Marines new rifle - rant

[Zak Smith]

No. In early 2005, AI was repurchased by a group of the original rifle designers and seems to be doing strong business since. The US importer gets rifle shipments every few months from the UK. Overall US market demand for AI rifles is high, and it's not uncommon for a used AI rifle to command a near-new price because of immediate availability.

-z

 

[Detritus]

ok cool, some times it's nice to wrong

 

[Detritus]

And not one person addresses the cost or the fact it's COTS with nothing new or revolutionary at twice the price of an AI that actually is new and revolutionary compared to the Remington 700.

welcome to American gunsnobbery, there is a deep rooted and often sub-conscious(sp?) belief amoung many US gun nuts that being made in America makes an item magicly worth more (shoot better, of better quality, etc) than anything produced overseas. this belief esp holds true of things that a "American Designed" if the competition is european in origin.

Plus there is a certain sour grapes aspect as well. (i could write a whole PAGE on this but i'll not)

personally i know than an AI, or a Sako TRG, is going to shoot better than I can by a wider magin than an OTS rem 700. But since i can't and probably never will afford either of those, what's it matter.
Plus my life and those of others are not reliant upon how surgically accurate my rifle is. so it really does NOT matter what i think.

 

[Kalashnikov]

I know Iron Brigade really well. One of their top firearms testers (greg) is my tattoo artist. I personally welcome anything they have to offer.

 

[LittleLebowski]

You must be rich then.

 

[buzz_knox]

welcome to American gunsnobbery, there is a deep rooted and often sub-conscious(sp?) belief amoung many US gun nuts that being made in America makes an item magicly worth more (shoot better, of better quality, etc) than anything produced overseas. this belief esp holds true of things that a "American Designed" if the competition is european in origin.

AI has an American affiliate based in Oak Ridge, TN, that does the majority of AI's work for American agencies.

 

[Zak Smith]

I thought the Oak Ridge AI location closed? The old guns had the Oak Ridge import mark-- the new ones are marked Mingus TX.

-z

 

[buzz_knox]

I thought the Oak Ridge AI location closed? The old guns had the Oak Ridge import mark-- the new ones are marked Mingus TX.

I hadn't heard anything about it since it opened. One site I checked still discussed the Oak Ridge location, but it could have easily been old information that hadn't been updated yet.

 

[woodybrighton]

AI are not exactly based in china and your not going to need vast amount of spares even I couldn't bend one
unlike the large number of SA80s I broke maybe thats why they made me a sniper

 

[GunTech]

The Marines selected a foreign made scope, I don;t see why they'd have a problem with a foreign made rifle. The AI is, IMO superior for military applications than a tarted up M700. Try doing a barrel swap with each rifle.

As Zak noted, it is a sorry situation when we can do any better than 1960s technology. AI and PGM rifles seem much more 'advanced' than the souped up sporters we are using. And after a couple of failures, I am not keen on the 700 extractor for a life or death rifle. Battle rifles of the early 20th century were almost exclusively fixed ejector CRF rifles - and for good reason.

And even if you are going to stick with the 700, why not something like the Surgeon action, which eliminates a lot of the 700s problems?

 

[Detritus]

AI has an American affiliate based in Oak Ridge, TN, that does the majority of AI's work for American agencies.

And?

having a service center in Georgia doesn't make Glock "american" does it. neither is the Berretta 92FS/M9 an "american design" the majority of the ones sold here as i understand are made at a US plant, but most US gunowners think of it as an "Itallian" gun.

my point was that Origin as in "where it was born, built, designed originally" has a weird affect on a lot of people. and sometimes that mentality bleeds over into decisions about critical gear for our armed forces.


I know AI is good, got nothing at all against it, i wish i could afford one. Unfortunately for me the closest i'll probably ever get to an AI is the other side of a pane of glass.

 

[Titan6]

War is expensive.

The cost of war (in dollars) rises the more you want to conserve your manpower and maximize the loss to the enemy. Eventually you get to the law of Diminishing Returns. However if you have an open wallet and are really concerned about the lives of your soldiers than diminished returns mean little.

As we now live in the information age we suffer under the notion that everyone must have the very best as soon as they realize what the very best is.

