You may be right but I'm dubious of the caseless designs as expensive/not really proven. Sig claims it's 40 percent lighter on the MG version, and I'm sure the 6.8 AR rifle is basically...old reliable to most of us but a bit heavier due to the barrel. 5.56 to 6.8 I am not sure a real weight saving is possible, right wrong or indifferent.

I think the mag fed/bull pup designs are interesting, as SAW replacements but am not sure either really are a step forward. Not an expert however.

Quote:

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SIG SAUER 6.8mm Hybrid Ammunition: designed to enhance mission effectiveness, this high-pressure, compact round combines a significant reduction in weight, with the ability to handle higher pressures resulting in increased velocity and greater penetration. Additionally, based on the cartridge design and the traditional manufacturing processes, the growth potential of the SIG 6.8mm ammunition is exponential.

SIG SAUER Lightweight Machine Gun (NGSW-AR): with an emphasis on significant reductions in soldier load and enhanced combat performance, SIG SAUER designed the NGSW-AR to be 40% lighter than current systems, and dramatically reduce felt recoil while maintaining traditional belt-fed operation to increase downrange capability. The MG 6.8mm machine gun features ambidextrous AR-style ergonomics, quick detach magazines, increased M1913 rail space, quick detach suppressor, and vastly improves upon the operation and function of the legacy M249.

SIG SAUER Rifle (NGSW-R): a lightweight rifle built on the foundation of the SIG SAUER weapons in service with the premier fighting forces across the globe combined with the added firepower of the 6.8mm round. Features include a fully collapsible and folding stock, rear and side charging handle, free-floating reinforced M-LOK handguard, fully ambidextrous controls, and quick-detach suppressor.

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Really against the GD/ Beretta bid. They are the only design to not figure out how to go to such high pressures with a short enough barrel to not go with a bullpup design. They also are going magazine fed for automatic rifleman replacement. Hate both of these choices.

So, the 6.8 composite case sounds interesting;

Quote:

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Ammunition manufacturer True Velocity in early January finalized delivery of more than 625,000 rounds of the company's proprietary composite-cased 6.8 mm ammo to the U.S. Army for consideration in the program. The Army is looking to replace the standard 5.56x45 mm round, according to a company statement.

Its "composite cartridge provides significant logistical advantages over traditional brass-cased ammunition and gives end users unmatched accuracy, repeatability and reliability, all in a light-weight cartridge," the statement said.

The product offers a "30 percent weight reduction, improved accuracy, optimized muzzle velocity and increased ballistic efficiency," it added.

For a typical infantryman's load of seven 30-round magazines, that would amount to him being able to carry an additional 90 rounds, a company executive told National Defense at the 2019 Shot Show.

Along with the new round, the Army is also reviewing True Velocity's manufacturing processes and infrastructure. A production cell that occupies 2,640 square feet can produce as many as 27 million rounds per year, the statement said. The company occupies a 66,000-square-foot facility in Garland, Texas.

Company CEO Kevin Boscamp said: "True Velocity rounds will not only give warfighters a significant advantage in the field, but we believe our products and processes will save institutions such as the Department of Defense millions of dollars in logistics costs."

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I'd like to think that if they can produce this stuff economically from under 3,000 square feet at those volumes it would have a great impact on ammo prices, but of course it's not a drop in for any existing brass/steel 6.8 rounds;

Quote:

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This ammunition has a metal base that is integrated with the polymer body. All the True Velocity cartridges that were shown before were replicating the external dimensions of their brass counterparts. However, the NGSW submission has a different design of shoulder and neck areas. As you can see, instead of a traditional shoulder and neck, the case has a rather small step from the case body to the bullet. I assume that step is designed to provide a headspacing point. I think the bullet should be supported inside the case. This design should be more reliable due to the elimination of a conventional case shoulder and neck which arguably has been the weakest point of polymer cased cartridges.

