ABCNEWS.COM has posted a story on the new Objective Individual Combat Weapon.

[url]http://abcnews.go.com/sections/scitech/CuttingEdge/smartrifle010926.html[/url]

I was interested to read the following paragraph...

"Bierman [the designer] notes that the OICW can also fire the same 5.56mm ammunition used in a standard M-16 rifle, but with much better performance. Early tests indicate that bullets fired from the OICW will penetrate Kevlar armor at ranges of up to 500 meters."

My question... how can a new rifle make the standard 5.56 round shoot with "better performance"? If I shoot a tricked out space-gun with a 20 inch HBAR, or the standard AR-15A2 with a 20 inch HBAR, using the same ammo, wouldn't the performance of that round be the same?

Just asking since I'm a simple man.

Av

The new rifle can't make the same round do any better at any range.  This assertion is total crap because media liberals go along making this it up just like they do with all gun related stories.  They don't have a single clue about firearms...they just know they hate them.  They are the ones that turn to butter and pray for mercy when confronted by an implacable enemy about to do terrible things to them...then they go looking for us...the ones with guns, that they were just bashing.  MORONS!
[soapbox]

One of the gun rags was talking about improved powders for the 10" type of barrels.

Maybe that could do it, but I really doubt it.

It could be that they are using the new
Tungsten Carbide 5.56 rounds versus standard. And they may have just glossed over that.  
That in my estimation is the only way to get the conclusion they have seem to draw.  But then again by my way of speculation, The Tungsten Carbide round should allow a 4 man squad to take out a BMP farely easily as well.  See in the name of Environmental quality they have introduced the Tungsten Carbide round. But the Army also knows that they have introduced the most lethal rifle round to ever be placed on the battlefield.

what, they use cordite or something now?? That's a real good thing to use in a machine gun.  Even with a better barrel, the added heat of a powder able to make that big of a difference would cause the bolt to expand and seize up during longer bursts...  It's just a bunch of crap, they probably compared the OICW(really just a G36) firing AP ammo against an m16 firing ball ammo.

I read a article by the USMC that said the abilities of the G36 on the OICW are poor for piercing body armor and recomended either increasing the barrel length or ditching the G36 on the weapon.

They just said it'll penetrate kevlar... probably one layer with nothing behind it...  Always question gun PR.  Doesn't matter if its from a reputable source, or an anti-gunner.  Like all things being reviewed, the weapons must be compared under equal circumstances, and multiple off the shelf guns of each type should be used for testing.

I have heard many member of the military say the OICW is a peice of shit, and from what they can tell wouldn't hold up in extreme environments. TOO MUCH ELECTRONICS, TOO MANY THINGS TO GO WRONG. It looks to me like a boat anchor, and looks like your are trying to weild a bazooka.  Although as big as it is, I am sure that it gives the soldier an extra measure of protection given that it covers absolutely all his vital organs.

Remember these are the same people who brought us the "380 magnum" and "shot with a 40mm handgun."  At one time, these folks sincerely believed that you can bring down a helicopter by using a bow & arrow a la Rambo II.

Wouldn't tungsten carbide rounds really wear down barrels fast?

I don't think 5.56mm steel rounds could penetrate a BMP's armor, either.  

I think I'll trust the USMC over ABC.

And from what I can gather the US Army is trying to meld the Grunt into a a peice of Battlefield electronics, and from the reports I have seen they are having a vary hard time doing so.  They want control all the way down to the individual soldier and well this Borg like use of soldiers will just get them killed. Let the soldier take care of himself. He knows what he see's and they can definetely be taken care of by their SGT's as well as think for themselves. They already contain a peice of battelfield electronics that is far better then any computer the US Army could field. Its called a brain. And the horrific feedback loop which is the battelfield is so harsh that faulty compenents (poor soldiers) are eliminated quickly.  Too much control and they are going to loose their fluidity , and then you will see them get their asses kicked. That is something which I never want to see happen.

[QOUTE]
Wouldn't tungsten carbide rounds really wear down barrels fast?

