Poll - Favorite Assault Rifle

[chico20854]

I know we've done this before, but it's been a while.

A couple of different philosophies seem to apply here:

1) My PC is from X country. X country issues Assault Rifle Y to their soldiers. My PC trained on this in boot camp and is most familiar with it and possibly has the spare parts to support it. Therefore, my PC carries Assault Rifle Y.

2) Assault Rifle Y has the least recoil for its weight, highest rate of fire, or fires the 6.5 Grendel, IMHO the baddest round ever. It never jams and could gut an elephant with a single shot from 1200 meters. It was a test weapon that my PC found in a burnt-out supply truck on the side of the road in western Poland. I'll worry about finding ammo later, and since it never breaks there is no need for spares. Therefore, my PC carries Assault Rifle Y.

3) I like the looks of Assault Rifle Z. Therefore my PC carries it.

(I exaggerate a little)

What is your favorite, and why? Do you think my philosophies apply.

[fightingflamingo]

M16 series, most of the time my PC's have been American's. The occasional British PC I have had used the L85. I tend to go with the issued weapon per the nationality played, unless I'm playing a SpecOps munchkin (whom can get anything).

[Raellus]

Do you consider the G3 series and the FN FAL/SLR "assault rifles"? Since neither are choices, I figure that maybe you consider them "battle rifles". I don't really see a clear distinction- seeing as the AKM is a choice on this list- but some folks (including the boys at GDW) do. Just wondering.

I like the AK-74. With it's fairly unique muzzle brake, it has very little muzzle rise on full auto and it's got the AK-47's legendary simplicity, toughness, and reliability. Since I'm rapidly becoming a Pole-o'-phile, I'd take the Polish equivalent Wz. 88 Tantal instead.

[pmulcahy11b]

Well, assault rifle-wise, I'm most familiar with the M-16, and I know what it can do and what it can't do. Unfortunately, I know what it can do and what it can't do.

[jester]

Assault Rifles, hmmm, Something robust, but also with the capacity for accuracy. Thus,

The SOCOM Model M14 which is a shortened version of the M14, or even the Carbine version. Another vairant would be the G3 cut down into an assualtrifle size or the L1/FN-Fal series in .308 cut down to carbine or assault rifle size.

If its purpose made assault rifle, then the HK 33/93 series seems to be good to go. Rebosut, reliable and accurate.

[Legbreaker]

The G-11.

It uses caseless ammo. I mean it's CASELESS! How cool is that!? :P
The low recoil, good range and massive standard mag size doesn't hurt either...

[Spoe]

Originally Posted by Raellus

Do you consider the G3 series and the FN FAL/SLR "assault rifles"? Since neither are choices, I figure that maybe you consider them "battle rifles". I don't really see a clear distinction- seeing as the AKM is a choice on this list- but some folks (including the boys at GDW) do. Just wondering.

The classic distinction isn't operation, but power of the cartridge. Battle rifles use full power rifle cartridges, like 7.62x51mm, 7.92x57mm, 7.62x54mmR, .303 Brit, .30-06, 6.5x55mm, etc. Assault rifles use intermediate powered cartridges like 5.56x45mm, 5.45x39mm, 7.62x39mm, 7.92x33mm, 5.8x42mm, etc.

You mention the AKM. 7.62x39mm is an intermediate power cartridge. Compare these muzzle energy figures and tell me which group it fits into:
7.62x54mmR: 3600-3800J
7.62x51mm (M80): 3350J
.303 Brit: 3250J
7.62x39mm (M43): 2000J
5.8x42mm: 2000J
5.56x45mm (M855): 1750J
5.45x39m (7N10): 1400J

[Tegyrius]

Originally Posted by Spoe

The classic distinction isn't operation, but power of the cartridge. Battle rifles use full power rifle cartridges, like 7.62x51mm, 7.92x57mm, 7.62x54mmR, .303 Brit, .30-06, 6.5x55mm, etc. Assault rifles use intermediate powered cartridges like 5.56x45mm, 5.45x39mm, 7.62x39mm, 7.92x33mm, 5.8x42mm, etc.

