#Future

We are currently living in the most exciting era in space exploration in history, one arguably even more important – and certainly more dynamic – than when the Apollo Moon landing program was ongoing in the 1960s and 1970s. Today, a commercial space industry is set to provide transport to low Earth orbit (LEO) for NASA astronauts or even commercial passengers, and just yesterday Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX and Tesla Motors, gave a presentation detailing his vision not just for landing humans on Mars, but for making the human race a true interplanetary civilization by opening up access to the rest of the solar system for anyone willing to go.

It looks like it could be back to the future for the US Army, if Textron’s new carbine design is any indication of what’s to come. The company unveiled its latest prototype of a cased, telescoped ammunition-firing rifle at Modern Day Marine 2016 in Quantico, VA, on Tuesday. The rifle, which weighs 8.7 pounds unloaded and feeds from a 20-round magazine, is reported to fire a 123gr 6.5mm bullet at 3,000 ft/s, producing 3,350 J and rivaling the existing 7.62 NATO in energy. Military.com’s KitUp! reports:

In May of this year, I got the rare opportunity to travel to Heckler & Koch’s headquarters in Ashburn, VA, to take a look at some of the experimental and prototype firearms they have located there in their famous “Grey Room”. It wouldn’t be worth as much for me to just tell you about it and to snap a few foggy cell phone pictures, though, so I brought along Othais of C&Rsenal to help me take high resolution light box photos of these unique and rare firearms.

Previously, we discussed different concepts for lightening the soldier’s load, including aluminum-,  composite-cased and caseless ammunition. Today we’re going to look at the weight-reducing concept that many believe is the horse to bet on when it comes to next-generation small arms ammunition, and that is the plastic-cased telescoped ammunition concept, often referred to as cased, telescoped ammunition (CTA).

Previously, we discussed the benefits of and challenges facing saboted projectile ammunition, including the advantages of decoupling the diameters of the bore and the projectile, and the problems of accuracy during sabot discarding. One concept that could possibly provide many of the benefits of saboted projectile ammunition without the drawbacks is the idea of having a malleable projectile that is forced through a conical section of bore, squeezing it down to a smaller shape. This increases, to a degree, the swept volume of the barrel, while not requiring any discarding sabot and not producing “wasted” energy that goes into propelling the mass of the sabot out of the barrel.

After World War II, US Army analysts determined that the effectiveness of the infantryman was not as closely related to their marksmanship discipline as had been previously thought. It seemed that instead, the random environmental circumstances and effects, plus the concealment and movement of the target, had much more of an influence on the probability of a hit than the ability of the shooter to fire his weapon with precision. With this knowledge in hand, arms designers in the West set out to improve the chances of the soldier to hit his target, and the most obvious solution was to simply send more lead downrange. The simplest way to do that was, of course, to create ammunition that fired more than one projectile per round.

Previously, we discussed trying to lighten the soldier’s load by making the cartridge case out of different materials, including aluminum and compositing the case out of polymer and metal. Yet, wouldn’t the lightest possible case configuration be… Having no case at all? That’s the thinking behind one of the most ambitious ammunition configurations there is, the case-less round.

In the last episode, we discussed how the most ballistically efficient projectiles are the longest, most slender ones, with the highest sectional density. This naturally leads to the idea of using a super long, rod-like projectile which would in theory have excellent ballistic characteristics… But there’s a problem with that: Unfortunately, modern rifle projectiles are spin-stabilized, and there’s a limit to how long of a projectile can be and still be stabilized by gyroscopic forces in that manner (that limit is about 7 calibers long in theory, more like 6 in practice). This means that to successfully stabilize the longest possible projectile with the highest possible sectional density, another method is needed. The most popular alternative – and the one used in arrows, darts, APFSDS tank projectiles, and today’s topic, flechettes – is fin-stabilization.

One of the problems of small arms ammunition is that of swept volume. That is, the most ballistically efficient projectiles are the longest and thinnest ones, which cut through the air more easily than squatter, fatter projectiles. Yet, the best projectiles from a propulsion perspective are the widest ones, as they have the most area at their base for the expanding gases to push on, making them more efficient, especially from shorter barrels.

The metallic cartridge case was invented in the 1840s, and – starting in the 1860s – its military application brought with it a host of of advantages for the soldier: Now, ammunition was self-contained, weatherproof, and durable. Yet, despite it being a massive advance, the metallic cartridge wasn’t an across the board triumph. With the addition of a metal case, ammunition became heavier, and cost more to manufacture. In the early days of metallic cartridges, military weapons were slow to fire, and fired heavy bullets that made up the overwhelming percentage of mass of the ammunition, so this advantage was small. Ironically, though, the metallic cartridge allowed the invention of faster firing designs that expended ammunition more quickly, and as ammunition caliber shrunk and average bullet weight dropped, the percentage of mass contained in the metallic case grew.

Quick: What’s the most advanced infantry rifle that was ever designed, but never got the chance it deserved? I’m thinking about a futuristic weapon from Central Europe that fired advanced, lightweight ammunition and featured a high rate of fire “hyperburst” firing mode. Care to take a guess?

The United Kingdom has become the first nation in the world to receive  a modern cased telescoped ammunition (CTA) automatic weapon, the French 40mm CTCS, according to IHS Jane’s. The UK procured the weapons in July of last year to upgrade their Warrior IFVs, and as the main armament for the new Ajax scout tanks, expected to enter service in 2017.

This post was written as a companion to an upcoming Gun Guy Radio podcast, hosted by Ryan Michad. The discussion below will be expanded upon in the show when it’s released later this month, but for now, read on to learn more about the past, present, and future of infantry weapon calibers!

In the comments section of  my 6.8mm SPC article last year, I was asked what I thought about future infantry small arms. This is a subject that has dominated my thinking over the past several years, and much of the historical research I have undertaken has been in service to forming a better picture of the current state of small arms and how to improve it.

Those of you who believe laser weapons are right around the corner may be more right than you think. Laser weapons promise unique capabilities for destroying the vulnerable sensors apparati needed for both early warning and for modern precision guided weapons to hit their mark. Further, lasers can also be used against thin-skinned ordnance such as missiles (where the laser beam’s instant flight time is a boon to hit probability), and against other targets where a silent attack is needed. General Atomics, makers of the infamous R/MQ-1 Predator drone, are working on a 150 kilowatt laser, which could potentially be installed on an AC-130 transport-derived close air support aircraft.  BreakingDefense reports: