loc978 said:
Eh, the XM8 would've fit with the Army's new decor perfectly... works great, until it fails... but when it fails, it does so spectacularly.
-familiar with this dust test?
One thing most people don't mention about it: of the 127 stoppages the XM8 had... I believe it was... eight of them? ...were "major" stoppages, requiring field-stripping and complex repairs.
The rest of the rifles had no major stoppages.
...we should have picked up the SCAR...
... Except that a stoppage is a jam, so the current M4 had over 5 times more jams then the Xm8.
"Newer carbines outperform M4 in dust test" [http://www.armytimes.com/news/2007/12/army_carbine_dusttest_071217/]
Here's the 1st paragarph:
"The M4 carbine, the weapon soldiers depend on in combat, finished last in a recent ?extreme dust test? to demonstrate the M4's reliability compared to three newer carbines.
Weapons officials at the Army Test and Evaluation Command at Aberdeen Proving Ground, Md., exposed Colt Defense LLC's M4, along with the Heckler & Koch XM8, FNH USA's Special Operations Forces Combat Assault Rifle and the H&K 416 to sandstorm conditions from late September to late November, firing 6,000 rounds through each test weapon.
When the test was completed, ATEC officials found that the M4 performed "significantly worse" than the other three weapons, sources told Army Times.
Officials tested 10 each of the four carbine models, firing a total of 60,000 rounds per model. Here?s how they ranked, according to the total number of times each model stopped firing:
XM8: 127 stoppages.
MK16 SCAR Light: 226 stoppages.
416: 233 stoppages.
M4: 882 stoppages.
The results of the test were "a wake-up call," but Army officials continue to stand by the current carbine, said Brig. Gen. Mark Brown, commander of Program Executive Office Soldier, the command that is responsible for equipping soldiers."