The ironic thing is while a missile seems more high tech they're subject to far less stress, and generally need far less precision of manufacture than a rifle. (The sensors and electronics being an exception; but I'd assume Pylon isn't manufacturing those)
@UCbIMP6XJ7bLvOdxB7lyV4NQ No, but that's not exactly a hard design objective when the material science for metal alloys is extremely well understood and catering to chamber pressure gradients is an inherently straight-forward design objective (treatment processes and chamber/barrel geometry both achieve the same goal of increasing pressure limits). Aerospace materials are inherently more complicated due to the tighter design parameters they need to fit within (density/mass, moduli etc.). Rifles are mechanically pretty simplistic in function - all the issues outlined in this video were a product of extreme negligence bordering on the absurd.
This was my exact reaction. I was really, really hoping I misunderstood, and the angle of the cut was in some other, less catastrophically bad direction.
@@yorhaunit8s Yes. It clearly is. The question is: Why did they do it in the first place? They must have had a reason for it. I just can't think of one. The way I understand what exactly was done, I would think that it might actually have made machining the bolt heads MORE complex and expensive. So, why?
As a gunsmith and part-time grammar troll, I would like to point out ‘an’ only works if the word begins with a vowel, at least most of the time. Say “as an engineer” and “as an mechanical engineer” out loud and you will see what I mean. You’re totally right though.
Props to the British military for seeing through Pylon's BS and preventing them from ruining AI and the L96. Very rare, sober decision for an organization.
Pylon deserved to go bankrupt. Imagine they even tried to push poor guys out of business! Clowns. Could have ruined one of the most iconic precision rifles of all time.
The sad part is that the people making those decisions probably didn’t suffer much from that, just moved on to cause some other manufacturing disaster. The regular Joe’s there who were just following the directions given to them are probably the only ones to have truly lost out of Pylon going bankrupt.
@@loganb7059 Indeed. The directors of failed companies just move on to another directorship or senior management position somewhere else, citing "challenging market conditions" as the reason for their failure, while the people on the shop floor have to take any job they can get to make ends meet.
Rocket Science is kind of a misnomer. It's really rocket engineering. The science may come in on the materials level but it takes competent engineers to make things work. One thing I think that is missing in engineering today is the practice of making engineers work on the shop floor in manufacturing, assembly and servicing areas so that they really have a grasp of just what problems they can create. My last job I found a number of engineering mistakes that caused problems in the service life of machines. These were caused by assembly issues or improper clearances or tolerances. One involved the a problem that would cause a bearing spaced to be crushed because it was possible to be constantly chasing the torque specification because the part holding the bearings in place had too much clearance allowed between the faces. Others involved seals inside an assembly that could be rolled over simply because there was no lead on the part the seal rode on and when assembling there was no way to know. Experience on the shop floor would have solved a lot of these issues.
@@peteraustin9057 It's more like the elitist older brother of pyrotechnics. Also, rockets explode at the end, whereas bullets explode at the beginning. Clearly this is where Pylon got lost.
When I was working as a research technician, when I sent things to the machine shop for manufacturing, our guys would ask things such as "can I makes this piece which you've got as 6.2mm, as a 1/4" instead, as that'll be way quicker?", but the important thing there was that they ASKED, and we discussed how it was going to be made, and what could be changed and what was critical and needed to be done the difficult way. The problem here is fundamentally a communication one, Pylon assumed they knew better and changed things without asking important questions, and people got hurt because of their negligence.
The funniest bit was when the army sent someone to make sure they weren't some guys in a shed so they got access to a workshop and just told the guy everyone else was on lunch.
@@hansdietrich83 you think there was engineering startups in sheds before 1776? that's pre industrial revolution. what were they making that was "engineering"? in the USA it's engineering companies in sheds aswell, i just said computer companies because so many of them started in sheds. HP, Apple, Microsoft, etc
What a nightmare. Pylon almost invented CMMG's Radially Delayed Bolt system decades ahead of time. Your description of the board meeting with a rifle and cleaning rod was straight-up jaw-dropping.
This sounds deliberate from the get-go. A missile manufacturer understands materials and treatment specs. The fact that they were revealed to have tried to steal the contract is, to my mind, proof that that's what they had in mind when hey first met the guys from AI. "Look at these noobs- let's fleece them."
@@markfergerson2145 If this happened in Soviet Russian you ran the risk accused of (economic) "wrecking" and sent to the gulag if not worse.... Or accusing the designers of doing the "wrecking" themselves.
@@charlesbaker7703 Well, the fact that Pylon was forced into bankruptcy is kind of a parallel, except the owners and whoever inside the company that made the "mistakes" didn't get a lifetime vacation in Siberia. I wonder what did happen to them...
Revolutionary concept: do what your contract says you’re doing, you might only make the expected profit, but if there’s any issues you get paid twice without any risk of being liable as you did exactly what you got paid for…
The part about this story that blew my mind was when they rented a shop and bluffed the MOD into believing they weren't 3 guys in a shed by saying everyone else is out at lunch.
Most likely yes. British industry by that time resembled more a government welfare office than actual industry, so they probably didn't even know how to do it properly.
Ian McCollum is the most significant firearms historian and commentator working today. His work typifies the spirit of the early internet: impart information generously to others, for free. There is not a trace of the puffed-up self promotion so sadly typical of other firearm “review” sites, which are more often than not more interested in shilling shoddy gear than imparted learned wisdom. Good for you Mr McCollum.
As a machinist myself, I absolutely HATE companies that promise the world when they know they can't deliver. Usually it's the salespeople blowing smoke up the customer's ass, and then the shop rats getting chewed out when they can't make the part with existing tools. I saw something similar to this happen close up, and it was embarrassing to be part of the slo-mo train wreck.
I’m a Cnc lathe machinist and I deal with that almost daily. Run an old lathe that’s been crashed dozens of times over the years by different people. Plus, tooling that’s just as beat up. Small town family business, but we make tight tolerance parts for many big customers. It’s a stressful job...
@@austindrumhe4937 "Yeah, absolutely... We can hold +.0005/-0 on that pitch diameter. With no gauge. On a 20 year old Haas with .010 backlash. Yeah, we got this."
And every manufacturing company believes themselves to be following the tightest of ISO specifications for everything they do (and self-certify)... but as often as not, decisions about materials and processes are just made by whichever boss man is loudest and has the most clout, as fast as he wants because he has golf or something to get on with.