I don't think 5.56mm steel rounds could penetrate a BMP's armor, either.
[END QOUTE]

 Well Steel is Steel and Tungsten Crabide is Tungsten Carbide.   Tungsten is alot harder then any Steel. Is %88.735 the mass of lead and melts at 11,000 degrees farhenheit vs lead 800 degree melting point.  The decrease in mass can be made up for by having a slighty longer round.  The Carbide part helps reduce Tungstens inherent brittleness due to its extreme hardness.  So you can get almost the same kinetic energy, but unlike ball ammunition or FMJ it will most likely not deform to any extent close to that of either FMJ or BALL. Yeah my guess is it will turn BMP armor into swiss cheese.

I believe the research and development being done with Tungsten Carbide has been with penetrators.

Long cylinders encased in different materials.  These may be in the form of sabots or encased in a frangible material so that the penetrator remains encased until striking the target.

The difficulty is that the shape is not conducive to traveling straight through targets, the penetrator tends to veer sharply away from the intended direction loosing a great deal of velocity in the process.

Ryan

How are they solving that problem??  I hadn't heard that.  Hmmm, The encasing thing would help barrels quit a bit.  I guess they could do it the same way a heat round on a tank works, The casing stripps away in the airstream before the penetrators gets to the target. Sounds like a very hard engineering problem to me.

1" = 25.4 milimeters. So 33mm = 1.29" of steel. That's a lot even for .50 Cal M2 rounds.

Maybe I should delete my post so I don't look TOO stupid![:I]

You're absolutely right.  I've done several interviews over the years with various newspapers and even Wired Magazine.  Without exception the reporter TOTALLY fabricated things or twisted what I said into the meaning they were looking for.  It was unreal to read the articles.  Many times I went out of my way to clarify a point only to have it purposely confused by the reporter in their article.

We even asked one reporter to submit his questions in writing so we could respond in writing.  I don't think a single sentence from our responses was printed, they even screwed that up.  Mind boggling.

Also, if they need to fill more space, they will just make stuff up that sounds good to fill it.

Ultimately we refused (our company) to do any more interviews.

One thing you can do is take the interview. Have them submit their questions and reply in writing. Then submit the whole interview to another magazine dealing with the subject matter. Then you can show them for the liers they are.

I'm sorry, but you're totally wrong... perhaps misinformed.

The systems we're testing actually will enhance battlefield performance such as increasing tactical efficiency and reducing the number of friendly fire accidents.

Imaging seeing a map with all of your fellow soldiers clearly identified on it.  Imagine a mixed up firefight in an urban environment where all enemies are clearly marked in your headset while all your fellow soldiers are also clearly marked, even at night.  Imagine the incredible effectiveness of the command if they can see a battle unfold in real time, as if hovering above the chaos and being able to warn troops to potential dangers or to give them new orders and being able to watch them as they are executed.  No one is suggesting the troops won't be able to make decisions... the point is they'll actually be able to make well [b]informed[/b] decisions.

Imagine being in a firefight where you have eyes and ears sitting in a command room miles away, with data pouring in, that can give you clear direction and assistance in finding various targets or threats.

That's the vision and that's what's being tested.  It's hard to explain without having seen it, but once you see it you'll be totally impressed.

I don't know how you can honestly believe a soldier is more effective with less information.  These new systems, once deployed, will give what most will consider to be an unfair advantage to our forces.

I just wish we could field it sooner than later.

As far as our BMP discussion goes.  Is it just steal plate?? What is the BMP armors made of? I am going to say that the round will penetrate.   1.29'' of steal

 |_____________| <---- ~1.29"+ really 1.40"

  @1024x768 resolution.  

Figure a velocity for the round between 2700 --->3200 FPS SWAG(Scientific Wild ass guess). A mass of the round say 68 grains a good average.  Anyone have the conversion between grains > grams???

Ben

[QOUTE]

Imagine being in a firefight where you have eyes and ears sitting in a command room miles away, with data pouring in, that can give you clear direction and assistance in finding various targets or threats.

but once you see it you'll be totally impressed.

