New British Army Rifle?

[Sim G]

Pull up a sandbag, ooman, and listen...

Firstly, reliability. It worked irrespective of whether it was covered in mud, sand, water or a mix of all three. Try trogging through the Shatt al Arab marshes all day and keeping it clean when you're being shot at. It worked when others rifles didn't: we had US, Dutch and Spanish troops serving alongside and they all envied its reliability. You may not want to hear that.

Secondly, accuracy. It has a tendency to hit what its fired at, within range limitations, i.e. it's good enough for 500 mard engagements. (Your accuracy may vary, particularly on a two way range.)

Poor balance ? Try using it properly. Yes, it's poor for drill. In combat the weight is where it needs to be, close in. It's easy to carry, especially in CCW*. See comment about accuracy above.

Terrible ergonomics? Only for drill. It's short and easy to climb in and out of vehicles (OTC**, wok-woks or CRA***) , very quickly, with. It's short and so easy to point in close confines. Try fighting room to room or in narrow alleys in an Arab town with something longer. It's short and heavy, pretty good in a room to room bayonet fight.

Poor trigger ? It's not an F class target rifle. When the adrenaline is flowing and the targets are shooting back, our paw / eye co-ordination and fine motor control is almost certainly a little less honed than yours might be at Bisley. The trigger does the job well enough, even when coated in silt. You may not want to hear that.

Can't fire it left pawed ? Agreed. It's not perfect. Its day has passed: it could do with scrapping and replacing by the EM-2.

Pretty much puts to bed a lot of what has been said about the rifle. Good shout.

[meles meles]

Good shout.

We can be quite gobby when need arises...

[Fedaykin]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_wdhN5_RpX4

I see you're a Forgotten Weapons Fan too.

Indeed! Arguably one of the best gun channels on Youtube, informative, interesting and accessible.

[Fedaykin]

Can't fire it left pawed ? Agreed. It's not perfect. Its day has passed: it could do with scrapping and replacing by the EM-2.

I can see you are keen on the EM-2 but there is pretty much zero chance anybody is going to put it into production. Manufacturing wise it is a gun from another era, have a look back at that video I put up where you get a close look at the receiver. As Ian at Forgotten Weapons says it is insanity, significant machining is required to make it and for the cost of one EM-2 you could probably make several FAL(SLR). The gun also has a fair few features that might well be unwelcome now like the chambering of a round when the magazine is inserted, just imagine the potential for ND's! It is a beautiful rifle but flawed nevertheless, my guess is even if it had entered service plenty of changes would of been made to the core design to bring down cost and iron out quirks.

What interest would any modern manufacturer have putting in a complex and expensive to make rifle that needs further development when there are plenty of other established designs available off the shelf?

[meles meles]

It depends upon the manufacturer. We'd imagine BAE would love the job: imagine how much time and money they could spend sorting out the issues you mentioned ! The cash till would be ringing for a decade.

A progressive manufacturer, on the other paw, ideally one who makes automotive parts and is used to delivering on time and at reducing cost with fines for warranty issues arising, would quickly and effectively sort the remaining issues and have an improved version of the rifle in service within 12 months.

[Fedaykin]

Well one can dream I suppose but the idea the EM-2 will ever see the light of day in modern guise is fantasy, there are other established designs available that don't need significant reworking. Again look at the video, the receiver is an expensive machining nightmare. If BAE Systems go after the contract it would be via one of their subsidiaries but I am sceptical, they have all but pulled out of the small arms market. In theory that part of the business is centred at the Land Systems site in Barrow but they would be going from a cold start. I have seen several people state BAE would love the money but if you look at their current business and product portfolio Small Arms are just not there. They would have to buy someone else to get back in. Small Arms manufacture is a small niche business in the UK these days, those who do service the military market are making small batches of specialised arms like AI with their Sniper Rifles. I suppose the company who have the greatest potential of scaling up is Manroy engineering who make machine guns and it is interesting to note that FN have just purchased them. I could see FN bidding the contract with the SCAR using their UK based Manroy subsidiary doing certain work.

http://www.manroy.com/

I have seen the argument that an automotive components manufacturer could just step in but I am still sceptical, just a few too many what ifs and the vagaries of the Section 5 world to get over before anybody went down that path. Anybody who wins the contract to replace the L85 will be from the big players who can produce vast numbers of rifles quickly along with ancillary equipment at a low unit price.

