More on G3s

Tim May tcmay at got.net
Thu Jan 11 11:35:56 PST 2001


At 1:12 PM +0100 1/11/01, Tom wrote:
>Jim Choate wrote:
>>  Up until then I thought I did too...I"m not so sure any more.
>>
>>  It's not a clone of the HK G3 as it was explained to me, it was apparently
>>  used as an interim weapon when the German Army dropped the HK G3 as a
>>  standard issue weapon a few years ago (ala G11). Maybe FAL, they're
>>  selling a 'G1' rifle that uses caseless ammo? Though I can't find a
>>  reference to any such rifle. Maybe it was CETME you do see their gun
>>  pushed as the 'G3' (the HK is a 'clone' or derived weapon from the Spanish
>>  gun).
>
>a friend of mine was an officer in the german army until very recently
>(he decided to get a real job :) ) - give me 24 hours and I'll tell you
>exactly what the past and current standard issue weapons are and what
>kind of ammo they fire.

On Choate's point above, it is not FAL (a rifle, but I assume Choate 
must mean the maker of the FAL, Fabrique Nationale, now owned by 
another company, IIRC) who are making a caseless ammo rifle. Rather, 
it is in fact H-K. The G11 has been in development for close to 30 
years now.

(H-K are _also_ owned by another company. Last I heard, a British 
company bought H-K, though the factories and design groups remain in 
Germany.)

Most NATO countries have now adopted some variant of the 5.56 mm 
cartridge, in either M-16-type variants or in bullpup designs like 
the excellent Steyr AUG or the newer HK G36 (with a civilian model, 
the SL8). Neither the caseless ammo of the H-K G11 not the 
flechette-firing prototypes are getting wide acceptance.

And as relates to Choate's "I was right" point, repeated again 
recently, the G3 in use by the German army was most definitely a 7.62 
mm, i.e., a .308 Winchester. It was _not_ the 5.56 mm variant, at 
least not for wide use. (I say this because quibblers like Choate 
like to find examples where _someone_ used a 5.56 mm and then say 
"See, I was RIGHT!")

--Tim May

-- 
Timothy C. May         tcmay at got.net        Corralitos, California
Political: Co-founder Cypherpunks/crypto anarchy/Cyphernomicon
Technical: physics/soft errors/Smalltalk/Squeak/agents/games/Go
Personal: b.1951/UCSB/Intel '74-'86/retired/investor/motorcycles/guns





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