As a writer/designer, that's the distinction I use when such things matter. However, for purposes of hoplological taxonomy within the game, I generally lump battle rifles into the "assault rifle" category. Most game systems tend to loosely define "assault rifle" as "infantry rifle with burst or full auto fire mode," and there's no rigid mechanical distinction to differentiate "true" assault rifles from battle rifles. Traits derived from caliber performance or size do stand out, but I can't think of a system that makes an assault rifle fundamentally different from a battle rifle in terms of how the character makes attacks with it.

- C.

[Spoe]

Originally Posted by Tegyrius

...I can't think of a system that makes an assault rifle fundamentally different from a battle rifle in terms of how the character makes attacks with it.

Nor can I think of a reason to. But, that extends to semi-auto hunting rifles and, to an extent, even bolt-action or other manually cycled weapons.

It's an arbitrary distinction, even in the real world.

[Matt Wiser]

FN-FNC. Two main reasons: first, my SEAL PC needed a weapon that he could carry anywhere, even in prewar operations where carrying weapons "Made in the USA" could cause problems if KIA or captured. Second is more simple, really: I own a semi-auto version of the rifle. Which I had to register with the State of Calfornia after the state stupidly passed an assault weapons ban and I had to pay a $45 "registration fee".

[Grimace]

Seeing as I'm a lefty, I prefer the M-16 series. But, as Raellus mentioned I also like the G-3, but it's not on your list so I don't know if it's counted in this mix.

[Legbreaker]

Originally Posted by Grimace

Seeing as I'm a lefty, I prefer the M-16 series.

Sounds like you just need a real weapon that can be quickly and easily converted to left handed use...
The Steyr AUG would suit you nicely and is definately a better weapon than an M16...

[weswood]

M16, cause I know it

[Rainbow Six]

Preference would actually be a Battle Rifle (specifically the L1A1).

However, if I had to choose an assault rifle for a PC, I'd probably go for the L85 (based on philosophy #1).

[pmulcahy11b]

A plasma rifle in the 10MW range...

[Dog 6]

M-16A2 or A4, I used an A2 in the army and loved it, got my hands on an A4 a few times and its even better.

[Haven]

#1 with the twist of picking up the OPFOR #1 weapon for the extra ammo

[Grendel]

Originally Posted by Rainbow Six

Preference would actually be a Battle Rifle (specifically the L1A1).

However, if I had to choose an assault rifle for a PC, I'd probably go for the L85 (based on philosophy #1).

Im with you. FN FAL or L1A1 no puny 5.56 here.

[Medic]

Again, depending on the nationality of the said character, practically any assault rifle would do though I have some qualms about the reliability of the Colt family. For a Finnish character it would be the m/62 or m/95, depending on his unit of service. And in case of m/95, probably one equiped with some kind of an optic and the cheekplate installable on the folding stock.

For a mercenary character the Israeli Tavor might be cool...

[.45cultist]

Originally Posted by Medic

Again, depending on the nationality of the said character, practically any assault rifle would do though I have some qualms about the reliability of the Colt family. For a Finnish character it would be the m/62 or m/95, depending on his unit of service. And in case of m/95, probably one equiped with some kind of an optic and the cheekplate installable on the folding stock.

For a mercenary character the Israeli Tavor might be cool...

Don't worry, I used an R604 M16(no "A") in 1995, it was 10 years older than I was and had serial number 54,XXX.

[Raellus]

Based on the new responses on the Favorite APC/IFV thread, I thought a bit of thread necromancy might be in order.

[pmulcahy11b]

I've used both the M16 and AK-47 in real life -- and the winner is the AK-47. Yes, it's heavy, and a decent lot of ammunition is beastly heavy, but it works. I haven't had extensive real-life use of an AK, but you can shoot and shoot, throw it around, use it as a baseball bat club, and it keeps going without a hiccup. and it's round is guaranteed a fight-ending wound or a kill.

The M16 is light and easy to tote around, and you can carry a s---load of ammo for it. And you'll need it, because you'll need at least a 3-round burst or sterling marksmanship to bring an enemy down. And then, the bane of existence in my experience with the M16 -- extraction failure. Rarely did I go through more than 3 magazines without one. Often, it was only one. Then you find yourself clearing your chamber under fire, discarding the magazine (because it was sometimes the culprit) ans then doing a SPORTS routine.