To me, the benefits that can be possibly gained by adopting polymer cased ammunition such as the weight savings, cost-effectiveness, low heat conductivity, increased corrosion resistance, are truly a step forward in the ammunition design and I think one of these polymer cartridges will become the choice of US Army. This is just this author's prediction and only the time will tell what becomes the Army's ultimate choice.

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bullpup design not very user friendly for left handed shooters as the spent casings will land in your ear...

caseless ammo is interesting. would like to see how that works out and holds up. Any dramatic shift in log/transpo req's? Any special environmental factors that make brass casing still a better choice (heat/humidity, etc.)?

how do the new rounds hold up to loading and unloading from mags. I'm thinking of stripping out all of the rounds from pre-loaded mags at the end of a range day.

Ammo is the key, if they can crack that nut and get better penetration from a heavier projectile out of a lighter overall round it will give our infantry an advantage.

Most modern bull pup designs have ambi shooters in mind. FN started kicking spent casings down through a hole in the receiver. Other companies are designing the ejection port to be swapped left/right side. Still hate the bull pup, but a lot of improvement has been made since the L85

I am assuming the 6.8 version could handle brass cased ammo as well as the composite case? Because otherwise there would be zero logistical advantage in adoption. I say that because there are deviations in the composite case from the metal cased ammo.

And I keep wondering why 6.5 x 55 Swede was never considered. It has excellent terminal ballistics, accuracy and relatively low case pressure to avoid erosion of the barrel.

I'm sure size of the loaded ammo has a lot to do with it. 6.5 Swede (6.5x57mm) is longer than 7.62x51mm NATO. That would require a weapon system with a longer, and thus heavier, action.

A more interesting question, to my mind, is why they didn't go with the .264 USA cartridge developed by the AMU.

Langenator said:

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I'm sure size of the loaded ammo has a lot to do with it. 6.5 Swede (6.5x57mm) is longer than 7.62x51mm NATO. That would require a weapon system with a longer, and thus heavier, action.

A more interesting question, to my mind, is why they didn't go with the .264 USA cartridge developed by the AMU.

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Then why not .277 Wolverine which uses a 5.56 NATO case and launches up to a 130 grain projectile and can use existing M16-style rifle chasses, bolt carriers and magazines? A .277 barrel replacement is retail about $ 230

I concur with your point about the OAL of the cartridge being a disqualifying attribute for the 6.5 Swede. I do believe that UTExan was correct about it being 55mm. the 6.5x57mm was apparently a sporting cartridge never used by any military rifle.

UTExan said:

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I am assuming the 6.8 version could handle brass cased ammo as well as the composite case? Because otherwise there would be zero logistical advantage in adoption. I say that because there are deviations in the composite case from the metal cased ammo.

And I keep wondering why 6.5 x 55 Swede was never considered. It has excellent terminal ballistics, accuracy and relatively low case pressure to avoid erosion of the barrel.

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Barrel erosion is the elephant in the living room with the determination to go with a 6.8mm cartridge. The logistical implications for barrel life, especially for the automatic rifle, are going to make the weight and frequency of spare barrels for replacement an issues. The 6.8mm is going to wear out barrels a lot faster than any 5.56. It's not an argument in favor of remaining with 5.56 but they really have not calculated the additional costs in terms of more frequent barrel replacement both in material and maintenance time.

Historically, barrel replacement on service rifles has been done based on a calendar schedule. However, some very good research has determined (not surprisingly) that barrel erosion for military small arms inventories follows a Pareto distribution, i.e. 80% of rounds fired are from 20% of the weapons. This means that the weapons that fire 80% of the rounds down range lose their accuracy (increase in MOA for the cone of fire) long before they are replaced. It also means that a lot of the weapons at the other end of the Power Law distribution have barrels replaced when they still have a few thousand rounds of useful life left in them.

The calendar based replacement of barrels is both sacrificing accuracy and wasting money. Unlike artillery tubes, it is impractical for armorers to perform pull-over gauge readings on rifle barrels because of the tighter tolerance required for condemning a barrel and the armorers would be doing pullover gauge readings around the clock with no time left for anything else.

