USAF ejection seat rifle

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Yeah, I wonder where they expected to be forced down. Not much big game to subsist on in France or England. Maybe they were planning on operations over the various African colonies.

Using German logic, they found an off-the-shelf solution for both Air Crew subsistence and self-defense for the officers. (Other then their pistols.) The enlisted may have had orders to pack out the MG15's for defense of the crew. A drilling does have two shotgun barrels, useful in getting small game and birds, as well as the rifle barrel for stand-off defense, and the odd roe deer.

Every other air force at the time issued pistols only. Even the MG's (MG15) were man-portable and useable for such. The Vickers or M1917 (or M2!) , not so much.
 
What he said. This is almost certainly a COTS supply contract, since assembling an AR isn't research. Even gas/recoil system tuning isn't R&D.
Yeah except they put the project out as a RFP with required sample guns and a promise of a contract to the winning bidder. Then after receiving, evaluating and testing the sample guns withdrew the program and built the guns themselves using the ideas they gleaned from the samples that were submitted under good faith that they were competing for a contract. That might have been perfectly legal but utter BS at the same time. Been doing DoD proposals and DoD funded R&D since I was in grad school. This is an underhanded way to run a procurement program and won't be forgotten by the bidders.
 
$2.7 million, divided by 2,700 = $1k each. Where do I sign up for one?

Looks to be, contrary to many government programs, quite a bargain.
If the math is correct.... even less per unit as the contract will include support items and sometimes a training package as well/

Todd.
 
Yeah except they put the project out as a RFP with required sample guns and a promise of a contract to the winning bidder. Then after receiving, evaluating and testing the sample guns withdrew the program and built the guns themselves using the ideas they gleaned from the samples that were submitted under good faith that they were competing for a contract. That might have been perfectly legal but utter BS at the same time. Been doing DoD proposals and DoD funded R&D since I was in grad school. This is an underhanded way to run a procurement program and won't be forgotten by the bidders.

Were you involved with this one? Seems a bit personal for you. I've been involved with plenty of DOD work as well, What they did was legal, and good for the tax payer. The AF shouldn't be paying rediculous markups to non-value-added bidders just because they want to win the Uncle Sugar Lottery by slapping a bunch of other companies' parts from Brownells together as their "design". If there was legally protected IP stolen, someone could protest or sue, but there wasn't, the AF just decided to organically assemble their own ARs for their own use from readily available commercial parts, there's nothing shady about that. Lots of contracts go out of that center, I'm sure there was no shortage of bidders the very next day.
 
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Noted that someone wanted one of the item shown for his boat... I work on a small boat (and have for some years since I retired out of police work). I would never ever want a weapon on my skiff (unless for some specific event...) because you simply can't stop the salt and moisture from doing what it does to steel... I won't even keep my good fish cutting knives on my skiff (except for bait knives) for that same reason. Tough enough keeping all the gear you must have in good condition but life for anything made out of steel on a skiff is very, very tough when you're on the water day after day...
 
If the math is correct.... even less per unit as the contract will include support items and sometimes a training package as well/

Todd.

True when there is a design/build contract, but in this case the work was done organically. I'm guessing the cost mentioned was just for basic configuration development, some reliability testing, and the assembly and distribution of the actual weapons. They probably had organic SMEs and engineers write up whatever field maintenance procedures and drawings there might be along with training guides, and of course there was already an existing depot (they did the assembly).
 
True when there is a design/build contract, but in this case the work was done organically. I'm guessing the cost mentioned was just for basic configuration development, some reliability testing, and the assembly and distribution of the actual weapons. They probably had organic SMEs and engineers write up whatever field maintenance procedures and drawings there might be along with training guides, and of course there was already an existing depot (they did the assembly).
Ahh...
I could only get a partial load of the link and thought they bought the entire set-up from the maker noted.

I'd love to see the in-house feasibility study with the cost savings from the Branch that gave us the zillion dollar hammers, toilet seats and coffee makers.

Probably made some folks careers..... or ruined them.:evil:

In any case, a downed driver having more than a pistol would be worth the cost of a zillion dollar Mr Coffee.

Todd.
 
Ahh...
I could only get a partial load of the link and thought they bought the entire set-up from the maker noted.

I'd love to see the in-house feasibility study with the cost savings from the Branch that gave us the zillion dollar hammers, toilet seats and coffee makers.

Probably made some folks careers..... or ruined them.:evil:

In any case, a downed driver having more than a pistol would be worth the cost of a zillion dollar Mr Coffee.

Todd.

FWIW, the greatest hits list of AF money wasting pretty much all involve contracts mismanaged or gone awry and lack of organic capability/tech data. The stuff done organically is usually fairly low complexity/risk (like the subject of this thread) and doesn't tend to make the news. With additive manufacturing capability proliferating at the depots, hopefully we'll see less of the million dollar toilet seats supplied in the onesies or twosies by the jackpot winner who happens to own the 40 year old drawings.
 