[Legbreaker]

Originally Posted by pmulcahy11b

The M16 is light and easy to tote around, and you can carry a s---load of ammo for it. And you'll need it, because you'll need at least a 3-round burst or sterling marksmanship to bring an enemy down. And then, the bane of existence in my experience with the M16 -- extraction failure. Rarely did I go through more than 3 magazines without one. Often, it was only one. Then you find yourself clearing your chamber under fire, discarding the magazine (because it was sometimes the culprit) ans then doing a SPORTS routine.

Have to agree with your assessment of the M16 - I had similar experience with them myself. Every. Single. One.

[CDAT]

Originally Posted by pmulcahy11b

I've used both the M16 and AK-47 in real life -- and the winner is the AK-47. Yes, it's heavy, and a decent lot of ammunition is beastly heavy, but it works. I haven't had extensive real-life use of an AK, but you can shoot and shoot, throw it around, use it as a baseball bat club, and it keeps going without a hiccup. and it's round is guaranteed a fight-ending wound or a kill.

The M16 is light and easy to tote around, and you can carry a s---load of ammo for it. And you'll need it, because you'll need at least a 3-round burst or sterling marksmanship to bring an enemy down. And then, the bane of existence in my experience with the M16 -- extraction failure. Rarely did I go through more than 3 magazines without one. Often, it was only one. Then you find yourself clearing your chamber under fire, discarding the magazine (because it was sometimes the culprit) ans then doing a SPORTS routine.

I have to say that your experiences are totally different from mine. I spent about five years is Iraq using M16/M4's of one type or another. But most of that time I was working OGA (Other Government Agency) this just means that I was working for a different agency than the one I belonged to (State department when I was Army in this case). I had the opportunity to work with the locals a lot, and we (the US government) would give them brand new from the factory firearms, within a month we got a fair number of them back as they were no longer working. What were those firearms you ask? They were AK-47's (not sure who made them but think it was a former block) and Glock 19's. One of the things that I got tasked with was figuring out what went wrong, with the Glocks we found that it was due to poor ammo, they had a fair amount of bad ammo that produced squib loads, the way they cleared them was to fire another round. So on one had it shows that the Glocks were very tough firearms as they did not blow up, they just had bulges in the barrels that would lock the slide open. As for the AK, we have no idea what they did. We could not even get the slide to open with a hammer it was as if it was welded in place. Could not find anything out of the normal with the ammo it was not the best quality, but not the worst I have seen, it did have corrosive primers, but not that out there. They did not do the best maintenance, but much better than what "they" (being the uber fans) say is all that is required, I have also seen troops do worse maintenance on there M16 and they still worked just fine. Then when you add in the lack of accuracy or maybe better to say lack of consistency. What I mean by this is when doing test shooting some of them shot patterns, and others were almost OK, none were what I would call good, best were about 2 to 3 MOA, worst I do not have any idea as not all rounds were on the paper from a bench rest at 25 feet (worst I have ever seen, so not saying it is typical of them).

[HaplessOperator]

AR-15 variants for service rifles, hands down.

Manual of arms is faster than a raped ape. Runs better in mud than an AK. Runs even better if you keep 'er wet, even in the desert (the "keep your weapon dry" thing is a sure fire way to have it malfunctioning; environmental contaminants can't seize if they're a liquid), and you can slap just about anything on the platform in any configuration you wish and still have a lighter rifle than the next competitor, and you can trivially upgrade or modify essentially any single part of the rifle imaginable.

Need a rifle the size of an MP5? Mk18 has you covered. Need to reach out and touch someone at 800? Mk12 and 90-grain SMK's got it. Want to convert between the two in a private setup? You're two takedown pins and 15 seconds away from a room sweeper to a precision rifle. More exotic workups are easily possible; that same rifle can serve as a 9mm subgun to a .50BMG bolt-action, magazine-fed rifle or anything in between, and with a given lower, fire anything that fits within the 5.56 action length, and if you're not too snooty about upsizing, you've got the AR-10 and SR-25 families of design following essentially the same pattern.

