Busy week for nomenclatureists?
Originally wanted to call this “Xes and Os” (no resemblance to the pudgy Schneider offspring*) but it turns out the Army doesn’t call all their prototypes by an X prefix. Ah well – I learned something.
The Army has given its Future Long Range Assault Aircraft Bell V-280 (their equivalent to a CV-22 Osprey) the official designation of MV-75, formerly YMV-75.
In terms of the designation itself, the “M” stands for “multi-mission” and the “V” refers to it being a vertical takeoff and landing capable design. The use of the “M” prefix for the baseline FLRAA variant is interesting given that previous Army transport helicopters like the Black Hawk and the Chinook have all had designations starting with “U” for utility or “C” for cargo. The “multi-mission” designation here may, in part, reflect the baked-in special operations-specific features.
Whether the number “75,” which is very much out of sequence with other known “V” designations, has any special significance is unknown. **Designation-Systems.net says that XV-25A, reportedly approved last year for the experimental tilt-ducted fan ARES drone, is the most recent in-sequence designation in that category.
** It refers to the founding of the Army in 1775, per a
Think “Osprey with a racy fuselage” and you have a pretty good picture.
The 101st Airborne Division, the Army’s premier air assault unit, is set to be the first unit to get MV-75s. The 101st has already begun laying the groundwork to receive the future tiltrotors, which officials say will completely transform how it conducts operations, as you can read more about here.The War Zone
A bit heavier than originally specced so it can be easily adapted to special operations, the Bell V-280 has a top speed of 300mph, 2400 mile range, and effective combat range of 800 miles. Unlike the Osprey, the engine pods do not rotate, the rotors and drive shafts do. V-280 Wiki
And the Army has also accepted the Sig-Sauer M-7, formerly XM-7, rifle. It uses an interesting cartridge, the 6.8×51. Now, gun types would probably assume it was just (in civilian terms) a .308 necked down to take a .270 bullet, right? Far from it – this uses a hybrid steel/brass cartridge case and works at pressures of 80,000psi (compare that to its predecessor, the .270 Winchester, which runs about 62,000psi.) It launches a 150grain bullet 150fps faster than the .270, in a cartridge case which is short enough to fit in a medium (i.e. .308 action. Oh, and in the interests of lower cleaning requirements – it’s a gas-piston gun like the AK-47.
As of last year, the Army said its “acquisition objectives” included the purchase of 111,428 M7s and 13,334 M250s.
There has been some controversy over this – an Army Captain Braden Trent has made some serous allegations about the weapon and cartridge
The Army infantry officer did his work while attending the Expeditionary Warfare School, part of the Marine Corps University in Quantico, Virginia.
What is now designated the M7 has suffered from serious reliability and other issues, including having cartridge cases “ripped apart by the internal pressure of the system,” excessive barrel wear, and regular breakages of key components, Trent stated. He claimed that these problems, together with a host of other factors, including the weight and recoil of the rifle, make the gun “unfit” for its intended purpose. The War Zone II
Sig-Sauer claims CPT Trent is unaware of many mitigating engineering changes. One thing I would note – it is significantly heavier, 9 pounds with suppressor, than the M-4 it will replace, and its standard magazine holds 20 rounds (like an M-14.) So a combat load of 7 magazines will work out to 140 rounds, versus the current 210.
* Elle King, the pop-turned-country singer of “Xes and Os” is the daughter of Rob Schneider (“Down Periscope”).
Category: Science and Technology
Down in the dirt reliability seems to end up on the cutting room floor with all of these new rifle designs. Stick with what isn’t broken like the M-14.
Better still, the M-1 Garand that we used in the Navy. Just watch your thumb…
The rifle with the three year service life?
Wish I would have had one in QuangTri Province back in 68.
80K PSI? Ouch! The Army best have a lot of docs and chiropractors on hand to handle the uptick in shoulder and back problems. And additional clerks to handle the additional medical discharges.
Not to also mention (as above) the wear and tear on the rifle itself, from muzzle to receiver.
At that pressure level, best put those gunz on two wheeled carriages and change those Grunt MOS to Gun Bunny MOS.
Not Service Connected.
I have mixed feelings about this rifle / mg system. I like the idea of a more powerful cartridge but think that the 80K pressure for the case and breach is excessive. I also think there has to be a limit to what you can do with an aluminum frame for the rifle.