Everyone bitches when Uncle Sam gets taken for hundreds of dollars for a toilet seats or hammer but cheers when Uncle Sam goat ropes a bunch of potential contractors and never bothers to think if there is a connection. Point to another industry, that does not involve .mil/.gov, where what happened with this RFP would be tolerated or considered ethical?

Had they done it as an RFI and not a RFP they would have still gotten much of the same information on the various random widgets they ended up using for the internal build from industry without milking all the potential contractors for build samples and testing resources. The contractors thought there was a contract to be won, and thus expended a fair amount of time and expense to build samples and test the samples. Unlike when those random widget makers making parts for general civilian sales there is a fair amount of testing involve to ensure that it meets all of the Air Force requirements (environmental, rough handling etc) and in many cases the widget maker did-not/could-not do them. The Air Force let the contractors do that testing at their own expense under the guise of a potential contract to be won but instead it turned into a goat ropin' for the contractors and used the information to make their own internal efforts look good and cost effective.

Yes @Gtscotty is was personal this time. It was not my first goat ropin' by the government in the small arms arena, but it was my last, so I felt like venting on this particular one. When you wait months after they cancel the RFP for your samples to come back and get someone else's random hardware mixed in with your own, clearly abused sample rifles, cause the Air Force's give-a-f*** must have ran out before they finished playing with them, it sort of rubs the engineers the wrong way.
 
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I sure hope they have a tax stamp for that short barrelled rifle. Oh wait, I forgot those rules don't apply to them, just us.
Too, it's a shame to think the way rules are that these will never be on the surplus markets with any USAF markings.

Well, perhaps as surplus *kits* one day.

Todd.
 
Noted that someone wanted one of the item shown for his boat... I work on a small boat (and have for some years since I retired out of police work). I would never ever want a weapon on my skiff (unless for some specific event...) because you simply can't stop the salt and moisture from doing what it does to steel... I won't even keep my good fish cutting knives on my skiff (except for bait knives) for that same reason. Tough enough keeping all the gear you must have in good condition but life for anything made out of steel on a skiff is very, very tough when you're on the water day after day...

The solution is the stainless steel Ruger Ranch/Mini14....but you still need to replace all the springs every year. Unlike the AR, which will leave brass rolling all over your deck, my RR would launch spent brass at least a boat length away. /80ft trawler...
 
I used to fly with Uncle Sammy's Flying Circus back in the late '60s. I never carried a rifle in a Century series tactical airplane in SE Asia (no room). If you got into a shootout on the ground, you were gonna be dead real soon.

Some folks MMV...I was lucky not to ever find out.

Harry
Exactly right. A lone man, down in the jungle should think twice before he pisses off a company of infantry.
 
Without a closeup of the attachment system, it looks kind of like this http://cryhavoctac.com/qrb-kit.html

Then there is the DOLOS system that came out a while back. And this one http://www.tacticallife.net/TAKEDOWN-AR-BARREL-SYSTEM_c_73.html

Wonder if these were all out before the request or not, but they all look kind of cool.

I think it's the Cry Havok QRB

Midwest industries who, I believe makes the handguard on the real thing, is selling a pistol clone.

https://www.midwestindustriesinc.com/MI-GAU5-P-5-56-Clone-Pistol-p/mi-gau5a-p.htm

It does look like a pretty neat setup.
 
Aircrew survival weapons is are at the top of my interest right now. I just bought a rough crickett 22 for the purpose of making a survival rifle. I picked it up from lgs today and hope to start building the stock this weekend. I was originally thinking of a twist lock wire stock but I saw the air crew survival m4 and now I’m pretty stuck on that.
 
You guys might be correct but its still shady as f***. Those companies did a lot of research to find the parts that met the AF requirements. They also put a fair amount of cost into testing to show that those components worked together and that required some engineering investment. They had to tune gas systems etc to go with the various non-standard parts use in this systems. So it might not have been a theft of IP in a legal sense but there was a lot of engineering done anticipating it would be recouped in a contract and the AF stole that research/engineering effort and built it themselves. Shady as f*** and makes companies less likely to respond to RFPs from that group in the future. It definitely pissed some people off. If your going to build it yourself then do it yourself don't let someone else do it under the guise you might buy it from them. There is a big difference between a RFP and a RFI. One has and expectation of a contract at the end. Don't create a RFP and use it as a stealth RFI, not cool.
I guess people aren't free to just change their minds anymore. "stealth RFI" LOL tinfoil hat much?
 
I guess people aren't free to just change their minds anymore. "stealth RFI" LOL tinfoil hat much?
Respectfully, I would ask if you have read, and if not please read, my last post to this thread (#36)? I would argue they did not change their minds they simple used the bait of a potential contract to get several potential contractors to do their leg work for them and then cut them out of the deal to make themselves look better.
 
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