Lefties do fine, too. No proprietary parts switching (which aren't issued along with service rifles most of the time, anyway), no worries about having to physically pull your magazine free if retention isn't required but speed is, allowing you to shortcut the process of gassing your weapon back up, no brass to fly in your face if you're transitioning shoulders (and you will constantly be transitioning shoulders).

With over 500 companies manufacturing parts for the things, and thousands that could if needed, they're better situated than any other country's service rifle for emergency wartime production, especially considering modern design and fabrication methodology for cutting aluminum billet and punching barrel blanks, and the existing aftermarket is probably the richest for any rifle platform in existence. These days, you can turn an AR-15 cheaper and faster than you can most extant AKs.

There's no one rifle that can do everything, but the AR-15 - especially in its modern incarnations - probably comes the closest.

If I were a trifling man, I could also mention that I've never been able to ignore that all these countries with indig service rifles (especially bullpups) tend to have their special operations forces almost universally using some flavor of AR-15 as well.

For the business end of things, an AR-15 is - within most common shootout distances - slinging a round that is going to cause considerably more tissue damage than a 7.62x39, as well, with lighter recoil, faster follow-up on the target, and on a trajectory that isn't like firing a rock from a slingshot.

[Raellus]

Ah, the classic AR v. AK debate continues!

Originally Posted by HaplessOperator

The AR-15 runs better in mud than an AK.

I'm curious as to your sources for this claim. Everything I've read or seen on this particular subject says the exact opposite.

The AK-47 series is legendary for its robustness and ability to operate reliably even when filthy. I once saw a video of South African special forces recovering an AK that had been buried for years in a guerilla cache in Mozambique. They literally dumped a can of motor oil over it (not even close to a proper cleaning), and then immediately fired off a 30-round magazine on full auto with no problems. I've never seen an M-16 do that.

The early M-16 had a deadly reputation of jamming under adverse conditions. In Vietnam, hundreds of US soldiers and Marines were KIA when their first-gen G.I. M-16s jammed during firefights. To be fair, this was corrected in subsequent versions but, AFAIK the AK still operates more reliably under adverse conditions (mud, sand, water, etc.) than the AR-15.

Originally Posted by HaplessOperator

If I were a trifling man, I could also mention that I've never been able to ignore that all these countries with indig service rifles (especially bullpups) tend to have their special operations forces almost universally using some flavor of AR-15 as well.

True, but these days, those AR "flavors" are more-often-than not look-alikes rifles like the HK416, which uses a different, more reliable operating system. It looks like an AR-15 but, ironically, its innards are more similar to those of the AK.

For the business end of things, an AR-15 is - within most common shootout distances - slinging a round that is going to cause considerably more tissue damage than a 7.62x39.

The 5.56mm round performs really well in ballistics tests, but it falls short of 7.62x39mm when it comes to penetrating anything tougher than soft tissue. I've also read multiple battlefield reports of the 5.56mm round lacking "stopping power", and of human targets of fighting through multiple 5.56mm round hits.

That all said, what I've read/seen on the subject definitely confirms that the ergonomics, operating controls, recoil, accuracy, mod-ability, and ammo weight of the AR-15 is superior to the AK and its variants.

-

[HaplessOperator]

Originally Posted by Raellus

Ah, the classic AR v. AK debate continues!



I'm curious as to your sources for this claim. Everything I've read or seen on this particular subject says the exact opposite.

The AK-47 series is legendary for its robustness and ability to operate reliably even when filthy. I once saw a video of South African special forces recovering an AK that had been buried for years in a guerilla cache in Mozambique. They literally dumped a can of motor oil over it (not even close to a proper cleaning), and then immediately fired off a 30-round magazine on full auto with no problems. I've never seen an M-16 do that.

The early M-16 had a deadly reputation of jamming under adverse conditions. In Vietnam, hundreds of US soldiers and Marines were KIA when their first-gen G.I. M-16s jammed during firefights. To be fair, this was corrected in subsequent versions but, AFAIK the AK still operates more reliably under adverse conditions (mud, sand, water, etc.) than the AR-15.



