The general firearms thread

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Delekhan said:
Floor Polish said:
When making home made guns, many of them are based on the sten due to its simplicity of construction, and it does look sexy.
What century? :lol: Most manuals I see floating around the net showing you how to make your own firearm are based on either the AR-15 or AK-47 and those manuals are always circulated by either some sort of Militia or White Separatists.

20th century, under and after WWII. Making a Sten is easier than making an AK-47.
 
I was working on getting my barrett 50 rifle and 454 casul revolver in game before the hard drive failure....need to get back to work at it. :razz:
 
13 Spider Bloody Chain said:
AFAIK, bolt-action rifles are superior in terms of sheer accuracy.

Sorta.

First, some terms. In statistics, you have accuracy and precision. Accuracy is how close something comes to being "true," or to use the analogy of a bullseye, how close the shot comes to center. Precision is how repeatable the results are. Back to the bullseye, a precise grouping would be clustered close together. 100% precision would be all the rounds going through the same hole. High accuracy can be low precision, the rounds all hit the bullseye in different spots. A high precision grouping may be way off the bullseye. When speaking of inherent accuracy, we really mean precision. You can adjust the aim to get closer to the bullseye, tightening precision is not as easy.

Improving precision means eleminating variation. This variation comes from the rifle's action torquing while firing, the barrel flexing, the weight of the bullets, the number of powder grains, the position of the cartridge in the chamber, and how precisely the barrel is machined. Just to name a few. The action torquing is usually solved by bedding the action, creationg a stable and consistent contact area between actionn and stock. The reason for heavy barrels on is simple: a heavier barrel is harder to flex than a light one. This also means that, contrary to most expectations, a shorter barrel will probably be more precise than a longer one. A short barrel can be stiffer, pound for pound, than a longer one. (One common trick with Mini-14 rifles is to shorten the barrel a bit and recrown it. People say it makes their groups smaller) One reason why people tend to think of long barrels as being more precise is because they usually have a greater sight radius. The farther the distance between the front and rear sight, the easier it is to aim. Within reason, of course. If you can't see the front sight, it's a little too far out. :wink:

So, to bolt actions versus autoloaders. The top tier of high accuracy shooting is devoid of semi-autos. There's just more variation in an autoloading action. The lockup will never be as repeatable as the twisting lugs of a bolt action. The military, however, isn't in the business of punching holes in paper. Our enemies tend to move around and combat doesn't really give you those nice, prepared positions to calmly make your shots. Once that pucker factor is introduced, the accuracy difference isn't large enough to notice. One bad thing about a semi-auto for real sniping, I don't mean squad support, is the ejection of the brass. It's rather eye catching.
 
Only thing about the short barrel is the extent. If the barrel is too short then the bullet won't take to the rifling which would ruin accurate fire. Though of course as long as the barrel is long enough to let the rifling catch you won't get it any more accurate by extending the barrel unless you're in the habit of using a howitzer to snipe with (that's what I'd call eliminating with extreme prejudice).

To be honest, I suspect a lot of the long barrel associations come about because people don't recognise a flash suppressor when it's screwed onto the end.
 
Archonsod said:
Only thing about the short barrel is the extent. If the barrel is too short then the bullet won't take to the rifling which would ruin accurate fire.

Very true. The barrel has to be long enough to be practical. There's got to be a decent sight radius and enough tube to get the bullet moving a reasonable speed. 20-22" is the standard for short range benchrest. It could be shorter but then it starts to get impractical from a load development standpoint. You want big enough bullets going fast enough that wind and such won't affect them as badly.

Seff said:
Doesn't a longer barrel mean more time for the powder gas to push the bullet, giving it more power?

To a point. You can actually lose velocity if the barrel is too long. The supposed rule of thumb is that every inch adds another 50FPS. It's close enough but in actual practice, it depends on the powder, bullet, and how long the barrel is already. Adding another inch to a 29" barrel won't help much. Firing .45ACP through a 16" barrel barely adds 100FPS.
 
13 Spider Bloody Chain said:
And I thought that ^ was much of the philosophy behind the bullpup design; make the weapons shorter and more compact, but preserve barrel length.

Pretty much. The idea was to combine the maneuverability of the sub machine gun or carbine with the accuracy of the rifle.

In general I think longer barrel weapons are preferred when the muzzle flash caused by the rounds they fire would be dangerous to the operator or when the weapon is using self propelled rounds (in which case the longer barrel protects the operator from any damage caused by the propellant). As Feanaro said, to a point it can improve power, but that's generally taken care of by the actual round rather than the gun these days. Using barrel length for the same effect tends to cause more problems than it solves (for example, it makes it a lot harder to actually maintain the weapon in the field, is pretty much useless in a confined space and so forth).
 
It's pretty much down to personal preference really. Some guys don't like having the muzzle so close to their face when firing, some like them because of their reduced weight and the ease of lugging them around all day. Pretty much depends on who you ask. The balance can take some getting used to, I think in general it's people who are used to using the more traditional weapons who complain about it though; but then I've known guys who've been in the military for thirty years who claim if the bullpup rifles were around when they joined up they'd have been a lot happier.
 
I've not played with many bullpups but my general impression in meh. They are indeed compact. The magazine change isn't as awkward as I would have expected but it's not as fast as with an AR-style rifle. Although the risk is very tiny, having my face next to a chamber containing 60,000 PSI is not a comforting one. Bullpups are usually butt heavy. Triggers don't suck as much as they used to. Iron sights on a bullpup will be inferior to the same rifle in standard configuration, the sight radius is shorter. With optics, it's even, except for built-in optics. Some of those just suck(P90 comes to mind).

The design has advantages without being clearly superior.
 
I think it's better at a mid-range, especially those with the foward pistol grip. Means you can swing it around alot faster (basically point your fist at the enemy). Stery Aug good example -
steyr_aug.jpg

It seems in the Iraq war they're going back to a more sub-machine gun domination because of the CQB. A bullpup with a forward handle bridges that gap of needed the speed inside, and the range outside.

So, preferably, the British should equip their troops with SA-80's with front handles -

sa80-l22a1.jpg


As for the trouble of left hand ejections, the KEL-TEC RFB Rifle simply ejects foward and eliminates that problem.

The only major problem I can see with bullpups, is that it is difficult to fire around corners and above cover.
 
Seff said:
The 7.62x54r Russian round is the only rimmed cartridge still in official military use, and every other modern army uses only rimless, in case you were wondering about the use of the two.

BTW, the Russians only use it for their Dragunov sniper rifle.
I believe some russian machine guns still use it as well.
 
Buxton said:
What's the deal with Dum-Dums being banned?

The Germans got them banned because they were better than their own bullets :razz:

They're not banned as such, many police and similar agencies use them. They're forbidden for use by the military though, primarily because the Geneva Convention is built upon the Hague Convention which originally banned dum dum rounds (as well as the launching of explosives from balloons, which is still in effect today).
 
Archonsod said:
(as well as the launching of explosives from balloons.)

Not sure why you'd want to!  :lol:

I assume they're less effective against armour than FMJ ones. I guess it's the physcological effects of the massive wounds then. Seems a bit silly really though, if they're more effective - use them.

I know it's not generally a firearm question - but how are railguns coming along?
 
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