But just to be sure, maybe us women should start a thread and name it,
Experts say squeeze melons for freshness (WOW!! Now THOSE are some MELONS!)
And I have the perfect picture to accompany it:
Posted on 03/10/2006 4:09:18 PM PST by SandRat
CAMP MERCURY, Iraq (March 9, 2006) -- Arnold Schwarzenegger is going to want one.
Marines with Regimental Combat Team 5, based in Camp Fallujah, test-fired the latest in the Corps’ arsenal of weapons’ improvement, the M-32 Multiple shot Grenade Launcher. It’s a six-barreled, 40 mm beast of weapon that has just about enough attitude for Marines.
“I thought it was pretty bad the first time I saw it,” said Cpl. Jason H. Flanery, a 23-year-old mortarman from St. Louis, Mo., assigned to RCT-5’s Personnel Security Detachment.
The M-32 MGL looks like something straight out of an action movie or a weapon ginned up by designers of futuristic video combat games. It’s a bare-bones, shoulder-fired weapon with a bulging six-barreled cylinder. There’s no bones about it. This thing’s all business when the trade is knocking out bad-guys at a distance.
“You can put six rounds on target in under three seconds,” Flanery said. “I thought this thing was sick.”
Sick might be right for the insurgent on the other end of the sight. The M-32 MGL is step up from the M-203 grenade launcher Marines have used since post-Vietnam days. It fires similar 40 mm grenades and at similar distances. It just puts more rounds on the bad guys faster.
“The ‘203 has been around since the ‘60s,” explained CWO4 Gene A. Bridgman, the regiment’s gunner, or weapons expert. “It keeps improving. This is a progression in the weapons system.”
Flanery put the comparison of the two similar weapons in more simple terms.
“It makes it obsolete,” he said. “It’s that much better.”
The idea to bring M-32 was the brainchild of Marine gunners across the Corps, explained Bridgman, a 43-year-old from Garden City, Kan. During an annual symposium, they decided an improvement was needed over the M-203. One option was to bring back a rifle-grenade. The M-32, won out, however, and now each Marine battalion will field them as an experimental weapon.
Bridgman added the M-32 isn’t a new idea altogether, though. Brazilian, Italian and South African military have carried them in the field for years. Marines, though, took it one step further.
A fore-grip was added and a scope was mounted to the top, eliminating the old leaf sights like that of the M-203. The scope allows a Marine to follow the grenade to the target and immediately adjust and follow up with a lethal volley of indirect fire.
“The ‘203 was on shot at time,” Bridgman said. “The ‘203 became a signal weapon. This is more of an offensive weapon. With this, you shoot, adjust and fire for effect.”
The average Marine said it’s just about that easy to shoot. Lance Cpl. Alexandro R. Raymundo, a 20-year-old from Rancho Cucamonga, Calif., isn’t an infantryman. He’s a network administrator by trade. He shot the M-203 before during initial training, but this was his first time picking up the M-32 MGL.
“I thought it might be like the ‘203,” Raymundo said. “But is shoots more rounds, faster. It’s really simple. I had ‘hands-on’ once. I picked it up really quickly.”
As far as how it felt shooting it, Raymundo said the weapon was about as beefy as it looks.
“I felt like there’s more recoil than the ‘203 and the trigger’s a lot heavier” he explained. “It’s heftier than the ‘203.”
His likes about the weapon included the small scope added to the rail-mount system on top of the weapon.
“The optic was nice,” he added. “It’s a lot easier to sight in.”
Of course, there’s the part about lots of things going “boom” downrange too.
“My favorite part was being able to fire out so many grenades and not have to reload between each shot.”
Sgt. David G. Redford, a 35-year-old from Kennebunkport, Me., has more practical experience when it comes to what grunts like in the field. He’s an infantryman by trade and has logged in his own hours carrying the M-203.
“I didn’t know what to think about it before we came out here, but it’s nice,” Redford said. “It’s easier to shoot. You don’t have to constantly load. If you run into something, you’re already loaded.”
Redford predicted that most infantry Marines will welcome the addition of the six-pack attack weapon.
That’s exactly the reaction Bridgman wants to see. Adding the M-32 MGL could realign the way Marines operate at the small-team level. Fire teams could become more lethal, more mobile and more independent. The idea of a dedicated grenadier might just be reborn.
“Now you have your own indirect fire support right in the fire team,” Bridgman explained. “You have someone who can lay down (high explosive rounds) against someone in a trench. It would be used against enemy in fighting holes or behind cars, because of the indirect nature of the weapon. It’s the only weapon aside from mortars,” at the small team’s disposal.
Still, Bridgman stressed the weapon is only experimental. Marines will be gathering data about its’ effectiveness and durability from experiences on the streets of Fallujah.
For Flanery, though, the M-32 is already welcome.
“I think it’s one of the most simple and effective weapons systems,” he said. “I just want buckshot rounds.”
I think being on the reciving end of that may put a slight damper on any allah akbaring
But just to be sure, maybe us women should start a thread and name it,
Experts say squeeze melons for freshness (WOW!! Now THOSE are some MELONS!)
And I have the perfect picture to accompany it:
I still await an explanation of your reply to my post #55
um... dayyyum...
Nice lugs !
Oh My God! I'll take two of them bombs!
Be sure to check the fuse Mr. EOD :)
Does anyone remember the "Dogs of War" movie with Christopher Wauken? What was the weapon he had that had a revolving cylinder that looked like a Thomson but fired explosive grenades? That must have been 20 years ago.
Yep. Six rounds of shot skipped off the pavement would slow any mob down--a lot. And that is the polite option. It gets more wicked from there...
I would say they are more mk-83's not quite mk-84's Myself I am fond of mk-82's
Too nippy that's one to let blow in place.......:o)
Nice bombs....
L
Duck hunting. Heck that might even be good for fishin. Takes far to long to light and toss those dynamite sticks. I could fish the whole lake in nothing flat.
Ok I surrender. Maybe if I'm lucky she'll try to get the information out of me with those horrible interrogation techniques like stripping, dancing real close, and maybe even tossing her undies at me, like those poor folks at Gitmo have to go through.
It would be closer to a 1.125 gauge. The gauge of a weapon is determined by how many spheres of solid lead the diameter of the barrel it takes to weigh a pound. The bore of a 12 gauge is 0.729" or 18.5mm. Since the weight of a sphere varies by the cube of the diameter, a rough doubling of the diameter increases the mass of each sphere by a factor of (40mm/18.5mm)^^3 or 10.11 times. Divide 12 gauge by the factor of 10.11 to get the actual gauge.
You'll have to do that. I'm not worth a crap at math.
I know but i couldnt let that line go without inserting the sienfeld catchphrase lol
Just wanted to make sure you were abreast of the current threat level........
Nite I am outta of here !
I said this before; I'd be a terrible soldier because the second my troop was fired at, everything within 100 square miles not American would be wiped out dead, blanched, gone, zip, zero, nada.
BTTT
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