True, but these days, those AR "flavors" are more-often-than not look-alikes rifles like the HK416, which uses a different, more reliable operating system. It looks like an AR-15 but, ironically, its innards are more similar to those of the AK.



The 5.56mm round performs really well in ballistics tests, but it falls short of 7.62x39mm when it comes to penetrating anything tougher than soft tissue. I've also read multiple battlefield reports of the 5.56mm round lacking "stopping power", and of human targets of fighting through multiple 5.56mm round hits.

That all said, what I've read/seen on the subject definitely confirms that the ergonomics, operating controls, recoil, accuracy, mod-ability, and ammo weight of the AR-15 is superior to the AK and its variants.

-

Mostly from running both platforms in mud comps and on the job for the past 20 years. There's modern mud tests that bear this out, though. Outside of "legendary" claims and lingering fuddlore regarding the original production model's faults in Vietnam, essentially anything that shuts an AR-15 down is going to shut down an AK as well. About the only thing they do better - assuming both weapons are well-lubricated - is run better in deep freeze conditions, and if your AR isn't running in Bridgeport at 12,000 feet, well, you're using the wrong lubricant.

If you're not running the thing dripping, put plainly, you're doing it wrong. CLP is cheap, and there's not a thing in the world will seize on if you've got the operating system essentially swimming. Ran the thing through the Dynamic Assault Course and a couple dozen critical incident courses over the years, and through most competition, and whether shooting compromised or flat range, she runnin', as long as you keep the thing wet.

As far as the actual mechanics of it, the popular claim that an AK runs better because of "loose tolerances" is bunk. That's why the thing ingests so much environmental contamination, and why you can get so much large particulate in the chamber and even down into your magazine, even if the weapon is loaded. If your safety isn't on, the side of your weapon is open and able to ingest. Like, not just moisture, or water with particulate in it, but talking chunks, and straight into your operating system. The bolt also doesn't self-clear the way an AR does, blowing gas though the starboard side of the bolt carrier group; you're generating a high pressure environment that exits through the path of least resistance with every shot, and you can literally see it blowing mud out of the ejection port during the firing cycle. Whole thing stays more or less closed off, as well, whether the ejection port cover is open or not (better to keep it closed after charging a round anyway).

Your anecdote about dumping a can of motor oil into and onto a weapon isn't surprising at all. Motor oil, as it turns out, and as you may imagine, is an utterly fantastic lubricant, and as I've attempted to make clear, if a weapon is well-lubed, it'll generally fire, no matter the make or model, so long as it's not got a gross physical stoppage already in play that requires clearing to allow cycling the operating system.

As to the early M16 part, I couldn't really tell you other than agree with the reports, but we're not really talking about early M16s with jacked up operating and maintenance instructions, poor barrel finishing, and engineered failures.

As to the variant operating system, it's more reliable than the in-line internal gas piston of traditional ARs in certain circumstances, but it's not an across-the-board thing, and there are trade-offs with it, as there are with any design choice in a firearm; there ain't no such thing as a free lunch in any engineering field, and internal gas piston vs. an offset short stroke is no different. Also, for what it's worth, the system you're referring to shares little with an AK, as it's derived directly from G36's system in function, which itself is derived from the AR-18; the Germans basically re-skinned a Stoner design for their own operating system, and later put it back into an AR-15 form factor. There's a fairly straightforward lineage to this. As to the 416 mention, prior to their rolling that out, most of the ARs in use by the special operations forces mentioned were simply product improved Colt designs from licensed manufacturers, and still used the in-line internal gas piston.

For terminal performance, yeah, 7.62x39 knocks through a lot of light cover better, but you get better AP performance through body armor (especially more modern designs, as 7.62x39 designers failed to keep up with Western ceramics) with the tungsten core munitions at the higher velocities that the 5.56 cartridge generates, even out of M4-length barrels, compared to the AK. If you're sitting there trading rounds with someone through cover, though, few hundred yards away, where this sort of thing is usually taking place, you're doing yourself a disservice by sitting there and not making use of the rest of the weapons in your squad to fix, flank, and tenderly caress that hostile element that's engaging you. For what it's worth, though, you can wallbang just fine with 5.56 though most residential structures. If you're trying to sit there and wallow out a block wall, you're not going to achieve that with either rifle, unless you've got a firing squad. And generally speaking, if you're behind cover that I can't penetrate with my rifle, but COULD penetrate with a 7.62 round, I'm going to set your corpse on fire with a copper jet from an HEDP round or slamming a LAW into you, cuz it's no skin off my ass, and I brought three, because only an idiot fights fair.

