Army & Marine Corps are checking their M16s for dangerous glitch?

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It's not the manufacturer of any new rifles. All m4s are going through a modification work order to be converted from 3 round burst to full auto and also have an ambidextrous selector lever installed. That's where the problem came from.

If the selector lever is accidentally left between semi and auto and the trigger pulled......the rifle does not fire......but......when putting the selector lever back to semi.....BANG. you'll notice that the article states selector lever In between semi and auto.......those are the m4s that have gone through the conversion from 3 round to auto.....and also had the ambi selectors installed.

I still wear the uniform ......and have a great deal of first hand knowledge of the situation.......I'll just say a message was sent down for all units to function check the modified rifles for this issue.....and it effects ALOT of them .
 
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what do they check? i would be nice to know the procedure to check
You won't need to worry about your personal owned ar.......it's due to a faulty modification work order on government rifles. But......the check that was passed down was to start with a cleared rifle (obviously)......charge the rifle.......put the selector between semi and auto and pull the trigger.......hammer does not fall.....release the trigger......then rotate the selector to semi and see if the hammer falls.......lots of them do! The army has a shit ton of deadlined m4s that have just had the modification completed .
 
Because its a piece of shit and everyone hates it, lol. It should have never been put on the rifles to begin with.

-Mike
I'm going to disagree with you on this one. It was put in place shortly before the M249 was put into service and every infantry Squad had a light belt-fed machine gun for suppressive fire. So the main battle rifle was changed to save ammo. Also the burst gives the rifleman a split second to get the sights back on target before quickly tapping the trigger again. I know many infantry officers and ncos that are scratching their heads about the Switchback to full auto right now.
 
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They’re not getting rid of it. They’re just multiplying it by ten.

I THINK I read somewhere that the guys in the field wanted FA. so the Army listened. I wasn’t aware the Marines were doing it too.
The Infantry guys that I talk to we're not asking. For crying out loud even with the three round burst The Rifleman can just keep tapping the trigger anyway and it's the same as full auto......with the added benefit that with practice the sights can be brought back on target between trigger pulls.
 
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For general info......the armorer's that I know that had to inspect these rifles found that if the rifle had this issue the hammer would fall 100% of the time during the test. It's not a situation where the hammer would fall sporadically. If the rifle has the problem it will do it every time.

Also......to re do all the m4s that have been modified world wide has an astronomical price tag and will probably have been cheaper to just have bought all new rifles in the first place. There's government efficiency for you!
 
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I had a guy ND an M16A2 when he pressed the trigger while the rifle was on safe.
(Thankfully it was only with blanks, but still.)
We did a function check and the rifle failed and repeated the condition.
Not the same malfunction as in the article in the OP, but just proves that a rifle is a series of simple machines, designed by humans which can be manufactured poorly, installed wrong, worn out or maintained incorrectly.
 
I'm going to disagree with you on this one. It was put in place shortly before the M249 was put into service and every infantry Squad had a light belt-fed machine gun for suppressive fire. So the main battle rifle was changed to save ammo. Also the burst gives the rifleman a split second to get the sights back on target before quickly tapping the trigger again. I know many infantry officers and ncos that are scratching their heads about the Switchback to full auto right now.
You are correct, full auto on an M16/M4 is a waste of ammo. The A2's I had in the Guard were POS, they were converted A1's. When we deployed to Bosnia many were dead lined for poor machining, rough surface on the chambers causing ejection problems.
 
The weapon initially failed to fire when the soldier pulled the trigger because the selector switch was in between "semi" and "auto," Walters said. When the selector switch was clicked back into place, the weapon fired.
My guess is the safety/selector switch prevents the hammer from following but does not prevent disengagement of the sear hook, so then it is moved to a semi or full "ready to fire" condition - bang.

My first 1911 was a Colt that had a similar problem. If the trigger was pulled with the safety on it disengaged the sear notch but the safety held the hammer back. When the safety was moved to 'fire', the hammer would fall - but would be caught by the half cock notch since the trigger was not actively being pulled. Colt fixed it under warranty. In fact, checking for this flaw is part of the checklist for installing and fitting a new 1911 safety.

As to 3 round burst - not a great design on the 1911. If you pull and release the trigger so you don't get all 3 rounds off, the next pull will fire the remaining ones in that 3 round set - not fire 3 rounds as you would expect, since the little wheel does not reset position when less that a full burt is fired.
 
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