IMO and this is as a ballistic knowledge amateur (shooter and handloader for over 50 years now), I think they should have gone with a 6mm or 6.5mm based on the 308 case. A 100 to125 gr slug out of a 16″ barrel should have all the oomph they wanted with a decent long range. They could bump up the pressure to about 65k lbs to exceed what the civilian ammo in similar caliber / cartridges achieve, like they did with the 5.56 vs .223.
That would require an AR10 platform, an already proven system, and maintain barrel life as well as structural integrity of the frame.
I am thinking once they get the production guns out in the field for troops we are going to see what the good Captain says about longevity and increased expense in rebuilding rifles that prematurely wear out. Once the frames have a few thousand rounds downrange I bet we will have frames coming apart under firing pressure and maybe injuring troops.
I hope I’m wrong.
At least they’re not getting Red Ryder BB guns….you could shoot your eye out with one of those things.
Love that movie.
“Oh Fuuuuudddge”
Essentially what you are describing is a .260 Remington or 6.5 Creedmoor. The standard pressure on a .260 is a bit over 60,000psi, 62,000 in the 6.5, and ballistically there is no effective difference. They stay supersonic over 1000 meters, too. An interesting Wikipedia quote:
Walter D.M. Bell, who was known to have shot over a thousand elephants in his lifetime, used, among others, .264 caliber (6.5 mm) and .284 caliber (7 mm) rifles to do so.[8][9]
Pretty sure if it will reliably kill elephant with a well-placed brain shot it should be effective on man. And to be honest, they talk about effectiveness at ranges 99% of soldiers can’t even distinguish a target, much less hit it.
Could even go the route of something like a Ruger SFAR – an AR-15 sized rifle chambered in a medium (.308, .243, .260 etc.) cartridge. Less than 7 pounds without a sight, if you really want a gas piston gun add a pound and you are still a pound lighter than the Sig.
A write-up on the cartridges in Shooting Illustrated:
https://www.shootingillustrated.com/content/shell-game/
I seem to remember some similar concerns with reliability (not unfounded) when Stoner’s designs were sent to ‘Nam
Stoners design was, and is, sound. That Winchester changed the powder without notification, so they could make ammo cheaper, while charging the same “military industrial complex monetary compensation”, was the culprit, not the rifle. Which is why the design is still going strong after nearly 70 years.
All the function upgrades (A1 version), didn’t really amount to anything when the powder was returned to the required Dupont mix. The chrome lining helped during cleaning and barrel life, and the buttstock was redesigned to take the cleaning kit. But the forward assist is worthless, and the barely adjustable sights remained.
The A2 was mostly firing comfort changes, with better sights.
The M4 series just reflected “I wants cool stuffs” from war time use.
One has to wonder if “new and improved” is actually…improved? Is this new tilt rotor gonna be more better than the Osprey…or an accident, with losses of trained service members, waiting to happen? I did a dive in the linky, and the linky’s linky trying to find some evals on whether or not it works as advertised, not a whole lot of joy there. Same with the new “Battle Rifle”. Just a lot of accusations and propaganda back and forth. As a POG, I never met an In-Fun-Tree Dood that wanted to tote a heavier rifle…and less ammo.
I hope we don’t lose too much time…and waste too many lives on these systems.
More ammo will always be more ammo.
The major problem I have, given the current conflict(s) and the probable ones with varied foes on the horizon, wouldn’t money be better spent on letting those Infantrymen break ISR and one-way drones?
We will always find the physical/practical weak points of a system better than all the eggheads at MIT, Rensselaer, UoCO-B, DARPA, etc combined.
If that last “300 meters” really needs to happen with FM7-8ing, anything capable of fixing the enemy with ballistic persuasion will suffice. (See point 1 for emphasis)
I majored in Nomenclature in college…until they caught me at it one day and I had to change my major to Anthropology….the rest, as they say, is not fit to print.
Hopefully CPT Trent didn’t make any long term career plans with the Army.
Bad thing, is that he’ll be gone if/when they figure out that he was right.