There's no perfect weapon, again, and with any of them, you're working in other areas to counter shortcomings. ARs simply don't require a multitude of sacrifices.

As to the humans fighting through multiple 5.56 round hits, there's nothing surprising about that. You see similar with many other cartridges, all the way up to .300 WinMag. Ugly truth of it is that any hit not in the ten ring is gonna be a long an ugly death if you're looking at torso hits. If you don't blow the heart and lungs out, it's gonna take an uncomfortable amount of time for your target to die, period. Sometimes you see someone go down quickly from the traumatic psychological shock of the event, but it's unpredictable and absolutely cannot be counted on, even if you slammed a 7.62x51mm round into their chest. You can blow someone's heart and both lungs out with a hit, and worst case scenario, they've still got about 8 seconds on their feet they can kill you with. That's why you fire until your target is hamburger, no matter what system you're running. If you don't get a good spinal, or blow out the heart and lungs, or get lucky and tag someone in the domepiece, you're going to have to shoot them more. There's a reason it's a good idea to get a machine gun into a house, and it's not just cuz of fire superiority. 9mm, 5.56, 7.62, doesn't matter. If you can shoot your target half a dozen times and destroy every functional organ they have, they're going to bleed out and go down from hypovolemic shock that much quicker, and you've got more of a chance of clipping the strings with a good spinal hit with every shot that nails them, or blowing out the pelvis, or getting a similarly good structural hit that physically prevents the human body from working the way it's supposed to.

Stopping power in and of itself is a literally non-existent concept born largely out of fuddlore and the operators of a weapon not understanding the actual principles of what's taking place when they smoke someone, and weighing their perceptions of a fictional understanding of how gunfire kills people against an uncompromising reality of what happens when a bullet hits an organism that is wired from the ground up to stay alive until the brain shuts down from lack of oxygen and that is fully capable of killing you even after lethal injury unless you completely disassemble it or clip the strings.

Also, sorry for the whole post quote. I haven't used forum markup for years and am utterly terrible at it, and was unsure of how badly I'd bork the formatting if I tried getting clever or fancy.

PS: I should add that none of this is a straight repudiation of the AK platform as a whole. But the takeaway should be that there's nothing particularly legendary about it other than how widely available it was and how much better it was than most systems in use by the countries and non-governmental forces that adopted them in its early days of widespread popularity; the landscape didn't offer a lot of breadth in choice back then, and its competitor hadn't sorted out teething issues. The "reliability" of an AK is literally nothing more than you can achieve out of essentially any rifle platform in existence. We just don't see many other countries' designs in constant use through decades of conflict, because most countries don't spend decades at war or directly supplying conflict forces the way the US and USSR did. Like, no one's going to have an enduring memory of the L85 other than UK servicemembers. Everyone's seen an AK, and after Vietnam, just about anyone except folks who run both platforms regularly and in a variety of operating conditions is typically exposed to a great deal more myth than reality.

[Raellus]

I appreciate your thorough response, HaplessOperator. You've got me questioning a lot of what I thought I knew about the AK vis-a-vis the AR-15.

Originally Posted by HaplessOperator

As far as the actual mechanics of it, the popular claim that an AK runs better because of "loose tolerances" is bunk. That's why the thing ingests so much environmental contamination, and why you can get so much large particulate in the chamber and even down into your magazine, even if the weapon is loaded. If your safety isn't on, the side of your weapon is open and able to ingest. Like, not just moisture, or water with particulate in it, but talking chunks, and straight into your operating system. The bolt also doesn't self-clear the way an AR does, blowing gas though the starboard side of the bolt carrier group; you're generating a high pressure environment that exits through the path of least resistance with every shot, and you can literally see it blowing mud out of the ejection port during the firing cycle. Whole thing stays more or less closed off, as well, whether the ejection port cover is open or not (better to keep it closed after charging a round anyway).

