How could or should the 6.5 mm Grendel be improved?

[cory]

We only made 50 PPC size bolts for 1 small batch of barrels. They are being used but we don't hear much unless something goes wrong. None have broken on the PPC size or BR size.
I still have the first 6BRX I made in 09. 36 gr of N550 will push a 95gr SMK to apx 3200fps.

Are those bolts interchangeable with the bolts we're using now?

[woohoo]

Are those bolts interchangeable with the bolts we're using now?

No, they (800 series)must use a different barrel extension. The extensions can't be swapped with a barrel that has the gas port drilled either.

[tcte]

are these bolts and extensions available for purchase? thanks,Kevan

[woohoo]

are these bolts and extensions available for purchase? thanks,Kevan

Not at the moment. They aren't really a money maker so we produce the high volume parts most of the time. If we can get a few thousand 5.56 and 6.8 bolts in the bins we may machine a small batch later in the summer.

For target shooting and hunting the normal 9310 alloy bolts seem to work fine with PPC based cartridges. I just commented because a high rate of fire could cause reliability issues in a military weapon. 5.56 bolts break, the bolts with a larger recess are weaker and the cartridges create more bolt thrust so common sense says they should break sooner in the same type of condition.

[tcte]

so these bolts are to sensitive for FA use?

[woohoo]

so these bolts are to sensitive for FA use?

Regular AR15 bolts with a recess large enough to accept a PPC/Grendel case are, more so than a AR15 with a 5.56 size recess..

[XcountryRider]

What exactly are 800 series bolts. Whats the history of them and can they withstand higher pressures? I see thay are used in the 270AR SPR you guys are going out with. Any way to get on a list for one of those barrels?

[woohoo]

What exactly are 800 series bolts. Whats the history of them and can they withstand higher pressures? I see thay are used in the 270AR SPR you guys are going out with. Any way to get on a list for one of those barrels?

There will be plenty of those barrels when they get around to producing them, it will be this fall sometime. The 270 AR has a little more case capacity than a BRX, it is the same rim diameter and runs the same pressure so the bolt thrust will be the same. I've been shooting a 6 and 6.5BRX at near 60,000psi since 09 and have made a few hundred for customers. The lug attachment is very close to an AR10 bolt and these bolts are made from 9310 instead of 8620 like most 308 AR bolts. Gave you a link on the other forum.

[XcountryRider]

There will be plenty of those barrels when they get around to producing them, it will be this fall sometime. The 270 AR has a little more case capacity than a BRX, it is the same rim diameter and runs the same pressure so the bolt thrust will be the same. I've been shooting a 6 and 6.5BRX at near 60,000psi since 09 and have made a few hundred for customers. The lug attachment is very close to an AR10 bolt and these bolts are made from 9310 instead of 8620 like most 308 AR bolts. Gave you a link on the other forum.

Yeah saw that thanks.

[kamrr4437]

I think its a hell of a round. Its in between the 5.56 and the .308. Little heavier than one and a little lighter than the other. But still has excellent terminal ballistics to kill a man and has good accuracy at range. What do i think we need to do to improve grendel. More ammo. More manufacturers should jump on board making this ammo. It should be readily available like .308 is. If it was in the stores readily i think more people would make the jump to this awesome round.

Keith Maxey

[stanc]

What do i think we need to do to improve grendel. More ammo. More manufacturers should jump on board making this ammo. It should be readily available like .308 is. If it was in the stores readily i think more people would make the jump to this awesome round.

I imagine every member of the Horde agrees with that, but unfortunately Guardsman26 was not asking how to improve 6.5 Grendel for civilian shooters. His stated concern is, "what could be done to make it a better military calibre?"

It appears to me that the cartridge has been fully optimized for use in existing weapons. Within those design limitations, the only route left to make 6.5 Grendel better for military use is the development of necessary combat loadings: Ball, Tracer, etc.

This calls for an M80A1/M855A1-type Ball round for the US Army...



...and rapid-yawing, but non-fragmenting FMJ Ball for other armies.

