Consequences for the RF Armed Forces in the event of success or failure of the NGSW program
In the previous article, we examined what actions can be taken in the event of a partially successful implementation of the Next Generation Squad Weapon (NGSW) program, when program participants cannot create weapons that simultaneously provide a significant increase in range and high armor penetration, combined with a fairly low recoil, and an acceptable mass of weapons.
In this case, weapons created under the NGSW program will occupy a limited niche in the US military in the form of the NGSW-AR light machine gun and the NGSW-R marksman rifle. At the same time, the bulk of the US military will be armed with traditional weapons chambered for 5, 56x45 mm, or weapons for slightly more powerful ammunition, for example, based on 6, 5x39 Grendel or 6, 8x43 Rem SPC cartridges.
The response actions of the Russian armed forces and industry in this case may lie in the area of relatively low-cost evolutionary development of existing weapons, such as the Pecheneg machine gun, SVD / SHF sniper rifles and Kalashnikov assault rifle or light machine gun, as well as ammunition for them of caliber 7, 62x54R, 7, 62x39 mm or 5, 45x39 mm.
However, if the participants in the NGSW program are able to create weapons that simultaneously provide a significant increase in range and high armor penetration, combined with a sufficiently low recoil and an acceptable mass, it will no longer be possible to do with a simple improvement of existing weapons and ammunition. In this article, we will consider what options for response decisions can be implemented by industry in the interests of the armed forces of the Russian Federation
As a preamble, you can cite the words of Alexei Sorokin, the former director of the Tula TsKIB SOO:.
And one more digression:.
Treasured 6.5 mm
Since the advent of the unitary cartridge for small arms, countless ammunition of various calibers and purposes has been fired. Probably from that moment, the search for the ideal ammunition began, first for rifles and machine guns, and then for machine guns, which continues to this day not only on the pages of specialized Internet resources, but also within the walls of defense enterprises and institutes. Often, in the search for the "ideal" caliber, it is forgotten that the bullet diameter is only one of the characteristics of the ammunition, and cartridges with fundamentally different characteristics can be realized within the same caliber.
Often, the choice of the optimal ammunition is overgrown with legends, one of which can be attributed to the widespread opinion that the 6, 5 mm caliber cartridge proposed in 1913 by the designer V. G. Fedorov in 1913, the cartridge 6, 5x57 mm for an automatic rifle of his own design. For cartridge 6, 5x57 mm V. G. Fedorov developed not only standard, but also armor-piercing bullets with tungsten alloy cores.
The cartridge 6, 5x57 mm was never adopted by the Russian, and then the Soviet army, in connection with which it is possible to speak about its probable advantages only in the format of an alternative history.
In the late 19th - early 20th centuries, many cartridges of 6.5 mm caliber were fired - these are the Italian 6, 5 × 52 mm Mannlicher-Carcano, and the Swedish 6, 5 × 55SE mm Swedish Mauser, and the Japanese 6, 5 × 50SR Arisaka, which V. G. Fedorov used 6, 5x57 mm instead of his own cartridge in his rifle.
Ultimately, in the 20th century, cartridges of caliber 7, 62 mm and low-impulse cartridges of caliber 5, 45/5, 56 mm dominated by a huge margin. Taking into account the funds that the leading powers of the world have invested in defense research, it can hardly be said that this choice is unfounded.
Nevertheless, history is being made in a spiral, and the development of promising 6-7 mm ammunition may be in demand in promising weapons
Soviet legacy
In the USSR, systematic studies of promising small arms and ammunition for them were carried out. As you can see from the previous article The evolution of the machine gun in the USSR and in Russia in the context of the American NGSW program, the scale of work carried out within the framework of the competition for the machine gun for equipment "Warrior" is not even close to what was implemented in the USSR, within the framework of solving a similar problem.
An interesting ammunition for small arms, about which there is not enough information, is the 6x49 mm cartridge, developed in the late 80s of the 20th century by specialists of the Central Research Institute of Precision Engineering (TsNIITOCHMASH). The 6x49 mm cartridge is a rifle and machine gun ammunition designed to defeat targets protected by personal body armor (NIB) at a distance of up to 1000 meters. The predecessor of the 6x49 mm cartridge was the 6x54 mm cartridge, created back in 1975, with an initial velocity of a 5 gram bullet of 1080 m / s. The energy of the bullet of the 6x54 mm cartridge in some parts of the trajectory exceeded, and in others it was comparable to the energy of the bullet of the cartridge 7, 62x54R.
