One of the major issues modern forces face in the field — aside from weight — is how to maintain proper levels of electricity to power their various electronic gadgets and doo dads.
U.S. weapons are increasingly incorporating new sights, pointers and beams to their weapons and those things suck power with a vengeance. How much would it blow if you’re a sniper and Ole Osama passes through your crosshairs one night and all the sudden…<blink> goes your night illumination scope.
There goes your $25 million reward…
But the head of Army weapons programs hinted yesterday that his office at Picatinny is working on a project to incorporate a “hot rail” system onto its rifles. PEO Soldier Weapons Col. Doug Tamilio told us:
“It hooks into the 1913 rail system. And what that allows you to do is put a system on [the weapon] and do away with the battery pack. And what you can do is on the buttstock of the weapon or the hand grip you can put batteries in there. So everything you put on this system is already hot wired and can run off that. And you get a lot more battery life out of that too.”
Another plus is that the weapon’s weight and center of gravity shifts to a more shooter-friendly spot: in the grip and stock, instead of along the rail or forward. This could translate into increased accuracy and less fatigue.
Tamilio said that Congress injected some funds to look into this last FY and he’s got some money to continue it in this FY. His office has a prototype ready for testing and if all goes well, this “hot rail” system could be added to the Improved Carbine requirement as it evolves.
{ 38 comments… read them below or add one }
Why is there a picture of a Navy SEAL in an article about the Army?
CGman…
Here's the caption:
A U.S. Special Forces soldier looks through the remains of an electronic device in Uruzgan, Afghanistan on April 24, 2010. (U.S. Army photo by Spc. Nicholas T. Lloyd Combined Joint Special Forces Task Force Afghanistan.
That's what you have to comment about? Seriously? I mean aside from the fact that pretty much any operator would suffice to demonstrate the article, you have to quibble about the picture instead of comment on the meat of it? *shrugs* I guess if you don't have anything better to do, but afterward maybe get involved in the discussion. Just sayin'.
seals do not wear patches on their left arms like soldiers do. look closely its there
Now they just need to surround the barrel and chamber with thermophotovoltaics and, voila, you have an active cooling system plus plenty of DC power to store in the batteries built-in to your grip and stock to power your gear. Could be the perfect way to address the potential heat problems associated with polymer and case-less ammo, too.
This requires you to keep shooting in order to keep a charge. Most firefights are over in less than a minute, and are the result of hours of sitting around. Not sure the cost would be worth the result, but it is a neat idea.
Hmm, looks like my link didn't work in that last post. Here's the wikipedia article on thermophotovoltaics:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermophotovoltaic_c…
If they used Super Capacitors instead of rechargeable batteries, that would make the system even more appetizing. Faster recharge time, and can be recharged thousands of times before they need to be replaced.
From what I've seen, LEOs love the 5.11 Light for Life. http://www.511tactical.com/html511/static/LFLDemo… More information can be found : http://www.supercapacitors.org/ and http://www.ultracapacitors.org/
Does anyone else see this as a bit wast of time and money. . . I mean how much crap do they think people put on their weapons to need a "hot rail" power source, and if you combine all your optics to one system what happens if that system goes down? Then everything goes <blink>. . . I see the appeal of picking one type of battery for everything in stead of AAA, AA, and 3v. Give me a rifle I can engage at 1,000m with and not one I can plug my Ipod into.
In airsoft people commonly store the batteries for their gun in the crane stock so I think with a little modification to current weapon systems you could easily place a power source in the stock and run wires to all your accessories.
this is an actual rifle…no an AEG…GTFO of this site…ahahah
@Adam; they definitely sometimes get carried away with things, and we've seen a lot of guys putting crap on their weapons that don't need to be there. There was one particularly ridiculous picture in SWAT Magazine last year that was particularly ludicrous. That being said, however, this is a natural extension. Some of those tools are good to go, and you have to figure if they can make a "hot rail" to recharge optics or whatever, it's just a short jump from there to making one that can be used to give emergency juice to a radio or GPS or something potentially critical. If that's the case, and it's not priced so high that only units can afford to buy it, then it could be a Good Thing.
It just seems like their making a solution to a problem thats not really there. I can see how it would be good for say maybe SWAT or someplace where speed and low profile is needed but for a ground pounder that has almost no logistical train to replace a bunch of relatively easy to get batteries with something that would be rare and complicated is a mistake. You will always carry extra batteries for everything and having disposable batteries means if I need to I can dump'em rather then hump'em out. I would just have more peace of mind knowing that if my PEQ fails only my PEQ fails and not every optic on my rifle.
We agree in large part, make no mistake. This should be a specialty thing used in specific situations. Of course, the more complicated it is, the easier it is to break, and the more likely someone is to want to buy it just cuz it's tacti-cool. We're pretty much in agreement here.
Use portable solar powered charging stations equipments.
See: http://www.earthtechproducts.com/solargorilla-sol…
http://www.thisnext.com/item/3894DC1E/3CDC8F52/Po…
http://www.thisnext.com/item/8298C0A0/57830BF3/Po…
http://sunshineworks.com/portable-emergency-power…
http://www.thisnext.com/item/98C0855D/2C2F863C/Po…
Don't all their rifles have back up iron sights?
no.