@@ibgorton there’s truth in that haha. At my job, it’s mostly a “figure it out” mentality that my bosses have. They almost always take zero accountability for anything that goes wrong despite that, and it’s up to the little guys like myself to throw shit at the wall and make it stick. When it doesn’t, it’s never because the boss man decided to accept a job that we don’t have the right resources to complete... Because of that, a lot of guys at work send parts through even if they are out of spec because they’d rather take the chance of it not being noticed than to admit the part isn’t right because that would guarantee nothing good.
Yeah, when I was working in quality control I often heard too often about sales and the big boss cutting corners with the processes to get parts out in time. We always needed a concession to get our batches out since they were so shite at their job and promised the customers the world. The poor machinists having to work with terrible materials and fill impossible orders in little to no time, unfortunately it always fell back on our department and the machinists when these orders couldn't be filled in time.
There's actually a book about the role of the outhouse in Swedish history - Det Svenska Dasset, Inte En Skitsak. The Swedish Outhouse, Not A Shitty Thing. Quite funny, written by a former teacher of mine, Kalle Bäck. I'm sure a book on the role of the garden shed in human history would be even better!
@@Niinsa62 Thanks for that. That is interesting. When the Anglo-Saxons came to Britain they built houses like they did back home. This included the Grubenhaus which was a small structure partially sunk into the ground. Back in Europe they had used to keep their cattle in in winter. But as British winters are not usually as harsh as those on the continent they started using them for other things instead of cows, such as the weaving frame. The grubenhaus became what would later be called the shed. Interestingly in the 10th century there was a change in the way weaving was done and it went from being something the wife did to keep the family clothed to something the husband did as a job. I like to think that whoever came up with the change did so in the grubenhaus.
Pretty wild to think that if Pylon engineers hadn't been completely incompetent, AI would probably not exist today, probably absorbed into some other company.
I'd wager at least some of the engineers at Pylon knew what a shitshow this was mounting up to be, but some dude higher up probably just said "cheerio lads, we can make it cheaper and faster to produce, we'll just change those few bits, no one'll ever know"
@@RiddSann "Who needs straight-cut bolts? Bah! Expensive. Here, 45 is much easier. We've got a great casting department, so cast that. And that. And that. I know it calls for this high-strength steel, but c'mon! It's a rifle. It doesn't need all that much strength to punch a primer, right? Use that mild steel leftover from the missile project. Also? We're gonna need to make it metric, and I'm giving you about...4 hours from the start of your shift, so you got about 35 minutes left."
@@Scoobydcs Nah, wasn't born until the next decade. But I've enough experience with stupid management decisions (a lot from my current job...) that make you question the ability of those who make decisions. And unfortunately, you realize exactly how common that is. Way too many 'leaders' and 'managers' have little knowledge or respect for those who are professionals and experts in their fields.
That was actually engineering tomfoolery. It was manufactured as it should have been. The idiots just decided to make the first few inches of their control rods have the opposite effect you want from a control rod.
@@jorgedelrey742 Nope, that was operator error. At every level. Running a test the system wasn't designed for. Then running that test when the plant wasn't in the operating conditions that the test was meant to be run under. Then not running the test according to plan. And finally, the operator panicked and hit the SCRAM button when if he'd been napping the test would have (quite remarkably, given the above) worked.
@@ElementalOctopus The first few inches of the control rods were that way for a good reason, to allow both positive and negative control. It was the stupid test they ran (which didn't take into account the design) that ultimately caused the blow up. Certainly not a very good design, but one that can (and has been everywhere else it's used) be operated safely.
I suspect that it was more hubris than incompetence. Engineers are notorious for this kind of thing, because they are often the smartest person in the room until they're not.
@@achievementart I heard him... My comment was more about the statement that lumped all engineers into the same category instead of just stating that the old ones, in this case, were clearly bad ones. If all engineers were "notorious for this kind of thing", the gun wouldn't have functioned in the first place.
As an engineer, this is an extremely interesting video. Often in the layers between people/objects (technical term is interfaces), for example communication, things go wrong and this often is the cause of failure of projects. Many people underestimate the importance of well defined and strict adherence to interfaces. 5:10 a great example is the "hyatt regency walkway collapse" where the people building the walkway took it upon themselves to make a seemingly small change to the plans to make it easier to manufacture, leading to a much greater load on a nut which failed, causing the death of 118 people.
The perils of subcontracting. "Okay, you have to make it EXACTLY to spec." "Got it." "I mean exactly what it says on the blueprints." "Understood." Exactly, alright?" "Don't worry about it!" Once they actually start: "Hey boss, all this stuff is in imperial." "Well just convert it into metric." "Hey boss, machining this thing takes forever." "Well just cast it instead." "Hey boss, we don't have the right steel." "Steel is steel, use whatever we have." "Hey boss, the guys that hired us are complaining we're not doing it to spec." "What? They think they know better then us? They're three guys in a shed. We make MISSILES."
I think its more along the lines that Pylon was a company that was successful enough for long enough period of time that the engineers/producers got removed/retired from all the decision making process, and every last thing was being decided by committees of business majors and accountants. Why else would the company not insist at least one of the engineers that designed rifle was not on hand for tooling and production?
Ian I work software QA for a living and use some of these videos to actually teach folks what happens when different departments do not talk to one another. Thank you
Yes and no. If the accountant is the one saying "do this cheaper" then they're probably dangerous. If they're the one saying "if you don't do this cheaper you will go bankrupt" they're good.
It would be interesting to hear what the price difference was/is between the specified firing pin steel and the substitute. The part would still have to be machined, therefore the material cost was the only saving.
Things like this happen far too often in manufacturing..... And it even happens in house between different departments as well..... I was working for a robotic company in the late 80's early 90's when I designed a tool to program the positions of the robot that had to place an item with a tolerance within 5/1000 of an inch..... The drafting department made changes to my design without my knowledge, after I was already overseas..... So when the tools arrived in Korea and had to be used, they wouldn't hold the required tolerance and scuttled the inspections and acceptance of the systems, all 30 of them at $2million each. Fortunately I had brought my original prototype with me and was able to program all 30 units with the prototype..... And with a minimal loss of time...... But it shows how arbitrary changes to the design of a Piece of equipment by an outside person can tank a multi million dollar project.....
