Lowers are available for Glock and the Sig 320. These are very controllable to shoot and are high quality! I’m glad to see this. This will be sweet paired with the EBR round.
http://soldiersystems.net/2019/04/01/us-army-selects-bt-for-sub-compact-weapon/
Awesome win for B&T, and it’s entertaining to see the Sig fanboys lose their sh!t a little haha
SIG USA is garbage.
I’m looking forward to picking up a pro model at some point
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The APC9K seems super cool but couldn’t they have just gotten some new HK MP5K PDWs which the US military already has experience with? I like seeing new firearms but it bugs me as a tax payer how much the US mil spends on just selecting a new firearm (let alone buying) that doesn’t do anything significantly better than the item it is replacing. I would be surprised if they didn’t spend more on selection then if they had just purchased enough new MP5Ks. I’m suspicious that a lot of the problems with US mil small-arms I’ve read about are because they are worn out from over use and not necessarily a shitty design. But the B&T guns are super cool, so go them!!! Though was sort of hoping the CZ Evo would get it as I have one.
Who in the army has experience with MP5s? Maybe some real old school SF guys but that’s probably about it.
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A joint, but traditionally Army led command…we had them available at USSOCCENT in 2001-2. They were more common with the Naval units and we had just come under command of a Navy Admiral.
Right, so a joint special operations command that included NSW from almost 20 years ago. That’s exactly my point - none of those guys are the ones that are going to be part of these PSDs, the supply and parts systems are wildly different, and none of the institutional knowledge remains within the Army.
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I love the MP5 and MP5K. I never plan on parting with either of mine. With that said, they have their detractions. The glaring detractions include the lack of a last round bolt hold open, ergonomics that lag behind the M4 and other contemporary designs, a terrible extractor/spring design, require separate optic mounts, among others. The b&t APC9 has better ergos, is truly ambidextrous, has a last round bolt hold open, has ease of optic mounting, has a more reliable extractor design. Additionally it is far easier to manage at the armored level than the MP5 series. It eclipses the MP5 handily.
My point wasn’t that the APC9K may not be better but that the military selection processes are often convoluted and outrageously expensive. Thus, unless this particular SMG selection process was reasonably efficient (which I feel is unlikely though I don’t know for sure), was it worth taking the time and, more importantly money, to find a better mouse trap? Although there may not be many active duty US military personnel with MP5/k experience, the US military does have a lot of experience with the MP5/k platform relative to any other current SMG. For example, even if we stopped using the M2 BMG for 20 years, we would still have a large body of knowledge about how the weapon works (unless all electronic or written historical records were lost, which is not likely) if we wanted to go back to it. The MP5 works like a champ, although it does have some flaws, and is the gold standard by which other SMGs are judged. The APC9K has some nice features the MP5K does not and the APC9 I handled seemed beautifully made. As somebody interested in military firearms I think it is really cool that B&T got the contract. I just hope it didn’t cost us millions to make the decision.
For a standard SMG role I’d still rather have the MP5. But given that this role is specific to a sub compact SMG that is concealable, I think they made the right choice. Even the K without a stock is still a pretty large package, turn it into a PDW and it’s a lot of gun under your coat.
The only really discrete SMG I can think of is the Skorpion VZ-61 and the M-11/380 and both of them have their inherent design limitations.
The M2 has been in service with every branch for almost 100 years. The MP5 has seen VERY limited use outside of NSW and some ARSOF units, and that was at least 20 years ago in most cases. I don’t disagree with your overall point, but just because a few SOF units used a weapon some time ago does not mean that the military has a lot of experience with it.
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I think the military adopted the little B&T subgun because they likely will look at their carbine in the future.
Probably was one of the smartest small arms procurement processes in recent history. Buy a sampling, put them in the hands of users, down select, go with the lowest bid from the down select that can deliver in the duration required.
Having carried a MP5K overseas in another life actually kind of sucked after the first hour of cool factor wore off. Yes they did make a shoulder rig and yes we did try to hide them under banana republic vests. How silly. What no one is thinking of is that folding stock doubled the thickness of the package. We had a cool briefcase that secured the K pretty good and fell open at the push of a button. That was probably 25 years ago. It’s time for some updates. David
Im surprised with the B&T deal. But I dont know jack shite about them. Are they considered to be quality tuff like a an MP5. Why not just a K MP5. Why does Sig care? Dont get that either, they just won the handgun deal, game over on that one.
Esplain
PB
I bet the armorers will welcome the APC over the MP5. I won’t ever get rid of my MP5 (clone), but it has gathered much dust since I purchased some of the B&T offerings. I think our service members will feel the same, once they get them.
The APC9 is very high quality. It’s made in Switzerland by B&T AG, who has been an OEM supplier to HK for MP5 barrels, optic rails, and sound suppressors. It is a very smooth shooting blowback design with a hydraulic buffer that really smoothes it out. It has a full length top picatinney rail for easy optic mounting. It has fully ambidextrous controls. The model that won the competition has a removable AR pistol grip. And it features a last round bolt hold open, which is fully ambidextrous. The ergos are better than the M16 FOW (the ambi bolt catch design is an improvement IMO), yet sufficiently similar that it will be an easy transition from the M16 FOW (and back to the M16 FOW) for end users.
It is easily suppressed and despite its straight blowback design, it doesn’t dump a ton of gas/carbon in the user’s face. The extractor design is vastly superior to that of the HK MP5. It’s highly reliable. Numbers I’ve seen from other end user testing prior to the Army competition re: MRBS and MRBF are outstanding.
It’s also far easier to support at an armorer level than the mp5. And it doesn’t require different locking pieces for suppressed vs unsuppresed use or for different bullet weights (the latter is not really a consideration in the context of mil issue).
I say all of this as a dyed in the wool mp5 fanatic. I have an all German MP5K-N and MP5-N, both select fire SMGs. If both the APC9 and MP5 were offered, both were select fire SMGs, and I could only choose one, I would take the APC9 over the MP5 without hesitation.
The APC9 is truly (IMO) the best in class current SMG on the market.
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Got my eyes on the Pro Model, trying to come with the Money for it.