New British Army Rifle KS-1

PSE Composites Limited - The next level Rifle Stocks
Andy RV said:
Retool what? For the past 20 years the SA80 has been kept alive via H&K, the same with the GMPG.

We don’t have a mass production small arms weapon capability in the UK!

These contracts are best served by those already in serial manufacture.
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I thought Manroy Engineering made GPMGs (and M2s) for UK MoD?

Either way, this is a good development for UK Armed Forces. The analogy to Canada would be for Knights themselves to set up some UK based production.

Overall size of UK armed forces is so small now that would be hard to be a viable commercial prospect.
 
LeftHandGuy said:
I thought Manroy Engineering made GPMGs (and M2s) for UK MoD?

Either way, this is a good development for UK Armed Forces. The analogy to Canada would be for Knights themselves to set up some UK based production.

Overall size of UK armed forces is so small now that would be hard to be a viable commercial prospect.
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Good point - Manroy / FNH UK do make M2’s, I’m pretty sure that all of the GPMG’s I’ve come across are stamped H&K.
 
paul o' said:
We need a rifle that can compete on the world stage all be it an AR platform if it was me that would also be in what ever your enemy is using ! so if Ammo if short you can used there's.
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Need this then (PRC's assault rifle, nothing to do with Hornady...)

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Only issue being the manuals will be in Mandarin, but most of the squaddies have a hard time with English!
 
TringSaint said:
That must have been the Lee Enfield then, as the L1A1 (slr) is an FN browning design afaik and the SA80 was H&K (at least the second one was)
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The L1a1 was turned to Imperial from metric by Enfield.

The L85 was designed in Enfield but is pretty much an AR18 cut up and turned into a Bullpup.

H&K upgraded/remanufactured them into the L85a2 standard. Which was mainly sorting out materials that had been made cheaply and a few other issues. But the overall design is sound if perhaps not ergonomic. It's a very simple stamped metal design that would be very easy to mass manufacture without requiring specialist tooling like forging. And easily supportable because you can easily/cheaply replace the receiver and TMH. It is now very reliable and highly accurate. It was also one of the first service rifles to be designed as a "flat top" rifle that could have various sights fitted as well as giving every infantryman a 4x scope years before anyone else did.
 
SirNoltyboy said:
Yeah the L111a2 HMG is made by Manroy/FNH UK. The manroy website did used to show that they made GPMGs but I never saw one in service. Lots of original 60s and 70s manufactured guns still in service as well!
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That's what I remember seeing, but only from their website. Perhaps all they did was "make," GPMGs by force-matching existing components?

IDK. Defence procurement is one of things that inflames national passions! UK actually does pretty well with Defence sales, but there's a lot of dumb national pride BS too.

TringSaint said:
That must have been the Lee Enfield then, as the L1A1 (slr) is an FN browning design afaik and the SA80 was H&K (at least the second one was)
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Sorta' kinda'. Actually the SA80 is an AR18 that's been subject to the firearms equivalent of gender reassignment surgery. The decision to adopt it was a commitment to "buy British" before any more practical considerations. It's always beat the hell out of me that Stirling weren't just contracted to supply AR18s. Sure an AR15 based rifle off the bat would have been even better, frankly, but Stirling was right there, making an actually decent rifle... Wasted opportunity.
 
SirNoltyboy said:
The L1a1 was turned to Imperial from metric by Enfield.

The L85 was designed in Enfield but is pretty much an AR18 cut up and turned into a Bullpup.

H&K upgraded/remanufactured them into the L85a2 standard. Which was mainly sorting out materials that had been made cheaply and a few other issues. But the overall design is sound if perhaps not ergonomic. It's a very simple stamped metal design that would be very easy to mass manufacture without requiring specialist tooling like forging. And easily supportable because you can easily/cheaply replace the receiver and TMH. It is now very reliable and highly accurate. It was also one of the first service rifles to be designed as a "flat top" rifle that could have various sights fitted as well as giving every infantryman a 4x scope years before anyone else did.
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I have shot the 2nd gen sa80 (I used to work for a company who sponsored the marine commando shooting team so we had annual invites by them to shoot all of the HK toys) but not the first gen which, I heard, was a B.O.S!!!
 
The SA80 (L85) was in fact just one evolutionary step in a line of weapons developed by Enfield starting with the XL64.
 
Heym SR20 said:
British military has adopted the KS-1 rifle for use by Marines, Rangers etc.

1,600 have been acquired for a cost of £15m.

Appreciate it has optics, night vision scopes etc. but do the Maths and that’s not much change out of £10k per weapon.
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I'd imagine this figure includes spare parts, tools, training accessories, etc?
 
The L7A2 GPMG is a real legend... it started its life back in 1957 as the FN MAG - Fabrique Nationale Mitrailleuse d'Appui Général (General Support Machine Gun), and still going strong. I would argue that it has its name in history as a machine gun is a way that is akin to the AK-47 (and its variants) as an a assault rifle.
 
Sweden was the first customer adopting FN mag in 1958 we do still use them in 7,62cal, they are going to be replaced after we have replaced G3/ak4 (1965) FNC/ak5(1985) , AI arctic warfare, FN mini mag in 5.56 buying new squad designated marksman rifles then some time .... FN mag are going to be replaced still working fine.
 
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