I don't know how you can honestly believe a soldier is more effective with less information. These new systems, once deployed, will give what most will consider to be an unfair advantage to our forces.
[END QOUTE]

 With all due respect & I absolutely mean that, because I have more respect for you guys then you can possibly know.   In a firefight I am not going to have my face barried in a computer.  I am not going to be able to be above it all, I am in a shit hot environment trying to balance the goal with my ability to move towards it.  My point is this, While information is important (more important before a battle then during accept for last second small changes in goal (which probably mean a change in waypoint or a shift in enemy positions) It is more important that the LT. be informed and the SGT. And I can definetly see the importance of information on the battlefield. Especially if I am helping cover a organized withdrawl of one group so that it may be inserted in a developing weekpoint on the enemy side or what have you. And I know that the faster you can exploit those weeknesses that may last for 10 minutes only on the enemy position.  I can also see the benefit of looking down at my watch and be able to see a tactical situation without having to speak over airwaves.  My point is this, In the vietnam air war pilots started turning off everything accept accept the growl of their AIM9 with seekers not slaved to the Fire Control Radar. They were fed so much information that they were overloaded. They just unplugged during combat so they could maintain their local situational awareness.  I am saying that information must be balanced.  Not to much and only what I need to perform my mission. However, in a Firefight the mission becomes Kill and Survive.  The soldier can maintain a local lock say 20 feet on his brothers positions and I think keeps a mental tab on where everyone is. As far as linking different modes of combat Air Sea and Land, then I can see the effectiveness also.  If I were in the air I will definetely want to know where the good guys stop and the Bad guys start.  I know that it wont be used until it is perfected.  I am also saying that in a firefight the information may become somewhat less important then just getting the short term job done kill this group of enemy here. And I also know that their will be a growing of the US soldier using this, where they too will learn how to balance and use it to the best advantage while not letting it degrade their ability.  I would just like to see it done correctly. As a benefit to everyone. Are you using a control group to test things against. Does More information make the task take longer?? Are the Marines moving as quickly?? FAster / Slower?? You guys do not have an easy task.  I know that sometimes the Word TO HELL WITH IT have been spoken.  That sometimes there is no best way and its just total hell no matter what you do and total hell no matter where you go Hopefully it is you that is creating the hell, but sometimes it is not sometimes its the other guys.  And sometimes its the guy who says FUCK IT! that gets the job done. This is the most important man that you have.

Every picture I've seen of that thing is the same guy hiding behind the same tree.  Now I'm no expert, but it looks like that thing would be impossible to shoot well.  The length of pull looks way too long.  Plus figure with two full mags (grenade and rifle), two barrels, two actions, and that enormous sight on top, it must be a good 20 pounds.  When I picture myself trying to aim something like that, I am confronted with the reality that with my arms straight out like the soldier in the photo, I would have great difficulty even holding it up.  In spite of the fancy sight, the ergonomics don't look conducive to accurate fire.

It is very massive in size, but it actually weighs much less than a M16 with a grenade launcher. The HK OICW utilizes a lot of polymers and light weight alloys.

Like with everything else, just give it time to evolve. Smaller, faster, better and more reliable designs will soon follow. Triple redundancy and a modular design will make the electronics well worth it. If something breaks, just pop it off and grab another module. Imagine if the US military stuck with the KISS principle, we'd all still be shooting single shot rifles and flying in propeller driven aircraft while all our enemies have automatic assault rifles, V2 rockets, jets and GPS/laser guided targeted artillery and bombs.

"spelling"

Imagine being trained that you can depend on all this cyber-stuff to work, and just when the battle starts, yourealize your "eyes" aren't working any more. Or that it has been jammed or that your particular battery is defective and instead of lasting 24 hours lasted only two. Now what?

I think maybe someday, like at least 20 years from now, when they can do this with absolute reliability, it will be a big step forward. I especially like the ability to shoot around corners. But for the forseable future, the OICW as well as much of the Land Warrior system, is not ready for deployment and if it is deployed you will find lots of them abandoned scattered around the battlefields. I hope they make it so that the too short barreled HK can be detached and used all by itself with iron sights.
For now its too big, too heavy, too complicated, to fragile, and to prone to get you killed in a real war.

With all of the electronics in the rifle, what happens in an EMP pulse? Or even a basic electronic failure?


Does the dang thing even have iron sights?

Oh well, at least it turns a .223 into a super-duper .223! [rolleyes]

Av

This is correct.  I forget which rag it was (Guns & Weapons...or something?), It had a picture of two "Micro M16's" on the cover...I also forgot who manufactured them.  The M16's had 7" barrels and used powders that reached their pressure peak very quickly, which enabled near 3000fps velocities from their short 7" barrels.  Consequently, the new propellant would not be usable in rifle or carbine barrels b/c the bullet would begin deceleration before it exits the muzzle, due to a very early pressure peak.  This would obviously mean the introduction of non-standard 5.56mm, which probably cause problems.  Wether this is true or not I don't know, but it is an interesting concept.