So, what's the solution? I believe that embedding a recoil sensor that maintains a lifetime round count for the receiver is probably a viable solution. Each time a weapon is checked into the armory (or, in the field) a reader device using NFC could read the weapon serial number and round count to determine how many rounds have been fired through it since the barrel was installed.

Sorry for bumping two threads, but whatever. Sig was selected today.

Here’s everything we now know about the Army’s new squad rifles: https://t.co/Gw3rBGXb2z

— Tyler Rogoway (@Aviation_Intel) April 20, 2022

This is the revolutionary component of NGSW: OPTIC

They went with the M4 remake that's heavier. I'm not impressed and don't feel it's a significant enough jump in capability to counter the additional weight it will bring. Despite what they say this is more weight for the average infantryman to carry. The weapon is heavier, the optic is heavier, the magazine is heavier, and the ammo is heavier. The only weight savings is for the SAW version, which is a plus for sure.

I'm not sure the additional lethality is needed for the additional cost of the weight. Additionally the Ukrainians seem to be doing fine killing Russians with regular 5.45. Probably because a lot of Russians are running around without plates in their vests, which we have seem plenty of evidence of.

I'm not a fan of having two ammo steams in the supply system as the current plan is for only front line troops to carry this weapon while everyone else will carry the M4 in 5.56. So a transportation company being escorted by an MP company gets ambushed and the Infantry unit that comes to relieve them will be using different weapons and ammo.

I agree the weight is disappointing, as is the mass of the optic, which is borderline ridiculous, imho. The weight issue is the thing I struggle with most. Frankly, a detachable suppressor would make a lot of sense too (can it not be quickly taken off?). Aren't all suppressors easily detached with some sort of QD nowadays?

But, I think the focus on 6.8 and need for lethality/more penetration makes sense as well. It's been 65 years. We/the army couldn't stick with 5.56 indefinitely just because it is simple/common/all over. If they do buy 10's of millions of these 6.8 (necked 308) rounds then the cost will drop, ultimately, and the real criticism of the 5.56 after all was that it was a mistake to move to this from the 30-06. Time is a flat circle.

Somewhat (to your point), the Ukrainian and Afghan conflicts have given a false impression of possible future ones, as in the former there were a lot of open/hilly/long range targets, and in the latter the Russians are just sort of beclowning themselves when facing a competent infantry (possibly with social media aiding to the perceptions).

There's always a temptation to fight the last war, instead of the next one.

Gotta transition from 5.56 some day, though I agree about the weight, especially with continuously lowering fitness standards in DoD today.

The MG version does seem to be pretty well regarded.

74OA said:

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This is the revolutionary component of NGSW: OPTIC

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It better be revolutionary at $10,000 each.

Looking forward to the announcement that the
Army will increase its requirements for marksmanship proficiency by 50% to offset the reduction in the basic load of six magazines from 180 rounds to 120. If the demand for ammo doesn't decrease then the ammo hauling capacity at the tactical edge needs to increase.

I haven't kept up with the Army's fielding plan but I hope that they limit the NGSW to infantry and USASOC. They inherent precision of an M4 already exceeds the marksmanship skill of 95% of military shooters. The enhanced lethality of a 6.8mm really come into play at ranges beyond 300m. They have made some very interesting cost-performance trades.

CT'97 said:

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I'm not a fan of having two ammo steams in the supply system as the current plan is for only front line troops to carry this weapon while everyone else will carry the M4 in 5.56. So a transportation company being escorted by an MP company gets ambushed and the Infantry unit that comes to relieve them will be using different weapons and ammo.

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this would never happen.... oh... wait.....

nortex97 said:

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Gotta transition from 5.56 some day,

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I'm curious to hear your reasoning for this. Could you explain further?

Ulysses90 said:

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74OA said:

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This is the revolutionary component of NGSW: OPTIC

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It better be revolutionary at $10,000 each.

Looking forward to the announcement that the
Army will increase its requirements for marksmanship proficiency by 50% to offset the reduction in the basic load of six magazines from 180 rounds to 120. If the demand for ammo doesn't decrease then the ammo hauling capacity at the tactical edge needs to increase.

