I'd just like to point out something that nobody has addressed so far, which is that this setup triples the accurate range of the rifle compared to a human operator. That is absolutely astonishing. If the accurate range increase would apply to larger caliber rifles, this means that with a .50 sniper rifle, it could be used to snipe targets almost a mile away. It wouldn't even take a human sniper being in position.
...In fact, the $17,000 price tag is probably cheaper than training a human sniper. I'm sure we'll see this in military use in the next 20 years.
This system in no way triples the effective range of these rifles. The "error budget" analysis in the Army Research Laboratory report is purely estimated; it's not based on real world observations. Unless I'm reading it wrong, the error budget analysis is pure fiction.
Take the hit percentages from Table 5 for the .300WM - they claim a baseline hit percentage of only 34% at 600 yards which is ridiculously low. I've directly observed marksmen shooting the (far inferior) .223 cartridge at 600 yards with open sights at one of the more difficult ranges in the U.S. With no spotting, hit percentages are consistently close to 100%.
We see snipers in operational environments getting kills at over a mile with a .338 Lapua - one of the longest was 2600 yards. According to this report, that sniper would have had only a 4% chance of making the shot if is was 1000 yards closer.
I don't see any way to rectify what we see in the real world with the conclusions from this report.
> I'm sure we'll see this in military use in the next 20 years.
The individual technologies in this new integrated scope have been available in dedicated spotting scopes for years. The advancement here seems to be packaging it up into a single weapon-mountable scope. I don't think there's a whole lot of value add for this setup for the military over the separate spotting systems currently in use.
Not at all clear except on calm days; all my readings about sniping and very long range target shooting talk about the need to read the winds way beyond the location of the shooter. Long target ranges have flags at intervals, snipers have to learn how to read it from vegetation movement and so on.
... assuming it works as well as this PR piece suggests. But even if it doesn't, the tech will certainly evolve to something incredible in the next 20 years.
Next step: quadcopter based delivery of a gun like this (presumably one with a shorter or retractable barrel). Imagine: from the comfort of your office 1000's of kilometers away, you can have a gun fly out of a container, fly to the mark's backyard, wait until he gets home, shoot him in the head, and fly off before the cops or anyone else has a chance to even realize what happened! I've thought about the idea several times over the last few years, way cool that at least part of it is working. Or way scary, depending on how you look at it.
It makes me sad that software like Linux written in a benevolent co-operative spirit ends up being used for such a purpose.
Makes you wonder if there needs to be a software license with a stipulation along the lines of "must not be used for evil", though I guess that would need defining.
More of an autofire than an aimbot. Those were used to make it more difficult to spot a cheater in-game while watching from his point of view because the aiming process still looked natural — the crosshair didn't magically jumped to the target. The cheat just chose the best moment to fire.
Wow, if online cheaters were not difficult enough to catch already! Without client-side verification (such as PunkBuster) it sounds "even more" impossible to distinguish between really good players and cheaters. I wonder if such libraries are still being developed.
Actually, for civilian (or police) purposes I'd like to see a system that lets you mark targets that you don't want to hit, then automatically prevents you from shooting at or near them when you're aiming at your real target.
What is the point, there is no skill in this....oh wait...you get to press a button to select the target, yeah 1337 skills required for this. On the upside, hopefully the animals will suffer less due to better accuracy on kill zone.
Personally hunting is not my thing but I have no problem with others hunting, this rifle, however, just seems a step too far.
I had a similar reaction to the hunting shown in the video, but if you're shooting for animal control purposes rather than recreation it makes more sense.
There's still some skill required, if you can't hold the rifle in a firm and steady way it's not going to work. Probably wouldn't take that long to teach something that, but from experience as a JROTC rifle team member helping to teach all the cadets it's not trivial.
This isn't really consumer technology. It's privatized military research marketed as a hunting weapon.
This is a gun built for the military so virtually anyone can be a deadly sniper, amateurs include. It's 10x more accurate from nearly 2x the distance, more secure and safer (friendly fire protection), cheaper and SIGNIFICANTLY lighter than most guns used in this type of scenario.
