Originally Posted By: bdcardinal
Originally Posted By: hatt
I don't know if firearm designers get all caught up in the caliber wars. They build guns in the calibers that are wanted by the people who write checks. John Garand built his famous rifle for .276 when the army wanted that. Then upsized to .30-06 when they decided to stay that route. The .276 Garand was lighter, with less recoil, held 10 rounds vs 8 with the same basic actual ammo effectiveness.
Wasn't the switch to 30-06 due to the HUGE stockpiles of that round from WW1 and using the 1903 Springfield rifle up until the beginning of WW2?
The U.S. Army for the longest time was extremely frugal borderlining on cheap. So yes, MscArthur basically overrode the U.S. Army Ordnance and ordered the Garand to be adapted to the 30-06 round. The 276 Pedersen round was a nice reduced caliber round that passed all the requirements of the time.
And weapons designers nowadays don't get into heated discussions but if you read around, back in the late 40's through the mid 60's it was a very hot topic in Army Ordnance. There were two distinct camps, the small caliber high velocity crowd, and the traditional full power camp who basically considered even the T65/7.62 NATO round an "intermediate" round, which is somewhat laughable to me.
I would say that if you are shooting out to 300 yards, a properly matched ammo to gun combo in 5.56 is perfectly suitable. The biggest problem with the lethality of the 5.56 round is that over time was have tightened our twist rates and shortened our barrels. The early tests with 55gr ammo, a 1 in 14 twist barrel, and a high velocity showed wounds in combat that surprised soldiers used to the 30-06 and 7.62 NATO. That combo produced fragmenting and tumbling. Later studies by the military say that the change to a 1 in 12 twist (to pass arctic conditions accuracy requirements) may have reduced lethality up to 40%( I believe it was the Hall Study). Shows just how dependent the proper combo of ammo and gun is for that concept.
Originally Posted By: hatt
I don't know if firearm designers get all caught up in the caliber wars. They build guns in the calibers that are wanted by the people who write checks. John Garand built his famous rifle for .276 when the army wanted that. Then upsized to .30-06 when they decided to stay that route. The .276 Garand was lighter, with less recoil, held 10 rounds vs 8 with the same basic actual ammo effectiveness.
Wasn't the switch to 30-06 due to the HUGE stockpiles of that round from WW1 and using the 1903 Springfield rifle up until the beginning of WW2?
The U.S. Army for the longest time was extremely frugal borderlining on cheap. So yes, MscArthur basically overrode the U.S. Army Ordnance and ordered the Garand to be adapted to the 30-06 round. The 276 Pedersen round was a nice reduced caliber round that passed all the requirements of the time.
And weapons designers nowadays don't get into heated discussions but if you read around, back in the late 40's through the mid 60's it was a very hot topic in Army Ordnance. There were two distinct camps, the small caliber high velocity crowd, and the traditional full power camp who basically considered even the T65/7.62 NATO round an "intermediate" round, which is somewhat laughable to me.
I would say that if you are shooting out to 300 yards, a properly matched ammo to gun combo in 5.56 is perfectly suitable. The biggest problem with the lethality of the 5.56 round is that over time was have tightened our twist rates and shortened our barrels. The early tests with 55gr ammo, a 1 in 14 twist barrel, and a high velocity showed wounds in combat that surprised soldiers used to the 30-06 and 7.62 NATO. That combo produced fragmenting and tumbling. Later studies by the military say that the change to a 1 in 12 twist (to pass arctic conditions accuracy requirements) may have reduced lethality up to 40%( I believe it was the Hall Study). Shows just how dependent the proper combo of ammo and gun is for that concept.
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