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A Guy’s First Time … Shooting a M4 Carbine with a Fun Switch
The great crew out at Asymmetric Solutions USA in Farmington, Missouri brought out some of their more, let us say, “professional grade” weapon systems the other day and I was around to watch and try out one of their full auto M4 Carbines, a self-described “bastardized” HK 416 with assorted goodies, including a really high tech IR light/laser thing-a-ma-jig on it, with an Eotech, a cool prototype titanium suppressor from Gemtech, with a HK416 upper and a LMP select-fire lower. [Insert sound of brakes screeching here]. Wait? Did you say, “select fire” … oh, yes, indeed, I did.
John, one of the lead intructors at Asymmetric, demonstrated it for us and handily sent down range three and five round bursts like a guy who has done this before, because, well, he has. A lot.
The video shows two of the guys out taking a combat pistol class giving it a try for the first time. Of course, the response was pretty predictable. Big grins and a well deserved “holy crap” … what more is there to say? Well, let me try.
First, I’ve always wondered what it would be like to press the trigger on a select fire M4. Would it run away? Would I spray bullets off into the ever-after endangering every living thing in a two mile radius of my wild “spray and pray”? How about recoil? Could not be that bad, right? After all, it is a high powered .22LR, basically, well, sort of. You get my point.
The video shows how smoothly it operated and how quietly with that great suppressor. That is one sweet suppressor.
So I had my turn. I put a few rounds down range in semi-auto mode. Nice. Very nice. That suppressor is awesome. I could do this all day. OK, time to move that safety lever over to “fun switch” mode. Easily done. Ready to go. Square up to the berm into which we were shooting. Lean forward. Aggressive stance. Nice forward grip. Arms in position. All systems go.
Slowly pull that trigger and ….. bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam … seven shots rip off before I can get my finger off the trigger. Wow. Rocked me back more than I thought it would. Accurate? Hardly. Fun? You bet. But, I was surprised at how uncomfortable it was. Not a pleasant experience for my trigger finger and hand. Come to find out that the full auto trigger group is slamming pretty good in there and you sure feel it. That was the largest surprise for me.
Next burst was more controllable: three rounds. Finger on, finger off. Easy peasy. Still not terribly comfortable. Shots seemed to group around the same general area. OK, got it. Squeeze off a few more, and … time to change the magazine. New magazine in. Squeeze off a few more, do it a few more times. New mag time again. Wow, that was fast. Too fast. No way full auto is a practical way to use the M4 Carbine. The 30 round magazine is just way too low-capacity to feed this hungry beast on full auto. Give me one of them 60 rounders, if you please. Nah, on second thought, I’d just rip through that in a few seconds and at around $30 a pop for good ammo per 60 round magazine, no thank you.
I decided to have some more fun and squeeze of a long burst. All set, lean into it and pull the trigger and…the muzzle rise was ridiculous in spite of my best effort to keep it down. And so I stopped before spraying bullets into the adjacent county.
And that’s the biggest take away. Full auto is great for having fun, but not much else. One can imagine situations where suppressing fire using full auto may be necessary, as long as you had a group of other people with you doing the same thing to cover you when you run dry, which will be, nearly instantly.
The better and most obvious use would be in very short, controlled bursts. Three rounds? Five rounds? But then again, with a good finger and good trigger, you can squeeze off shots very quickly, and more controllably in semi-automatic mode. Not much point even in a “burst” mode setting, as far as I can tell.
In speaking with combat veterans at Asymmetric they, to a man, said that during their careers they never went full auto in a fire fight. Semi-auto was the way to go for them. More precise. More reliable. More accurate.
But it sure is fun, but beyond that….not very practical to go full auto on a M4 Carbine. Would I do it again? You bet I would, especially if I was using somebody else’s ammo.
Here's the video:
Full Auto M4 Carbine w/Suppressor - Machine Gun Fun - YouTube
The great crew out at Asymmetric Solutions USA in Farmington, Missouri brought out some of their more, let us say, “professional grade” weapon systems the other day and I was around to watch and try out one of their full auto M4 Carbines, a self-described “bastardized” HK 416 with assorted goodies, including a really high tech IR light/laser thing-a-ma-jig on it, with an Eotech, a cool prototype titanium suppressor from Gemtech, with a HK416 upper and a LMP select-fire lower. [Insert sound of brakes screeching here]. Wait? Did you say, “select fire” … oh, yes, indeed, I did.
John, one of the lead intructors at Asymmetric, demonstrated it for us and handily sent down range three and five round bursts like a guy who has done this before, because, well, he has. A lot.
The video shows two of the guys out taking a combat pistol class giving it a try for the first time. Of course, the response was pretty predictable. Big grins and a well deserved “holy crap” … what more is there to say? Well, let me try.
First, I’ve always wondered what it would be like to press the trigger on a select fire M4. Would it run away? Would I spray bullets off into the ever-after endangering every living thing in a two mile radius of my wild “spray and pray”? How about recoil? Could not be that bad, right? After all, it is a high powered .22LR, basically, well, sort of. You get my point.
The video shows how smoothly it operated and how quietly with that great suppressor. That is one sweet suppressor.
So I had my turn. I put a few rounds down range in semi-auto mode. Nice. Very nice. That suppressor is awesome. I could do this all day. OK, time to move that safety lever over to “fun switch” mode. Easily done. Ready to go. Square up to the berm into which we were shooting. Lean forward. Aggressive stance. Nice forward grip. Arms in position. All systems go.
Slowly pull that trigger and ….. bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam … seven shots rip off before I can get my finger off the trigger. Wow. Rocked me back more than I thought it would. Accurate? Hardly. Fun? You bet. But, I was surprised at how uncomfortable it was. Not a pleasant experience for my trigger finger and hand. Come to find out that the full auto trigger group is slamming pretty good in there and you sure feel it. That was the largest surprise for me.
Next burst was more controllable: three rounds. Finger on, finger off. Easy peasy. Still not terribly comfortable. Shots seemed to group around the same general area. OK, got it. Squeeze off a few more, and … time to change the magazine. New magazine in. Squeeze off a few more, do it a few more times. New mag time again. Wow, that was fast. Too fast. No way full auto is a practical way to use the M4 Carbine. The 30 round magazine is just way too low-capacity to feed this hungry beast on full auto. Give me one of them 60 rounders, if you please. Nah, on second thought, I’d just rip through that in a few seconds and at around $30 a pop for good ammo per 60 round magazine, no thank you.
I decided to have some more fun and squeeze of a long burst. All set, lean into it and pull the trigger and…the muzzle rise was ridiculous in spite of my best effort to keep it down. And so I stopped before spraying bullets into the adjacent county.
And that’s the biggest take away. Full auto is great for having fun, but not much else. One can imagine situations where suppressing fire using full auto may be necessary, as long as you had a group of other people with you doing the same thing to cover you when you run dry, which will be, nearly instantly.
The better and most obvious use would be in very short, controlled bursts. Three rounds? Five rounds? But then again, with a good finger and good trigger, you can squeeze off shots very quickly, and more controllably in semi-automatic mode. Not much point even in a “burst” mode setting, as far as I can tell.
In speaking with combat veterans at Asymmetric they, to a man, said that during their careers they never went full auto in a fire fight. Semi-auto was the way to go for them. More precise. More reliable. More accurate.
But it sure is fun, but beyond that….not very practical to go full auto on a M4 Carbine. Would I do it again? You bet I would, especially if I was using somebody else’s ammo.
Here's the video:
Full Auto M4 Carbine w/Suppressor - Machine Gun Fun - YouTube