What would you carry into combat??  I think it is funny. I have seen mock attacks of airborne. They jumped with full equiptment. Those must have been 80 pound sacks.  At the point of seeing those guys waddle accross the field with all this shit on their backs. I then remembered that every picture I have seen of vietnam firefights the men had none of that shit anywhere visible.  They were stripped clean in most cases not even having flack jackets. In some cases just T-shirts; firing away at the enemy.  Now I don't know about you, but guys running that slow on the battlefield would be fricken toast.  It took them a full 5 seconds to fall to their knees then get prone. I was sitting their thinking why aren't these guys just diving to the ground.  It was because of all the frickin gear.  But granted it was not very realistic as I doubt that they would drop into a fight. And in a real situation would be at least a klick away.  But the first thing that would be off of me besides that parachute is that sack of shit. RIFLE/FJacket(small), HELMET.

Having been interviewed by the Boston Globe at length, (April 2000, Battle Road reenactment articles) AND misquoted by them (editor's fault, acc. to the reporter, who was not amused at the chop job done to his story) I feel your pain (excuse the Klintonism..)!

Here are some quotes to illustrate the dilemma that guns cause for the ignorant, liberal media:


Reporters today are far removed from America's founding values and are
alarmed and contemptuous of gun owners as dangerous lower classes.
- -- HENRY ALLEN, WASHINGTON POST

Most reporters are very sympathetic to gun-control agendas and will skew
or lie outright about facts to promote them.
- -- DENNIS CAUCHON, USA TODAY

--From "The Dilbert Principle":

You say:
"Our company is skilled in many other things that are never reported by
the biased media."

Media reports:
"Our company -- -killed -- m--- other ------ t--- --- ---er -------- --
--e ---s-- ----a."

"Reporters are faced with the daily choice of
painstakingly researching stories or writing whatever people tell
them.  Both approaches pay the same."
Scott Adams (Dilbert)


Veracity? We don' need no steenkin veracity! We sell papers- not truth...

Concerning better troops. Well one of the most impressive things that I learned of about the Gulf war was that arabs were teaching our soldiers how to navigate by the stars. That is something that is useful.  We can give our soldiers all the technology they could ever want.  BUT TRAIN,TRAIN,TRAIN.  Teach them how to operate without your intervention.  Teach them how to fight and live if your dead. TEACH THEM EVERYTHING THERE IS TO KNOW ABOUT Fighting conventional wars, Gorrilla wars,city wars, mountain wars, desert wars. Teach them about using the environment to their advantage.  Teach them how to navigate blind, because all of a sudden all our satellites have been blown up.  Teach them how to do it the dirty way.  Does each of our soldiers have the anarchist cookbook memorized?? Teach them to think Tactics. Make them so damn tough, mean, scary, and fluid, opportunistic, ruthless, and able to fight so hard in a no-tech battlefield, that no-one wants to even get near them, make the enemy think they are psychotic.  Make sure that when the enemy thinks of a US Soldier he remember the verse from Revelations 6:8 :
 And I looked, and behold a pale horse: and his name that sat on him was death, and Hell followed with him.

  Make our soldiers so lethal that even the enemy thinks its a forgone conclusion that they themselves are going to die.  That is what a US Soldier needs to be. Both HIGH TECH & NO TECH.  

 The IRAQ War showed a great deal, but what I also learned from that war came from an IRAQI LT's diary and Documents from MOSCOW who were watching us fight our war.  The IRAQI Soldier went from being Gung Ho at Day 1 of the Air Attacks. As the weeks progressed this guy went into total melt-down both Psycologicaly and Physically he died in the ground assault I believe.  By the end he was bleeding internally (don't know what from, crying constantly, had dissentary and literally praying for death). Moscow drew the conclusion that their air defenses needed improvement, but created quite a stir.

First off, no one would be trained to function [b]only[/b] with this gear.  You would be trained to function with it or without it.  That's like saying our troops are screwed if their nightvision fails.

Secondly, the gear is unobtrusive in that a single monocular eyepiece (which can be moved out of the way) superimposes the info into your line of sight.  There's no looking at a laptop screen in the heat of battle.  If you see someone standing behind a vehicle your headset will put a box around that person and either mark them as enemy or friendly.  Pretty damn good for preventing friendly fire accidents.

