Due to the fact that most of the military operations by the US military in the late 1980s. now had to be carried out in the Middle East, there was a need for a new sniper weapon, providing high-precision shooting in open desert spaces from a distance of at least 1 thousand m. In addition, it was noticed that the previously used M21 sniper rifles began to fail. Finding spare parts for this weapon was problematic. As a result, US weapons designers began work on the creation of a new rifle unit, which today is known as the M24 sniper rifle. Read more about these weapons later in the article.
Acquaintance
The M24 sniper rifle is an American weapons development company Remington Arms. The rifle unit was designed in 1987. It has been in service with the United States Army from 1988 to the present. The rifle is designed in two versions: M24A2 and M24A3 calibers of 7.62 and 12.1 mm.
About the history of creation
The previously used M21 sniper rifle, the base for which was the semi-automatic M14, began to deteriorate. American experts felt that it would be cheaper for the state to create a new rifle unit than to deal with spare parts for the M21. The military command of the United States Marine Corps formulated a requirement for a new rifle model, namely, the weapon should be equipped with a longitudinally-sliding bolt and a polymer box. In addition, stainless steel must be used to make the barrel. Sniper weapons were designed on a competitive basis. Two rifles reached the final: Steyr SSG69 and Remington 700BDL. The expert commission gave preference to the latest model. As a result, in 1987, the M24 sniper rifle was adopted by the United States Army.
Description
The M24 sniper rifle is equipped with a stainless steel barrel, whose length is 60.9 cm. This element of the sniper weapon is adapted for the use of 7.62 mm NATO-style M118SB ammunition. A variant of the large-caliber sniper rifle (12.1 mm) was also created for firing ammunition Lapua Magnum 338. For the barrel, a 5R drill with five rifles developed by Remington is provided. In order to minimize friction, the edges of the grooves were rounded. The fighter can customize the weapon for himself, pushing the butt plate back and forth 6.9 cm.
You can hit a target from M24 (a photo of a sniper rifle is presented in the article) using the Leupold Stewens M3 Ultra sight with a fixed magnification of 10x and 12x, a scale by which the distance to the target is determined, and a compensator. The task of the latter is to take into account the decrease in the trajectory of the fired projectile. Both types of sniper weapons use store-type ammunition. For M24A1 non-removable stores are provided, which are designed for 5 ammunition. The M24A2 uses detachable clips of 10 rounds. The operational resource of the barrel with a rifling step of 1 revolution per 28.6 cm reaches 5 thousand shots.
About technical specifications
M24 sniper rifle has the following indicators:
- With an empty magazine and without optics, the weapon weighs 5.4 kg, with full ammunition - 7.62 kg.
- The total length of the rifle is 116.8 cm, the barrel - 61 cm.
- Shooting is carried out by NATO ammunition 7.62 x 51 mm, Magnum Winchester 300, Nitro Express 470 and Lapua Magnum 338.
- The weapon works due to manual reloading with a sliding bolt.
- The fired bullet has a speed of 830 m / s.
- Aiming fire from a 7.62 mm rifle is possible at a distance of up to 800 m. With the Lapua Magnum 338 this figure increases to 1, 500 m, and with the Nitro Express 470 - up to 2, 300 m.