[kamrr4437]

I agree with the penetrator and military offerings for our boys. If our great leaders actually put the grendel up against the 5.56 really theres not contest. The grendel beats it hands down. I will never understand there thinking for not adopting this round. The front of that magazine said it best. The 6.5 Grendel the best round the military does'nt have.

[Tony Williams]

I think it's more subtle than just lack of money - cancelling one new DDG-51 destroyer or a dozen F-35s would probably be enough to pay for the replacement of all the US small arms.

The problem is the official mindset. Senior officers are extremely reluctant to admit that there's anything wrong with 5.56mm, partly because they don't want to shake the confidence of those who use it, partly because it would generate bad PR and lead to them being accused of sending troops into harm's way knowing that they had deficient weapons.

So they keep trying to tweak the 5.56mm to make it better - something that they've now spent so much money on that if they were to turn around and admit that 5.56mm was fundamentally inadequate they would also be charged with wasting all of that development money in trying to come up with better loadings.

There is also the CYA aspect, in terms of the effect on careers. Nobody's career gets hurt by supporting the Army's official position (in this case, that 5.56mm is fine), but start rocking the boat by suggesting otherwise and you'll quickly become very unpopular.

Add all of the above together and what you get is massive inertia and reluctance to consider change, which makes getting anything different adopted - whatever its merits - a real struggle. Technical arguments can't prevail - it will take very senior officers and/or senior politicians to be convinced and tell the military to make the change.

[stanc]

I think it's more subtle than just lack of money...

Judging by history, money has often been an excuse, but never a reason. A couple of examples:

- After the War Between the States, military budgets had been slashed to the bone. Despite that, the Army adopted TWO new rifle cartridges. The first, in 1865, was the .58 Rimfire. The second, in 1866, was the .50 Government.

- In 1936, during the Great Depression -- a period that makes today's economy look like boom times in comparison -- the M1 Garand rifle was adopted.

Whenever they really want something, they always manage to find the funding.

Add all of the above together and what you get is massive inertia and reluctance to consider change, which makes getting anything different adopted - whatever its merits - a real struggle.

Which is probably the way it should be. If it weren't for this conservative nature, the troops could've been saddled with disasters like the SPIW, the HK G11, or the OICW.

Technical arguments can't prevail - it will take very senior officers and/or senior politicians to be convinced and tell the military to make the change.

I agree. History demonstrates this to be true.

[LRRPF52]

I think it's more subtle than just lack of money - cancelling one new DDG-51 destroyer or a dozen F-35s would probably be enough to pay for the replacement of all the US small arms.

The problem is the official mindset. Senior officers are extremely reluctant to admit that there's anything wrong with 5.56mm, partly because they don't want to shake the confidence of those who use it, partly because it would generate bad PR and lead to them being accused of sending troops into harm's way knowing that they had deficient weapons.

So they keep trying to tweak the 5.56mm to make it better - something that they've now spent so much money on that if they were to turn around and admit that 5.56mm was fundamentally inadequate they would also be charged with wasting all of that development money in trying to come up with better loadings.

There is also the CYA aspect, in terms of the effect on careers. Nobody's career gets hurt by supporting the Army's official position (in this case, that 5.56mm is fine), but start rocking the boat by suggesting otherwise and you'll quickly become very unpopular.

Add all of the above together and what you get is massive inertia and reluctance to consider change, which makes getting anything different adopted - whatever its merits - a real struggle. Technical arguments can't prevail - it will take very senior officers and/or senior politicians to be convinced and tell the military to make the change.

Perspectives
I see it in an opposite perspective to that. There are plenty of senior officers who would love nothing more than to cash-in with a major contractor before retirement, with a new anything, caliber/weapon/camo pattern/body armor-doesn't matter, as long as the trade-show job is there waiting. Then you have to deal with the ground-truth reality that a lot of gun/military enthusiasts simply don't want to hear or refuse to take into account, since it offers them no real role in somehow contributing to the defense industry-aside from actual service or employment to such end.

There are a lot of guys now, and even before from every armed conflict where 5.56 has been used, that know what it does and doesn't do. It's an excellent cartridge that gets a lot done within common engagement distances, even from carbines.

