05-18-2012, 06:27 PM
More info from Tony Williams:
Quote:GD took the gun down to the range session at the end of NDIA, so (after a long wait in the queue) I was able to fire it. That is one impressive gun. I was instantly aware, from anywhere on the range, when it was firing. That deep, measured hammering sounds very different from all the 7.62mms and 5.56mms (which to my ears sound very similar). I couldn't really judge recoil because it was on a tripod, but it stayed on-target between bursts. GD were obviously so confident about the gun that they gave literally scores of tyros like me the chance to shoot it, in a steady stream (they were working hard to belt up the ammo - Black Hills manufacture, loaded with 300 grain Sierra MatchKing).
Some notes from the GD presentation:
- ballistic drop similar to .50 ball at 1500m
- defeats Level III body armour at 1000m
- delivers 4x the energy of 7.62mm at 1000m
- can maintain 10 minutes of continuous suppressive fire (50-100 rpm) without a barrel change
- very quick-change barrel (the carrying handle is on the barrel)
- quickly strips down into a few parts
- will fit on any M240 mounting (doesn't need a soft mount - the mechanism has its own, built in)
- the gun mechanism is called Short Recoil Impulse Averaging: it uses gas operation, but the barrel group recoils in the receiver and fires as it is moving forwards, giving a very smooth recoil push rather than a series of sharp kicks
- forward-stripping link specially designed: normal load 50-round soft pouch
- weight of gun plus one minute's worth of ammo (500 rounds) = 105 lbs, compared with similar load for M240 (800 rounds) = 100 lbs.
- GD working on polymer-cased ammo to reduce the weight.
I can imagine that troops facing long-range attacks in Afghanistan would be queueing up to carry this one into battle, despite the ammo weight. It provides what the US Army keeps stressing it needs: "overmatch". Unlike the M240, which can only match the performance of the PKM (with a lot more weight), this one will make PKM gunners afraid.
http://iaaforum.org/forum3/viewtopic.php?p=91061#p91061