How could or should the 6.5 mm Grendel be improved?

[Guardsman26]

I agree. However, the yet-to-be-answered question is, will it be close enough?

Reviewing some of the interesting posts on this thread. I think I asked the wrong question.

Perhaps, I would have made life easier for myself if I had asked: what could be done to help military and LE users accept and use the 6.5 mm Grendel more widely?

The supplementary question is: is it good enough as is? If not, what could or should be done to improve it.

Of course, I stand by three comments:

1. We're not going to replace 5.56 mm any time soon, so don't bother trying
2. 7.62 mm is making a reluctant comeback across NATO - I say reluctant, because the very weight and recoil issues that led to 5.56 mm NATO supplanting it in 1979 have come back to haunt us
3. 6.5 mm is proving itself to be a very accurate and reliable caliber so is an ideal option to be an intermediate cartridge that is genuinely capable of replacing 7.62 mm
4. To actually replace 7.62, a 6.5 mm cartridge has to be as close a ballistic match for 7.62 mm NATO as possible while offering reduced weight and recoil (I am not sure what level of weight reduction triggers NATO excitement)

The 6.5 mm Grendel already comes very close to 7.62 mm across its performance envelope. One potential issue is that existing FMJ projectiles don't yaw rapidly in soft tissue. The same is true for 7.62 mm - of course, 7.62 mm doesn't need to yaw to deliver a fairly extensive lethal effect. That may also be true of the 6.5 mm Grendel given its increased energy versus 5.56 mm.

There is no reason why the construction of the Grendel couldn't be improved to make it yaw sooner in soft tissue, then even a 7 g one should be a very close to 7.62 mm in both retained velocity and energy as well as terminal effectiveness.

One of the issues I've touched upon but probably need to mention in more detail is the need for a tracer round. Would a 6.5 mm Grendel tracer need to be much longer than the existing bullet to give it the extra mass it needed to match the ball round? And if so, would this reduce case capacity and thus the rounds power.

Bill A., where are you on Grendel tracer?

It has also been mentioned using high-power propellant to give the projectile increased velocity and energy. This is interesting anyone like to suggest what the impact might be on MV.