I am sure many remember the question that a young Army Specialist asked the SECDEF in "Why don't we have enough body Armor and why don't we have enough armored HMVV?" And he said; "You go to war with what you got, not what you want" (papraphrase).

It was a BS answer then and it is now. Are there better choices? Probably. Are there cheaper choices? Certainly. Will it do a great job? Undoubtly.

Armed Bear Wrote:

However, yesterday, when I once again saw a couple of young Marines tooling down the highway in a Humvee, I wondered yet again if the difference between the price of the things and commercial Jeep Wranglers in quantity (like ICE uses), and the extra fuel cost of driving the big beast on paved roads around LA Metro, couldn't have been better used on an armored Humvee in Iraq or Afghanistan a few years ago.

Since you were wondering I will tell you. The vehicle you saw cost a lot less than you would pay for an H3 or F350. They carry a lot more than most civilian vehicles as well. But in any case the services use many thousands of civilian type vehicles in just the role you are talking about anyway. They are leased through GSA. I am surprised you have not noticed the tags in your area with so many bases around.

There are dozens of variations of the Hummer out there and the contract price on them is actually quite low for most of the utility models. The Armored versions cost a lot more. About 5-15 times as much, or even more depending upon the model.

At the start of the war the most common armored version was designed to stop multiple 7.62X39 (and 5.56) hits at close range to the doors or windshield. Not high explosives. More of these would not have helped much. They have gotten progressively better each year.

The newer versions can stop most smaller IEDs (at least stop well enough to keep the crew alive). The larger bombs are designed to destroy a Bradley and throw it 50 feet in the air so no wheeled vehicle made (that I know of) will take that kind of punishment.

 

[Mantis]

Unless they have the USMC 2112s in Quantico on staff, they aren't fielding this rifle in the Marine Corps.

IBA does hire ex-USMC 2112s from Quantico to build their rifles. In fact a good friend of mine is a former 2112 who used to build rifles for IBA. Much more detail goes into these rifles than most people realize. The goal is to make them extremely accurate AND bullet proof, so to speak. When your life is on the line, you can't afford to have your rifle lose it's zero just because you accidentally banged it against a tree.

Just about anyone can bed and accurize a rifle, but to do it the right way takes extra skill. I had this same friend accurize a couple of my Rem 700's and watched him do the work. Never in my life have I watch someone work who paid as much attention to detail as he did. My .308 Rem 700 VS that he worked on will now shoot 1.5" five shot groups at 300 yds, and that's no BS.

On a side note, I had the opportunity to go to dinner with Norm Sr. and Rocky Chandler a few years ago with my friend while we at Camp Perry. We sat and talked for 4 hours. Rocky, especially is a fascinating man. If we didn't have to get up early to shoot the next morning, I could have sat and listened to him all night.

 

[Zak Smith]

Bedding is so 1960's.

 

[quicktime]

Bedding is so 1960's

Then why is it that 99% of all target rifles are bedded?
I might go as far as to agree that fiberglass bedding is 1960's
But give me a good bedded action in Devcon with a metal powder added over a block any day.
Especially on a rifle with any kind of recoil.
I agree that the guns used by the military need to be pretty much bullet proof reliable.
But I have personally seen my gunsmith throw a 100% custom built sniper rig down the length of the shop twice and it still hold zero. This was done for a retail price of about 9000 with optics and accessories.
There was no night vision however.
Nesika action, Lilja barrel, Robertson composite stock, Nightforce Optics

 

[Zak Smith]

Probably because they're custom built for target use with components easily available in the after market, not engineered from the ground up. Interestingly, the dominant Match Rifle in NRA HP, the T2K, has no bedding. Its design made bedding irrelevant.

Many modern sniper rifle designs have done away completely with the conventional "action in stock" paradigm, for mechanical simplicity, durability / zero retention, and manufacturabilty.

 

[LittleLebowski]

Mantis, GAP can build a rifle that will go head to head with and very likely outshoot the XM3 for $3k. But the AI Covert is cheaper than the XM3 and more durable and easier to service than either.

