All over the place, even on FW, people keep saying that the M16 is not a very good rifle because of unreliability and low stopping power. The truth is that the reason they jammed so much in Nam was because of poor maintenance. Since maintenance has improved, M16s have proven themselves very reliable.
Many people also say that the 5.56mm round doesn't have enough stopping power to be effective. Even Mack often says this because when he fires it at a target it has low penetration. The problem with his tests is that the targets are never human flesh analogs. If he fired a 5.56mm at aa 1'x1' block of ballistics gel with a high-speed camera looking in from the side, we would see how deadly this round truly is. The conical bullet is very rear-heavy and travels very fast. When it hits a soft target, the front slows quickly while the back keeps moving, causing the bullet to tumble and often break in half. This makes the round very devastating.
The M16 is also very accurate for an assault rifle. The Ak47 is innefective at ranges as short as 200m. At this range, the M16 still performs beautifully. Here is a comparison of the two weapons: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6BpI3xD6h0
Well, at less than 200m the 5.56 no longer fragments when it yaws, so it is much less effective, also. When fired from the 14.5" barrel that goes down to about 75m. Also, 5.56 M855 will occassionaly show late yaw, doing no more damage than 7.62x39.
The worst problem with 5.56mm is intermediate barriers: walls, auto glass, even a pouch full of ammo can seriously degrade 5.56mm lethality.
7.62x39 is no prize. It works well against barriers, but it tends to make small holes in people and unless you it a critical structure, no joy. In the North Hollywood Shootout all thirteen officers and bystanders shot with AKs survived.
When veterans talk about something better than the 5.56, they are usually talking about the 6.8 SPC (also 6.8x43 or 6.8 Remington). This can be fired from a M4 with some modifications. The M4 is not as reliable as the full-length M16, although it does quite well with proper cleaning and maintenance.
The problem with the M855 round can be summarized in a few points:
1. It was optimized for penetration of body armor. This decision was made back when the USSR was still our major possible enemy. But when you optimize for penetration, you loose a bit on tissue damage.
2. It is being used in a platform it was never intended to be used in: the short barreled M4. The M855 round is a velocity dependent bullet. The higher the impact velocities, the more damage it does. Out of a 20" M16 barrel, the round retains enough velocity to yaw and shatter out to about 300m (as it was designed to do). Out of a 14.5" carbine barrel it retains that velocity threshold to about 150m. Hits beyond that range will not create consistantly lethal wounds. And this leads to the next point;
3. The M4 was never intended to be used for general issue. It was intended to give soldiers who's primary job was not that of a rifleman (and carrying a rifle would be awkward) a better weapon than a pistol(cooks, medics, vehicle crewman, etc). However, because it was the newest, sexiest thing in the arsenal (not to mention it was light and handy), and thus EVERYONE wanted to get their hands on one (even if it wasn't an appropriate arm to carry).
As far as the reliability of the weapon system, while it's not as maintenecne free as the AK, it is a rugged weapon, and properly maintained, will function reliably.
Originally posted by redneckrunner: I never did really like the M4 carbine, but the 20" barreled M16 is a great weapon and I'm holding to that.
If your primary job is not to send rounds downrange, the M4 is a great alternative to an M9 any day of the week. A full size M16 is pain to lug around, and even more so when it's going to be slung on your back most of the time when doing your job.
This message has been edited. Last edited by: kim g,
I tend to agree about the 5.56. It's only a .223 caliber round, but the smaller a round, the more penetration you're going to get. In the North Hollywood shootout, the police had to go borrow Civilian M16's that fired, of course, 5.56mm rounds. They were able to penetrate kevlar body armor with it, when they were unable to do so with 9mm and .45 caliber handguns.
Also, someone may want to correct me on this because I'm not sure, one of the criminals was using a 5.56mm weapons and was able to shoot through car doors and still kill or injure police officers. Even through walls. But that may have been the 7.62mm weapons they were using; I think it was a Yugoslavian AK-47 refurb. But again, I'm not too clear on it.
They were both using full-auto 7.62x39 AKs, I am not clear on the variant. They had at least one weapon available in 7.62 NATO, but they do not seem to have used it.
The officers did indeed get eventually AR15s from a local gun shop, but IIRC the robber shot with 5.56 was shot by a SWAT officer with his issue carbine.
Originally posted by RevolutionMan: I tend to agree about the 5.56. It's only a .223 caliber round, but the smaller a round, the more penetration you're going to get. In the North Hollywood shootout, the police had to go borrow Civilian M16's that fired, of course, 5.56mm rounds. They were able to penetrate kevlar body armor with it, when they were unable to do so with 9mm and .45 caliber handguns.
Also, someone may want to correct me on this because I'm not sure, one of the criminals was using a 5.56mm weapons and was able to shoot through car doors and still kill or injure police officers. Even through walls. But that may have been the 7.62mm weapons they were using; I think it was a Yugoslavian AK-47 refurb. But again, I'm not too clear on it.
Lets make one thing plainly clear: the 5.56mm NATO round will do the job. It's put a lot of people into the ground since first introduced during Vietnam. Now saying that, there are some trade-offs you must accept if you are going to use it.
As for the N Hollywood shootout, the primary weapons were 2 illegally modified AK variants with 100 round drum magazines. They also had IIRC, a 7.62mm G3 rifle and 2 5.56mm Bushmaster AR15s that had also been modified to fire full auto. LA SWAT at the time had both M4 style carbines and MP5 variants. I'm also not sure if the last perp was killed by shots from the issue carbine or a comandeered weapon.