I haven't kept up with the Army's fielding plan but I hope that they limit the NGSW to infantry and USASOC. They inherent precision of an M4 already exceeds the marksmanship skill of 95% of military shooters. The enhanced lethality of a 6.8mm really come into play at ranges beyond 300m. They have made some very interesting cost-performance trades.

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"The weapons will go to "close combat" forces in both the active component and National Guard as ammunition production ramps up, Burris said. Under the current fielding plan, infantry, cavalry scouts, combat engineers, combat medics, and forward observers will carry the NGSW. The Army will continue to field the M4, M249, and M240B medium machine gun to units outside of the close combat force, he said."

NGSW

92AG10 said:

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nortex97 said:

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Gotta transition from 5.56 some day,

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I'm curious to hear your reasoning for this. Could you explain further?

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Well, I don't want to be considered the expert on this, by any means, as a first disclaimer, but with that said, many studies (links in this article) by the military have shown that it is a limiting factor for the American infantry by training/ballistics vs. modern body armor/snipers/tactics, and against near peers with also similarly modern IR/night vision tech.

Not many people, incidentally, know that the Air Force/Curtis Lemay were essential in the AR-15's adoption, or that it was first tried in combat with 'short/small' ARVN soldiers who couldn't handle M-14's, theoretically I guess. My point being, we shouldn't be constrained by ancient history.

Personally, I think the True Velocity and other plastic/composite cased ammo is pretty neat from a 'geek' perspective, but I also think the NGSW came down to three bidders; why take on a new design, new ammo, from a non-gun manufacturer all together?

I 100% believe you are a more qualified subject matter expert than I.

Thank you for your service.

I do still think many informed opinions about what is needed moving forward diverge from yours. 22 cal is not…ideal. The new round is flatter than a 6.5 creedmore out of a 13 or so inch barrel.

I get it. I'm a gun guy. I'm not saying there aren't ballistically superior options to 5.56. But how much better than good enough is really needed? Do we need our enemy to be more dead-er in order to be more effective? It really is diminishing marginal returns at some point.

Personally, I think the biggest proponent for a new battle rifle is the weapon manufacturers. They need a new jam to milk the taxpayer for bigger profit margins. And some of those "informed opinions" are actually employed by those same manufacturers….

The Army itself identified the need for a projectile that could better penetrate modern body armor years ago. That is what drove the change in caliber and subsequently the new rifle. CHANGE

"The choice for 6.8mm emerged out of a 2017 research initiative: the Small Arms Ammunition Configuration Study. That report convinced Army leaders that infantrymen need a round that would penetrate enemy body armor much more effectively than the current M855A1 EPR round."

The M855A1 is a footnote but also a prelude to the NGSW program. Several years ago the CEO of Liberty Ammunition pitched to the Army an enhanced lethality 5.56mm cartridge that Liberty had patented. It was a different bullet composition and propellant that would provide improved lethality against soft tagets at closer ranges and improved lethality against platearmor at all ranges. The Army told Liberty that they were not interested in the design. Then, the Army "designed" the M855A1 which was an exact copy of the Liberty Ammunition design. Liberty sued the Army and won a judgment of $15.6 million lump sum plus a $.014 per bullet royal ty on every M855A1 that the government buys until Liberty's patent expires in 2027.

That's a lot of money and it is far inherent than Liberty would have gotten if the Army had just been honest and said, "We tested your stuff and we love it. Let's negotiate a licensing agreement for the technology."

The Army was already exploring larger cartridges to replace the 5.56mm and was specifically looking at 6.5mm. After getting spanked in court over the M855A1 they decided to go to 6.8mm lest they end up in court again with the patent owner of the 6.5 Grendel asserting that a new design was too similar to their design.

https://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/liberty-ammunition-wins-patent-lawsuit-armys-m855a1-ammo/

The terms of the solicitation for the NGSW are supposed to protect the government (taxpayers) from paying royalties on the new cartridge design. Army acquisition has a poor track record when it comes to acknowledging the rights of patent holders for designs that they want to use. Multicam camo pthere is another example.

