By Michael Pannone for DefenseReview ctts at live dot com All photos/images contained in this article were supplied by the author, Mike Pannone. January 9, 2008 Mark LaRue (owner of LaRue Tactical) sent out one of his 16" Stealth Upper Receivers (AR upper receiver) a year ago January while I was working on a carbine course for the DoD (U.S. …

by David Crane defrev at gmail dot com January 4, 2008 DefenseReview has received an interesting PowerPoint brief on the recent M4 Carbine "Extreme Dust Test" (Fall 2007 test) that we published info on recently, as well as some info/results from the preceding extreme dust test earlier in the year (2007). The brief came in from one of our professional …

by David Crane defrev at gmail dot com December 31, 2007 1) Northrop Grumman Corporation (NGC) has a new weapons sight called the "FMWS", which stands for "Fused Multispectral Weapon Sight". It’s DefenseReview’s understanding at present that the FMWS combines an infrared (IR) imager and I2 (Image Intensification / Night Vision) imager (unfonfirmed/unverified). The FMWS is so new, we don’t …

by David Crane defrev (at) gmail (dot) com December 21, 2007 Last updated on 7/30/11. Recently, DefenseReview published an article on custom tactical 1911 pistols built by Bob Marvel of Bob Marvel Guns a.k.a. Marvel Custom Pistols. It’s our understanding that Bob makes some of the most reliable tactical 1911 pistols in the United States, and thus the world, so …

by David Crane defrev at gmail.com December 17, 2007 This article was updated on 12/19/07 and 5/15/09. Ya’ know that Colt M4 Carbine vs. Heckler & Koch (HK) HK416 vs. FN MK16 SCAR-Light (SCAR-L) vs. HK XM8 LAR extreme dust conditions reliability test that the U.S. Army Test and Evaluation Center (ATEC) at Aberdeen Proving Ground (APG), Md. was conducting? …

by David Crane defrev at gmail.com DefenseReview readers are well aware that we’ve been following the Pinnacle Armor Dragon Skin body armor vs. U.S. Army Interceptor Body Armor Program for quite some time, now. As you also know, the Pinnacle Armor vs. U.S. Army situation subsequently resulted in the Departiment of Justice (DOJ) Office of Justice Programs (OJP) pulling (i.e. …

by David Crane defrev at gmail.com In our latest article on the TDI Kriss Super-V XSMG .45 ACP submachine gun, it stated incorrectly at the top that I, David Crane, am the pictured one in the photos. This mistake has now been corrected in the text. While I did test-fire the KRISS during that same range session, the photos in …

by David Crane defrev@gmail.com DefenseReview is interested to know how the Heckler & Koch HK416 / HK417 system stacks up against the FN SCAR-L (SCAR-Light) / FN SCAR-H (SCAR-Heavy) system with regard to reliability under adverse conditions and high round count, durability/ruggedness under same, and accuracy under same. While the HK416/17 system is closer to the Colt M4/M4A1 Carbine with …

by David Crane defrev@gmail.com October 22, 2007 Piasecki Aircraft Corp. (PAC) has designed and developed a compound helicopter called the X-49A Speedhawk, which utilizes a Sikorsky YSH-60F Seahawk helicopter as the base airframe. The Seahawk is a marine version of the UH-60 Black Hawk heliocopter series. The Speedhawk’s “compound” aspect is comprised of wings for additional lift and a vectored-thrust …

By Roger Charles DefenseWatch 10-17-2007 UPDATE to following article: Two congressional sources report that the Director of Operational Test and Evaluation (on the staff of the Secretary of Defense) caught the Army’s attempted exemption of current Interceptor vendors from independent testing, as allowed in the original solicitation. Under pressure from DOT&E, in August the Army issued a modification not listing …