Much like the above bird, the song of the same name is all about dick.
https://youtu.be/0uLI6BnVh6w?feature=shared
I think they made a mistake with the Sig-Sauer M-7. YMMV
Well, some folk were always sore about the M16-series family not being invented in-house…
The contractors and those in their pockets win big, as always. The MV-75 looks interesting and could prove to keep the 101st on the cutting edge of battlefield transportation. Yeah, I’m biased, having been an Iron Rakkasan first and Screaming Eagle second over two decades ago, but despite losing their jump status, the 101st (and especially 187th) have been the leaders in Airborne operations since the end of WWII. Korea? 187th ARCT. Vietnam? Air Mobile (3/187 was part of the 11th AASLT DIV [Test] which became 1st CAV). Post-Vietnam? Air Assault.
As for the rifle, everything has to be modified to accommodate the new cartridge. I planned and coordinated a PEO Soldier event at Fort AP Hill for MG Potts (RIP) a few years ago, and one of the things he wanted was for the officers to have a shooting competition with the XM7. You’d think that if anyone could get this done, it’d be the 2-Star who oversaw the NGSW program. None of the ranges were certified for the 6.8×511 round, though, and even the heavy weapons range (.50 cal.) couldn’t be used. Impact zones have to be surveyed and laid out, maps have to be updated and printed, 25m zero and alternate qualification targets have to be produced, and so on. Despite its initial hiccups in Vietnam, the M16/M4 has proven to be one of the most capable and versatile small arms in military history. 5.56×45 NATO has proven effective, and more ammo is rarely a bad thing. We always plussed up, with me carrying as much as 1200 rounds for the M249 (double the basic load), and Riflemen often carrying 10 or more mags. Larger mags and heavier rounds reduce the amount that can be carried.
Factor in suppressor and weapons maintenance/gauging, ammo pouches and other load-bearing equipment, cleaning kits, and so on, and contractors of every color are rejoicing.
fm2176, if you haven’t checked this dood out, you may want to drop by now and again. He’s Former Rakkasan his own self. There’s a number of us d’weeded deplorables here that visit him on the reg.
https://bigcountryexpat.com/
Just checked his page out, I’ll keep the tab open until I remember to visit as often as I can (I would say daily, but I don’t even come here daily anymore).
I found this, and it brought back some memories, though he seemed to have been in 2/187 (“Raider Rakkasans”) before I reported to 3/187 (“Iron Rakkasans”). A Minor Side Trip and a Family Visit – Big Country Expat
Those old barracks he lived in were the 20th Replacement Company barracks when my friend and I reported. We woke up at a motel outside of Nashville, got decked out in our Class B’s complete with the single Army Service Ribbon and garrison caps, and finished the drive to Campbell. Following the signs to 20th Replacement, we went to the WWII building it had been located in only weeks before and found it vacant. We finally made it to the proper location (the old Rakkasan barracks–3rd BDE had relocated just before deploying to Afghanistan in ’01/’02), only to get stared down by everyone looking as these two obviously brand-new E-1s walked up to report.
As for the reflag, it happened as I was leaving for The Old Guard. 3/187 carried the lineage of the Regiment since 1942, as 1st and 2nd battalions had been reactivated from the Panama-based 4th and 5th (themselves originally 1/503 and 2/503). After Iraq 2003, 3/187 became 3/187 Reconnaissance, Surveillance, and Target Acquisition (RSTA). Big Army planned to reflag them to 1/33 Cav, but COL Steele (of Blackhawk Down fame) fought tooth and nail to keep 3rd batt, so 2/187 was reflagged instead, though 3rd batt took over the latter’s footprint and absorbed most of their Soldiers as the 19Ds came in.
Unit lineage and honors, it’s confusing as hell, but fun to know and instills pride in some Soldiers. The 1st Cav that fought in Ia Drang Valley were largely Soldiers from the 11th AASLT Div, including 3/187, which later formed the core of 3/101 that fought on Dong Ap Bia (Hamburger Hill).
Thanks for the link.
Cool! I have a number of sites that I bookmarked for quick access, my advantage is being retired, and not physically able to do much more than defend the perimeter, do a little escort duty, and surf the web. “Tiny” is an interesting character that has BTDT and just flat don’t care who he may p*ss off. Does a lot of resto work and general gunsmithing that you may find interesting when you have some down time to do some deep dives. Using a Chrome Book Laptop beats phuquing with a fone…all.day.long. I have prolly more than 100+ “other bookmarks” tabbed in. Keeps me off the streets and out of trouble…well…off the streets anyhow.
Watched one of these ripping around Vandenberg SFB. Sleek and fast!