LSAT news

[Tony Williams]

From: http://phx.corporate-ir.net/phoenix.zhtml?...&highlight=

 

U.S. Army Awards AAI Sole-Source Contract for Continued Lightweight Small Arms Technologies Development

 

Hunt Valley, MD - December 11, 2008 - AAI Corporation, an operating unit of Textron Systems, a Textron Inc. (NYSE: TXT) company, announced today that it has received a three-year, sole-source contract from the U.S. Army's Joint Service Small Arms Program Office, based at the Armament Research, Development & Engineering Center in Picatinny, N.J., for continued development of Lightweight Small Arms Technologies (LSAT). Initial funding for this contract totals $5.8 million, with incremental funding up to a total potential contract value of $28 million.

 

Under this follow-on contract, AAI will continue work it began under a prior contract to develop the 5.56-millimeter light machine gun and two lightweight ammunition technologies, including a cased telescoped

(plastic-cased) design and a caseless design. With a focus on increasing the maturity of these technologies even further, AAI also will begin development of a new cased telescoped carbine rifle variant, a valuable

addition to this family of high-performance, lightweight weaponry.

 

The contract is expected to culminate in an operational demonstration of LSAT in 2011, for which AAI will provide 100,000 rounds of cased telescoped ammunition and eight light machine guns.

Options under the contract that the Army may exercise include development of a caseless carbine, fabrication of additional caseless ammunition, a subcompact weapon study, and implementation of alternate bullet configurations

.

 

"There is nothing more important to our team than getting the best possible systems into the hands of America's warfighters," says AAI Vice President of Business Development and Advanced Systems David Phillips. "By continuing our work on the LSAT program, AAI can advance these armament and ammunition technologies, looking toward a time when they will be the standard for our nation's warfighters. Not only will LSAT provide a lightweight alternative to existing weaponry, but these technologies will deliver precise, repeatable and reliable performance."

 

The LSAT program seeks to reduce the weight and size (or volume) of the small arms and ammunition carried by America's warfighters, with a 45 percent weight reduction goal for the light machine gun and ammunition system. Additional program objectives include improvements in system reliability, accuracy, dispersion, and ergonomics, as well as reductions in training and maintenance requirements. AAI is continuing its development of LSAT technologies along with the experienced team of companies from the prior contract including ARES Inc., Alliant Techsystems, Battelle Memorial Institute, MSC Software, Omega Training Group (a Cubic company), St. Marks Powder (a General Dynamics company), and Veritay Technology.

 

The highlighted italics bit is interesting. From a discussion with an AAI rep I had at Eurosatory, the "alternate bullet configurations" could include an intermediate calibre.

[D.E. Watters]

The weird thing about this press release is how late it was released. The contract award was posted by Picatinny back in September.

[demosthenes]

The Army seems less than hopeful regarding the caseless ammunition. Caseless merely an "option" for trials?

 

It is to my understanding that AAI licensed caseless technology from Dynamite Nobel; their ammunition performed well on the G-11 (eventually solving the chamber cook off problem), so I am curious as to what AAI is actually improving upon.

[Simon Tan]

Yet more money pissed away.....

[GregW]

Yet more money pissed away.....

 

What makes you think this is such a waste?

 

I think the Cased Telescoped makes alot of sense and I could see the push thru chamber used in the demonstrator being very reliable under heavy use. I could also see a plastic cased round being very easy to seal against moisture and it should be plenty able to withstand handling and abuse. What advantage does a traditional brass case have over plastic?

 

I am less impressed with the caseless version. It may be slightly lighter and smaller but it has no insulation of the chamber from combustion, no easy way to seal the chamber, and I would think it must leave some powder residue in the chamber and mechanism. What happens to the booster and primer on the caseless round - do they follow the bullet down the barrel?

[Simon Tan]

Because all publicly funded small arms development has led to a big fat zero in the last 40 years. Government programs are by nature large, inefficient and self-serving, i.e. there is no pressure to make it commercially viable at the end of the day. There is no motivator to drive success. If it fails, everyone still had a nice ride on the gravy train.

 

In comparison, you only have to look at the tangible leaps and bounds made by privately funded small arm companies who have to sell to survive.

 

Cased telescopic ammo has been around for 40 years. Developing ammo analogous to M855 is idiotic given all the limitations to that round. The same money could be spent on fielding a more effective caliber like 6.8SPC which would produce tangible improvements in terminal effects etc.

[demosthenes]

What makes you think this is such a waste?

 

I think the Cased Telescoped makes alot of sense and I could see the push thru chamber used in the demonstrator being very reliable under heavy use. I could also see a plastic cased round being very easy to seal against moisture and it should be plenty able to withstand handling and abuse. What advantage does a traditional brass case have over plastic?

