Smart bullet
Tula gunsmiths create an almost fully polymer machine. And they also design a fundamentally new semi-automatic sniper rifle, not even one, but a whole family, with different dimensions and calibers.
Weaponcreated by M.T. Kalashnikov, in the twentieth century was considered the best in the world. How are you doing now? Judging by the appearance, the Western samples look better than ours. But does the aesthetics of the weapon affect its technical characteristics? Where are we lagging behind the West, and where are we ahead? And what are the trends in the development of small arms in the 21st century? On this and many other things, our conversation with the head of the unique Central Design and Research Bureau of sports and hunting weapons, Alexei Sorokin.
Your design bureau was created a year after the end of the Great Patriotic War as the head organization for developing sporting and hunting weapons. And this is significant. The war is over, you can pay attention to the shooting sport and hunting. However, it is known that Tula forged weapons for centuries. And it's not a secret for a long time that the TsKIB has created many unique combat pistols, machine guns, machine guns, rifles. Are you currently developing something completely new?
Alexey Sorokin: Of course, we do. But for the details, for obvious reasons, I can not speak. Now plastic and composite materials are increasingly being introduced into weapons. So, our specialists are designing, one might say, almost completely polymer automatic. Metal still remain the barrel, bolt and bolt carrier, the rest is all plastic. It is possible that such plastics will appear in the very near future, which will allow the barrel to be made composite. We also create a fundamentally new semi-automatic sniper rifle, not even one, but the whole family, with different dimensions and calibers. Preliminary tests suggest a very high shooting accuracy, primarily due to a different design of the gas engine, which does not create additional stresses and vibrations on the barrel at the moment of firing.
By the way, once a self-loading rifle with excellent accuracy was created at TsKIB, while it was almost 1 kg lighter than SVD in terms of weight.
There are also works on the creation of machine guns, in which we solve a number of important problems related to both the rate of fire and the reload of the machine gun. We create a sample without a flip top cover, and with a high pace, and a very simple recharge. We carry other topics, but they are secret.
Among experts there is a perception that the basic calibers of automatic weapons that we have are outdated. You need to create some kind of new cartridge. Is it so?
Alexey Sorokin: In general, the idea of finding a new caliber for small arms excites the brain, not only to domestic specialists, but also to foreign ones. Foreigners are discussing it for a long time and actively.
This is due to attempts to create high-speed ammunition. If the bullet will fly out of the barrel at a speed of more than a kilometer per second, then there is no need to make a correction of the sight at a distance of up to 500 meters. Naturally, the energy of the bullet increases, its damaging properties increase.
What's the problem? To increase the speed, it is necessary to increase the pressure in the barrel. That is, it is logical to simply make the sleeve larger and, accordingly, pour more gunpowder into it. And, probably, you can make a sabot bullet, like an anti-tank projectile. In artillery, such an approach made it possible to increase the velocity of projectiles immediately by one and a half times.
Alexey Sorokin: Work on the creation of sub-caliber bullets was carried out. But they did not give the expected result. It turned out that good in large calibers, completely ineffective in small ones. In addition, sub-caliber bullets are unstable when flying and do not provide aimed fire.
Regarding the increase in pressure - this is just realizable. But here there are serious problems. What lies on the surface - barrel wear increases sharply, the weapon life decreases, its reliability decreases. Yes, and the existing thread does not provide a sustainable flight of a bullet at ultra-high speeds. If you significantly increase the speed, then the bullet can even fly out of the barrel, even without starting to rotate, just rifling cuts off part of the shell, of course, one cannot wait for the accuracy from such a bullet. Increased pressure can lead to seizure of cartridges in the chamber, and to the destruction of the liner. So the "simple" way to increase speed is actually not that simple. Therefore, there is a search for such an optimal caliber, which with a minimum increase in the pressure of the powder gases will provide a significant increase in the speed of the bullet. Everything revolves around six millimeters. Perhaps the caliber of the cartridge of the future will be precisely in the area 6 mm.
On the other hand, it is impossible to close everything with one caliber. The 4,6 mm caliber is ideal for solving some tasks, and the 9 mm and even more for solving other tasks.
What, in your opinion, is the main trend in the development of small arms for the army?
Alexey Sorokin: This may seem strange, but, in my opinion, the weapon will not be complicated, but simplified. Although at various exhibitions of weapons appear quite complex systems. As they say, heaped up.
However, there is a clear tendency to reduce the price and simplify small arms. This does not mean that the technical characteristics will deteriorate or the quality of the weapon will decrease. New technologies and new materials are being introduced. The first steps are 3D printing. I would not be surprised if all-plastic weapon systems, including plastic barrels, appear soon. By the way, we are also working in this direction, as I said. Of course, at first it will be a disposable weapon. But it just may be very popular.
It is no secret that today the West is leading in the introduction of composite materials in small arms and especially in 3D printing. Can we boast something?
