XM312 & XM307 Officially Dead

[Suhiir]

Well it appears the XM312 (50 cal) and XM307 (25mm) weapons projects are both canceled in late 2007.

The Army is looking at the LW50MG as a replacement for the venerable M2HB in 2012.

And it seems the Mk 47 AGL may be upgrade for the Mk 19's.

[DRG]

Any sources for that ??

Which only highlights the frustration of adding "future weapons" into the OOB's. It's fine for tanks really but these things were added ( NOT BY ME ) and integrated into the OOB's and the person doing it should have known better. There is all kinds of crap like this strewn thoughout the US and USMC OOB that needs fixing. We've already dealt with the "M8" rifles.

It's all such "fun" somedays ...

Don

[iCaMpWiThAWP]

Late 2007? and none heard about that?OMG

[Suhiir]

Jane's International Defence Review
http://www.janes.com/extracts/extract/jiw/jiw_a144.html

Oct 10, 2008

Development
The XM312 was developed as a .50 calibre variant of the XM307 Advanced Crew-Served Weapon (see separate entry).
During the course of developing the XM307 for the US Army, General Dynamics noted that the standard .50 calibre
(12.7 mm) ammunition had similar impulse characteristics to the 25 mm ammunition being developed by Alliant.
To speed gun development the firm did much of the work in the former category, since the .50 calibre ammunition
was cheap, available and well documented. Since it only required the swap-out of four components to change the
gun from one calibre to the other the Army began looking into the possibility of using a .50 calibre variant as
a training weapon to reduce ammunition costs. When the XM307 was finally killed in January 2007 the Army told
General Dynamics ATP to use the remaining funds that had been obligated on the contract to continue to development
of the .50 calibre variant, now known as the XM312. This effort was scheduled to run through the conclusion of
the System Development and Demonstration (SDD) contract in March 2008. By October 2007 three prototypes in a
Type C configuration had been built and fired. In May 2008, the Army's Armament Research and Development Center
awarded GD-ATP a USD9 million contract for further development of a lightweight .50 calibre machine gun, now
known within the firm as the Lightweight .50 Calibre Machine Gun (LW50MG). This retains most of the features of
the XM312.

The Army at present will buy new M2s and MK-19s to replace the current ones that are wearing out.

Also, the M8 may be dead but take a look at the Barrett REC7 (formerly known as the M468).

[Suhiir]

Originally Posted by iCaMpWiThAWP

Late 2007? and none heard about that?OMG

Sorry, got my date wrong.
Late 2008.

[DRG]

I did some digging after writing that and found much the same thing. Both have been pulled from the OOB's. It was "fun" but not as bad as I feared

If you find any info in the XM25 let me know. I haven't found any that says its dead but I haven't found anything that says much about it at all except it was hived from the M8 program. My guess is it's going to be killed off as well

Don

[Listy]

Originally Posted by DRG

I did some digging after writing that and found much the same thing. Both have been pulled from the OOB's. It was "fun" but not as bad as I feared

If you find any info in the XM25 let me know.

Found this document. Not sure how much help it will be. OICW Increment II is what it calls the XM25.

There is an easy way out though:

Without an approved capability development document in FY 2006, an initial
airburst capability that can hit obstructed targets out to 600 meters might not
be fielded until, in a worst-case scenario, FY 2020.

bit of a cheat, I know.

[Suhiir]

Originally Posted by DRG

I did some digging after writing that and found much the same thing. Both have been pulled from the OOB's. It was "fun" but not as bad as I feared

If you find any info in the XM25 let me know. I haven't found any that says its dead but I haven't found anything that says much about it at all except it was hived from the M8 program. My guess is it's going to be killed off as well

Don

What I can find indicates the XM25 program was fully alive and well as of Sep 2008.
Field testing planned to start in Mar 2009.
General issue in 2014.

[DRG]

OK, not dead makes it easier but all these "future weapons" are a PITA to predict. The only real guarantee there is that any guess will be wrong.

I've put the LW50MG to replace the H2's in 1/113 in both the US and USMC OOB. I'll add the M25 in 1/115. That gives me 6 years to be proven wrong


Don

[Suhiir]

From what I read about the XM312/LW50MG project it looks like they'll replace ONLY the infantry M2HB's (due to weight).
For vehicle/helo mounts they plan to stick to the M2HB (since it has about twice the ROF).

And the XM25 is NOT planned as a replacement for the M203/M302.
Looks like it's intended to be something of a "special issue" weapon similar to the way the M32 MGL is now. Possibly used as a squad GL (like the old M79) in some instances but not a general issue item.