"EF-88 vs M4"

[Slater]

A five-part article written by an Aussie on why the EF-88 is superior to the M4. For anyone with some time to kill:

https://cove.army.gov.au/article/the-merits-m4-and-ef88-and-more-part-5

[dwhitehorne]

I just skimmed over it. My two takeaways are the author is a logistics officer. Not the type of MOS I would go to for long gun advice. The comment about their SF has disdain for the EF88 could be the bull pup design all together. It seems to me most units that have an option on weapon selection are still picking a M4 type for good reasons. David

[SteyrAUG]

Well the AUG (as fielded by Austria and I think Ireland) might have some advantages over the M4, the M4 remains the more practical of the two and the Australian AUG is a substandard piece of junk with a long history of failures.

Two things give the Austrian AUG a bad name, the SA80 and the F88 when those rifles are confused with the Austrian rifle.

[sundance435]

For better or worse, there is a substantial and vocal minority of Australian Regular Army soldiers and officers who fiercely advocate that the AUG is a horrible platform that should be replaced as our service rifle with something like the M4A1, yesterday. This is a complex social phenomenon and includes some individuals who demonstrate a very poor understanding of strengths and weaknesses of the various weapons and provide invalid or indiscernible justification for their view, as well as some who have a very good understanding and who tend to legitimately very highly value certain characteristics in a weapon that the M4 possesses. This section will attempt to explain the existence of the phenomenon and to validate the assertion in the preface that in a majority of use cases relevant to the Australian Army that M4 derived designs aren’t particularly better than the EF88.

I'll save everyone from reading the whole thing. The above is all of the context you need. I'm going to guess the "substantial and vocal minority" is also disproportionately guys who have to use their rifles regularly.

Edit: Further reading does, indeed, indicate it was guys using them in real life who preferred the M4.

[markm]

I'll save everyone from reading the whole thing.

Thanks. Yeah... one of our "been there, done that" members made the point a year or two back that no (at that time) serious Special Forces type units run a bull pup variant.

The AUG is cool and stuff... but when it's time to cut the crap, it's the M4.

[C-grunt]

I got to run inner security for a HVT raid by the SAS in 2005. They were running M4 variants.

[chuckman]

I reached out to a buddy in the Aussie SASR, he was like "what? All I've used in the M4".

[SteyrAUG]

In 1977 the AUG brought some revolutionary concepts to the small arms world. And IF the M-16 remained the M-16A1 there would be more than a few scenarios where the AUG might have been the preferred tool for the job, particularly in some special applications where compact weapons were needed in a rifle caliber and the XM177 was deemed too unreliable.

The problem is the M-16/XM177 design continued to evolve and concepts from the AUG were borrowed and applied to other rifles. The AUG is still fine for very specialized applications but unless you are a country like Austria it's not practical as a general purpose firearm.

And quite honestly, so long as Aussie special forces continue to be able to be supplied with M4 rifles and the like, Australia can probably keep getting along with the F-88 even though it's a substandard AUG. The country that really needs to finally ditch their primary rifle is England, they actually play army quite a bit with us and the SA80A2 really isn't up to the task. Even Canada runs a superior rifle for godsakes.

[titsonritz]

I'm done at "Bullpup". Everyone talks about replacing the M4 but the reality is more and more continue to adopt it.

[lowprone]

As much as I like the concept of the bull pup carbine it really should be relegated to the security forces of the traditionally unarmed branches
of national air forces, cooks and bakers.

[BoringGuy45]

I'm done at "Bullpup". Everyone talks about replacing the M4 but the reality is more and more continue to adopt it.

Thus far, the small arms industry has yet to develop any rifle better than the AR-based platform. Many may be on close to, on par, or slightly better in some ways. There have been some more recent designs, such as the SCAR, CZ 805, Masada/ACR, and Tavor, as well as older, solid and proven designs like the SG550 series, Galil, FNC, G36, etc. Yet, with all these options, whenever Western militaries are looking for a new rifle, they still keep turning to the M4 or designed based upon it (i.e. HK416, LMT MRP, etc.). I think that speaks for itself.

[Diamondback]

Even Canada runs a superior rifle for godsakes.
And Canada *still* turned to a member of the M16/M4/AR family tree, even though it does have a few localized quirks. (They got some things right, others wrong--if I could build a custom Warfighter AR from any sources I wanted worldwide unfettered by import restrictions or needing to pay for it, I'd start with Diemaco barrels and combine with M4/M5 RAS or RIS-II as my start point. That Tri-Ad rail, though, is the WTF that cancels out the better barrel... not to mention the ballbuster single-point slings.)

[ramairthree]

Take a Carbine with the M4 lower magwell, pistol grip connection, selector ergonomics, mag release ergonomics, and give it control hand finger tip BHO/BR.

Give it an off hand non reciprocating charging handle.

Give it a true folding stock.

These are about the only improvements to speed up the manual of arms.

Ambidexterity, rapid change barrel, etc. are all secondary.

As of yet,
What similar weight, accuracy, and reliability Carbine with ease of accesorizarion exists?

Everything I have tried either lacks LRBHO, jacks up the selector ergonomics, is not 100% compatible with AR mags/drums, has way more weight, a worse trigger/accuracy, reliability/durability issues, does not take AR pistol grips, can’t change the pistol grip, is a pain to accessorize, etc.

90% of people touting the benefits of bullpups do not have the resume/CV for me to give a shit about their opinion.
The other ten percent do, but then go to the range or competition,
Where their times and hits are always better with an AR than the AK, bullpups, etc. they are touting.