Alexey Sorokin: The West is leading in the mass production of small arms containing elements made of plastic materials. But everything new is well forgotten old. We were the first. In the USSR, much earlier than in Western Europe and the USA, they developed revolutionary schemes for weapon systems, including those with extensive use of plastics.
Specific examples can be cited?
Alexey Sorokin: The first plastic frame gun in the world was developed in Tula, in our TsKIB, by the famous designer Makarov. It was at the very beginning of 1960's — more than fifty years ago. "Glock" with a plastic frame appeared in fifteen years. But today it is he who is considered almost a reference.
And what gives a plastic frame?
Alexey Sorokin: Improving manufacturability, reducing weight, reducing the cost of the whole structure. In general, it turns out a qualitatively new weapon.
Plastic PM passed all the necessary tests and showed significant advantages in comparison with the classic, all-metal gun. Let me explain for those who are not very familiar with the design of the shop pistols. The pistol frame is the handle, and in front of it is that part of the pistol on which the bolt, barrel, and all moving parts are mounted on top. That is, everything under the barrel is made of plastic.
On the "Glock" the same thing - the upper part is metal, the bottom is plastic. And now this is the main trend in the development of pistols.
Unique domestic small arms
I will say more. In the TsKIB museum there is a machine gun, developed in 1970-ies, with a polymer receiver. And today in the world no one dared to do this. And in Tula did forty years ago! If a machine gun with a polymeric receiver is released to the world market, it will be a real breakthrough.
So it cannot be said that our country has never engaged in the introduction of polymeric materials in small arms. We began to do it first.
And why are these unique developments turned out to be on the museum shelves, and not in the Soviet army?
Alexey Sorokin: The fact of the matter is that the main customer for small arms was the Ministry of Defense. If something, even completely unique, did not meet the requests of the Ministry of Defense, it was rejected. And in those years, the USSR Armed Forces were completely satisfied with the machine guns and machine guns created by Mikhail Timofeevich Kalashnikov. He really created the best mass weapons for his time - machine guns and machine guns.
However, in our country there were quite a few gunsmiths who, in their talent, were in no way inferior to the designer.
The Ministry of Defense proceeded from the fact that all the Kalashnikov systems were technologically debugged, produced in mass series. And the machine guns and machine guns themselves have proven themselves in real battles around the world.
And what's wrong with that? AK shooting systems objectively showed themselves from the best side.
Alexey Sorokin: This is so, and no one deserves the merit of designer Kalashnikov. But weapons production required development. It was necessary, at least in small series, to launch into production and, most importantly, to patent our priorities. If in the USSR there was a market for civilian small arms like the one in the United States, then almost everything developed at TsKIB would find its consumers, and today Russia, not the West, would be a trend setter.
What kind of fashion, for example, can we talk about?
Alexey Sorokin: About the same widespread introduction of various plastics into weapon systems, about the level of various upgrades. About the system bullpup. By the way, for some reason it is considered that this is a purely Western development. These are the creative ones that they took and invented to place the trigger mechanism in the machine gun not behind the store, but ahead.
What are the advantages of such a scheme? It leads to a decrease in the length of small arms while maintaining the length of the barrel. In turn, this makes it possible to use machine guns more effectively and conveniently when firing in an enclosed space or, for example, from the loopholes of armored personnel carriers. The bullpup scheme is very convenient for paratroopers and special forces. Today, bullpup is the West. And what really?
The first bullpup layout was developed in Tula, in our TsKIB. Do not believe it - in the middle of 1950's. A couple of years before the western competitors. The military - the main customers - looked at that miracle, did not see anything in it, and the revolutionary development went to the museum shelf.
In Tula, the TsKIB was a real genius of small arms, German Korobov. Who heard his name? But it was he who proposed and calculated the construction of the bullpup, he introduced plastic into automatic weapons. From his legacy left only photographs and test reports of prototypes. All this today is declassified due to the prescription of years. And when I show Western gunsmiths of the Korobov system, they say: this cannot be done, it simply will not work.
The fact that we could produce half a century ago, neither in Western Europe, nor in the USA, nor in Israel, especially in China and in the 21st century, have yet been able to do so. They even have no idea how to approach the design tasks implemented in Tula a decade ago.
What other tasks does TsKIB have in addition to those that you mentioned at the very beginning?
Alexey Sorokin: One of the main tasks is to update the entire existing line of small arms developed and produced in Tula. We pay very serious attention to ergonomics. Weapons should be not only reliable, but also easy to use, in their own beautiful.
By the way, ergonomics very significantly affects the quality of small arms. If the weapon fits comfortably into the hand of a fighter, if his design allows, without degrading the technical characteristics, to load the barrel with additional equipment, then this all together plays only to the benefit of the rifle system as a whole. Previously, we did not pay much attention to this. Now everything is different. We began to work with leading technical designers of the country. I am sure that very soon domestic samples of automata, machine guns, pistols in appearance and quality of processing will become on par with the best Belgian, American, Swiss and German samples.
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