Powerful Pistol FN 57

[Sakobav]

read in guns and ammo that this gun is being used by US secret service
FN's newest contribution the handgun's evolution is named the Five-seveN?. This 20-round pistol fires a 5.7mm bullet that will defeat most body armor in military service around the world today.

http://remtek.com/arms/fn/57/

Any comments whether this is going to be a trend for "new generation" guns

Regards
Navdeep

[mehulkamdar]

Navdeep,

The FNs are available on open sale in the US and I have seen several of them on sale in Wisconsin, but not in Illinois so far. The round has a small, hardened tip bullet designed to penetrate most body armour and it is the same round chambered in FN's Individual Weapons, which are considered modern submachine gun variations. The small calibre, high velocity round makes the guns light and virtually recoil free and you can have a 20 round magazine in your pistol compared to a maximum of 17 if you're shooting a Glock etc. Perhaps a good gun for armchair commandos - for most conventional use a larger calibre gun would be a good idea because it would follow the old dictum "bigger bullets let in more air and let out more blood."

Not sure that it is used by any official body in the US - the FBI uses a 40 cal auto as standard (they use a reduced 10mm Auto round in their guns instead of the 40 S&W for some reason) and the aSpecial Operations guys use a special version of the Heckler und Koch USP. The standard issue service pistol, of course, is the unloved Beretta 92, and it may be replaced with a modernised 45 sometime in the future.

Mehul

PS CDNN Investments used to have some on sale on their website. Haven't checked there in a long time.

[pwm]

the hard core superpenetrator is not available on the civil market.
crying startet when this pistol comes out it will be a cop killer but comercial ammo has a a conventional lead core full metall jacket

yes, I think small caliber handgun cartridges like this have a future in the military because only this can deal with body amor.

[eljefe]

pistols like these are meant to do a particular job-Like a formula car is used to race...the good guy use them to take out the baddies wearing all kinds of protective body armour! that the same round is chambered in FN's radically designed rifle is a boon to the logistically challenged quartermasters of most armies!
The not so new FN rifle is radical in its design because of the ergonomics, the feed-rounds must be rotating thru nearly 180 degrees, and the looks.

The US citizens are lucky that more than 200 years after independance, they had their first taste of gun control...
At least Americans can get a chance at owning a this pistol-super penetrator or plain jane ammo.
Axx

[Sakobav]

Asif

You are correct like this Russian revolver

http://world.guns.ru/handguns/hg194-e.htm

Rgds

[eljefe]

Thanks Navdeep,
That is a real find!
Had read about this piston powered ammo-first look and read! Wow!
best
Axx

[Sakobav]

Pure serendipity Thanks for enlightening me. I was clueless, never read the whole article

Navdeep

[Grumpy]

I`d like to point out that this 5.7mm isn`t particularly powerful. It relies on a small diameter, high velocity and a steel core bullet to penetrate body armour. It`s hard enough to create practical body armour anyway - the 7.65 Tok is notoriously effective at penetrating police issue `bullet proof` vests.
I doubt that the calibre - and pistol - will see much use by the military as the 5.56 NATO ( as used in the M16/SA80 etc ) is pretty effective at penetrating body armour having a slightly smaller diameter bullet propelled at velocities that a pistol can`t hope to achieve. All that would be required is a steel cored bullet to make it far more effective than this pistol round.
Small calibre lightweight bullets - especially at the lower velocities obtained when fired from a pistol - are remarkably ineffective in their `man-stopping` abilities as they need to strike a major internal organ to put a man down quickly. This usually means the heart, brain or a major artery. The 5.56 NATO relies on tumbling to create a large wound channel but this is often nullified by the use of body armour which deforms the bullet and reduces velocity. How ineffective the 5.56 is has been proved in Iraq where the US military have found that it is a very poor man-stopper. Interestingly they are planning to adopt a .280 cal round.......something that was first proposed prior to WWI and then again in the early 1950s.
`What goes around, comes around` as the the old saying goes.....or `There`s nothing new under the sun`. Particularly appropriate in military procurement circles.

[eljefe]

Grumpy,
Every article I read of Jeff Cooper had something bad to say about the 223 as a military caliber.I still stand by 'size matters'!
Best
Axx

[Grumpy]

And you`re right Asif. No, Jeff Cooper couldn`t abide the .223/5.56 and he was right as well. It`s adoption was made in a very half-arsed manner as you probably know - US troops in Vietnam didn`t like lugging their M14s around the jungle and acquired M16s off their South Vietnamese allies. There was a sensible reason for the adoption of the M16 by the South Vietnamese military - their personnel tended to be appreciably smaller in stature than the Americans - but it was taken up by US forces because it was just about the only compact American made assault rifle available. A mistake as they have now found. In the meantime, because of the calibre compatibility requirement within NATO, it has had be adopted by several other countries.......which means that they will probably have to change as well. Still, if that means getting rid of the SA80 that`s not entirely bad news......................................................

[pwm]

Anthony Williams have something about this problems:

http://www.quarry.nildram.co.uk/PDWs.htm

http://www.quarry.nildram.co.uk/special ... _ammun.htm



also this for seeing how it tumble from one direction into the other

http://www.quarry.nildram.co.uk/AR15bigbore.htm

of course, if I ever have an M16, than in.50 beowulf
the rebated rim idea is very german, it look good with my 11,2x60 RB Schüeler rifle

[Grumpy]

Thanks for the links to those three reports PWM. Some interesting material.
The second article made me grin at the mention of the 9x21 +P+ cartridge. Ten years ago I was using a 9x25 in Open Class PP which would correspond to something like +++P+++ - an absolutely horrendous beast ! Built it, used it twice and sold it !
If you ever get an AR15/M16 variant why bother with the .50 Grendel ? Ballistics on that aren`t too impressive and you`ld have to handload - why not get a .308 Win version instead ?

[pwm]

presure of this IPSC racegun wildcat cartridges is allmost terrible, it was the 9x25 mayor I believe.
You have to trust the quality of your gun a lot to make it.Interesting was that the rebirth of the bottleneck cartridge for handguns starts in this scene around 1995, the mauser C 96 with its 7,63x25 round was the rigth way.
God result from this play things was that 9x23 brass is now available again if you load 9mm Steyr or 9mm Bergmann.
I think the .50 beowulf is a good cartridge for the M 16 action, in any case the best for wild boar.
Handloading? Well I had have over 20 rifles and 4 pistols, most stand now by dealers or are sold because my trek to india comes in.
But the guns I hold for some reasons have this calibers: 11,2x60 Schueler, 24 ga, 20ga 2,5" + 28 ga full rifled, 8x50R Lebel, 6 + 9mm fLOBERT

you may notice that this are all more less handloading cartridges, also the Flobert rimfire garden guns I have for memorys.
RWS makes Flobert cartridges but they are so expensive now that I load my own.
reloadable for the 9mm with 32 S&W long brass and with primed cases and .22 airgun pellets for the 6mm