Real-world Terminal Ballistics
Many others and I have seen its killing/wounding characteristics, and have been impressed, as it doesn't look like your typical rifle wound profile that you would see on medium game, unless you shot one with a .22-250 within 200yds using a varmint pill (messy). Since people are much thinner-skinned than most medium game, you can let your imagination be your guide, or look up some of the rare photographs that have been taken of real-world 5.56 injuries/deaths.

The naysayers cry "anecdotal" and cite other anecdotes of 14rd non-instant kills (some people don't want to die, regardless of what you shoot them with. Charles Beckwith was shot through the stomach with a 12.7mm machinegun, and didn't die. He went on to be the Commander who stood-up and led SFOD-Delta in 1977.

Agendas
What I do see are a lot of complaints from people/soldiers who had an agenda before they were deployed, and no matter what their experiences were, even if they never saw someone shot with 5.56, they come back and talk about how "5.56 doesn't put people down", "takes 14 rounds to kill someone", "5.56 gets people killed", etc. I even had a guy who was really rude and emotional about the whole thing tell me straight to my face that guys in his unit unloaded with the SAW on enemy in Iraq with 50rd bursts, and still no instant kills. I then asked when he was there, and after some fidgeting, it was revealed he's never been near Iraq, and was in The Old Guard back at Fort Meyer in D.C. (who actually had some Companies deploy, just not his.)

I heard it from this guy, therefore...
I can most positively assure anyone, if you even let go of a 7rd burst with the SAW on someone, it will be extremely brutal, and yes, I've seen it done. These are some of the ridiculous things I've listened to though, from guys who can easily pull the wool over other people's eyes and put up a big front so that you won't ask the questions that boil down to them never having deployed, or if they did deploy, they were in the rear with the gear, or heard if from another unit that was in-contact, so now they absorbed the 3rd-hand info and internalized it, and will represent it as 1st-hand.

Look how people vote with their feet...
If 5.56 was so deficient, no Special Operations unit with the autonomy they have would even touch it, yet instead, you see a preference for it. Afghanistan is often cited as a reason to need a new cartridge, but units do well with balancing their small arms structure with 7.62 NATO and 5.56 weapons if they have the flexibility to do so.

Greed-based Surveys Backfiring
When the Army has conducted surveys that were prompted by greedy Generals, Colonels, & contractors looking to sell a new system to the military, to their dismay, 85% of actual combat arms soldiers who have used the M4 reported positive results with the system, to include reliability, accuracy, weight, lethality, user-friendliness, etc. Kinda puts a halt to any new opportunity for HK (facing financial hard times) or FN to hoist some new weapon on the soldiers, that will not do anything of value the M4 can't, and introduces several new failure points or negatives the M4 never had.

"Here's what you need! Thanks for not asking."
Then you have guys who decided amongst themselves that the Army needed a new cartridge that nobody but this couple was asking for, and went about a shady way of trying to force it on even their own community (who wanted nothing to do with it), and when their own and big Army said as much, they cried foul and that "soldiers weren't getting the best that they deserve", "lives will be lost", blah bl-blah bl-blah BS, to the point that they had to be physically escorted off of Fort Bragg after being told to stop.

Fan club to the "we know better than the customer" guys.
To add insult to injury, guys who are totally well-meaning find out about it, and grab the banner moving forward with such a project, and try to market it by saying it's "hush-hush", "can't talk about it", "super secret speshul farces", "order yours now-I know this guy.". That's a fast track way to destroy your name in the SF community, especially by claiming it's backed by SF when it isn't, and almost nobody else in USASF Command wants it, let alone the rest of USASOC and SOCOM.

The best thing those who aren't familiar with the way things work in the military could ever do to help with this, is devote the amount of time, energy, and resources they have spent on studying and analyzing the minutia of small arms, ballistics, projectile shaping, etc., and redirect all of that towards:

* The current state and history of initial entry training for both enlisted and officers
* The current state and history of NCO and Officer professional development
* Unit training standards and actual traditions
* Organizational bureaucracy and barriers to training by the risk-aversive military institutions in the US and some Western Nations

Grand Scheme: Cartridges/chamberings are marginal factors
This caliber/cartridge argument is virtually meaningless in the grand scheme of things. You want to fix something, go look at how Fort Benning conducts Infantry Officer Basic Course (waste of time/resources), or how the Army conducts PLDC (ditto), Infantry BNCOC (same thing) and ANCOC, or the SGM's Academy. Look at how the Advanced Officer Course is run (for Captains).