There's an old cautionary tale about the F-86 Saber. There were a number of fatal crashes that were ultimately found to be attributed to an assembly error on the wing leading edge slats caused by a case of an individual on the shop floor knowing "better"
@@zacharybennett3249 What do you want to question.... My typing skills on a phone❓ Or my ideas behind what I type❓🤔❓ The "..." represents a pause.... And it may not be structurally correct, but it's the way I think, the way I talk, and so the way I type..... So what❓❓❓
Makes you wonder how good the missiles were Pylon built, if they were that cavalier about the rifles for A.I.... hope MOD took a hard look at EVERYTHING they built, after that!
How much of their work was _solely_ their own work? Because this sounds like a subcontractor issue. Their engineers would know the capabilities (and foibles) of their manufacturing process and be able to compensate for and monitor the whole process.
The only missile that fits the bill is ALARM, which was a BAe product, so at best Pylon were a subcontractor. The name makes me wonder if their speciality was actually pylons rather than the missiles themselves.
It doesn't seem that Pylon had serious enough repercussions. If the CEO had been inprisoned for fraud I think it would have sent a message throughout the industry that would probably still be heard today. This is what we need, consequences for your actions, this is what we are lacking in most of the world.
That’s the thing i love about first half or rather three quarters of USSR. Wasting government (people money, think of it as tax payers dollars) money on some retarded mistakes or purposefully sabotaging some research group/engineer/scientist for your gain, you are going to answer to the law, no matter how high ranking or genius you are. This things actually happened quite a lot, including arms development, where “intellectuals” who as we all know were repressed by evil soviets because they are so smart, we’re writing complaints and snitching on one another hindering development, for sole reason to be the one who is credited with research, eliminating competition and heading the institute themselves. (I was loosely describing 3rd research institute aka rocket development institute)
Reminds me of the Corvette, now a beloved product in the US and to the car world as a whole as a tremendously performing vehicle for the money, battling supercars every year, yet it had a very rocky beginning and just barely, ever so slightly came out alive
It was also the introduction of the Small Block V-8 that had a great deal to do with it. But sometimes I wonder what would have happened if GM had pursued a DOHC 6
Sig’s the easiest manufacturer to recall for having early production problems, but at this point every time a new firearm comes out I just put a two year timer on it so I can see whether they have mechanical issues, recalls, or if the manufacturer goes under because of potential problems that arise from their new product.
REMINDS me of the six day war Egypts war minister send telegram to soviets. STOP SENDING SURFACE TO AIR MISSILES, START SENDING SURFACE TO PLANE MISSILES
"these things cost $1 million each! And we have so few, we can't possibly TEST them! Also there's no way we can keep such tests secret, if we test them and the tests show they don't work then the Russians may find out and exploit our weakness or worse... the press might find out and embarrass us! We frankly have no choice but to just hope that they work when we need them."
Machinist here converting metric to imperial and back is pretty common. Though accurate translations are crucial and ive never heard a machinist be able to just say fuck it and change shit
Part of good design is taking limited manufacturing capabilities into account. Also, I've seen LOTS of bad engineering design in British motorcycles. Luckily I haven't had to deal with much other British engineering.
As a structural engineer I can confirm that your description of plans being ignored by construction contractors is indeed frequently correct. As always fascinating story Ian.
Prior to CNC machining, lathes basically had a gear box that you set to cut threads. If your machine was geared for metric, then it couldn't cut inch threads. That would explain the need for a conversion.. though not why that conversion was so half-assed.
Also, i feel like Imperal to Metric wouldnt be that big of a deal today... just load up the cad file and convert the measurements... in the mid 80s... all that would have to be done by hand and clearly Pylon didnt do that good a job.
Still have to be careful now. Imagine putting metric dimensions into a machine with imperial parameters, 20mm suddenly becomes 20" and you get a mighty bang. Converting something? Double check, triple check and then check again just incase.
Yeah, you can make metric threads on an inch lathe or vice versa but not quickly. Have to leave it in gear and reverse it back for the next cut, instead of disengaging the halfnut at speed and just cranking the saddle back to the start of the cut. Source: I live in metricland but my lathe has an inch leadscrew.
By the mid 80's Lathes were starting to be computer controlled. I remember seeing pictures of some being controlled with computers as basic as the Commodore 64 which (considering this was a computer with a 1Mhz CPU and 64kb of total RAM) managed to stay relevant for a very long time. Even computers that basic were more than capable of doing imperial to metric conversions and lathes could also be converted between imperial and metric, granted that was not cheap or easy to do but something that should not be hesitated over for a major order like this.
@@jameslewis2635 Now I think on it,the rule of thumb back then was 3×50 . That is,$50,000 for the machine new,$50,000 for the conversion to CNC ,and $50,000 for the software to run it. Not including the conversion time (training time) for the operator,who if a small shop ,is God help him,the programmer. About two weeks from deciding on new item till the first new item successfully came off the machine. There were a lot of unhappy people those years. I remember that quite well. Wrecked machinery,amorphous blobs of metal until glitches were sorted,experienced machinists finding new occupations,and so forth.
You brought the topic up in a video not long ago, but this right here is a shining example of why production engineering/manufacture engineering is so important. You have to figure out how to actually make things, but the people figuring out those changes really need to have a proper understanding of how and why the device works in order to make changes that make sense.
Where were they? I was working in Rochester for GEC at the time and don't recall the name ever cropping up as a local competitor. Googling I've turned up a Pylon Industries at Dartford, but that operated 1990-96, so not the same company, though I suppose someone may have tried to salvage part of it.
@@davidgillon2762 I understood Crayford on the road between Crayford and Erith. We've probably seen the same address. Maybe I'm barking up the wrong tree?
I wish you did more vids like this one. I drive a lot for work, and I can’t really look at the screen. So when it’s mostly anecdotal as opposed to visual inspections of firearms, I get super excited because I’d prefer to listen to you tell me about all types of armament all day long.
I would've "loaded" a random rifle from the run, and handed it to the person responsible for the revised methods. Then told them to demonstrate their faith in the quality of what they had done.