If the Army is already pursuing a government designed solution and industry demonstrates something that makes it obsolete, the Army's first reaction is to tell the vendor and Congress that theyou don't really understand the requirements and that they Army design is superior regardless of additional cost and complexity. Despite the Federal Acuisition Regulations Part 12 stating that COTS, commercial items, and non-developmental items are the preferred solution, the allure of running and R&D project causes many program managers and their engineers to ignore FAR Part12.

This isn't unique to the Army. The "not designed here" mentality pervades government acquisition programs. I say that from the perspective of having been a government acquisition program manager.

https://www.arnoldporter.com/en/perspectives/advisories/2018/09/palantir-federal-circuit-confirms-agencies

Good background, but my comment was in reply to 92ag10's assertion that the need for a caliber higher than 5.56 was somehow foisted on the Army by industry. That Army apparently settled on 6.8 in order to avoid legal entanglements with an existing 6.5 is an interesting aside.

And I stand by my statements as a professional in the field. This was a solution in search of a problem. A new weapon system was a want, not a need.

On a separate note, I concur with the Multicam argument. What a giant waste the ACU experiment turned out to be. Adopt it in 2004 and we as a service (and service members) would have saved a fortune over the next decade plus.

From a procurement/transition perspective, they sliced a lot of money from the ammo budget this year.

Quote:

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It could take "three to four years" for the Lake City Ammunition Plant, the military's largest producer of small-caliber ammunition, to fully transition to making 6.8mm rounds on a large scale, Doug Bush, who serves as acting assistant secretary of the Army for acquisition, logistics and technology, told lawmakers. The facility is in Independence, Missouri.

While the Army is looking into new guns and slowly moving to field 6.8mm ammunition, the force could see a dip in the number of bullets it buys next year. The force's 2022 budget calls for a reduction of more than half a billion dollars in ammo spending. The administration's proposed budget outlines $2.1 billion for ammo versus $2.8 billion this year.

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Regardless, opinions on the 5.56 (22 vs. 30 cal) from people in the field have been varied for a long time.

Quote:

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5.56 does most of its damage through spalling, kind of a happy accident of design. Above a certain velocity threshold, the bullet positively comes apart in tissue. Even the much maligned "green tip" M855 steel penetrator round shatters into three pieces. This is well known, and backed up by research from giants such as Dr. Martin Fackler, founder and head of the Wound Ballistics Laboratory. But, velocity threshold is the key point here. And 5.56 sheds velocity at every inch of barrel below 20.

Now, as a GWOT era soldier, don't think I am completely negating the 5.56 round. In the last 20 years, ballistics have done a lot for improving the round. While it isn't ideal out of something like a 10-inch barrel, it is still much improved over even the bullets used Oct 3, 1993. Since 9/11, it has put a lot of bad guys in the ground.

And even among troops that have options about what to carry, the debate still rages of 5.56 vs. 7.62. I've used both, and both have merits. But so do a monster truck and Prius. My point isn't that one is better, or both aren't good in certain roles. My point is that both are old, and maybe it is time to evolve.

6.8 as a caliber was first tried at the beginning of the GWOT. A special project between the Army and commercial manufactures yielded the 6.8 SPC round back in 2002. It wasn't quite ready for prime time, but did catch on with the civilian market. Remember the British .280 caliber bullet from way back at the top of this article? 6.8 SPC is remarkably similar.

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I hope 'our guys' aren't burdened with a heavy weapon that leads to a shortage of ammo, and that they are as lethal as our training/dollars can make them.

NGSW: UPDATE

Further on the general subject of new Army gear:

KIT
GOGGLES
SYSTEMS
WEAPONS

Here's the only thing I don't get about this.

In a world where an EMP is a large threat, are their BUIS on these weapons? Because I have a feeling a computer controlled gun can eventually be jammed, hacked, EMPd, etc. and as a soldier it wouldn't be fun to realize your weapon is nothing more than a paper weight.