The 6x49 mm cartridge had higher characteristics compared to the 6x54 mm cartridge with smaller dimensions. A bullet weighing 5 grams accelerated to a speed of 1150 m / s, while the recoil momentum was 25-30% less than that of cartridge 7, 62x54R.
Under this cartridge, prototypes of small arms have been developed - TKB-0145K sniper rifles developed by TsKIB SOO and SVK, SVK-S.
Apparently, the 6x49 mm cartridge is the most advanced promising ammunition developed in the USSR / Russia. To what extent is it suitable for weapons that can be considered as a competitor to the automatic rifle created under the American NGSW program?
As we said earlier, in the event of negative results under the NGSW program, the bulk of the US military will be armed with traditional weapons chambered for 5, 56x45 mm, or with a reinforced cartridge based on cartridges of type 6, 5x39 Grendel or 6, 8x43 Rem SPC with an initial energy 2000-2600 J. And in the case of a successful scenario, the initial energy of a promising cartridge of caliber 6, 8 mm NGSW can be about 4300 J. This is much more than cartridge 7, 62x51 and even more than cartridge.30-06 Springfield (7, 62 × 63 mm) used in the American M1 Garand rifle.
The initial bullet energy of the 6x49 mm cartridge is about 3300 J, it can probably be increased to 3500-3700 J. This is presumably lower than that of the promising American cartridge of 6, 8 mm NGSW caliber, but here there is a suspicion that it is one thing to want to get an automatic weapon chambered for a cartridge with an initial energy of 4300 J, it's another thing to get it in reality. It is likely that the US military will have to "cut the sturgeon", and in the process of development, the United States will come to the same 3500-3700 J.
Another argument is that even if the Americans manage to create a weapon that allows them to fire in bursts with a cartridge with an initial energy of 4300 J, then at short ranges it will lose in accuracy to an automatic weapon of a similar layout, made on the basis of a cartridge with a lower energy. Thus, a weapon chambered for 6, 8 mm NGSW with an initial energy of 4300 J will have advantages at a long range, for example, over 500 meters, when firing single shots, and weapons created for a 6x49 mm cartridge with an initial energy of 3300 J will have advantages at a shorter range, for example, up to 500 m, when firing in short bursts.
Long-range shooting, in addition to the necessary and sufficient parameters of the weapon-cartridge complex, also requires the corresponding skills from the shooter. It is doubtful that all US military personnel will be able to realize the capabilities of such weapons, and in this sense, weapons chambered for a powerful cartridge are more effective in the traditional role of Marxman weapons. At the same time, suppression fire can be fired both with a weapon chambered for a promising cartridge 6, 8 mm NGSW, and chambered for 6x49 mm.
Penetration of modern and future NIB at effective fire range should be approximately the same for both cartridges. The lower estimated energy of the 6x49 mm cartridge, compared to the 6, 8 mm NGSW cartridge, is compensated for by almost 30% of the larger transverse area of the latter's bullet. The area of a 6 mm bullet is 28.3 mm2, a 6.8 mm bullet is 36.3 mm2, for a 6x49 mm cartridge with 3300 J it is 117 J / mm2, for a 6.8 mm cartridge with 4300 J it is 118 J / mm2 … Accordingly, if the initial energy of the 6x49 mm cartridge is increased to 3500 J, and the 6.8 mm NGSW cartridge is reduced to 3700 J, then these figures will be 124 J / mm2 and 102 J / mm2, respectively. Of course, these are quite general numbers, since a lot will be determined by the shape and size of the carbide core, the aerodynamics of the bullet and other factors.
Weapon chambered for 6x49 mm
It cannot be said that the idea of using a 6x49 mm cartridge instead of an intermediate cartridge is some kind of new. According to the available data, the 6x49 mm cartridge was initially considered as a single ammunition for a promising sniper rifle, assault rifle and machine gun, although there is no reliable information about the assault rifle. Experimental samples of weapons chambered for 6x49 mm were tested - sniper rifles TKB-0145K and SVK, SVK-S, a machine gun based on PKM and presumably an assault rifle based on AN-94 "Abakan".
Can the AN-94 assault rifle be reborn as a Phoenix bird and become the basis for a promising rifle complex based on a 6x49 mm cartridge? The answer to this question in many respects lies in how well the design of the AN-94 has been worked out, and how it will work in tandem with a 6x49 mm cartridge, which is much more powerful than 5, 45x39 mm. The main advantage of the AN-94 assault rifle is that it uses a fire monitor with a shifted recoil impulse, which will potentially allow firing powerful 6x49 mm rounds in short bursts with acceptable accuracy and accuracy. Presumably, the fire monitor is used in one or more samples of weapons developed under the NGSW program.