Reminds me of a joke about building planes by apprentices: a bunch of professions have a team of apprentices build a plane and for its maiden flight, the masters are the passengers, long story short: only the IT master actually boards and does so without fear, upon being questioned, he responds: „my guys can’t make it move anyways, so why be afraid of it crashing…“
@@jasonwebb7574 Just for clarity I didn’t serve with the Green Jackets, just I have both books. I have had many interactions with RSMs and they’re always scary, all those years of command experience. They had no time for idiots, but I always listened to what they had to say, always the best policy. I reckon Steve would be a good guy to have a beer with and hear some solid soldiering stories.
Kind of funny story with the whole metallurgy thing. Before they actually made the PM, they used to build replica colt revolvers based on reference pictures. Apparently, these revolvers were very faithful replicas and this is what caused someone to suggest to the two Daves to build their own competition rifles. Also, they were both competition shooters themselves.
Why didn't the British government award the contract to Sterling? It would've made much more sense as Sterling had long experience of producing firearms .
Note to self for once I’ve completed my design for the best rifle in the world ever (including some completely left field and possibly French design details to keep Ian happy) Make sure to have enormous penalty clauses for any subcontractor who fails to follow the signed blueprints as provided. Gotcha 👍
Ian has done previous videos on the L96A1 and its successors. Apparently when the L96A1 became end of life they were rounded up, cut into pieces and dumped in the North Sea. Happy hunting.
Well guide lamp didn't manufacture firearms, or singer etc... a whole bunch of companies had no firearm (or tank, artillery) experience prior to being pressed into production for WWII. Key differences being they actually could produce quality goods to spec and they were overseen by people with weight and authority behind them.
@@bengrogan9710 Something similar happened to the Stryker MGS (Mobile Gun System), originally designed to essentially be a mobile field-cannon with a 105mm gun and had such a gun designed specifically for it. Some bean-counter somewhere figured, "Hey, we have all these spare 105mm guns lying around from upgrading all our M1 tanks to M1A1s with 120mm guns, let's just use those." The M1 guns were high-pressure guns designed for something over 60 tons, the original MGS gun was a low-pressure gun designed for something under 20 tons. The current MGS can't traverse and fire it's gun more than 45-degrees or it'll knock the vehicle on it's side and they had to add a muzzle-brake because without it if you fire the gun straight ahead the muzzle blast will crush the driver's compartment.
I live a short walk from that shed. I hope to own one one day. It's a long way to the nearest long range though. Although, crucially, it's also far _too_ long a way to the nearest long range.
I know a great many people have watched this video and gone "But how can this happen?!" I watched this video and nodded along. Speaking professionally this sort of thing can happen ALL THE TIME. If you have a good working relationship with your manufacturers you can work this stuff out, and depending on what you are making it is often easier to get them involved at the design stage of some parts to get their feedback on what you are trying to make and ensure they can achieve your masterpiece. On the other hand you get people that just gob smack me. Had a project. Needed a bunch of weld studs applied to some 3mm sheet so we could fit a COTS part using the OEM's mounting flange. - "We need to mount this part. As you can see we don't have a lot of play so we need to have a fair degree of geo tol applied to these studs. Can you achieve this? - "Oh yes" - "Cause we need this. Or it won't fit. Which would be bad." - "All good. We understand the problem." So we get them back and some of them fit. Our flaw was because we were a bit shoestring on resources our end we didn't do a full inspection of the entire delivery and only spot checked a few before accepting the delivery. Problem was after we were once bitten and called them out on some items we weren't happy with. So I got a story from their engineer where I was told they had to deliver something with 100 riv nuts to a different client and 3 out of the 100 riv nuts hadn't gripped properly... but the others had... cause sometimes riv nuts don't grip. So I am on the phone in utter shock. Sure, not all riv nuts bite, so you allow 3% re-work, add that into your quote and ensure that when you deliver you have 100% pass. Seriously I was in shock. So yeah, these things happen. A lot :(
Hi Ian, fantastic story. What's interesting, it seems that the British Government has a long history of awarding contracts to businesses having no capacity of delivering these. In this case all went OK (well, not necessarily so for the poor injured marine). But in other cases it only shows government's complete negligence in dealing with taxpayers' money. In preparation to Brexit Mrs. May's government (and specifically Transport Secretary Chris Grayling) signed a contract for people and cargo shipping services across the English Channel (there was a risk that there would be a need for more providers as the problems with the Eurotunnel were anticipated) with a company that had no shipping experience, had no ships and had no history of ever delivering this kind of service. Take care and thank you for all your work.
I swear I had heard the AWP(Essentially a more developed version of this gun in .338) in Counter Strike being referred to as the "Green Meanie" before.
It never ceases to amaze me in engineering how bigger established companies always think they know best... Even when they are contracted as a sub contractor... I've seen this first-hand.. the exasperation of AI clearly has made it the company it has become..
“Hey boss it says to use this type of steel for the firing pin” “Yeah I know it says that, but if we use pot metal it saves us a couple pounds each firing pin, let’s go with the pot metal”
here in denmark we had a brand new hospital that was built following the blueprints too closely, because when the hospital was due to open, someone discovered that there were no toilets anywhere in the entire building lol
@@kkwun4969 yes but only after i think 1 and a half year delay to re model the layout to make space for the bathrooms and plumbing and such. the architect was not popular after
Very informative video sir, thanks much. Having spent most of my working life in manufacturing, I can tell you that in my experience this isn't unusual in many, many cases. Specs are changed without telling anyone else by someone who has no idea or sometimes concern for the consequences.
Pylon: "Its not like its a missle."
Also Pylon: *tries its hardest to make the rifles into shoulder-mounted grenades*
A good lesson that being good at one thing doesn't necessarily mean that you are good at a different, related thing.
The ironic thing is while a missile seems more high tech they're subject to far less stress, and generally need far less precision of manufacture than a rifle. (The sensors and electronics being an exception; but I'd assume Pylon isn't manufacturing those)
@@jonathan_60503 This is just straight up incorrect. Control surfaces on missiles need to be to much tighter manufacturing tolerances than rifles.
@UCbIMP6XJ7bLvOdxB7lyV4NQ No, but that's not exactly a hard design objective when the material science for metal alloys is extremely well understood and catering to chamber pressure gradients is an inherently straight-forward design objective (treatment processes and chamber/barrel geometry both achieve the same goal of increasing pressure limits). Aerospace materials are inherently more complicated due to the tighter design parameters they need to fit within (density/mass, moduli etc.). Rifles are mechanically pretty simplistic in function - all the issues outlined in this video were a product of extreme negligence bordering on the absurd.