 

I am less impressed with the caseless version. It may be slightly lighter and smaller but it has no insulation of the chamber from combustion, no easy way to seal the chamber, and I would think it must leave some powder residue in the chamber and mechanism. What happens to the booster and primer on the caseless round - do they follow the bullet down the barrel?

 

 

You may be interested to see what this Austrian company has to say about their proprietary caseless technology:

http://www.caselessammunition.com/

[EchoFiveMike]

You may be interested to see what this Austrian company has to say about their proprietary caseless technology:

http://www.caselessammunition.com/

 

I recall seeing rifles for that caseless ammo in the middle 90's, it was a commercial flop. Caseless has no commercial advantage, only a military application. I find it hard to imagine a caseless round that would standup to the idiotic ammo accountability practices of the average internal guard detachment. Regular rounds don't stand it well as is. S/F....Ken M

[demosthenes]

http://www.imemg.org/res/imemts2006_Ashcroft_pres11B.pdf

 

According to the above PDF, they're trying to "replicate" the caseless technology used on the H&K ACR. I presume this means they're just trying to set up production techniques rather than trying to reinvent the wheel, as far as I can interpret. Anyone else have more information?

[Lampshade111]

I still like the potential of caseless ammunition to be used in a recoil system like on the G11, allowing a three round burst with very little deviation.

 

Modern cased telescoping ammunition may be good for decreasing the weight a bit, but I would rather see it in a new caliber.

[Tony Williams]

http://www.imemg.org/res/imemts2006_Ashcroft_pres11B.pdf

 

According to the above PDF, they're trying to "replicate" the caseless technology used on the H&K ACR. I presume this means they're just trying to set up production techniques rather than trying to reinvent the wheel, as far as I can interpret. Anyone else have more information?

They're not reinventing the wheel, they bought the rights to the technology from Dynamit Nobel, who developed the ammo for HK.

[Simon Tan]

Like....is not a valid reson for wasting taxpayer dollars.

 

Simon

[Lampshade111]

Like....is not a valid reson for wasting taxpayer dollars.

 

Simon

 

I hardly consider the development of new ammunition which could well find a use, a waste of taxpayer dollars. Especially when you consider so many other projects our government is wasting taxpayer dollars on.

[Simon Tan]

If it were a goer, private enterprise would have done it already. Like, maybe etc. all have no place in fiscal decision making and the failings of government in adhering to this rigor is why so little comes from so much money spent. Of course government is invariably a reflection of the society it comes from so profligacy and laziness are a given. Almost all the material LSAT has been pimping was trodden in the 60s.

[Lyle, Bob]

I'm trying to recall the radical, out of the box thinking that supposedly has come from civilian small arms designers since Eugene Stoner. Yeah, everything in LSAT is twenty years old or more [how long have revolving breaches been used in aircraft cannon?]. The main difference is that SPIWS and the ACR were looking for new capabilities, LSAT just wants to lighten the load.

 

6.8 SPR is a non-starter. The SAW gunner is already the most overloaded member of the fire team. If you go to the heavier round you need to back d own to an auto rifle or add an ammo bearer.

[Guest aevans]

I recall seeing rifles for that caseless ammo in the middle 90's, it was a commercial flop. Caseless has no commercial advantage, only a military application. I find it hard to imagine a caseless round that would standup to the idiotic ammo accountability practices of the average internal guard detachment. Regular rounds don't stand it well as is. S/F....Ken M

 

You can tell a lot by what isn't in a brochure. (And that web site is essentially a brochure.) Is was obvious to me the second I read their list of "major hurdles" that they still don't have a clue about how to address the handling durability issue.

[Guest aevans]

I'm trying to recall the radical, out of the box thinking that supposedly has come from civilian small arms designers since Eugene Stoner.

 

How much "out of the box" did Stoner ever really get? The Germans had already pioneered non-traditional materials and fabrication techniques with the MP40 SMG, and only extended those with the StG44. All Stoner did was replace automotive industry materials and techniques (plastics, stamped sheet metal) with ones from the aircraft industry (fiberglass, forged aluminum). Okay, he's the guy that did it, but it's not like somebody wouldn't have tried those materials eventually.

 

6.8 SPR is a non-starter. The SAW gunner is already the most overloaded member of the fire team. If you go to the heavier round you need to back d own to an auto rifle or add an ammo bearer.

 

What's the utility of a belt-fed SAW anyway? 7.62mm machineguns are issued either two per platoon or six per company. It's not like sustained firepower goes out the window if we rethink the SAW back into something more like the BAR.