The carriage scheme was also used in the experimental Stechkin TKB-0146 assault rifle, which is being developed as part of the Abakan competition. Despite the fact that the Stechkin assault rifle TKB-0146 lost the tests, it may well be refined at a new level and considered as another sample of weapons chambered for 6x49 mm. By the way, purely visually, the TKB-0146 device looks much simpler than that of the AN-94. The problem of the need for double reloading in the Stechkin assault rifle can certainly be solved in one way or another.
Also, in a promising machine based on TKB-0146, the developments obtained during the creation of automatic grenade launcher complexes 5, 45A-91, 7, 62A-91 and ADS (Two-medium special automatic machine) developed by KBP JSC (Tula) can be taken into account …
Thus, within the framework of a potential Russian competition, in response to the American NGSW program, two participants can be involved - the Kalashnikov Concern with an AN-94 assault rifle and KBP JSC / TsKIB SOO branch with a TKB-0146 assault rifle. In addition to the development of a promising machine gun for a single 6x49 mm cartridge, as it was intended, a machine gun, for example, based on the Pecheneg machine gun, and a sniper rifle, based on a microwave oven, should be created
Also, to reduce recoil on promising weapons, a closed-type muzzle brake (DTC) can be used. In addition to a significant reduction in recoil, closed-type DCTs significantly reduce the brightness of the muzzle flash and reduce the sound of a shot to values that are safe for hearing - you can shoot indoors without problems. When firing from a prone position, a weapon with a closed-type tank destroyer raises significantly less dust. DTK closed type can be used with supersonic cartridges. By the way, unlike mufflers, closed-type DTKs are allowed in Russia for civilian use.
The mass of a closed-type tank destroyer depends on the number of cameras and averages from 400 grams (tactical series) to 900 grams (machine gun models). Titanium alloy products weigh about 30-40% less. In the manufacture of closed-type DTK from titanium by 3D printing, as it is assumed for some samples of weapons created under the NGSW program, their weight will decrease even more, and their efficiency will increase.
For example, the closed-type tank destroyer of the Rotor-43 company can easily withstand burst fire even with cartridges like 7, 62x54R. At the same time, the muzzle flame is almost completely removed, the sound volume is reduced from 120-140 dB to 72-78 dB. DTK is quickly put on the weapon and also quickly removed; additional amendments to the weapon sights are not required. Also, replaceable membranes and regular maintenance are not required - "cans" of DTK are self-blowing.
The use of closed-type DCTs made of titanium alloys by 3D printing may become one of the leading trends in the development of promising weapon-cartridge complexes. In combination with a gun carriage, this can really make it possible to switch from small-caliber, low-impulse cartridges in small arms to a single cartridge of 6-7 mm caliber, with an initial energy of about 3500 J. a level at which the use of recoil accumulation schemes is not required, which in turn will significantly expand the list of weapons potentially acceptable for conversion chambered for 6x49 mm.
Epilogue
Why exactly 6x49 mm? Can't you create a completely new cartridge using the latest technology? Of course, the development of a completely new ammunition using the latest advances in the creation of materials and propellants, as well as production technologies, will make it possible to obtain a product with higher characteristics than those that can be realized in a 6x49 mm cartridge. The only question is whether they are being carried out now and what results have been achieved. The cartridge 6x49 mm, and the technology of its production, with a high probability, have been worked out at a fairly high level. Based on the existing groundwork, the 6x49 mm cartridge and weapons for it can be created in the shortest possible time, which will allow an adequate and timely response to the American NGSW program, in case of its early successful implementation. Also, the reserve for the 6x49 mm cartridge can be used as a basis for the development of a new cartridge of 6, 5-6, 8 mm caliber, if it is deemed appropriate. In any case, as mentioned earlier, the diameter of the bullet is far from the only parameter of the cartridge, and the figure of 6.5 mm is hardly worth considering as the answer to all questions.
On the other hand, it cannot be ruled out that the NGSW program will stretch over time. In this case, it makes no sense for us to rush and we can approach the development of a promising ammunition for small arms with greater thoroughness, using promising striking elements, materials and ammunition layout schemes. Of course, in this case one cannot do without the backlog of the Soviet period, but we will talk about this in the next article.