Isn't that a feature as much as a bug? I've read that the AK's loose tolerances contribute to reduced accuracy compared to the AR, but that they allow the AK to continue to operate in pretty much any environment with very little routine maintenance.

Lest anyone think that I'm an AR hater, I am not. Although I tend to be cynical and rather suspicious of the US military-industrial complex, there must be legitimate reasons that the AR platform is still going strong. It's the only assault rifle that I've ever operated and I haven't experienced any performance issues with it. I must say, though, cleaning it is a bit of a chore. Again, I don't know from experience but I've read that the AK has fewer working parts and is easier to disassemble/reassemble than the AR.

In the T2kU, I think I'd still take the AK-74 over the M-16A2. I'm not quite fully convinced that the AR family is as robust or likely to function in adverse conditions as the Kalashnikov, and in Poland, at least, ammunition for the latter would be easier to come by.

-

[HaplessOperator]

Originally Posted by Raellus

Isn't that a feature as much as a bug? I've read that the AK's loose tolerances contribute to reduced accuracy compared to the AR, but that they allow the AK to continue to operate in pretty much any environment with very little routine maintenance.

It might be useful to talk about meanings here, and to clarify what tolerances mean for a gun, as well as clarify my own language, since I was mirroring yours; it's going to remain obfuscated unless I do. So, tolerances in a gun - as with any manufacturing - are simply deviations from spec. It often gets used colloquially (especially in discussions on AK reliability) to mean the overhead in design. That is, in the case of designing a cylinder exactly 1 inch wide, when you need it to be a minimum of .95 inches for optimum function, you're generally talking about clearance. The tolerance for that part may be so many hundredths or thousandths of an inch plus or minus that diameter.

In a gun, if your manufacturing methodology has loose tolerances from the designed standard, that means - literally - nothing other than you're going to have parts that don't fit, due to both stacking tolerances and variance in one edge being off beyond a functionally acceptable tolerance at the same time the part mating to it is off as well. In Soviet AKs, this was fairly common, due to inconsistent manufacturing quality and essentially non-existent QC, though the platform can generally survive this due to a sufficient overhead in design specifications. For example, both the front and rear sight bases in Soviet-era AKs are often off-spec to a significant degree, as are the gas block, and - oftentimes - the front and rear trunnions themselves. When parts like the trunnions and gas blocks are out of tolerance, it doesn't contribute to reliability or resilience against environmental contamination; it merely means that it's going to be things like blowing more or less gas than designed, or the parts beating the absolute hell out of each other since the fitment isn't as designed.

This is no more easy on the AK than it is any other design. This isn't an indictment of your intelligence or knowledge, but you can see how this in and of itself wouldn't explain making something reliable, just wear out quicker, or serve as an indication of cheap (not efficient) manufacture. The lion's share of AK reliability is myth; it's no more reliable or less reliable than most other service rifles we've collectively made as humans after World War 2, and most of the characteristics ascribed to AKs apply more or less equally to other platforms. AKs deal with cold weather pretty well as designed, but that's about the only particularly notable thing about them, and it's a capability that can be rather efficiently engineered into existing designs, as the Canadians have done with several platforms over the years. That said, best way to keep your gun ice-free in ultra-low temperatures is to keep it sealed and well-lubricated with a temp-appropriate petroleum distillate, and an AK is far from sealed, and an AK full of ice is going to fail to cycle just as surely as any other gun full of ice is. THAT said... most weather almanacs I've seen for the time don't suggest that this would be a concern, anyway. Switzerland, in 4th Edition, on the other hand...

Something to mention in favor of the AK is how sharply tapered the cartridge it fires is; that's why the magazines look the way they do. It takes an awful lot wrong to cause a malfunction in cartridge extraction in an AK. Also, the internal open space in the receiver DOES allow for the buildup of gross particulate in some of the interior spaces without serious obstruction to the action, but once you get anything in the path of travel for the bolt, guide rod, or in the chamber, it fails just as easily as any other weapon, for the same reasons that any other weapon would fail: the operation is being physically obstructed. This is probably where a lot of the perception of its resilience to mud probably comes from; most weapons solve this problem by simply not letting the mud in in the first place, or by having nowhere for the mud to actually infiltrate.

