02-19-2022, 01:39 AM
BluntForceTrauma Wrote:Am not necessarily advocating the 65CM as an issue round though I wouldn't complain if it replaced 7.62 NATO. My main point was to question the need to reinvent the wheel of 6.8 NGSW if 65CM can do just as well.
Having said that, could be the marketers of the 65CM AP I saw at SHOT Show had somehow gamed the system wouldn't be the first time! or that the increased pressure and velocity of the 6.8 NGSW truly is truly necessary to achieve DOD's goal.
BFT:
Yes, could be they were and just as likely they weren't. The 6.5 CM is a great and efficient cartridge and a 6.5mm projectile, being thinner than a 7.62, can be made longer and more streamlined. And sectional density plus velocity give a AP round great potential to penetrate stuff. That said, I think the 6.8 is for issue to all combat arms personnel -- at least initially so high speed 6.5 mm bullets shot from a CM are probably not going to happen. I bet those guys were showing the potential of their ammo in terms of specialized units with the need and skills to use it effectively.
One thing about this whole 6.8 business is that the requirements are forcing industry to find technologies that meet the requirements. Not leap ahead in my opinion but better than just inventing a new cartridge that doesn't do much more than what we have right now, that didn't do much more than what we had 115 years ago during WWI.
Personally -- I don't have any real bone to pick with the 6.8 as a bullet diameter other than no one has explained to me how using a bullet of that diameter would somehow be a leap ahead of any other diameter. I think that is really what bothers me about the whole thing.
LR-55