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M4 Carbine Fairs Poorly in Dust Test
- Thread starter FPrice
- Start date
![[wink]](/xen/styles/default/xenforo/smilies.vb/002.gif "Wink [wink]")
M4
Yup, well known. But the Army refuses to consider a new weapon. They say the M4 is performs well in combat. They`ll spend billions on 1 aircraft but won`t get us the best combat rifle on the market.
Yup, well known. But the Army refuses to consider a new weapon. They say the M4 is performs well in combat. They`ll spend billions on 1 aircraft but won`t get us the best combat rifle on the market.
Well, 2% failure rate in 60,000 is 1200 failures which is 1 in 50 rounds fired. Which means you won't get through 2 mags before a failure is experienced, on average. Would you buy a personal defense side arm or long arm for yourself with that kind of failure ratio? Building on a previous post, they should recreate the test with some real AK74's.
P-14
NES Member
From the military.com online article referenced by FPrice:
If I owned a pistol that I use in competition that failed to fire every 60-80 rounds, I'm looking for a new pistol. I can't imagine a real-live world class genuine military ASSAULT rifle, like the M4, even being considered for use if it failed this often.
God bless the troops in Iraq that must continually be cleaning their rifles to keep them working!
+1 on the AK comparison, too!
If I owned a pistol that I use in competition that failed to fire every 60-80 rounds, I'm looking for a new pistol. I can't imagine a real-live world class genuine military ASSAULT rifle, like the M4, even being considered for use if it failed this often.
God bless the troops in Iraq that must continually be cleaning their rifles to keep them working!
+1 on the AK comparison, too!
Hate to throw more gas on the fire but over the years we've blow out hundreds of thousands of rounds of ammo and probably 35,000 was 5.45 Russian out of a variety of AK74's. Except for a couple of American made parts (to make the firearm compliant) that broke, these 74's never broke down or jammed. Anyway, for what it's worth, that's my 3 cents for the day (use to be 2 cents but inflation, you know!!).
What i want to know is how extreme the test was....we are all thinking "OMG" but what would a comparable rifle do in the same situation? How about all our carry weps that we are so confident in? 1 out of 60 failing seems OK if the test was them pouring sand into the action as it fired, but i dont know squat, so im just talking out my azz here.
Wonder what their definition of a "typical" combat condition is and if any of the word framers ever experienced one.
They included the HK 416 and FN Mk416 which are both piston designs no? About 1/4 the failures of an M4, but still a lot of stoppages.
I suspect this test really shows what everyone already knew. If you want your rifle to shoot, you shouldn't pour sand into it. But life isn't perfect - if you get some sand in it, it'll probably work for a while until you can clean it.
I suspect this test really shows what everyone already knew. If you want your rifle to shoot, you shouldn't pour sand into it. But life isn't perfect - if you get some sand in it, it'll probably work for a while until you can clean it.
Yet another reason to go back to issuing everyone a good old '03. ![[smile]](/xen/styles/default/xenforo/smilies.vb/001.gif "Smile [smile]")
< Warning! Rant Commencing.>
I seriously can't stand the stories I hear from my friends and family about their equipment. We should be bathing our soldiers, sailors, Marines, and airmen in the absolute best equipment our considerable budget can buy.
I am very well aware that you can't serve a gourmet meal to 100,000 people at once but for the sake of Pete these are not pens and paper we're talking about.
When you send someone out to undertake serious business without the option of failure they must be issued serious tools that do not increase the likelihood of failure. And, I'm not just talking about M4's jamming in the sand box.
<End Rant>
< Warning! Rant Commencing.>
I seriously can't stand the stories I hear from my friends and family about their equipment. We should be bathing our soldiers, sailors, Marines, and airmen in the absolute best equipment our considerable budget can buy.
I am very well aware that you can't serve a gourmet meal to 100,000 people at once but for the sake of Pete these are not pens and paper we're talking about.
When you send someone out to undertake serious business without the option of failure they must be issued serious tools that do not increase the likelihood of failure. And, I'm not just talking about M4's jamming in the sand box.
<End Rant>
dwarven1
Lonely Mountain Arms
My cousin told me that he used to keep two shaving brushes on hand in Fallujah - one dry, to dust off the rifle, and one very lightly oiled with BreakFree to oil the rifle - very sparingly. Gary was the company armorer...
I love topics relating to this subject - it brings all weapon guys out of the woodwork into the light. We then get to soak up all the knowledge that they've gleaned off of the 'Net with no first hand experience other than dragging weapons from the car to the range...
1) Testing is great but most of the complaints ( from the reports available on the net from USMC/US Army sources ) lists stopping power as the biggest problem with the M4. 6.8 SPC should fix that but they won't change horses in mid war to correct the big problem. Best fix is to get more Mk 272 ammo to issue to more people.