Also, you can toggle modes so a map of the battlefield is superimposed into your vision.  You can see where your teammates are and the command center, CO or your Platoon Sgt. can issue silent orders.  If you're ever been in a situation where 30 men are all firing their weapons, it makes giving orders almost impossible.  This system SERIOUSLY works to reduce the "fog of war", which in almost everyone's opinion that's seen it or used it is a tremendous benefit.

You can sit here and what-if it to death and tell everyone how useless it is, but the fact is we will deploy such systems eventually and they will give us an advantage.

To the other poster who said pilots turned their "systems" off in Vietnam.  That's a great story.  If it is true, then I'm sure there is a reason for it.  I can assure you [b]today[/b] you won't find pilots switching systems off because it's too much data.  Perhaps in the 60's the technology wasn't advanced enough to be anything more than annoying.  That's certainly not the case today.  Hell, in the 60's and early 70's heat seeking missiles still targeted the sun.

I DO like the idea in concept, but as an electrical engineer, I can tell you that it is not ready for deployment in the near future. The fact that you even have to carry the thing on your back tells me that. And the fact that the batteries don't last long enough for a lengthy patrol without replacement tells me the same. I agree we should continue developement, but I don't want it to be deployed pre-maturely.
The one thing I really don't trust is the 20mm rockets with directional charges. These will undoubtedly be spinning at a high RPM when they go over the target. Getting the thing to detonate so that the charge blasts downward or at the target is not going to be stone reliable any time soon. You may be able to do it sometimes in a test environment, but that does not constitute reliability by any stretch. Keep working on it and make it a LOT smaller and a LOT more reliable, and a LOT more battery efficient, and THEN deploy it. This does not even take into account the possibility of the coms being jammed in the field or the possible effects of EMP from bombs or future weapons. As long as you're linking by electro magnetic waves (radio) it's vulnerable. Give it more time.

You can always let the D-Boys play with in the meantime. While it might have problmes with the com gear and such against a sophisticated enemy, it might still work very well against third world opponents. For a 10 or 20 man raiding party that has to go in and snatch some hostages or embassy personal out from the clutches of Fuzzy Wuzzies, that have only AK-47's and numbers on their side.

Well, I'm certainly no authority on D-Force!!!! But I suspect that they would rather leave it home on this mission. If they are only going in with 20-30 operators, they don't need to carry all that weight or bother with all the complexity. They already have good quiet coms at their disposal. I just think it's too soon to try it out in a life and death situation. The video camera and HUD setup might be handy for peering into the darkness of caves though. Anybody know if the thing is modular so you can take only what part you want?

What I want to know is how does it find an enemy? Measure Robe length??? (Ooops that was funny)  Seriously if it doesn't have such and such signal is it just marked BADGUY#XX??  Also if these things are emitting EMF , would they be susceptible to certain types of munitions.
I don't know about our current crop of enemies, but I know that the US has munitions both Air and Land that can target Radio , etc.

Well the LRRPs and SEALs got all the funky new toys- like Stoners, underbarrel 40mm grenade launchers, ect in Vietnam.  I dont think that that has changed for their modern decendants. They have used a lot of things that never get used anywhere else- not because they dont work, but because they arent soldier proof- like the Stoner.

Yes the OICW sight is modular, it has been used on flattop M4's and M16A4's as well as with test OICW's. There are actually rather more thermal imagers around than working OICW's at the moment. A hint at what the "end user" [i]actually[/i] thinks is the most important part of the package.

Gunn, I hate to say it, but at least at this point it sure looks like OICW is an acronym for "clusterf*ck".  Damn, that bitch looks big.  The idea behind it does seem to have merit, especially the airbursting grenade round.  Like you, I'm certain the electronics can be developed to a point of battlefield reliability, but the soldier needs to be able to have a fallback option in case of electronic failure, and finally, most important of all, the soldier needs to be able to shoot, dammit.  Its not like marksmanship is a thing of the past in infantry now; hope this concept doesnt push it further onto the back burner.

shooter

The new US Army 5.56mm armor-piercing round will penetrate the armor on a BRDM scout vehicle with enough velocity left over to cause "incapacitating wounds" on any crew it happens to hit.

It is the M995 AP round, and is distinguished by a black tip (though almost the entire slug is black in the photos I have seen).

Here is a link to data on the new M995 and M93 (7.62mm) AP rounds.

http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/land/m993.htm

Anyone tried to shoot one of these from the prone position?

