By David Crane defrev (at) gmail (dot) com July 1, 2011 It goes without saying that everyone and their mother in the small arms manufacturing game wants to get that uber-juicy “Individual Carbine” contract to provide the U.S. Army general infantry with the “Next Carbine”, and/or land at least some part of the M4/M4A1 upgrade/modification/improvement contract. That would be great …

By David Crane defrev (at) gmail (dot) com February 8, 2011 Updated on 1/12/11. About a week ago, on January 31, 2011, the U.S. Army issued a Draft Request For Proposal (RFP) W15QKN-11-R-F003 for an “Individual Carbine” to supposedly replace the Colt M4/M4A1 Carbine, a direct-gas-impingement (DGI) AR-15 carbine configured to U.S. military specifications. Of course, the Army looking for …

By David Crane defrev (at) gmail (dot) com July 9, 2010 For quite some time, now, DefenseReview (DR) has been publishing information on just how reliable the direct-gas-impingement (DGI) select-fire Colt M4/M4A1 Carbine/SBR (Short Barreled Rifle) and semi-auto AR-15 carbine/SBR can be if they’re properly set up/sprung and lubricated (and even if they’re not properly lubricated). We have retired U.S. …

The following is a U.S. Army press release: PICATINNY ARSENAL, N.J. (June 23, 2010) — The Army announced today it has begun shipping its new 5.56mm cartridge, the M855A1 Enhanced Performance Round, to support warfighters in Afghanistan. The new M855A1 round is sometimes referred to as “green ammo.” The new round replaces the current M855 5.56mm cartridge that has been …

By Mike Pannone Info@CTT-Solutions.com All photos contained in this article were taken by Mike Pannone for DefenseReview.com, and are copyrighted. Mike Pannone and DefenseReview.com own the copyright on these photos. March 19, 2010 Here’s my question for those that subscribe to the direct impingement fouling concept: I fired 2400 rounds of M193 through a 14.5” M4-type upper receiver from Bravo …

By Mike Pannone June 15, 2009 In the early months of 2006 while I was helping to write and refine the curriculum of the Asymmetric Warfare Group’s Combat Applications Training Course (CATC) I took it upon myself to research performance enhancements and reliability upgrades as an integral part of educating the soldier on how to maximize his M4/M4A1 carbine. The …

By David Crane defrev (at) gmail (dot) com May 20, 2009 According to Army Times magazine, The 75th Ranger Regiment is scheduled to battle test the Special Operations Combat Assault Rifle (SCAR) very soon. The Rangers will reportedly be taking 600 FN SCAR rifle/carbine/subcarbine/SBR (Short-Barreled Rifle) weapons packages into battle, but DefenseReview doesn’t know how many of these are the …

By David Crane defrev at gmail dot com April 23, 2009 All photos contained in this article were taken by DefenseReview.com, and are copyrighted.

Why M4's have reliability issues…and why it's our fault! By Michael Pannone December 24, 2008 I fired 15,000 rounds through a semi-automatic M4/M4A1-type direct-gas-impingement (DGI) carbine in 31 weeks without a single malfunction attributable to anything except bad ammunition or bad magazines, with a grand total of 9 malfunctions. The least number of rounds fired between cleanings was 960 rounds, …

By Charlie Cutshaw For those of you who may have been on another planet for the past three or four years, our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan are having serious reliability issues with the M16 rifle and M4 Carbine, especially the latter. The basic problems with the M16 and M4 are nothing new. M16 reliability issues date to the mid-1960s …