Pylon: "Its not like its a missle."
Pylon: "But I'm sure we can make it explode anyway".
“-and instead, they cut them at a 45 degree angle”
You *WHAT?*
Delayed blowback bolt action rifle! Worked for the CMMG Banshee
That is not just lacking some specific gun knowledge. That is not giving a single thought about force directions and basic mechanics.
This was my exact reaction. I was really, really hoping I misunderstood, and the angle of the cut was in some other, less catastrophically bad direction.
@@rootbeerpoptart In 7.62 NATO... I can't help thinking that the "delay" would have been notional at best.
@@yorhaunit8s Yes. It clearly is.
The question is: Why did they do it in the first place?
They must have had a reason for it. I just can't think of one.
The way I understand what exactly was done, I would think that it might actually have made machining the bolt heads MORE complex and expensive.
So, why?
"The recipe says 1kg of sugar. I'll just use salt."
this is what this sounds like
They're both small white crystals, what can the difference be ?
Like replacing blood with V8 juice in medicine, what could go wrong? They're both red...
With the added benefit that you can now say it's sugar free! Everyone wins!
More like "the bottle of acetone says to dilute with water, I'll just use hydrogen peroxide"
I think it's a little more like, "1kg of sugar? I'll use 1lb of salt."
As an mechanical engineer, this sounds exactly like how contract manufacturing works, time and time again.
As a gunsmith and part-time grammar troll, I would like to point out ‘an’ only works if the word begins with a vowel, at least most of the time. Say “as an engineer” and “as an mechanical engineer” out loud and you will see what I mean. You’re totally right though.
Yup, same experience🤣
@@soggybiscuits9399 Git yer fukc az outta hur
@@brahtrumpwonbigly7309 😁
@@soggybiscuits9399 nazi
Props to the British military for seeing through Pylon's BS and preventing them from ruining AI and the L96. Very rare, sober decision for an organization.
Intelligent, yes, sober? Maybe
@@asdasd-ty9se you know this is the UK military quartermaster
@@aker1993 I was talking about the decision and the conditions it was made under, not the man/men that made it
Pylon deserved to go bankrupt. Imagine they even tried to push poor guys out of business! Clowns. Could have ruined one of the most iconic precision rifles of all time.
The sad part is that the people making those decisions probably didn’t suffer much from that, just moved on to cause some other manufacturing disaster. The regular Joe’s there who were just following the directions given to them are probably the only ones to have truly lost out of Pylon going bankrupt.
It's called industrial sabotage
They also endangered lives. Actively. And did not course correct for it enough. Like, what the hell dudes?
Typical British government cronyism. I bet one of the Pylon bosses and a high ranking guy from the MOD were buddies at Eton.
@@loganb7059 Indeed. The directors of failed companies just move on to another directorship or senior management position somewhere else, citing "challenging market conditions" as the reason for their failure, while the people on the shop floor have to take any job they can get to make ends meet.
"1/10 of millimeter here and there on a high powered precision rifle can't be that much of a deal :)"
Its funny that .004" was always .1mm but .1mm switches to .0039" when the tenths indicator gets pulled out.
"It's just a stupid gun, how precise does it really need to be? It's not rocket science." - Egotistical Rocket Scientist
🤣 Lars
@@absolutechaos13 .004″ is actually 0.01016 mm.
It pains me every time I see metric system combined with fractions.
Pylon: Well it's not rocket science
Narrator: But it was rocket science
Someone I worked with reported being in a meeting on, IIRC, ASRAAM and watching someone say "Come on, it's not as if it's rocket... oh."
Rocket Science is kind of a misnomer.
It's really rocket engineering. The science may come in on the materials level but it takes competent engineers to make things work. One thing I think that is missing in engineering today is the practice of making engineers work on the shop floor in manufacturing, assembly and servicing areas so that they really have a grasp of just what problems they can create. My last job I found a number of engineering mistakes that caused problems in the service life of machines. These were caused by assembly issues or improper clearances or tolerances. One involved the a problem that would cause a bearing spaced to be crushed because it was possible to be constantly chasing the torque specification because the part holding the bearings in place had too much clearance allowed between the faces. Others involved seals inside an assembly that could be rolled over simply because there was no lead on the part the seal rode on and when assembling there was no way to know. Experience on the shop floor would have solved a lot of these issues.
If it was rocket science pylon wouldn't have been so incompetent, that was literally their thing. Apparently rifle science is more difficult
It's not rocket science, it's bullet science, which is kind of like mini rocket science
@@peteraustin9057 It's more like the elitist older brother of pyrotechnics. Also, rockets explode at the end, whereas bullets explode at the beginning. Clearly this is where Pylon got lost.
Wow, all those “mistakes” do certainly sound life willful negligence
Industrial sabotage... should be liquidated
@@janwitts2688 Pylon went out of business as a result of this fiasco
@@CoconutMigrating Good. If they repeatedly couldn't follow directions they have no business doing business.
@joe loney which is why they destroyed their own auto industry
Because you're not accounting for the enormous creativity of fools?
When I was working as a research technician, when I sent things to the machine shop for manufacturing, our guys would ask things such as "can I makes this piece which you've got as 6.2mm, as a 1/4" instead, as that'll be way quicker?", but the important thing there was that they ASKED, and we discussed how it was going to be made, and what could be changed and what was critical and needed to be done the difficult way.
The problem here is fundamentally a communication one, Pylon assumed they knew better and changed things without asking important questions, and people got hurt because of their negligence.
"3 guys in a shed" is the business equivalent of "2 kids in a trench coat"
45 clowns in a VW bug?
I laughed way to hard at this.
The funniest bit was when the army sent someone to make sure they weren't some guys in a shed so they got access to a workshop and just told the guy everyone else was on lunch.
hah. Brilliant analogy.
Its how all of the best British inventions started.
"Basically just 3 guys in a shed."
You already said they were a British company Ian, no need to repeat yourself.
basically every American computer company was started in a garage or shed, not sure why brits think this is a British thing
@@krebgurfson5732 yep, and in britan it's engineering companies, probably before the USA even existed
@John citizen now i did
@@hansdietrich83 you think there was engineering startups in sheds before 1776? that's pre industrial revolution. what were they making that was "engineering"? in the USA it's engineering companies in sheds aswell, i just said computer companies because so many of them started in sheds. HP, Apple, Microsoft, etc
@@krebgurfson5732 1776 is early in the industrial revolution, so around the time of the first 'engineering sheds'.