[Briganza]

I find it hard to imagine a caseless round that would standup to the idiotic ammo accountability practices of the average internal guard detachment. Regular rounds don't stand it well as is. S/F....Ken M

Having spent many hours counting soldiers round I see you point all to clearly.

 

But.

 

Pre packaged ammo with the top one a different colour or tracer. So in the future you would only get your ammo in disposable mags. Confirmation of tampering could be by weight rather than taking them out and counting them. I know it will be difficult for the QM to make that leap but if they have no choice then the will have to bend. Old mage could be used for drills or doing rifle drill.

[Guest aevans]

Pre packaged ammo with the top one a different colour or tracer...

 

That's not just a supply officers nightmare, it would be a combat soldier's as well. How would you like to have a magazine failure deprive you of 20% of your ammo? Or how about relying on a magazine spring that's been on the shelf for ten years, that you can't test?

 

People forget that the magazine, even if it isn't issued in 1-1 correspondence with the weapon, is still an integral piece of the system. That's why the disposable magazine has never flown, and probably never will.

 

Also, speaking of the particular quoted example, the electric ignition system is truly boneheaded. It's fine for cannons and rockets, where the overall platform has to have a working electrical system to function anyway, but making a battery a single point failure source for an infantryman's entire ammo supply? I don't think so.

Edited December 18, 2008 by aevans

[EchoFiveMike]

Having spent many hours counting soldiers round I see you point all to clearly.

 

Pre packaged ammo with the top one a different colour or tracer. So in the future you would only get your ammo in disposable mags. Confirmation of tampering could be by weight rather than taking them out and counting them. I know it will be difficult for the QM to make that leap but if they have no choice then the will have to bend. Old mage could be used for drills or doing rifle drill.

 

Well, I've elaborated on the ideal way several times (that being just have metric shitloads of ammo available and hand it out as requested like the docs hand out Motrin) but the military simply attracts too many trivial minutia obsessed control freak asshats for that to work outside the small unit level on a normal basis.

 

I'm not going to go off on a rant about the stupidity of people on trivial issues, but suffice it to say that most people in the American military are so unfamiliar with the tools of their chosen profession that it may well be magic to them. It manifests itself in mainstream society as the rampant hoplophobia(fear of guns) and that carries over to the .mil. Until that changes, we'll be stuck with elaborate rituals of the stupid such as cleaning weapons to destruction, punitive uniform/gear inspections and of course, the ridiculous count every round every shift guard turnover.

 

On the weight of 6.8 vs 5.56 issue: there's so much garbage gear that can be dropped to make up the balance that this is the argument of the devil's advocate. Any service that seriously considers having every grunt carry a IFF transponder and 30+ lbs of armour can't possibly bring up the weight difference between 6.8SPC and 5.56 as anything but a farce. S/F....Ken M

[Guest aevans]

I'm not going to go off on a rant about the stupidity of people on trivial issues, but suffice it to say that most people in the American military are so unfamiliar with the tools of their chosen profession that it may well be magic to them. It manifests itself in mainstream society as the rampant hoplophobia(fear of guns) and that carries over to the .mil. Until that changes, we'll be stuck with elaborate rituals of the stupid such as cleaning weapons to destruction, punitive uniform/gear inspections and of course, the ridiculous count every round every shift guard turnover.

 

Yeah, yeah, yeah -- I bet you can't even enumerate the reasons for doing so (whether you agree with them or not).

[Briganza]

How would you like to have a magazine failure deprive you of 20% of your ammo?

How would a mag failure deprive you of 20% of you ammo, unless you only had one mag. But then you could always load the US mag into an old OK one.

Or how about relying on a magazine spring that's been on the shelf for ten years, that you can't test?

 

Ammo turnover the same as any other ammo. Ammo has a use by date then return for checking and serviceability. How many missiles fail to fire. You could also not fight gravity in your design. The problem is not insurmountable. The mags could be loaded and unloaded without problem so testing is not an issue just requires a quality check every now and them like all ammo is checked. The problem come when your load and unload ammo and count it every day like EFM was saying, you just need to change the method of checking.

 

Also, speaking of the particular quoted example, the electric ignition system is truly boneheaded. It's fine for cannons and rockets, where the overall platform has to have a working electrical system to function anyway, but making a battery a single point failure source for an infantryman's entire ammo supply? I don't think so.

 

We have a number of single points of failure. Two spring to mind immediately 1, percussion caps, now they are seen as 99% reliable but were not always the case, 2, firing pin, remember the Dreyse Rifle, but again firing pins are 99% reliable now.