Bull pups are cool.
Just like an UZI, HK91, FN FAL, M14, Bren Ten, etc. are cool.

I would not kick an AUG or Tavor out of bed for getting crumbs on the sheets.
But I won’t leave my AR wife for one.

[VIP3R 237]

I can’t remember who originally posted this but it stuck enough for me to copy it:

a modernized SIG 55X would be the most reliable, durable, and an overall advanced weapon that could be created. Simply it is the only design to combine the piston fed design, reciprocating charging handle, static ejector, large massive locking lugs of the AK along with the bolt hold open, bolt release, and ergonomic controls of the AR all into one weapon. However it would need further refinement such as the addition of multiple gas settings including specifically for adverse and suppressed use, a folding collapsing stock, a quick change barrel for mission requires, and finally a push button magazine release coupled with an adverse condition paddle style release aka HK433 or G36 style.

[MountainRaven]

Why would it need a push button magazine release?

Why would it need any more than maybe two gas positions?

[Ed L.]

Well the AUG (as fielded by Austria and I think Ireland) might have some advantages over the M4, the M4 remains the more practical of the two and the Australian AUG is a substandard piece of junk with a long history of failures.

From what I remember when I was into AUGs (I still have one), Australia had to junk their first few thousand production AUGs because of minor changes that they made with some parts that led to tolerance stacking. The first article mentions this.

Did they ever fix all of the issues, SteyrAUG?

[Firefly]

AUGs are toys. Fun toys, but toys. I get what they were trying to do (FIBUA) but otherwise they are irrelevant

[1168]

give it control hand finger tip BHO/BR.

Boonie Packer Redi-Catch.


I can’t remember who originally posted this but it stuck enough for me to copy it:

a modernized SIG 55X would be the most reliable, durable, and an overall advanced weapon that could be created.

I think that was 7n6/RetroRevolver77. I’m not certain, though.

[sundance435]

As much as I like the concept of the bull pup carbine it really should be relegated to the security forces of the traditionally unarmed branches
of national air forces, cooks and bakers.

Give them to the guys who train the least? Sorry, but that makes even less sense - I'd expect to see a not insignificant increase in hand burns, holes in hands, and NDs with injuries. I fired a bullpup once (2 mags through a Tavor) and I thought it was cool, but also no way I would ever train enough to become proficient with it.

An M4 (or even 416) is the simplest non-AK platform, from a mechanical and manual of arms standpoint, that you can give to both door-kickers and door-installers. I'd argue it beats the AK for manual of arms, too.

[BoringGuy45]

I can’t remember who originally posted this but it stuck enough for me to copy it:

a modernized SIG 55X would be the most reliable, durable, and an overall advanced weapon that could be created. Simply it is the only design to combine the piston fed design, reciprocating charging handle, static ejector, large massive locking lugs of the AK along with the bolt hold open, bolt release, and ergonomic controls of the AR all into one weapon. However it would need further refinement such as the addition of multiple gas settings including specifically for adverse and suppressed use, a folding collapsing stock, a quick change barrel for mission requires, and finally a push button magazine release coupled with an adverse condition paddle style release aka HK433 or G36 style.

I'm a huge fan of the SG55x series. If they were readily available in the U.S. at a comparable price to the AR, it would be a tossup between that and the AR as my go-to rifle (I'm talking the actual Swiss ones).

Sig Sauer's SIG556xi had the potential to be all that you were saying in this platform. But to the surprise of nobody, Sig cut corners as they do, and they ended up with a complete POS rifle. Had the 556xi come from Swiss Arms, I'd imagine it would have been a different story. At any rate, Swiss Arms already has a "USA" lower, that takes AR mags and is push button release. They also have a folding/collapsing stock one can use in lieu of the standard folding fixed stock. So, they're more than halfway there.

It seems like all the new "3rd generation assault rifles" are based on the AR-18 (i.e. G36, SCAR, ACR, CZ 805, etc.) and obviously, there's nothing wrong with that; it's a good system. But it would interesting to see a lightened, modernized SG55x rifle with the versatility and ergonomics of an AR. I think that would be a good base system to work from. I mean, it's already the best of both the AR and AK worlds (relatively speaking), but still circa 1990s. If somebody updated that, it would get my attention.

[ramairthree]

Why would it need a push button magazine release?

Why would it need any more than maybe two gas positions?

Because no matter how fast you you can get with a rock in or paddle release,
A drop free control hand push button as you off hand in the mag is faster.

Again,
As I have noted in past posts,
Platform advantages are a pretty modern manifestation.

Military gear, sling design, etc.
Training availability, techniques, changed drastically in the past 20 years.

When nobody had any optics, everyone was issued should slings, and all mag pouches were about as fast and handy as a M1911A1 flap holster, magazines were treated like life long possessions, and training was much more limited,

Gun vs gun arguments were like Camaro vs Mustang BS sessions.

[SteyrAUG]

Did they ever fix all of the issues, SteyrAUG?

Honestly don't know, but I doubt it.

[vicious_cb]

I just skimmed over it. My two takeaways are the author is a logistics officer. Not the type of MOS I would go to for long gun advice. The comment about their SF has disdain for the EF88 could be the bull pup design all together. It seems to me most units that have an option on weapon selection are still picking a M4 type for good reasons. David

I stopped reading when I saw this:
Solomon Birch is a logistics officer who is currently posted to CIOG and in the process of transferring to the reserves.

You should rename this thread "Some article, by some POG, talking out of his ass about things he knows nothing about"