Caseless ammo?

J

Jedi Oomodo

New member
I couldn't think of where else to put this.

A couple years ago I read a G&A article about a rifle that fired "caseless" ammunition. It was described as having a primer that was electrically fired, by a specific voltage and current, and required a 9V battery or somethin' like that. Does anyone think caseless is the wave of the future, or is it a "flash in the pan"?

I've read sci-fi novels where the (obviously non-gun-owning) author wrote about caseless as though it was all "golly gee-whiz" and anyone who still used brass was some sorta hillbilly.

I personally think that cartridges cased in brass are here to stay for a good while. I would not trust my life to a battery operated firearm, as batteries have an annoying tendency to run out of juice. Plus, how would you keep the ammo clean? Just some thoughts, FWIW. Anyone else care to speculate?

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"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary security deserve neither liberty nor security."
-Benjamin Franklin
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"If it isn't Scottish, it's CRAP!"
 
I think that there have been a few rifles that were chambered for caseless ammo. I saw one in SGN that was on sale for about $800.00(orig. price was about $2900!). That tells you something there. It was chambered for something like the .223 and came with a free box of ammo. I bet the ammo is sky high. Caseless ammo would be a breakthrough if it would get all the bugs worked out. Super high rate of fire, no need for an ejector, extractor, etc., simplified mechanism, lighter and smaller ammo, less recoil, the list goes on and on. If I remember right, the rounds were very small for some of the guns, something like 4.85x28 or something like that. The ammo is too fragile and cookoffs are a problem. I agree with you, brass, aluminum, and steel case ammo is here to stay. Like that Ian Hogg dude says- There is no way you can conventionally improve the current day weapons, because they are at the peak of their perfection-. Think about the OICW for the Marines. It is really not that much different than an M203 with the grenade laucher on top. I think that there will be a gun that replaces the M16, but the military will be dissapointed. I look for 1-2 "inbetween" guns before the military gets a "breakthrough" gun that utilizes something like a caseless round or a lazer. Think about it, the G3, FAMAS, AK, M16, G36, L1A1, and all the other rifles are the same. Yes, the same! None of them have a definate advantage over the others, or everyone else would use the same "wonder" gun. I would not doubt what the foot soldier gets phased out before we get a wonder gun. Just my .02 worth.

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Don't turn around, uh oh oh, der kommisar is in town, uh oh oh!
 
It's not science fiction. Nearly two decades ago (while still too young and stupid to pay close attention) I got to visit a firearms manufacturing plant in Schutzenburg :), Germany.

They had developed a caseless round. At that time, it was too darned expensive to produce and shoot.

But so once was the brass cartridge round.
 
In the 60's or early 70's there was some work on a "rocket round". It was around .45 cal, and, as I recall, the round was a miniature rocket. There were many articles about it and then it just died out.

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"Quis custodiet ipsos custodes"
 
DC. The rocket round was the Gyro-jet. I think it was 11mm in caliber. You can see examples of these guns in the Jame Bond movie YOU ONLY LINE TWICE. The good guys use them to clean the clocks of the bad guys. The system was a failure in real life. None to accurate.
As to caseless ammo, there is one foreign rifle out now, but I'm not sure who puts it out. Daisy, the BB gun makers made one for a little while. I think it was called the VL or something like that. It too flopped. I don't know how well that one worked.
Paul B.
 
I think caseless ammo is a good idead. I also think it will become a reality sooner than later. You'll still need an ejection system in case a round fails to fire. The real savings will be weight. The military is very concerned about the kills per pound ratio.

There are some commercial rifle avaliable by from what I hear they're more of a novelty than anything else.

For cilillian use, I agree the brass case is hear to stay for a long time.

As for the OICW, 20,000 bucks to produce a rifle/grenade launcher that weights 14 pounds. No thanks, I'll take a good AR, AK, of FN any day of the week.
 
Heckler & Koch worked on a caseless round for a number of years for their HK11 rifle. I believe they were still having problems with keeping the propellant stable under a wide range of temperatures. Anyway, with the fall of the iron curtain and the absorption of the former East Germany, the Deutches government didn't have the money to keep funding the project. It may still be on the back burner, but the current issue German rifle is the G36 in standard 5.56mm.

Metallic cased ammo will probably be around for awhile, though I wouldn't be surprised to see plastic take over. There were a number of low powered handgun cartridges that used plastic cases that were very easy to reload and very long life. I expect that technology will improve plastics enough to handle high chamber pressures.

Before you get too ecstatic about brass/steel cased ammo, its only been around for a little over a hundred years. I think the flintlock was in use for 300 years.

The next real wave might not be caseless ammo using a gunpowder based propellant, but the rail gun concept using a magnetic field to accelerate a steel bullet. No case, no propellant, no muss, no noise. Just the supersonic crack as it passes your head....if you're lucky.

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Dorsai
Personal weapons are what raised mankind out of the mud, and the rifle is the queen of personal weapons. The possession of a good rifle, as well as the skill to use it well, truly makes a man the monarch of all he surveys.
-- Jeff Cooper, The Art of the Rifle
 
I think the battery problem has been solved in some of the prototypes (the failed G11 among others) by using a piezo-electric firing system. Anybody know about this?
 