 

Put the battery in the mag, use the trigger force to produce the energy to fire the round, solar chargers, any one of a number of ways can be used to power it and we seem to have solved the problem of batteries that power all the other tools used on the battle field. Your arguing the wrong problem. Cost is the problem, not can we use batteries.

[Guest aevans]

How would a mag failure deprive you of 20% of you ammo, unless you only had one mag. But then you could always load the US mag into an old OK one.

 

Riiight. Think like a mechanical engineer -- this new ammo is smaller and lighter per round, so we'll jam 50 rounds in a standard unit of issue (exactly what was done with the G11, BTW). Pretty soon, you have a standard issue of 250 rounds in 5 units. One unit fails, yeah, you can always thumb the rounds out and load them in another unit, but remember, that unit too is made by the lowest bidder and expected to have to work exactly once. I can see magazines not being loadable in the field. Even if they are, you have to fire one good one out, and hope to have a free moment to crossload the ammo -- then hope the already used mag is good for another use.

 

Ammo turnover the same as any other ammo. Ammo has a use by date then return for checking and serviceability. How many missiles fail to fire. You could also not fight gravity in your design. The problem is not insurmountable. The mags could be loaded and unloaded without problem so testing is not an issue just requires a quality check every now and them like all ammo is checked. The problem come when your load and unload ammo and count it every day like EFM was saying, you just need to change the method of checking.

No, the problem is that mags will not necessarily be loadable in the field and they may not even be designed to be reloadable at all (imagine replacing springs with expanding gas, like in a non-CFC aerosol dispenser). Even if they are, the ammo, which is expected to be used once and only once, by your own design criteria, will have minimal handling durability. In that (most likely) case, you don't get to test your springs -- or whatever analogue pushes up the rounds -- you get to rely on them as they come.

 

We have a number of single points of failure. Two spring to mind immediately 1, percussion caps, now they are seen as 99% reliable but were not always the case, 2, firing pin, remember the Dreyse Rifle, but again firing pins are 99% reliable now.

 

The firing pin I'll buy, but that's an unavoidably unique piece of the system, just like the bolt, barrel, etc. Percussion caps soldiers have always had many of. No single one could shut down the operation for more than one round.

 

Put the battery in the mag,

Creating a situation where a whole magazine's worth of rounds is uselss if the battery fails. (This makes reloading used mags moot, y'know.) Better, but nowhere near good enough.

 

use the trigger force to produce the energy to fire the round,

 

Automatic fire?

 

solar chargers,

Batteries fail in many more ways than just running out of charge.

 

any one of a number of ways can be used to power it and we seem to have solved the problem of batteries that power all the other tools used on the battle field.

 

No, we haven't. Batteries are still a major headache in systems that can be powered in no other way. I'll stick to chemical initiation of ammunition, thank you very much.

 

Your arguing the wrong problem. Cost is the problem, not can we use batteries.

 

Incorrect. I don't care about cost all that much, since battereis are probably no more costly than chemical primers, when all is said and done. I'm arguing the decreased reliability in decoupling the round of ammunition from its ignition source.

[Briganza]

Design requirement of only having 50 rounds in a mags, solved the 250 mag problem.

 

Can you point to any test were mags loaded for long periods have fail or is it perceived wisdom that they would. I am not a physicist but would not continually using an item cause it to fail quicker than using it only once?

 

The point of the battery method was to point out that there are many ways to produce a charge and I’m sure you realised that but you like to be argumentative. The point I tried to make is that if the need was there then a solution would be found. You cold use the cocking motion to charge the weapon, don’t close a door just because it is not to your liking.

 

Cost is always the problem as you have just said, “made by the lowest bidder”.

[EchoFiveMike]

Yeah, yeah, yeah -- I bet you can't even enumerate the reasons for doing so (whether you agree with them or not).

 

Doing which time wasting thing, Divinely Inspired Chalice of all Knowledge? The cleaning weapons to destruction because leaders are unimaginative and have minimal understanding of their tools but they know clean weapons are Good? The routine punitive uniform inspections by martinets who needed to prove their superiority in some fashion and strutting about like a popinjay was just another public display of their insecurity? The counting rounds because God forbid we lose one("My Precious") and the troops can't be trusted? Or perhaps that the troops are ill-trained, insufficently supervised or just plain too fucking stupid to trust with live ammunition outside of an absolutely Prussian environment. Feel free to enlighten me as to what you think the reasons are. I know the peacetime USMC has had a metric shitload of negligent discharges going into a wartime environment where everybody insists on fumbling with their guns, loading and unloading all the time for no good reason, much like the guard mounts I recall from the early 90's.

 

It's telling that the Order for the interior guard, NAVMC 2691A, is a subset of the Drill and Ceremonies Manual NAVMC 2691. S/F.....Ken M