What a nightmare. Pylon almost invented CMMG's Radially Delayed Bolt system decades ahead of time. Your description of the board meeting with a rifle and cleaning rod was straight-up jaw-dropping.
That system was already present on the Villar Perosa, the first SMG ever manufactured.
The AI guy was a saint at that point. I'd have just given every one of those board members a loaded gun and told them to fire a test shot.
This sounds deliberate from the get-go. A missile manufacturer understands materials and treatment specs. The fact that they were revealed to have tried to steal the contract is, to my mind, proof that that's what they had in mind when hey first met the guys from AI. "Look at these noobs- let's fleece them."
@@0neDoomedSpaceMarine Excellent point that applies to all the other "mistakes" as well.
@@markfergerson2145 If this happened in Soviet Russian you ran the risk accused of (economic) "wrecking" and sent to the gulag if not worse.... Or accusing the designers of doing the "wrecking" themselves.
@@charlesbaker7703 Well, the fact that Pylon was forced into bankruptcy is kind of a parallel, except the owners and whoever inside the company that made the "mistakes" didn't get a lifetime vacation in Siberia.
I wonder what did happen to them...
@@markfergerson2145 Possibly a golden parachute severance package, but that’s usually the “American way”
@@Abdega This happened in England.
One man inspecting 200 rifles:
*after the 23rd rifle: "I'm in hell."
That sounds like the start of a Mikeburnfire Campfire Story episode.
@@joshuahadams you beat me to it!
I mean, he probably only inspected two before shouting What the bloody hell those clowns were producing
No he made lower new guys do it with him and they told him the same thing then storm the board
He was going to abuse them.
But half his face was missing....
So basically the fix was to actually build it like they told them to ?
Who would've thought, right?
It's a new concempt... but I think it might catch on.
Revolutionary concept: do what your contract says you’re doing, you might only make the expected profit, but if there’s any issues you get paid twice without any risk of being liable as you did exactly what you got paid for…
Funny how that works
@@spookbuster4862 well, apparently it doesn’t…
The part about this story that blew my mind was when they rented a shop and bluffed the MOD into believing they weren't 3 guys in a shed by saying everyone else is out at lunch.
I wonder if Pylon would have done such a half-assed job if their own name had been on the finished product?
SA80 says probably yes.
Also their level incompetence/negligence itself says yes.
General British missile production says yes.
Most likely yes. British industry by that time resembled more a government welfare office than actual industry, so they probably didn't even know how to do it properly.
Yes, and the bosses of the company would still have got a nice payout from it anyway.
Ian McCollum is the most significant firearms historian and commentator working today. His work typifies the spirit of the early internet: impart information generously to others, for free. There is not a trace of the puffed-up self promotion so sadly typical of other firearm “review” sites, which are more often than not more interested in shilling shoddy gear than imparted learned wisdom. Good for you Mr McCollum.
well said. early internet without all the corporations was the best.
@@Gerwulf97 "Internet 2.0" was a BS marketing phrase if there ever was one.
The internet used to be pure before money got involved and entrenched.
As a machinist myself, I absolutely HATE companies that promise the world when they know they can't deliver. Usually it's the salespeople blowing smoke up the customer's ass, and then the shop rats getting chewed out when they can't make the part with existing tools. I saw something similar to this happen close up, and it was embarrassing to be part of the slo-mo train wreck.
I’m a Cnc lathe machinist and I deal with that almost daily. Run an old lathe that’s been crashed dozens of times over the years by different people. Plus, tooling that’s just as beat up. Small town family business, but we make tight tolerance parts for many big customers. It’s a stressful job...
@@austindrumhe4937 "Yeah, absolutely... We can hold +.0005/-0 on that pitch diameter. With no gauge. On a 20 year old Haas with .010 backlash. Yeah, we got this."
And every manufacturing company believes themselves to be following the tightest of ISO specifications for everything they do (and self-certify)... but as often as not, decisions about materials and processes are just made by whichever boss man is loudest and has the most clout, as fast as he wants because he has golf or something to get on with.
@@ibgorton there’s truth in that haha. At my job, it’s mostly a “figure it out” mentality that my bosses have. They almost always take zero accountability for anything that goes wrong despite that, and it’s up to the little guys like myself to throw shit at the wall and make it stick. When it doesn’t, it’s never because the boss man decided to accept a job that we don’t have the right resources to complete... Because of that, a lot of guys at work send parts through even if they are out of spec because they’d rather take the chance of it not being noticed than to admit the part isn’t right because that would guarantee nothing good.
Yeah, when I was working in quality control I often heard too often about sales and the big boss cutting corners with the processes to get parts out in time. We always needed a concession to get our batches out since they were so shite at their job and promised the customers the world.
The poor machinists having to work with terrible materials and fill impossible orders in little to no time, unfortunately it always fell back on our department and the machinists when these orders couldn't be filled in time.
An idea for a book. The role of the shed in human history. That's got to be a book worth reading.
Be the bloke in a shed, live the life of fun and danger
There's actually a book about the role of the outhouse in Swedish history - Det Svenska Dasset, Inte En Skitsak. The Swedish Outhouse, Not A Shitty Thing. Quite funny, written by a former teacher of mine, Kalle Bäck. I'm sure a book on the role of the garden shed in human history would be even better!
Need to own a house with a shed first.
@@Niinsa62 Thanks for that. That is interesting.
When the Anglo-Saxons came to Britain they built houses like they did back home. This included the Grubenhaus which was a small structure partially sunk into the ground. Back in Europe they had used to keep their cattle in in winter. But as British winters are not usually as harsh as those on the continent they started using them for other things instead of cows, such as the weaving frame. The grubenhaus became what would later be called the shed.
Interestingly in the 10th century there was a change in the way weaving was done and it went from being something the wife did to keep the family clothed to something the husband did as a job. I like to think that whoever came up with the change did so in the grubenhaus.
Pretty wild to think that if Pylon engineers hadn't been completely incompetent, AI would probably not exist today, probably absorbed into some other company.