Grenadier2,

(Tongue planted firmly in cheek, okay?) Wouldn't that that kind of pietzo ignition technically bring us back to the flintlock era?
 
Ah yes. The Voere electric rifle. Remember seeing it in the American Rifleman quite a few years back. I was young enough at the time to wonder wether or not the bullets would slow down as the battery started dying.
 
Caseless ammo has been around for a long time.
The M551 Sheridan "Tank" from the 1970's used caseless shells for the main gun. The shell casing was actually made up of explosive that was formed into a casing. The casing was consumed in the detonation and as a result no brass needed to be disposed of. The same gun also fired an anti tank missile.
The concept was an expensive mistake, as firing the main gun usually damaged the computer used to controll the missile launch system. The tank was too light for the gun and tank crewman suffered from the recoil of the gun which was 155mm I believe.
In Germany I heard of a sheridan round cooking off and killing the crew, even saw the remains of the tank. Problem was as the gun mechanism got hot the danger of a cook off increased. The Army dumped the idea but one company of sheridans still exists in the 82nd Airborne, don't know if they still use caseless ammo though.
This points out a problem with caseless ammo, cook offs when the barrels get hot.
 
The only civilian caseless firearm I recall was the Daisy V/L .22 Cal. It was caseless and primerless. It fired a caseless cartridge ignited by air at over 1,000 foot per second, made 1968 to 1969 only.

Chuck
 
I have read about the HK G11. I had wondered if they still used caseless in the production rifles. Cook-offs is another problem I have with the concept- I can't see any way, given our current technology, to prevent this. Or, what about the powder going "stale" after much handling? It might rub away, or get dirty, and when fired make your gun really dirty from all the skin oils burnt up with the powder.

Joe,

RE- an ejector still needed. I mentioned reading some SF where caseless was used. Apparently, the author didn't know that much about firearms, as he described that with a particular gun mentioned, you would have to "slap" it against your hand to unchamber the round. Oy vey! I got the impression that was his general idea about how caseless would work- no slides, no ejectors. When I read this, I thought the same thing as you said.

About rail guns-
:o

Some high school friends and I decided one weekend we would try to build us one a' those. We quickly discovered the prohibitive physics of that particlar (sic) type of weapon. Specifically- electromagnetism. It takes more windings around a ferrite core than I care to count in order to get any significant amount of magnetic field strength. We might could build a rail gun today, but it wouldn't be "man-portable"! :)

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"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary security deserve neither liberty nor security."
-Benjamin Franklin
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"If it isn't Scottish, it's CRAP!"

[This message has been edited by Jedi Oomodo (edited July 12, 1999).]
 
Quickie correction on the Gyro-Jet; it did not completely die, it is used for signal flares by at least the AF, the rounds have a much greater ability to penetrate tree cover and climb to a much higher distance than the previous (ballistic) flares. And they are still called Gyro-Jet, and still work the same. The weapon applications never panned out, though we were told clearly that the flares would work just fine as a gun except (with no barrel at all in that application) it would be durn hard to hit anybody with it.
 
The Daisy .22 was not the only Civilian Caseless around. It is the best known...

JagerSport of Germany marketed for a time caseless hunting rifles and ammo.

As for books:
Virtual Light by William Gibson - great book... He talks about full auto caseless pistols made by HK. Very Cool. I hope HK Listens!

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Every man Dies.
Not Every Man Truely Lives...
FREEDOM!

RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE

[This message has been edited by Kodiac (edited July 13, 1999).]
 
I love to read about, think about, and discuss small arms improvements! Unfortunately, unless there is a technological breakthrough in an unforeseen direction (and I certainly hope this happens soon), I don't think handheld weapons are going to change much at all. The fact is, they are already darn good.

The case does a lot more than just protect the powder. It carries a lot of heat away from the weapon when it is ejected, and there is no such "heatsink" in a caseless round. It also seals the breech so that the propellant gases don't leak out of the chamber. I bet that you would have severe reliability problems in a semi- or full-auto action that fit tightly enough for a gas-seal. I wouldn't be surprised at all if, as previous posters have said, a high-tech plastic of some sort replaces brass in the near future. Not exactly a quantum leap, though, IMHO.

I was thoroughly fascinated by the "bulletless ammo" concept from a Guns and Ammo sister-mag ("High-Tech Firearms" I think it was called) a few months ago. Seems this guy has made some prototype weapons that use regular cases containing normal powder but without a bullet (I think he sealed them up with a wax or plastic plug). After each case fires, rather than being extracted, it is pushed forward, to become the projectile for the next shot. Hence, bulletless ammunition. Great idea, IMHO. Wouldn't expect much accuracy, of course, but on the other hand, I bet the sharp rim would have a cookie cutter effect and slice right through soft body armor.

There are going to have to be some serious breakthroughs in electrical energy storage before we see lasers, railguns, microwave blasters, or whatnot in man-portable applications.

I think that small arms could benefit from reliable and safe exploding projectiles, but current laws obviously limit the marketability of such micro-grenades. Same story with armor-piercing, bladed, incendiary, poisoned, irritating, or anti-coagulant projectiles.
 
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