2) You find out what it takes to keep the weapon going and do this religiously! My worst problem I had with my M-16 was a cycling problem because I was stupid and forget to lube it before a exercise on the K-range. The rifle was slow in moving but still worked. I put some borrowed Break-free on after the end of my group and it worked great for the rest of the time there.
I went to a 2 day Tactical Response tactical rifle class and had 1 major malfunction that stopped the weapon over those 2 days. The firing pin retaining pin had failed and one of the leg parts had worked its way into the area where the bolt carrier moves in the upper. It took some solid pulling to clear it but the rifle didn't have a problem for the rest of the 1st day and all of the 2nd day. Long Island is the typical large-grain sand and the carbine was working good. (I found out it was the FPRP when I got home and broke the weapon down for cleaning, I was wondering why the firing pin was still in the bolt after I pulled out the pin. THE RIFLE WAS STILL RUNNING WITH A PARTIAL FPRP HOLDING THE FIRING PIN IN! I've replaced the FPRP with a solid pin to see how it works.)
3) AK series weapons are great in all conditions. Problem is the weapon has the some of the worst ergonomics and sight setup that you can use on a combat rifle next to the G-3/HK-91 series. You can learn to work around that and put some good sights/optics on it but it still needs some help. Best thing about it is that it doesn't take a rocket scientist to keep one running. The best of the AK actions has been used in other weapons with better ergonomics but they don't make it to combat in that area to see how it would fair. Before everybody jumps on me, even the Israeli's use the M-16 more over one of the best AK variants ever made, the Galil. It's probably due to the US giving them a good supply but one of the complaints about the Galil was its weight. I don't know if the South African's had the same complaint or not ( R4 was a version of the Galil they got from Israel.)
4) The M-4 will be around for awhile longer... get used to that.
5) The piston uppers for the M-16 are based off of what system mostly? Thats right boys and girls, most of them are based off of the FAL piston acion or a variation there of. Testing in that chamber showed it worked well but still wasn't perfect. The FAL's problem wasn't the gas system - it was the open design of the upper receiver with no ejection port cover or a way of keeping the dirt/sand out of the action when not shooting. The piston uppers would probably be the best fix that you could do to the weapon and make most of the people happy.
Joe R ( realizing that most of the last paragraph was taken from books but these were good books written by very knowledgeable people on the subject. )
1) Testing is great but most of the complaints ( from the reports available on the net from USMC/US Army sources ) lists stopping power as the biggest problem with the M4. 6.8 SPC should fix that but they won't change horses in mid war to correct the big problem. Best fix is to get more Mk 272 ammo to issue to more people.
2) You find out what it takes to keep the weapon going and do this religiously! My worst problem I had with my M-16 was a cycling problem because I was stupid and forget to lube it before a exercise on the K-range. The rifle was slow in moving but still worked. I put some borrowed Break-free on after the end of my group and it worked great for the rest of the time there.
I went to a 2 day Tactical Response tactical rifle class and had 1 major malfunction that stopped the weapon over those 2 days. The firing pin retaining pin had failed and one of the leg parts had worked its way into the area where the bolt carrier moves in the upper. It took some solid pulling to clear it but the rifle didn't have a problem for the rest of the 1st day and all of the 2nd day. Long Island is the typical large-grain sand and the carbine was working good. (I found out it was the FPRP when I got home and broke the weapon down for cleaning, I was wondering why the firing pin was still in the bolt after I pulled out the pin. THE RIFLE WAS STILL RUNNING WITH A PARTIAL FPRP HOLDING THE FIRING PIN IN! I've replaced the FPRP with a solid pin to see how it works.)
3) AK series weapons are great in all conditions. Problem is the weapon has the some of the worst ergonomics and sight setup that you can use on a combat rifle next to the G-3/HK-91 series. You can learn to work around that and put some good sights/optics on it but it still needs some help. Best thing about it is that it doesn't take a rocket scientist to keep one running. The best of the AK actions has been used in other weapons with better ergonomics but they don't make it to combat in that area to see how it would fair. Before everybody jumps on me, even the Israeli's use the M-16 more over one of the best AK variants ever made, the Galil. It's probably due to the US giving them a good supply but one of the complaints about the Galil was its weight. I don't know if the South African's had the same complaint or not ( R4 was a version of the Galil they got from Israel.)
4) The M-4 will be around for awhile longer... get used to that.
5) The piston uppers for the M-16 are based off of what system mostly? Thats right boys and girls, most of them are based off of the FAL piston acion or a variation there of. Testing in that chamber showed it worked well but still wasn't perfect. The FAL's problem wasn't the gas system - it was the open design of the upper receiver with no ejection port cover or a way of keeping the dirt/sand out of the action when not shooting. The piston uppers would probably be the best fix that you could do to the weapon and make most of the people happy.
