amen the M14 ,At least Our Beloved Corps never totally gave those up.
Smith Enterprise is covered up with orders to rebuild them for the Corps.
US Ordnance is covered up rebuilding the M60 for the Navy.
OH a little line of thought ,if the new ass hat in the white house signs onto an Assault Rifle ban ,and they will.
The M1A or the Fulton or LRB M14sa will be exempt ,they do not have a pistol grip .
And an M1 Garand would be totally exempt.

 

[MrChem]

Well whoever gets in, I already have an M1A, M1 Garand and an FAL. So I am covered in the .308 department. You just got to love the Garand/M1A though. It is an excellent piece of work and the standard sights are top notch. The FAL isn't too shabby either but I just don't like the sights nearly as much. My well-used 50 year old Garand can still hit inside a 4 in. ring at 100 yards consistently with old Greek ammo. It is quite an old war horse for sure.

Btw, the Corp was very smart to keep the M-14, at least in some capacity. If it ain't broke, don't fix it!

 

[DSM]

we started seeing more of the Mk262 stuff being used almost exclusively. Most troopers were saying folks were thinking twice about getting back up after being tagged.


M14's are great for sure but unless they bring back a reliable manufacturer for parts it'd be a nightmare. THe honor guard asked us to order a couple parts and it was a nightmare finding NSN's and then who knows when they get in. Finally took some snack bar money and ordered on the internet.

 

[MrChem]

Doesn't Fulton armory make parts for the M-14? I read somewhere that got a nice government contract.

 

[Phalanx]

Fulton makes a lot of stuff for the M14 , the coolest thing i ever saw for one is the high heat polymer upper hand guard they have.
It replaces the fiberglass tan ,the one thing i never like about the M14 plus they crack . I tried a vented steel once and it looked good ,but i got heat waves coming off a hot barrel coming through it messing up my sight picture. The Walnuts look great but when they get hot the wood spits.
So i got the polymer in black and its sharp.
If you have an M14 with the cut out in the stock for the selector ,Fulton makes a dummy selector that fills that in really nice.

 

[DSM]

If Fulton got a .gov contract that'd be great. More of those things are getting dusted off and shipped overseas. It would be nice to see a larger or at least more capable projectile (LOAC legal mind you!) to hit the streets out there. That's a big, big choice to phase into being though. War reserve stockpiles, parts, manual changes, max caliber allowances on the range, the list is mind boggling just how one seemingly small change can make, no matter what it is. The 6.8 or similar would be great but I think we'll see every last drop of usefulness come out of the 5.56 before anything new is widespread across the services. I'd bet those 77gr slugs, or something comparable, will become standard over the M855 rounds soon.

 

[MrChem]

Fulton makes a lot of stuff for the M14 , the coolest thing i ever saw for one is the high heat polymer upper hand guard they have.
It replaces the fiberglass tan ,the one thing i never like about the M14 plus they crack . I tried a vented steel once and it looked good ,but i got heat waves coming off a hot barrel coming through it messing up my sight picture. The Walnuts look great but when they get hot the wood spits.

I got the exact same handguard from Fulton and it does make my M1A look sharp. At one point I was considering their metal upper version too. Have you checked out Fulton's SOPMOD for the M-14? A total make over but it isn't cheap.

 

[variablebinary]

I'd bet those 77gr slugs, or something comparable, will become standard over the M855 rounds soon.

I wouldnt count on it. The performance of MK262 has been greatly overstated. As a round, its main benefit is consistant accuracy and soft target damage. However, it comes up short in a very important area, and that is barrier penetration. It has far worse barrier penetration than even M855.

For the military, there currently are no easy solutions to the M855 question. For civilians and LEO our options are much better as we can easily pick up loads that will defeat barriers, penetrate deeply and do sufficient soft tissue damage.

 

[DSM]

VB- can't argue with the barrier problem, a match round was made to punch paper and not a wall or door or mud brick wall. Body armor is an issue too. The Sierra's are too expensive to purefleet anyhow, what we were hearing some time ago was some sort of arsenal swaged slug in the 70+ grain weight. Granted this was something said in passing we got secondhand from the boss at one of those conferences so take that for what it's worth! 8)

I'm down the road from Grand Island and Hornady. Picked up a few cases of their 75gr T2 TAP bullets. Saw some watermelons at the store the other day...maybe I could spare a few and see what happens... >