 

[24kshooter]

Benchrester's can afford to use old line technology of bedding as the rifle is shot under controlled circumstances and bedding is less expensive than a new stock or rifle platform. The new rifle platforms have moved away from bedding. An average benchrest rifle would be fortunate to last a week in the "field" - excepting perhaps a Tubbs.

 

[alsaqr]

Maj. Jim Land, USMC (Ret'd) wrote an article in a magazine not long ago. He stated that the Model 70 Winchester that Carlos Hathcock used with great effect was not a minute of angle rifle. The barrel was even lightly pitted.

The junebugs have gotten involved in the sniper rifle business. Now they want the military to have a special day or night scope and lots of other bells and whistles. The rifle and scope ends up weighing 15 pounds or more. With all the other crap he has to carry, a sniper does not need a 15 pound rifle.

US, Russian, German and Japanese snipers did a great job in WWII with service rifles and mostly low powered scopes.

 

[HorseSoldier]

With all the other crap he has to carry, a sniper does not need a 15 pound rifle.

He does if it enhances his ability to perform his mission, which such esoteric and new fangled ideas as night vision scopes and suppressors most definitely do

US, Russian, German and Japanese snipers did a great job in WWII with service rifles and mostly low powered scopes.

And could have done a much better job with more modern equipment. I'd be curious to know how many guys with kinda-above-average-accurate service rifles, standard ammunition and scopes of x4 power or below were able to make shots past, say, 600 meters or 800 meters with anything approaching modern standards of consistency and repeatability. I simply don't buy that a guy of any ability level will be more successful with something like a 1903A4 compared to something more modern with better optics, better ammunition, and better mechanical accuracy built into the weapon.

 

[ALS]

As far as bedding goes IBA's rifles will all pass a military drop test.
What is a military drop test you ask?
The gun is first sighted in a 300 yards. The gun in placed a barrel vise on a pendulum upside down. That means the top of the gun and scope are facing down closest to the floor. The gun it self is being held by the first 4 to 5 inches from the muzzle. The butt of the rifle is raised four feet from a concrete floor and dropped. It will hit at between a 30 and 45 degree angle on the top corner of the butt. This is repeated for 10 times then the gun is removed and shot at a target at 300 yards. The gun MUST hold that original zero at 300 yards even after the drop test. This test is to measure the quality of the bedding.
I would love to see just how many bedded weapons other than what is coming out of IBA, McMillan, Quantico, and Fort Benning pass this test.

 

[Harley Quinn]

The 20 pound loaded, (approx) BAR was used and it is heavier, had to carry it, so I know about that Had a "recoil rate reducer buffer" and would come out of your shoulder if not held in good. It was 30-06...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M1918_Browning_Automatic_Rifle

 

[LittleLebowski]

I'll bet a GAP could survive that military drop test. And once again, the AI could do better for cheaper.

Does anyone else here on this thread think that Marine Corps was wrong for doing a no-compete award for a rifle that is less capable and more expensive than a COTS AI Covert?

I do.

Next?

 

[Mantis]

Then why is it that 99% of all target rifles are bedded?
I might go as far as to agree that fiberglass bedding is 1960's
But give me a good bedded action in Devcon with a metal powder added over a block any day.
Especially on a rifle with any kind of recoil.

I really don't know much about the new rifle that everyone is talking about, but I know the previous IBA models were Titanium bedded. To do it correctly takes a lot more skill than most people think. I had a benchrest gunsmith bed my Rem 700VS before I met my 2112 friend. When he took my rifle apart, he pointed out all the areas where the benchrest guy screwed up. I never would have known. He was pointing out things that I could barely see.

You guys got me curious now. My friend still has close contacts at IBA and I'm going to try to find out what makes these rifles different.

 

[Zak Smith]

Bedding, with whatever material, is a manual and individual process and to do it right apparently requires "a lot more skill than most people think." "Manufacturing" processes like these that cannot be scaled limit production and increase cost.

Think about the logistics trail required behind these guns that are each one built custom. Parts such as barrels and bolts, and even stocks, are not interchangeable. If anything goes wrong, it goes back to an armorer who has the skill to rebuild any part of the rifle. On modern designs such as the AI or Tubb rifle, basically everything is interchangeable. This means they are more maintainable and repairable, and any many copies as you want can be manufactured on the line.