2008 NDIA Small Arms Systems Symposium Firing Demo: Initial Report

Print Friendly, PDF & Email

by David Crane
defrev at gmail.com

May 25, 2008

Aaaand we’re back. Sorry for the delay in reporting in, but we’ve been fighting the travel demons and illness (minor and temporary) simultaneously. We shot some good video at the 2008 NDIA International Infantry & Joint Services Small Arms Systems Symposium, but we’re not sure how much of it we can show, yet.

We shot some footage in the lecture hall, and some at the firing demo. Some interesting things occurred in the lecture hall, so we’ll go into some of that at a later date. However, right now, we’re going to…

discuss the firing demo a little bit. The demo was held at Tac Pro Shooting Center, and it went off without a hitch, thanks to Sal Finelli of the U.S. Marine Corps (USMC) and Bill Davison and his staff at Tac Pro. As far as DefenseReview is aware, everyone got to fire the weapons they wanted to fire, and the demo was run very well and safely. The most interesting (new) weapons to DefRev at the demo were the 5.56x45mm NATO (5.56mm NATO)/.223 Rem. Israeli Negev LMG/SAW (Light Machine Gun/Squad Automatic Weapon) and 13" Micro Tavor MTAR-21 SBR/Subcarbine made by Israel Weapon Industries (IWI), the 66mm thermobaric M72A9 LAW ASM (Light Anti-Armor Weapon Anti-Structure Munition) made by Nammo Talley Defense of Mesa, AZ, the Next Generation Arms (NGA) 5.56mm tactical AR carbines and subcarbines, and the FN Mk16 SCAR-L (SCAR-Light) and and FN Mk17 SCAR-H (SCAR-Heavy).

We believe the version of the Negev we fired was the Negev Commando Version 5.56, but we’ll try to get confirmation on this. The standard Tavor TAR-21 assault rifle/carbine was also on-hand, but the Micro-Tavor MTAR-21 was, in our opinion, the more interesting weapon. We’ll be discussing both the Negev and Micro-Tavor more in-depth in a subsequent article or articles, but for right now, we’ll say that we liked both weapons. That said, Defense Review would be interested to see the effect on weapon controllability (on full-auto) if the cyclic rate/rate of fire (ROF) of both weapons were lowered to the 600-650 RPM range. Right now the Negev series fires in the 850-1050 RPM range on full-auto and the Tavor series fires in the 870-910 RPM range on full-auto. Even at it’s relatively high cyclic rate, the Negev LMG/SAW still seemed pretty controllable, but it would seem logical that lowering the ROF would only enhance full-auto controllability. Interestingly, the Negev LMG series is select-fire, with both semi-auto and full-auto settings, just like the Tavor series, due to IDF combat doctrine which calls for infantry machine gunners to be able to fire on semi-auto in certain situations.

DefenseReview put a decent number of rounds through the Next Generation Arms tactical ARs on both semi-auto and full-auto, and were really impressed with them. The weapons we fired employed both an Enidine hydraulic buffer and a Primary Weapons Systems (PWS) Quickcomp FSC556 Tactical Compensator/flash suppressor, so there was little-to-no muzzle rize, even on full-auto.

We also fired the Smith & Wesson M&P45 .45 ACP pistol at some steel pepper-popper targets. This weapon felt very comfortable in the hand and was comfortable to shoot. However, while the gun did its job on the pepper poppers, we were only firing at about 10-15 yards, so we’d like to see how the M&P45 pistol does at longer ranges. Glock was right next to S&W on the firing line, and they allowed attendees to fire the new Glock 30SF (a.k.a. Glock 30 SF) .45 ACP pistol. We didn’t get a chance to fire this gun, but we’re going to try to interview some of the folks that did.

Well, that’s it for now. More to follow, soon…

2008 NDIA Small Arms Systems Symposium Firing Demo: Initial Report by

About David Crane

David Crane started publishing online in 2001. Since that time, governments, military organizations, Special Operators (i.e. professional trigger pullers), agencies, and civilian tactical shooters the world over have come to depend on Defense Review as the authoritative source of news and information on "the latest and greatest" in the field of military defense and tactical technology and hardware, including tactical firearms, ammunition, equipment, gear, and training.

Check Also

Happy Veterans Day from DR!

By David Crane david (at) defensereview (dot) com DefenseReview (DR) just wants to wish our …