I'd wager at least some of the engineers at Pylon knew what a shitshow this was mounting up to be, but some dude higher up probably just said "cheerio lads, we can make it cheaper and faster to produce, we'll just change those few bits, no one'll ever know"
@@RiddSann "Who needs straight-cut bolts? Bah! Expensive. Here, 45 is much easier. We've got a great casting department, so cast that. And that. And that. I know it calls for this high-strength steel, but c'mon! It's a rifle. It doesn't need all that much strength to punch a primer, right? Use that mild steel leftover from the missile project. Also? We're gonna need to make it metric, and I'm giving you about...4 hours from the start of your shift, so you got about 35 minutes left."
@@n147258noah you wre there wernt you?!
@@Scoobydcs Nah, wasn't born until the next decade. But I've enough experience with stupid management decisions (a lot from my current job...) that make you question the ability of those who make decisions. And unfortunately, you realize exactly how common that is.
Way too many 'leaders' and 'managers' have little knowledge or respect for those who are professionals and experts in their fields.
@@n147258noah i was kidding but thank for the info lol
Ah, manufacturing tomfoolery to cut costs. Where have we heard this before?
Certainly not with the L85! (tho that was to crap out a gun for a scheduled privitisation)
Chernobyl nuclear plant?
That was actually engineering tomfoolery. It was manufactured as it should have been. The idiots just decided to make the first few inches of their control rods have the opposite effect you want from a control rod.
@@jorgedelrey742 Nope, that was operator error. At every level. Running a test the system wasn't designed for. Then running that test when the plant wasn't in the operating conditions that the test was meant to be run under. Then not running the test according to plan. And finally, the operator panicked and hit the SCRAM button when if he'd been napping the test would have (quite remarkably, given the above) worked.
@@ElementalOctopus The first few inches of the control rods were that way for a good reason, to allow both positive and negative control. It was the stupid test they ran (which didn't take into account the design) that ultimately caused the blow up.
Certainly not a very good design, but one that can (and has been everywhere else it's used) be operated safely.
Pylon absolutely deserved to go out of business for their part in this debacle
what makes me sad is that usually, shitheads like Pylon don't get wacked and the innocent engineers do. AI was a happy miracle in my opinion.
Seriously, what a ridiculous series of terrible decisions.
Wow, the Pylon company sounds like it was run by cooks.
"Don't have an ingredient? Use this instead!'
I suspect that it was more hubris than incompetence. Engineers are notorious for this kind of thing, because they are often the smartest person in the room until they're not.
@@captslaq The guys from AI were engineers too...
@@TheBrokenLife As Ian explained, they were OLDER and "more experienced engineers" who did not take lightly to taking instructions from juniors
@@captslaq "You don't want to do it like that...." 'Er, yes we do'.
@@achievementart I heard him... My comment was more about the statement that lumped all engineers into the same category instead of just stating that the old ones, in this case, were clearly bad ones. If all engineers were "notorious for this kind of thing", the gun wouldn't have functioned in the first place.
As an engineer, this is an extremely interesting video. Often in the layers between people/objects (technical term is interfaces), for example communication, things go wrong and this often is the cause of failure of projects. Many people underestimate the importance of well defined and strict adherence to interfaces.
5:10 a great example is the "hyatt regency walkway collapse" where the people building the walkway took it upon themselves to make a seemingly small change to the plans to make it easier to manufacture, leading to a much greater load on a nut which failed, causing the death of 118 people.
Oh dear, is that the one where they shifted to a tension joint rather than a shear one?
The perils of subcontracting. "Okay, you have to make it EXACTLY to spec." "Got it." "I mean exactly what it says on the blueprints." "Understood." Exactly, alright?" "Don't worry about it!"
Once they actually start:
"Hey boss, all this stuff is in imperial." "Well just convert it into metric."
"Hey boss, machining this thing takes forever." "Well just cast it instead."
"Hey boss, we don't have the right steel." "Steel is steel, use whatever we have."
"Hey boss, the guys that hired us are complaining we're not doing it to spec." "What? They think they know better then us? They're three guys in a shed. We make MISSILES."
I think its more along the lines that Pylon was a company that was successful enough for long enough period of time that the engineers/producers got removed/retired from all the decision making process, and every last thing was being decided by committees of business majors and accountants.
Why else would the company not insist at least one of the engineers that designed rifle was not on hand for tooling and production?
Ian I work software QA for a living and use some of these videos to actually teach folks what happens when different departments do not talk to one another. Thank you
The irony, Pylon operated like a 'new kid' who had never made their contracted product before.
more like they tried to sabotage AI to take the contract by themselves.
Christ, these god damn rocket cowboys nearly killed the entire thing.
Well... they DID succeed in turning the bolt into a backwards-firing ROCKET!!!
People who make things that are supposed to explode: "Wait, it's NOT supposed to explode?"
Welcome to the British government industrial complex. See also: Carillon.
Accountants are dangerous people.
I agree ... I am married to one of them hahahahaha
Yes and no.
If the accountant is the one saying "do this cheaper" then they're probably dangerous.
If they're the one saying "if you don't do this cheaper you will go bankrupt" they're good.
Yep. Hey look at this perfectly functioning part. Let's dick with it and see what happens. Oh, it flew off on the highway? Huh. Well let's try again.
cutting corners is always the problem.
It would be interesting to hear what the price difference was/is between the specified firing pin steel and the substitute. The part would still have to be machined, therefore the material cost was the only saving.
Love the classic contractor strategy of just building things wrong and hoping that no one notices
The timeless tale of "dudes messing about in a shed"
They weren't messing about... they were fooling around.
@@calholli they were also guys, not dudes, big difference
Things like this happen far too often in manufacturing.....
And it even happens in house between different departments as well.....
I was working for a robotic company in the late 80's early 90's when I designed a tool to program the positions of the robot that had to place an item with a tolerance within 5/1000 of an inch.....
The drafting department made changes to my design without my knowledge, after I was already overseas.....
So when the tools arrived in Korea and had to be used, they wouldn't hold the required tolerance and scuttled the inspections and acceptance of the systems, all 30 of them at $2million each.
Fortunately I had brought my original prototype with me and was able to program all 30 units with the prototype.....
And with a minimal loss of time......
But it shows how arbitrary changes to the design of a Piece of equipment by an outside person can tank a multi million dollar project.....
