5.56mm Carbine Weapon (W52H09-06-R-0195)

Light Machine Gun (W15QKN-06-R-0488)

The reciever on the LMG is only to last 3 times as long as a barrel?

The LMG shall have a regular barrel and short barrel that exhibit barrel life of 15,000 rounds

The LMG shall have a receiver life of 50,000 rounds

I like the idea of keeping standard rails.  They should have done that last time......

I'm sorry, what exactly are those docs? Are they order forms or test requests?

Barrel on the Carbine is only required to last 10,000rds.

It's also supposed to be 6.5 lbs unloaded. I bet this will be rather difficult to accomplish.

The 15 hits out of 30rds on a target at 300m doesn't sound too bad for accuracy requirements, sounds easily attainable, actually.

WIZZO

These are requests for proposals, essentially a request for vendors to bid on the opportunity listed in the solicitation.

These pre-solicitations are a chance for manufactures to prepare to or submit a weapon for evaluation by the DoD or a program there in. Typically, they will list thier absolute, rock-bottom requirements just to keep the "rats" out and so they can essentually guarantee a minimum level of performance. Thier objective performance is usually much higher and a winning weapon will be one that meets the objectives or exceedes them at the best possible price. Some people may read this and think the military is dead-set on replacing the current infantry weapons. This isn't necessarily the case....There are weapons-effectiveness type programs conducted by the Army and for the DoD by independent contractors to improve weapons performance. They wouldn't be

doing a good job if they didnt sample the market to make sure our current weapons aren't inferior.
Typically, they will use current weapons as a baseline and compare performance of new weapons to existing small arms. If the weapon tested is drastically better, then it may be adopted....but, its obviously alot more complicated than that. Speaking from someone who has been involved in this type of testing, the best weapon doesn't always win....or even get a fair shake. My predictions are that the usual suspects will show up for the Carbine pre-sol, with a few newer weapons like the Cobb or XCR. My suspicion is that FN, HK and Colt will all make a strong showing. Colt is well connected, so if the DoD requires a gas piston, it will almost certainly come from Colt. HK is 0-100 on large military contracts of this type and its not because thier weapons suck. For the LMG

side, thats a little more difficult. My guess is that FN will take the cake with an updated Minimi. Everyother SAW is basically a spin off of the Minimi, so why not go for the original piece of fuck?
The HK MG43 is likely a superior weapon and I hope its given a fair shot. The SAW has had alot of problems, some of which are associated with its design and may not be able to be fixed and a new weapon may be in order. KAC/Stoner also has a strong LMG, though is incredibly obscure now and given the fact that KAC is constantly up to its eyeballs in DoD contracts, they really can't handle anymore. While these presols don't necessarily mean that M16/M249 are gone, just that we are "looking" to see whats out there. If the current Carbine/LMG are replaced I predict that it will be by a gas piston conversion from Colt and an updated M249. It will be interesting to follow what happens....

Its interesting that the only "requirements" on this pre-solicitation are basically demonstrated reliability- none of the quick change barrel, monolithic upper, or other things associated with the SCAR program.  Maybe those requirements will be added later to the actual solicitation but you could see this as a solicitation for a "standard" M4 plus gas-piston a la the HK 416 or L-W gas piston weapon.  The weight requirement would keep out the 416 as it currently stands I think.

Quoted: Barrel on the Carbine is only required to last 10,000rds. It's also supposed to be 6.5 lbs unloaded. I bet this will be rather difficult to accomplish. The 15 hits out of 30rds on a target at 300m doesn't sound too bad for accuracy requirements, sounds easily attainable, actually. WIZZO

You missed the kicker though - "The Carbine shall have a sustained rate of fire greater than or equal to 45 rounds per minute without degrading reliability."

So basically, it will have to triple the sustained rate of fire for the current M4 carbine, while weighing less and maintaining a similar minimum barrel life. Considering heat is the prime killer of reliability and barrel life, I bet those requirements will be harder to meet than they sound.

Quoted: Quoted: Barrel on the Carbine is only required to last 10,000rds. It's also supposed to be 6.5 lbs unloaded. I bet this will be rather difficult to accomplish. The 15 hits out of 30rds on a target at 300m doesn't sound too bad for accuracy requirements, sounds easily attainable, actually. WIZZO You missed the kicker though - "The Carbine shall have a sustained rate of fire greater than or equal to 45 rounds per minute without degrading reliability." So basically, it will have to triple the sustained rate of fire for the current M4 carbine, while weighing less and maintaining a similar minimum barrel life. Considering heat is the prime killer of reliability and barrel life, I bet those requirements will be harder to meet than they sound.

What am I missing?  I thought M-4 sustained rate of fire is up around 650-750 rounds per minute.  This is 45, or less than one tenth of the existing system.  What am I not getting?

Quoted: What am I missing?  I thought M-4 sustained rate of fire is up around 650-750 rounds per minute.  This is 45, or less than one tenth of the existing system.  What am I not getting?

650-750rpm is the cyclic rate of fire. This is the rate the gun fires just based on physics and the design. The sustained rate of fire is how long you can continue to fire for an indefinite period of time. In the M4/M16 series of weapons that is 12-15rpm. You can fire faster than that; but only for limited time periods.

Quoted: What am I missing?  I thought M-4 sustained rate of fire is up around 650-750 rounds per minute.  This is 45, or less than one tenth of the existing system.  What am I not getting?

Cyclic rate, and sustained rate of fire are two different things.  650-750rpm is the cyclic rate - if you could keep the weapon fed for 1 full minute, assuming that there was nothing to hold it back - such as overheating barrel, how many rounds could you send down rante.

45rpm sustained is if you sat down, with that same unlimited ammo supply, and were going to fire as fast as you could, for all of time.  It worrys about heat - if your barrel over-heats, and you could no longer fire the weapon.

Similar theory, different application.

Thanks for the explanation.  So then, does the sustained ROF then bumps up against the 3,800 rounds between Class 3 malfunctions?  How does the test community bound the end point of that test?

Also, when comparing the reliability numbers, does that assume without maint along the way?  Or can a bidder come in with a design that requires maint/cleaning within the failure rate numbers, i.e.,  would they be allowed to demonstrate their reliability against the requirement, all the while maintaining the weapon IAW their maint concept/requirements?