Where to place your focus
If you really care about this mess, and know what M855 and M80 are, but don't know what PLDC, BNCOC, IOBC, or ANCOC are, you need to fix yourself first before making any further comments about how to fix small aspects of a cartridge that won't matter if the leadership can't even run basic marksmanship training that is effective, focused, and truly improves their soldiers' hit-percentages. Hint: The leadership can't shoot well themselves, so how can they teach it?

Study the promotion system, rater system, and organizational doctrine and TO&E, and how local and State economics/employment blow military readiness easily away as far as priorities go. If you were able to devise a workable fix for that, you would be a genius. I've been playing around with ideas in my head for 2 decades on how to fix it, and I'm still stumped as to how to replace the gubm't gravy train teet with a no-BS military force that takes training seriously, only promotes and rewards warriors, while punishing and expelling worthless morons that somehow slip through the screening and entrance system.

[Tony Williams]

A few comments in response:

Yes, I know that there's a lot of things wrong with the way in which procurement works; I can well believe that training could be greatly improved; and I am well aware that in deciding what wins a war, the calibre of small arms is not a major factor. I am also aware that the 5.56mm is capable of inflicting severe wounds within its rather limited effective range.

However, it's a hard task to solve all of the problems in this world. I focus on ammunition (and to a lesser extent guns) because those are the subjects which I know something about. And while the performance of small arms and their ammo may be insignificant in the great scheme of things, it is not insignificant to the soldiers whose lives may depend on them, and they do not like it when they come under fire from an enemy too far away for their 5.56mm weapons to respond to.

The idea that the effective range of the 5.56mm is short, and its terminal effectiveness is erratic, does not come from me: it comes from the many soldiers I have heard from who have complained about it, and both complaints have been supported by official spokesmen from the US and other armies who I have heard give presentations about this. The weight of 7.62mm MG ammo is also a major problem to all dismounted soldiers who have to carry it, and its recoil is a problem in rifles, so a switch to 7.62mm isn't the answer.

I have myself given various presentations to military audiences in the USA as well as the UK, and the response to the idea of an intermediate calibre cartridge which could match the long-range performance of 7.62mm while offering significant reductions in weight and recoil has been overwhelmingly enthusiastic (especially in the US). It can basically be summed up as "you make it, we'll buy it". I well recall after one such presentation being pinned to the wall by a US special forces guy whose comments on the 5.56mm were too rude to repeat here, but can be summed up as: it's fine up to 200 metres, useless thereafter in any kind of cross-wind.

The priorities in small arms effectiveness I always give as follows:

1. Training: by far the most important.
2. Sights: with big improvements coming.
3. Ammunition: in terms of achieving the right compromise between range and effectiveness on the one hand, and weight and recoil on the other.
4. The guns: as long as they are reliable, their exact characteristics are the least important factor (although you wouldn't think that from the focus on guns, as in the late IC competition).

A huge amount of time and money is put into recruiting, training and maintaining a soldier. It costs a relatively small sum to make sure that soldier has the most suitable weapons and ammunition we can provide, so there's really no excuse for not doing that.

The 7.62mm NATO was intended to be the universal rifle/MG round but it failed in that because of its weight (and associated gun weight) and recoil issues. The 5.56mm appeared more or less by accident and was seen as a temporary measure particularly suited to jungle warfare until something better came along. But once a round gets established, it's a long, hard slog to replace it.

You are right that adopting a new calibre doesn't have the same sexy glamour as a big-budget new scheme like the XM25, but big-budget new schemes haven't being doing too well lately: not just the XM25 but LSAT have been stopped, and M855A1 is causing problems. I hear that the Individual Carbine competition was abandoned largely because none of the guns (or the M4A1) could deliver the reliability and gun life requirements because the M855A1 develops too much pressure.

Despite the budget problems, there has probably never been a better time to argue the case for a change in calibre. Whether that happens is, of course, a different matter.