Sadly, no, and how stupid is that?
The Leupold Mark 4 has an etched reticle, so even without power, you can still aim. Instead od BUIS, this should be incorporated on to the optics.
So now with a unified power supply all of your electronics will go down at once instead of one at a time. Brilliant.
Agreed….
use the force luke…
This is a red flag about our develping over reliance on technology. Keep the iron sights handy for gods sake and improve qualification standards
No one is saying they're going to get rid of iron sights and no one is saying all the powered items will be linked to one source so they all go down at once. It's a sensible development. Could it cause additional problems? Sure. Are things easier to screw up when they're more tech-heavy? Sure. Does that mean we should get rid of all new advances? C'mon, do we need to answer that? Maybe we should go back to bolt action rifles, surely there's a statistic somewhere that says they malfunctioned less frequently than what we're using nowadays…seriously though, doesn't this, like the use of optics and PEQs and everything else, come down to proper training, maintenance and training NCOs/leadership that are engaged and invested in the proper use of tactics and equipment? Besides…now you can hotwire the rail to your iPod and watch porn on some f*&ked up rooftop in a sh*(&y village in some turd wurld country.
That's what they said when we switched from the sword to these gunpowder gizmos. When the batteries fail, you've got iron sights or is that aluminum? What happens when your Velcro® wears out? You could step back to buttons or just replace it with fresh Velcro®. I agree that low tech has a lower failure rate, but come on, technology has reduced war casualties astronomically. It's a good thing when managed properly.
Been there seen that. Till the US Army adopts a free float rail system this is all moot. Because every cool guy and wannabee cool guy put on PEQ-2/PAQ-15's, foregrips, lights, sling adapters etc, etc. Now take a rail that is not free floating and all that excess stuff and the Joe's sling and grip putting stress on that barrel. Hence accuracy goes out the window, and stress is put on the barrel that it wasn't designed for.
You Luddites who are moaning about "why don't they just use BUIS" or "how much of an issue is this really" are missing 2 very big fundamental points:
1. a lot of troops and operators are using a variety of powered devices on their weapons now – and for good reasons – and they're not going to all of a sudden go back to the iron-sights age just-becuase
2. as soon as you have even just one powered device on your weapon you have to worry about battery life, and replacing those tiny little batteries in field conditions ain't easy
So, I think this is a very sensible development – and for what its worth, I saw just such a system last year that had been developed by NFM in Norway.
I don't think we're missing those points at all. . . Yes we will never go back to using just iron sights but we're still issued back ups because stuff happens and by having a powered rail you're not getting rid of batteries you're just relocating them so now that optic won't work unless its seated properly on a rail and for every optic I plug in I have to worry about it draining that bigger harder to get battery. I've used a PEQ-2, PEQ-15, and PEQ-16 and I almost never had to replace the batteries because it was almost never on. The only optic I had to worry about changing batteries was my IWNS-T and I only used that at night, took me about 30 sec to change and I still had my PEQ if I needed to engage.
This Hot Rail system is a very, very bad idea. The rails will be accessible to any accessory therefore also exposed to elements like dirt and water. Dirty water, salt water, wet gloves, rain all conduct electricity. Which means that if a dirty wet glove, emersion in water or other wet or muddy condition bridges the rails, it will begin to degrade the charge on the battery, regardless if the accessory is turned on or not. So a swim with a weapon will shorten battery life. It would be far wiser just to have interchangable batteries between the optics, with those batteries in there own watertite compartments. Not only that but the electrical contacts of the accessories will also be exposed to the same dirty/wet conditions a rifle is subjected to, so the accessories themselves will intermittantly malfunction due to poor electrical contact.
So is the US Army going to set a stander type of power use for all accessary placed on the hot rail? What if the hot rail fails are you going to still have to have back up batteries and what about water getting it to the system? How are you going to run the wiring system in side or out side a weapon thats comes apart? And what about touching it with your bare hands are there going to be a special covers so you dont get shocked?
@Adam and @quicksaber8
You both make good points – I wasn't saying that I think this system is awesome, or even flawless, just that some people are making some pretty reactionary and uniformed comments.
I think there are several critical issues they'd need to address, like: back-up power, how do you protect the "hot rails" from the weather and from bare skin but still make it work, what if you need to use one of the "accessories" in dismounted mode – where would the power come from, and finally what about the dozens of gadgets that have already been produced with stand-alone battery power – how are they going to get all of them re-engineered / re-manufactured so that they'd take power off the rail?
Sure, whats another 2 or 3lbs!! Ridiculous.
Technology is great but I'm worried about becoming even more dependent on it.
I think there is a better uses of the money than trying to fix a problem that can be solved with just having a extra set of batteries and really how often does it happen? If the troops and NCO are good and check their gear before they go out and during the patrol it should be ok.
That makes sense, have civilian leaders ever done that?
Looks like materials engineering was the right major to pick ;P
Nice effort, but it's still just a high-power .22 caliber – another version of a five-five-six fiasco.
would armies have back up