Viewpoint - British Army Contract for L96A1 Sniper Rifle (by Gil Boyd B.E.M)

[sd4f]

Nothing to do with the production facility - the difference was 1 single new part:
From what I've read here, and everything I know about the AI, and other guns, the reason AI won was the locking collar that the bolt locks into which controls head spacing.

Basically by controlling 3 dimensions, you guarantee consistent repeatable headspacing.

By keeping the collar a consistent known value, and controlling the chamber and bolt geometry you guarantee as nearly as possible interchangeable parts.

ie, any AI barrel & bolt are interchangeable with any other.

pull an AI 308 barrel out of any existing rifle, or new off the shelf and once the torque value is the same, the headspace "Should be" exact.

basically they created a situation, where (as nearly as possible) the receiver is just another replaceable part. The AI AT and the AI AXMC have taken this to ne next logical step by formalizing the process.

Think of an AR15 barrel extension where the barrel extension is simply sandwiched between the receiver and the barrel.
ie. no short chambering, action truing, bolt lapping ect. necessary.

The thing is, what you've said literally applies to any firearm. It's not a factor of the design, but rather the design of the production and tolerancing, because if you control the factors relating to head space, to the same degree in other firearm, then you achieve the same result, complete parts interchangeability with consistent head space.

But the thing to take out of this academic discussion is that the others didn't do this, which meant their parts weren't interoperable and I suppose they were the ones whose production operations looked like garden sheds in comparison to AI, ignoring production scale.

Ultimately I've answered my own question, as it's not a matter of the functional design of the AI that won it over (I think that the reports establish that), rather the design of its production and parts supply chain. Fact of the matter is, any of the other rifles could have been manufactured to achieve the same level of parts interoperability, provided the critical dimensions were controlled... which they weren't...

Information

Warning: This is a relatively older thread This discussion is older than 360 days. Some information contained in it may no longer be current.

[Gil Boyd]

BSA did go further and I think many thought it would win the tender, but Peter is currently telling the story from documents he has found.
In terms of the Dartford engineering company, not sure I'm afraid.