Maybe one could be deployed per squad, but to give them to everyone is asking for trouble.

Damn...that thing is too big.  I wouldn't want to hump that weapon 'system' around all day.  Some of the ideas sound good but I just can't see how a trooper carrying that thing would be more effective than a grunt with the current weapons.  I wonder about the real effectiveness of the 20mm 'grenade' too.  I'm used to the 40mm from an M-79 or the M-203.  A good grenadier is worth his weight in gold...I wonder how much bang that popgun has?  Also, the issue of electronics has come up.  I have concerns as to the robustness of this thing in the bush.  I suppose the designers have thought this all out, but it has been my experience that a young snuffy can f#$k up a solid steel ball given the chance...and this weapon has to work from the arctic to the jungles and desert.
Also...I wonder how easy it is to reload.  Looks like it would take longer than for me to swap out mags in my AR and get back into action.
I can't think of much more effective fighting force than a group of our superbly trained and equipped grunts, be they Delta/SEALs, Marines, Army Rangers or Airborne (If I left somebody's pet elite fighting team off, please forgive me.), armed with our current weapons.  I always thought the M-203 system was really effective, though I really preferred a straight-stick M-16.  I never got the chance to use the SAW but it appears to be a superb weapon somewhat analogous to the HEER's MG-34/42, of the 1930's &'40s.  Then we have the ubiquitous M-60, which I think is the finest MG since those two famous German guns...and possibly even better, since it can also be carried into battle like a 21st century 'trench' gun like the BAR.
I heard that the OICW was undergoing operational evaluation with one of the airborne units before the war started.  Maybe now we'll see what it can really do.  I just hope it doesn't get any troops killed.
[soapbox]

Don't know why you directed this towards me, I haven't posted about the OICW.  

In the February 2001 issue of Small Arms Review, L. James Sullivan is interviewed about various subjects.  His comments on the OICW are quoted below:

"One frame combines two guns in one, a standard rifle and one that fires an explosive round.  That explosive round is supposed to be set off by a computer device that can exactly tell range and communicate that information to the round...So, by formalizing the requirement and giving a fortune to contractors who can keep straight faces, they think it will happen...
For starters the size and weight limitations of the shell would need an explosive that is four times more powerful than any known explosives and the shrapnel material would have to be denser than any other material on this planet just to equal the effect of the M203 round, which is adequate if it explodes close to the target...The OICW will probably end up like the last boondoggle, the Advanced Combat Rifle(ACR)program...The program was a total failure. Cost $100 million-and they never tested the technology that worked"

Sullivan was one of the designers that worked with Gene Stoner on the AR15/M16. His comments sum up OICW best, don't you think?

Hmm.  Guess those are somebody else's anchor&globes using your handle in this forum, eh?  [;D]
Don't get your civvies in a knot.  Just making conversation.  You took a postion favoring the hardware; I took one against.  This current generation is too damn big; the skunk works are going to have to work overtime to shrink it down and make it practical, not to mention affordable.  Not saying it can't be done; I'm interested, but if this is the best that can be done, I say drop a crate of'em off in the mountains of Afghanistan and let al Quaeda lug those bitches around.

shooter

Remember the SPIW??  Those that forget history are doomed to repeat it!

Don't worry, I wasn't up tight... just curious.  The system I'm talking about is totally independent of the OICW system.  I can understand the confusion given the sighting system of the OICW.

I plead guilty to bringing the Land Warrior in to the OICW thread!

I'd rather have 2 lighter/smaller guns than that big hunk of crap they call the OICW. If I were in battle and issued an OICW I'd leave it and take a reliable trustworthy and light M-16 anyday.

20mm = 2 cm = .8" or about the size of a 10 Gauge Shotgun Shell. Surely, it shouldn't take that much room to fit a 20mm to a G36.

Now, as for the people who like to collect Military Guns, I just say you'll not own this one. It is:

A) An NFA Short Barrel Rifle (10" Barrel)
B) An Illegal Assault Weapon (Grenade Launcher)
C) A Non-Sporting Rifle Banned From Import (HK = German ?)
D) Most Likely the round it uses are already illegal. Therfore finding ammo. to work in it would be near impossible for anybody besides Military.

OCIW is a piece of junk.  Come on, for $15,000 a piece.  It could be better spent on buying more ammo for training.