On accuracy... it's mostly down to the 7.62 Soviet cartridge, and more specifically, the QC and batch quality of Russian ammo. 7.62x39 has a dog crap ballistic coefficient, but manufactured properly, it's fine. The trouble is that the same philosophy that applied to Soviet rifles was applied to their ammunition, and at the time, it was inconsistent as all hell, along with inconsistent barrel mounting and poor crowning at a number of their factories, which essentially causes the bullet to be thrown off by a minute degree as it leaves the barrel. This, combined with inconsistent ammunition quality, propellant loading, and the subsequent variability in velocity and trajectory. All of these things combine to give you a far more variable beaten zone at any given distance on any particular target at any particular angle of fire.

Originally Posted by Raellus

Lest anyone think that I'm an AR hater, I am not. Although I tend to be cynical and rather suspicious of the US military-industrial complex, there must be legitimate reasons that the AR platform is still going strong. It's the only assault rifle that I've ever operated and I haven't experienced any performance issues with it. I must say, though, cleaning it is a bit of a chore. Again, I don't know from experience but I've read that the AK has fewer working parts and is easier to disassemble/reassemble than the AR.

There's no assumption of hate/dislike. People can enjoy whatever guns they want. For the longevity of the platform, it's largely due to how iterated-upon it is, the depth of the market, and the simple fact that there's literally nothing out there that would be worth the cost of replacing it; there's plenty of guns that do this thing or that better than a rack-grade M16, but there's practically nothing out there that does so for the same cost, and reducing build quality of most platforms to match an AR in cost would turn the platform in question into a trash fire; meanwhile, the ceiling on ARs is essentially sky-high - spend HK416 money on an AR-15, and you've got an AR-15 that will run circles around a 416, or a SCAR, or... you get the idea.

As to the moving parts bit, they're more or less identical. An AR-15 has eight parts that move when the operating system cycles, the same as an AK. Assembly or disassembly is something I've genuinely never considered, as it's kind of neither here nor there. You disassemble a Glock with your finger and thumb by pulling down two tabs, giving the slide some play, and squeezing the trigger; this doesn't mean that it's more or less suitable than a Beretta 92's pressing a button and rotating a tab, or a Sig P226, etc., merely that it's disassembled in a different manner. The AK's method of disassembly (and its construction) mean that it's got kind of a garbage sight radius and that it's more or less impossible to mount optics to it in a typical manner without a side mounting fixture.

Originally Posted by Raellus

In the T2kU, I think I'd still take the AK-74 over the M-16A2. I'm not quite fully convinced that the AR family is as robust or likely to function in adverse conditions as the Kalashnikov, and in Poland, at least, ammunition for the latter would be easier to come by.

Here, we're in full agreement, after a fashion. I kept a couple AKs in my truck as insurance against an absolute worst case. Ammunition and supply of other sorts was never short, and I could literally walk into the ASP and walk out with entire pallets, and was often encouraged to do so simply to make room for the next shipment coming in, and we were rolling like Scrooge McDuck in 40mm, LAWs, AT4s, and ordnance of all descriptions, but by the end of my first deployment, I had run completely out of ammunition exactly once, and had resolved to take several measures to ensure such a thing would never impact me again, no matter what the failure point.

Bonus info: the best AKs were never made in Russia, or Poland for that matter. Bulgaria, Romania, and the German DDR were rocking what were basically Cadillacs in comparison to the Polish and Russian pieces, and once the iteration of the platform began by countries outside of RSFSR, the AMD series and like "upgrades" more or less left the original platform (both AKM and AK-74) in the dust.

AKs, like the T-series tanks, have a mythology around them that is wildly overblown compared to the actual hardware sitting in front of you. I could tell you some truly hilarious stories about the so-called "monkey models" I got to shoot hell out of, but that's probably a story for another thread, along with the elaboration of what being a monkey model actually means in a practical sense when you're considering smacking the things with HEAT rounds.

And please, call me Hapless. All my friends do.