The Army May Have Found Its Next Rifle In A Colorado Garage - Sensationalist Headlines

https://taskandpurpose.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/5bad3973dde64.image_-840x420.jpg https://taskandpurpose.com/army-rifle-ribbon-gun/ "The specifications are incredible, four 6 mm barrels cut side by side within one steel block. New ammunition blocks fired by electromagnetic actuators that could theoretically give the weapon a firing rate of 250 rounds per second. And then there’s the feature no soldier would turn down. “It’s called a power shot,” Grier said. That’s the shotgun feature of this sniper-shot, machine-assault gun that can send four bullets simultaneously whizzing toward an enemy at more than 2,500 mph." "The first rifle, which weighs about 6½ pounds, slightly less than the M-16, hasn’t been cheap. Grier has poured more than $500,000 of his savings and investment by others into the working prototype. But by having a functioning weapon, he has drawn a lot of attention. Grier has been asked to create a prototype to Army specifications for testing. The Army will run the rifle through its paces to determine if his idea is worthy of the battlefield." Seems pretty cool. It's always interesting to see potential advancements. If the Army is taking an interest, he might actually be onto something less gimmicky than we've seen in the past with these sort of future weapons.

I kinda doubt this will go very far, the military already experimented with multii barrel and multi bullet designs through the late 20th century, and ultimately came to the conclusion that they didn't offer significant improvement. The use of electromagnetic propulsion might potentially have applications, but between power consumption and durability issues it's unlikely the technology is up to combat standards. Also the US Armed Forces already have a nasty habit of experimenting with an ultimately cancelling very innovative projects like the XM25.

For once it was worth it to scroll down to the comments https://files.facepunch.com/forum/upload/235717/7137df4f-6233-4577-a123-d618f3169a18/Capture.JPG

These better be standard issue for the Space Force.

Neat. Not going to go anywhere though.

The army will never invest in practical pulse weaponry until they get their ass kicked by it.

Caseless my ass, this is the modern equivalent of having a black powder muzzle loading revolver with multiple cylinders you can swap out. This is quite literally the brainchild of someone who has way too much money and has no idea what they're doing when it comes to designing firearms. Literally everything in this gun has already been done before, there is nothing innovative or futuristic about it.

This is a scam

It barely has any capacity. I'd rather have 30 rounds of 6.8 if we were to change anything about our current weapon. I don't really see any practical application for this. Everything it can do, we have something that can do it as good or better.

"Who needs suppressing fire when you have a POWER SHOT" -this dude, apparently

Everything about this idea just seems kind of, terrible. Like there is a reason that your boys use "the same junk" as the enemy, because it works and because its designed in a way that a soldier can deal with a failure in the weapon. More to the point, I saw a video on this thing a while back and the immediate thing that stuck out to me was the loading of it. The thing is straight up a cube of metal with 4 or so bullets in it that once fired, you have to replace. That is never going to perform better than a magazine.

It's garbage, we discussed this over in the firearms thread.

They may have. But probably won't

This seems fucking stupid.

The Army's prolly testing it just because maybe the firing mechanism has merit for further study, I seriously doubt they have even the slightest intention of adopting it.

I can't wait to see it put through a mud test.

Can't wait for the forgotten weapons video on it in a few years time.

not as good as this high quality classic facepunch ms paint masterpiece https://files.facepunch.com/forum/upload/112927/96418582-1883-4bbd-80fb-7f1ba9e50de7/periscope.png

Looks like it's gonna slap me rather then shoot me.

If nothing else, the dude's obvious dedication and talent has earned himself a spot as an engineer for a firearms company, I'd say.

oh hey its metal storm again...for like the 3rd time...

He got the idea in the 1990s after a day of shooting a .22-caliber rifle with his kids. This entire concept is stupid as fuck. Ace way to create a weapon with massively inflated manufacturing, repair, and ammunition costs though, with increased complexity and reliance on electronics to boot.

Sounds to me like it's mechanically pretty simple though, which could be a strength in some contexts. Just like electric cars are mechanically simpler than ICE cars, and how mirrorless cameras are mechanically simpler than DSLRs.

The firing mechanism is arguably simpler- but now you've got to deal with 4 of them, as well as the circuit that handles regular fire and POWR SHOTTE Also "Your weapon is running low on power. Please plug it in or it will go to sleep soon!"

Without having read much into this, I wonder if you could leech off the chemical energy to keep the thing charged.

Necessarily to harvest the kinetic energy you'd need to increase complexity even further. Gas-operated firearms already do this though, and with great efficiency compared to having to store the recaptured energy in a battery

As opposed to relying on a mechanical system that can fail due to a variety of reasons? Part wear, poor design tolerances, any number of extremely minor issues in cartridge production.. Solid state electronic is the superior choice for a firearm. Fewer moving parts means fewer points of failure. Fewer moving parts means a weapon that stays on target better. The problem stems from people trying to innovate EVERYTHING instead of just designing a rifle that uses cartridges with ballistics similar to stuff that has been proven before. A 5.56, 5.45, or 7.62x51 analogue. Whatever. With the rifle itself being designed to get the maximum benefit out of the removal of mechanical parts.

isn't that what the American military-industrial complex is all about though

Well in that case it's completely worthless since electronic ignition is already how we do rocket launchers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CI7XLFN-hD4 Actually saw this a while ago, only thing that stuck out to me is how this gun may as well feel like a guns in mass effect where you have to pop out hot thermal clips bc these blocks will soak up the heat, not the barrels which is the only neat thing lets be honest.