If you were to disrupt the 'sniping industry', this would be a gun that does it. It's way more effective than the overhyped and unpractical .50 cal rifle, a weapon most often left behind (and in the hands of an enemy) if a unit needs to flee.
"I wonder why this has not been developed by the military / government."
They actually outlined this in the article. The reason pretty much boils down to the fact that gear specifically for the military has to adhere to whatever crazy shit the higher ups demand. This makes developing a proof of concept/ fully functioning, marketable device rather difficult as the costs begin to skyrocket.
These guys took the opposite route: develop the tech, bring it to market, then let the military get in on it if they like it.
[+] [-] rthomas6|13 years ago|reply
...In fact, the $17,000 price tag is probably cheaper than training a human sniper. I'm sure we'll see this in military use in the next 20 years.
[+] [-] shpxnvz|13 years ago|reply
Take the hit percentages from Table 5 for the .300WM - they claim a baseline hit percentage of only 34% at 600 yards which is ridiculously low. I've directly observed marksmen shooting the (far inferior) .223 cartridge at 600 yards with open sights at one of the more difficult ranges in the U.S. With no spotting, hit percentages are consistently close to 100%.
We see snipers in operational environments getting kills at over a mile with a .338 Lapua - one of the longest was 2600 yards. According to this report, that sniper would have had only a 4% chance of making the shot if is was 1000 yards closer.
I don't see any way to rectify what we see in the real world with the conclusions from this report.
> I'm sure we'll see this in military use in the next 20 years.
The individual technologies in this new integrated scope have been available in dedicated spotting scopes for years. The advancement here seems to be packaging it up into a single weapon-mountable scope. I don't think there's a whole lot of value add for this setup for the military over the separate spotting systems currently in use.
[+] [-] hga|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] monochromatic|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pxlpshr|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] roel_v|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] duck|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] cabirum|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ricardobeat|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hnb32|13 years ago|reply
Makes you wonder if there needs to be a software license with a stipulation along the lines of "must not be used for evil", though I guess that would need defining.
[+] [-] phpnode|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] swalsh|13 years ago|reply
But what's evil? If you eat the deer, is hunting it evil?
[+] [-] sek|13 years ago|reply
The valley wouldn't exist without the cold war, there is always two sides of the coin.
[+] [-] monochromatic|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] spindritf|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pestaa|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wtracy|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] SeanDav|13 years ago|reply
Personally hunting is not my thing but I have no problem with others hunting, this rifle, however, just seems a step too far.
[+] [-] wtracy|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hga|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|13 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] binarymax|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pxlpshr|13 years ago|reply
This is a gun built for the military so virtually anyone can be a deadly sniper, amateurs include. It's 10x more accurate from nearly 2x the distance, more secure and safer (friendly fire protection), cheaper and SIGNIFICANTLY lighter than most guns used in this type of scenario.
If you were to disrupt the 'sniping industry', this would be a gun that does it. It's way more effective than the overhyped and unpractical .50 cal rifle, a weapon most often left behind (and in the hands of an enemy) if a unit needs to flee.
PS. This company is based in Austin, TX.
[+] [-] monochromatic|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hiddenfeatures|13 years ago|reply
Sounds a lot like the XM-25 grenade launcher (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XM25_CDTE) but without the air burst grenades.
I wonder why this has not been developed by the military / government.
[+] [-] zeffr|13 years ago|reply
They actually outlined this in the article. The reason pretty much boils down to the fact that gear specifically for the military has to adhere to whatever crazy shit the higher ups demand. This makes developing a proof of concept/ fully functioning, marketable device rather difficult as the costs begin to skyrocket.
These guys took the opposite route: develop the tech, bring it to market, then let the military get in on it if they like it.
[+] [-] Pezmc|13 years ago|reply
"If it doesn’t upset you to see animals being hunted, the video at the end of the story gives you a good idea of how a PGF works in practice."
The video shows animals being shot!
[+] [-] theorique|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|13 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] anon31415933|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] joelthelion|13 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] rthomas6|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] theorique|13 years ago|reply
[+] [-] cpsales|13 years ago|reply
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