#Iwi

NATO member and ally the Republic of Estonia has released a tender with up to €75 million (roughly $86 million USD) for nearly 20,000 new rifles in both the 5.56mm and 7.62mm calibers, according to reports from IHS Janes’ and other outlets. The new contract is intended to supply both brigades of the Estonian Land Forces with new weapons, replacing their aging Ak4 (license-built Swedish G3s) and Galil rifles.

The teaser image of the new Tavor 7 that IWI US posted on Facebook had a lot of response and raised more than a few questions.

IWI US just posted this on their Facebook page.

IWI’s Galil ACE series of firearms was highly anticipated by many throughout the firearms world.  A series of unfortunate events with the introduction of the platform to the US market most cruelly resulted in pistols being recalled due to noncompliance of regulations.  Though elusive for a long time, pistols and rifles are now in regular supply, and I was nicely surprised to find examples of both while stopping by one of my favorite brick and mortar gun stores.  The Galil ACE GAP39SB was designed to be a more controllable version of the GAP39II pistol, yet is just as compact due to the folding nature of its brace.  Chambered in the affordable and widely available 7.62×39 and using AK47 magazines, the GAP39SB is as close as the US civilian market can get to the compact Galil ACE 31 carbine without NFA paperwork.

In an unprecedented turn of events, the Indian government has approved the building of a private sector small arms factory at Malanpur in the state of Madhya Pradesh. Previously, the Indian small arms industry has been entirely nationalized, with the Ministry of Defence-run Ordnance Factories Board overseeing the production of everything from armored vehicles to the somewhat notorious Nirbheek revolver designed for sale to Indian civilian women. Now, however, the Indian engineering group Punji Lloyd are partnering with Israeli Weapons Industries to open the very first private sector small arms factory in the nation. The factory is part of a new effort to meet the long-unfulfilled needs of the Indian military for modern, quality small arms in the wake of the government’s decision to scale back issuance of the troubled INSAS assault rifle in favor of older models like the AKM.

Recently, I wrote  an article about one negative aspect of bullpups which is caused by their much-touted rearward balance. Even though its scope was extremely limited, this article caused a lot of discontent in my comments section, and many of my readers expressed a feeling that I was trying to slam bullpups or otherwise promote conventional rifles as the ideal weapons. In this post, therefore, I wanted to address the underlying issue behind this: How do I really feel about bullpups? Put differently, which do I think is better, bullpups, or conventionals?

While at Latin America Aerospace and Defence 2017 (LAAD 2017), Israeli Weapon Industries released the latest in their line of Jericho handguns. The 9x19mm NATO/.40 S&W/.45 ACP Jericho 941 PL Enhanced handgun is a move towards bringing the Jericho into motion with numerous changes in recent modular pistol design. This includes a flattened polymer frame, interchangable backstraps, a rounded trigger guard, and more picatinny rail-estate on the forend. The 941 PL comes in two sizes, a full size and a compact version. So far the only difference between the two that we can tell is that the full size has one more picatinny cross section and might be somewhat longer in the grip. The handgun comes in Black, Green, and FDE. Offering this handgun in FDE appears to be a first in terms of finish FDE options for IWI as well.

IWI DAN .338 LAPUA Sniper Rifle

The other day ALG Defense gave us a sneak peak of their new trigger for the Galil Ace, well they just debuted it today at the 2017 SHOT Show. ALG Defense which is the sister company of Geissele Automatics started out making affordable aftermarket triggers for the AR-15. They’ve since released a few triggers for the AK as well. They’re calling their new Galil trigger the AGT-UL which stands for ALG Galil Trigger-Ultimate with Lightning Bow. It’s a single stage trigger that’s based off their AKT-UL trigger. Their new trigger is machined from alloy steel and features a smoother and shorter trigger pull compared to the factory IWI 2 stage trigger. The new AGT-UL is rated at 3.5lbs. It also has the Lightning Bow that ALG uses on some of their other triggers.

During SHOT Show 2017 Industry Day at the Range, I dropped by the IWI USA booth to see what they had for attendees to shoot. Besides their highly competitive Galil ACE 308, they had also brought the 5.56mm variant of the ACE, which is just now making it into the country. I got a chance to fire these two rifles side by side to compare them. Sadly, IWI’s reps tactically operate their booths with touchscreen-baffling gloves on, and since I ride solo at shows like this that meant I got no photos of me actually shooting the rifles. Oh well, we’ll have to make do with some glamor shots.

IWI, or Israel Weapon Industries Ltd., from Israel are perhaps most known for their bullpup Tavor models, UZIs and Galil rifles.

Please excuse the poor pun. One of the rifles in the new Ghost in the Shell movie is based on the Tavor. Here is a display model Tavor SAR by IWI. As you can see it is completely transparent aside from the obvious parts that are not. I believe these were made to illustrate the function of the rifle but I have heard that they do not fire. I wonder if the shell would hold up to having real internals installed and fired? Probably not otherwise it would have been done by now. Still looks cool.

In this episode of TFB TV, Edward O takes a look at the IWI Jericho 941 pistol. This Israeli handgun is built on the Cz75 design, and has seen many iterations and manufacturers over the years. It’s also found its place in popular culture, appearing in dozens of movies and tv shows, along with the nickname “baby eagle.”

Canadian machine shop RPM Precision Tool has started producing limited numbers of their enhanced Tavor hand-guards. Done in both key-mod and M-LOK, these hand-guards are designed to add a little more rail space to the Tavor without sacrificing the original grip of the rifle.

For the past four years I have staffed the FNH USA 3Gun Championships. I am staffing the match again this year and I am writing this as the match is being held this week. The match is held Thursday thru Saturday. Competitors shoot only 3-4 stages a day. However Staff shoot all 10 stages on Tuesday and Wednesday. During the staff shoot I saw Rebecca McCoy and Tom Alibrando of IWI competing with staff. I did not get to actually see them shoot but I saw them as I drove past to head to some of the stages. Two ROs that I am working with were on their squad. During lunch on Wednesday I asked them “So how are the IWI people doing in the match? How well has the X95 been doing on the long range targets?” To my surprise they said that the X95 is doing great. In fact they were almost one to one on the long range steel.