.338 mmg

[stanc]

http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/2...hine-gun-lwmmg

[angsniper]

Interesting. Cost a pretty penny to feed that sucker! Full auto at $5 a shot.

[OdDuMet]

Drool....

Found an article on the round:

"the bullet doesn’t enter the transonic region until approximately 1,750 yards (~10 yds short of a mile) . When it does, it’s moving at 1,306 fps, with 1,136 foot pounds of energy.

http://www.longrangehunting.com/arti...a-review-1.php

[OC455]

Where's the "buy" button....LOL

[eastern_hunter]

About 18 months ago I spent a day with the consultant to General Dynamics who designed the .338 Norma Mag and did a prototype MG in that chambering. He is an amazing fella. And that is a great combat tool ... an antipersonnel and anti-material weapon that doesn't weigh nearly 100 pounds and must be mounted.

In terms of cost of ammunition, you think .338 NM is going to cost more than .50 BMG? I doubt it.

[stanc]

More info and shooter feedback:

That is one impressive gun. I was instantly aware, from anywhere on the range, when it was firing. That deep, measured hammering sounds very different from all the 7.62mms and 5.56mms (which to my ears sound very similar). I couldn't really judge recoil because it was on a tripod, but it stayed on-target between bursts. GD were obviously so confident about the gun that they gave literally scores of tyros like me the chance to shoot it, in a steady stream (they were working hard to belt up the ammo - Black Hills manufacture, loaded with 300 grain Sierra MatchKing).

Some notes from the GD presentation:
- ballistic drop similar to .50 ball at 1500m
- defeats Level III body armour at 1000m
- delivers 4x the energy of 7.62mm at 1000m
- can maintain 10 minutes of continuous suppressive fire (50-100 rpm) without a barrel change
- very quick-change barrel (the carrying handle is on the barrel)
- quickly strips down into a few parts
- will fit on any M240 mounting (doesn't need a soft mount - the mechanism has its own, built in)
- the gun mechanism is called Short Recoil Impulse Averaging: it uses gas operation, but the barrel group recoils in the receiver and fires as it is moving forwards, giving a very smooth recoil push rather than a series of sharp kicks
- forward-stripping link specially designed: normal load 50-round soft pouch
- weight of gun plus one minute's worth of ammo (500 rounds) = 105 lbs, compared with similar load for M240 (800 rounds) = 100 lbs.
- GD working on polymer-cased ammo to reduce the weight.

I can imagine that troops facing long-range attacks in Afghanistan would be queueing up to carry this one into battle, despite the ammo weight. It provides what the US Army keeps stressing it needs: "overmatch". Unlike the M240, which can only match the performance of the PKM (with a lot more weight), this one will make PKM gunners afraid.

http://iaaforum.org/forum3/viewtopic.php?p=91061#p91061

[68WJ]

When I was mounting a gun onto my hmmwv for logistics security during resupply trips to our front-line tanks, I had to choose between M2 or M240G. The potential threat was light armor (BMP, MTLB, etc) and dismounts. I went with the .50 due to anti-armor capability while still being able to use it against unarmored threats, where the 7.62 would have been better for the dismounts but couldn't defeat light armor. A .338 gun might have been the best of both worlds.

Now give me some belts of .338 API / API-T