[LRRPF52]

There are soldiers in basic training who continue to report that their Drill Instructors are encouraging them to aim low at the targets in hopes that the dirt and deflected projectile will have a better chance of impacting the target that way, and this trend dates back for decades.

There are units at the Battalion and Company levels who don't let their soldiers fire their weapons before deploying because the "leadership" is concerned that they might lose some of the new accessories, and that would look really bad on their Officer Evaluation Report.

This caliber debate means absolutely nothing in the grand scheme of things. You have institutional cancers that have metastasized into monsters that feed on continued incompetence and an abysmal lack of standards that is rewarded among the career-oriented desk jockeys, not punished and flogged as it should be.

After reading Tim Collins' book (Rules of Engagement), it seems that the same trends are ruining the British Army as well. I'll tell you one thing. These caliber debates sure keep us focused away from where we really should be looking.

[Michael]

[/QUOTE]Where to place your focus
If you really care about this mess, and know what M855 and M80 are, but don't know what PLDC, BNCOC, IOBC, or ANCOC are, you need to fix yourself first before making any further comments about how to fix small aspects of a cartridge that won't matter if the leadership can't even run basic marksmanship training that is effective, focused, and truly improves their soldiers' hit-percentages. Hint: The leadership can't shoot well themselves, so how can they teach it?[/QUOTE] From LRRPF52

+1. Although, some of them (or should I say us?) can shoot and/or understand how to train better shooters, just comes down to competing priorities for the higher HQs. To become a better marksman takes lots of trigger time…key word being TIME. Something I have never had enough of prior to a deployment.

Your average knuckle dragger is expected to be a jack of all trades on the modern battlefield – well versed in first aid, language and culture, negotiating skills, call for fire, sustainment operations, high tech communications equipment, cross-trained on 3-6 different weapons in addition to his primary weapon, etc, etc. All of these completing training requirements will weigh on a commander’s mind when he is allocating time for pre-deployment training and trying to balance what is required to deploy with ensuring his subordinates have a little time with their families before going overseas to a hostile environment...a hostile environment they may not return from.

[stanc]

This caliber debate means absolutely nothing in the grand scheme of things. You have institutional cancers that have metastasized into monsters that feed on continued incompetence and an abysmal lack of standards that is rewarded among the career-oriented desk jockeys, not punished and flogged as it should be.

After reading Tim Collins' book (Rules of Engagement), it seems that the same trends are ruining the British Army as well. I'll tell you one thing. These caliber debates sure keep us focused away from where we really should be looking.

Perhaps, but remember, we are shooters. We enjoy discussing guns and ammo, and that's what this forum is for.

Besides, how many here are sufficiently knowledgeable about US Army Training, Doctrine, and Leadership to even have an intelligent discussion? Not to mention the small matter that there is even less chance we could tame those "monsters" than there is of getting the military to adopt 6.5 Grendel or any other cartridge.

[woohoo]

Where to place your focus
If you really care about this mess, and know what M855 and M80 are, but don't know what PLDC, BNCOC, IOBC, or ANCOC are, you need to fix yourself first before making any further comments about how to fix small aspects of a cartridge that won't matter if the leadership can't even run basic marksmanship training that is effective, focused, and truly improves their soldiers' hit-percentages. Hint: The leadership can't shoot well themselves, so how can they teach it?

Study the promotion system, rater system, and organizational doctrine and TO&E, and how local and State economics/employment blow military readiness easily away as far as priorities go. If you were able to devise a workable fix for that, you would be a genius. I've been playing around with ideas in my head for 2 decades on how to fix it, and I'm still stumped as to how to replace the gubm't gravy train teet with a no-BS military force that takes training seriously, only promotes and rewards warriors, while punishing and expelling worthless morons that somehow slip through the screening and entrance system.

Do you think anyone posting on or reading these forums can change the way the men are trained? I would say most know they should be better trained, IMO it's kind of a waste typing it. Murray may have the right idea about building a better lmg and neither the 6.8 or Grendel will fill that role. A lighter high performance cartridge that will work in the LMG and DM rifle could be a plus, at least the DM can shoot it...or should be able to shoot it.