Of course that is even if the L85 is replaced, there is an argument to carry on reworking the rifle. There have been some interesting recent trials with stellite barrels.

[DaveB]

[quote="Sim G] Pretty much puts to bed a lot of what has been said about the rifle. Good shout.[/quote]


Only if you happen to agree with what he's said. I don't happen to agree. But then I freely admit to being prejudiced. My dislike is not confined to the L85, I loathe all bull-pup designs. We have the Steyr AUG here. I absolutely cannot find any affection for that one either. Every time I picked one up, it made me miss my C7. In fact I disliked it so much it even made me nostalgic for the C1A1.

[Fedaykin]

The Forgotten Weapons website has really interesting information about the EM-1 and EM-2 including manuals:

http://www.forgottenweapons.com/rifles/em1

http://www.forgottenweapons.com/wp-cont ... 0Notes.pdf (EM-1 Manual)

http://www.forgottenweapons.com/british-em-2/

http://www.forgottenweapons.com/em-2-rifle-manual/

Ian and the team at Forgotten Weapons do some amazing stuff!

[Sim G]

Only if you happen to agree with what he's said. I don't happen to agree. But then I freely admit to being prejudiced. My dislike is not confined to the L85, I loathe all bull-pup designs. We have the Steyr AUG here. I absolutely cannot find any affection for that one either. Every time I picked one up, it made me miss my C7. In fact I disliked it so much it even made me nostalgic for the C1A1.

I was initially trained on the L1A1, I was then trained on the SA80. Didn't have a lot of time with it as a change of role saw me issued an again, different weapon. In my time with my parent battalion, I never used an SA80A2, but I never experienced the failures that many did with the A1. And even as a "gun bloke", the SA80 never made me want to go back to the SLR, as I had full auto!! Ergonomics, weight, complexity never really bothered me in my youth as I was blessed with being able to carry more than most, tab further than most whilst carrying that and was able to physically perform fine manipulation as a matter of course. I liked guns, I liked them a lot, any guns and enjoyed them all, except the AK family... Consequently, I felt at ease with any. A lot of my colleagues did not.

Still, nothing funnier than watching "Johnny big balls, old sweat" get himself into a right old tizzy attempting to use the change lever of an SA80 or change mags whilst getting the weapon caught in pouches, pockets and webbing..... Happy Days!

[huntervixen]

It depends upon the manufacturer. We'd imagine BAE would love the job: imagine how much time and money they could spend sorting out the issues you mentioned ! The cash till would be ringing for a decade.

A progressive manufacturer, on the other paw, ideally one who makes automotive parts and is used to delivering on time and at reducing cost with fines for warranty issues arising, would quickly and effectively sort the remaining issues and have an improved version of the rifle in service within 12 months.

Absolutely agree, DO NOT LET BAE SYSTEMS ANYWHERE NEAR THIS I would like to see whatever is procured, built and assembled and supported in this country though.

As for those who have had combat experience with the A2, it is good to hear our lads at the tip of the spear finally have a rifle that works, the really sad thing about such statement is having to say that at all

It should be a given that a service rifle/weapon system/ issued pacifying equipment, whatever its called these days, should work and work very well, we only have a small military, so it should be equipped with the very best kit available, re working the prototype L85 to save money to an extreme, was stabbing our armed forces in the back, such penny pinching is understandable during a world war (Sten mk3 comes to mind in-particular) but, when your intention is only to build 300,000 ish for a small professional military in the first place, it is just not justified on any level.

The engineers who engaged in this practice must have known what the resuts of this deliberate downgrading of the design would be????!!!!

As for the people that say, if you have never been to war with one, you shouldn't have an opinion ...... well, I have never never dated a politician either, but I know they are all self serving ba***rds!