Joe R ( realizing that most of the last paragraph was taken from books but these were good books written by very knowledgeable people on the subject. )
I wasn't quick to judge. I know who here has had real experience with the weapons versus just " range time " with one. The statement was meant for those people with no real experience.
You tend to get more familiar with something when you have to drag it around for awhile during training. This process also allows you to figure out what works and what doesn't as far as gear and weapons. I was in during the 80's and we didn't have red dot sights and lasers. I have both an Aimpoint and an EO-Tech on 2 of the rifles now and I see why the people like them.
I owned my semi-auto AK when I was at Camp Lejeune and I was looking for a way to see if I could take it out to the field ranges. I was out before I had a chance to try. At the 2 day rifle class there was a guy that was using an AK and it was working quite well as expected. He did make some changes to it to make it more " user-friendly " by adding a VFG and a red dot sight to it. An AK can be used well but it takes some learning and repetition to burn into the brain on what to do. Some have never taken the classes to experience what it takes to do this...
Joe R.
M4
All the SF and Spec Ops units have gone to the HK I`m told. They weren`t happy with the performance of the M4 and have their own budgets for weapons.
****
All the SF and Spec Ops units have gone to the HK I`m told. They weren`t happy with the performance of the M4 and have their own budgets for weapons.
I've got a bunch of friends and coworkers that have served in Iraq, Kuwait and Afghanistan.
Only complaint I've heard is a few of them saying the cartridge is too light to be effective.
Many of them are experienced shooters and well aware of the M14, which they would rather have.
Not ONE has complained about jamming issues with the M4/M16A2 series rifles.
I have 35 plus years experience with the AR-15/M16 series rifle, and I have no complaints about jamming.
Truth be known, most of the jamming issues in Vietnam were about cleaning (they actually told the troops it didn't need cleaning, EVER), powder residue (high calcium carbonate content) and the wrong buffer (they froze up).
All 3 items were fixed (cleaning kits purchased, chrome lined barrels/chambers, new buffers and reformulated powder), and the incompentent Product Manager (LTC Yount) was relieved from duty and shipped to Korea (he hid the problems and failed to purchase cleaning materials). Robert McNamara should've been strung up for cramming a rifle down the troops throat before the R&D was done. All 3 issues would have been found during R&D.
Only complaint I've heard is a few of them saying the cartridge is too light to be effective.
Many of them are experienced shooters and well aware of the M14, which they would rather have.
Not ONE has complained about jamming issues with the M4/M16A2 series rifles.
I have 35 plus years experience with the AR-15/M16 series rifle, and I have no complaints about jamming.
Truth be known, most of the jamming issues in Vietnam were about cleaning (they actually told the troops it didn't need cleaning, EVER), powder residue (high calcium carbonate content) and the wrong buffer (they froze up).
All 3 items were fixed (cleaning kits purchased, chrome lined barrels/chambers, new buffers and reformulated powder), and the incompentent Product Manager (LTC Yount) was relieved from duty and shipped to Korea (he hid the problems and failed to purchase cleaning materials). Robert McNamara should've been strung up for cramming a rifle down the troops throat before the R&D was done. All 3 issues would have been found during R&D.
Dick Culver's articles about the M16 and jamming in Vietnam are worth reading. According to his articles, he was there, he helped write a letter to a congressman that got the Marine Corp to investigate the issue.
http://www.jouster.com/articles30m1/
http://www.jouster.com/articles30m1/
Without Forward Assist would be the M16, which was suppossedly only used by the Air Force.
The Army and Marines used the M16A1, which had the Forward Assist (FA).
That being said, the FA pretty much only lets the troop jam the rifle even worse. Most of the jamming issues were fired cases getting stuck in the chamber (which was rusted) and the extractor being weak and slipping, or tearing a chunk of the rim off.
Cleaning equipment and chamber brushes, along with chrome lining fixed part of it, and replacing the extractor springs finally got rid of the rest of it. Changing the powder reduced the crud, and reduced plugging of the gas tube.
Yeah, I'm not saying it's a GREAT design, by no means, but the AR-15/M16/M4 Series rifle isn't near as bad as they say. The DOD doesn't want to spend the $$$ to replace them right now, and when they do, figure on the replacement possibly being a different caliber (but don't hold your breath on either).
I'll add that the 6.8 SPC was never really considered, believe it or not. It was nothing more than a Spec Ops pipe dream.
I saw some thing awhile back when everyone was talking about the 6.8SPC where they broke down what the cost of replacing every rifle with something like the XM8 or the SCAR, vs the cost of keeping all the current service rifles, but replacing the uppers with 6.8SPC. It was dramatically cheaper to swap out the uppers, obviously.