There's an old cautionary tale about the F-86 Saber. There were a number of fatal crashes that were ultimately found to be attributed to an assembly error on the wing leading edge slats caused by a case of an individual on the shop floor knowing "better"
Why do you... type like this....
I really don't understand.....
@@zacharybennett3249
What do you want to question....
My typing skills on a phone❓
Or my ideas behind what I type❓🤔❓
The "..." represents a pause....
And it may not be structurally correct, but it's the way I think, the way I talk, and so the way I type.....
So what❓❓❓
Makes you wonder how good the missiles were Pylon built, if they were that cavalier about the rifles for A.I.... hope MOD took a hard look at EVERYTHING they built, after that!
How much of their work was _solely_ their own work? Because this sounds like a subcontractor issue. Their engineers would know the capabilities (and foibles) of their manufacturing process and be able to compensate for and monitor the whole process.
Well to be fair, Pylon's usual products only had to last a single use.
An anti-radiation missile during that time period would be the ALARM missile, which had some pretty unpleasant development issues as well.
Reminds me of that missiles *"Yes, Minister"* bit
"When it does. If it works"
The only missile that fits the bill is ALARM, which was a BAe product, so at best Pylon were a subcontractor. The name makes me wonder if their speciality was actually pylons rather than the missiles themselves.
Like my father said to me:
If you want something done right, you have to do it yourself.
I've heard Napoleon coined that phrase
My grandfather's would always say
"If It Has To Be It Is Up To Me!"
@@jonp.6131 Samuel Goldwyn, the movie producer, coined a similar phrase - "The next time I want some idiot to do something for me, I'll do it myself!"
It doesn't seem that Pylon had serious enough repercussions. If the CEO had been inprisoned for fraud I think it would have sent a message throughout the industry that would probably still be heard today. This is what we need, consequences for your actions, this is what we are lacking in most of the world.
I agree. They’re lucky to have gone bankrupt, because I think they were liable to go to prison for negligence and endangerment.
Corporate/white collar crime not getting addressed is so norm sadly.
That’s the thing i love about first half or rather three quarters of USSR. Wasting government (people money, think of it as tax payers dollars) money on some retarded mistakes or purposefully sabotaging some research group/engineer/scientist for your gain, you are going to answer to the law, no matter how high ranking or genius you are. This things actually happened quite a lot, including arms development, where “intellectuals” who as we all know were repressed by evil soviets because they are so smart, we’re writing complaints and snitching on one another hindering development, for sole reason to be the one who is credited with research, eliminating competition and heading the institute themselves. (I was loosely describing 3rd research institute aka rocket development institute)
I got a copy of it several weeks ago. Have only thumbed through it. Need to find the time to sit down and read it.
I hope that Royal Marine who suffered the out of battery detonation got to sue Pylon Engineering for a decent chunk of money
I *really* need to save up for that book!
It's predecessor by the same author is a quality read - it is worth the price.
@@Simon_Nonymous I have them both & they are expensive but quality like you said. Steve Houghton was in my regiment, the Royal Green Jackets.
and what a Mighty Fine Regiment! 😊👍🏻
Reminds me of the Corvette, now a beloved product in the US and to the car world as a whole as a tremendously performing vehicle for the money, battling supercars every year, yet it had a very rocky beginning and just barely, ever so slightly came out alive
whenever I hear "just barely, slightly came out alive", I think of that scene from its always sunny where Frank clambers out of the couch
Is there a video or documentary about it?
Yeah, a little family owned fiberglass company saved it, and still makes the bodies for it. They do cool stuff, and they're cool people.
It was also the introduction of the Small Block V-8 that had a great deal to do with it. But sometimes I wonder what would have happened if GM had pursued a DOHC 6
@@redgreen6436 Check the RegularCars channel for their documentaries on Corvette history.👍
His last statement in the video is the reason why I won't buy early production sig products anymore.
Sig is a GREAT example, but I won't buy ANYTHING that is brand new. If I am a beta tester, It d*mn well better be a free beta.
early production.. not so much... But once they get the bugs out, Sig's are pretty great.
Sig’s the easiest manufacturer to recall for having early production problems, but at this point every time a new firearm comes out I just put a two year timer on it so I can see whether they have mechanical issues, recalls, or if the manufacturer goes under because of potential problems that arise from their new product.
I was told by a pilot friend to NEVER fly the A-model of anything
That's why you also don't buy the first year of any vehicle too
Honestly, if a rifle gave pylon that much trouble, i shudder to think what the QC on their missiles were.
REMINDS me of the six day war Egypts war minister send telegram to soviets. STOP SENDING SURFACE TO AIR MISSILES, START SENDING SURFACE TO PLANE MISSILES
"these things cost $1 million each! And we have so few, we can't possibly TEST them! Also there's no way we can keep such tests secret, if we test them and the tests show they don't work then the Russians may find out and exploit our weakness or worse... the press might find out and embarrass us! We frankly have no choice but to just hope that they work when we need them."
That was almost unbelievable. I had never heard of this disgraceful situation, so well done Ian for another informative presentation.
I actually cheered when he said that Pylon went out of business
"It's a rifle. How good does it have to be? It's not a missile."
No, it requires much tighter tolerances than a missile.
Thought the same. Missiles are actively guided into the target, while bullets basically do their own thing as soon as they leave the barrel.
And why do they call them missiles anyway? 'Cuz the miss. If they didn't, they'd be called hittles.
@@kellymouton7242 the Hittites knew something we don't
@@bradenculver7457 :D
@@kellymouton7242 "Rapier, it's a hittile, not a missile" Actual advertising slogan from the period.
Machinist here converting metric to imperial and back is pretty common. Though accurate translations are crucial and ive never heard a machinist be able to just say fuck it and change shit
The rule I was always taught was "if you make it to print, you cannot be wrong." Now if the print is wrong, that's a different story
@@kellymouton7242
This is the way.
British Engineering is World Class, it's British Manufacturing that's terrible.
Hence the overall Bavarian/German excellence
Too true" that'll do" comes to mind!
Part of good design is taking limited manufacturing capabilities into account.
Also, I've seen LOTS of bad engineering design in British motorcycles. Luckily I haven't had to deal with much other British engineering.
@@beamerw.3311 LOL, yup just think Trident, worst bike ever! And I love limey bikes
@@chrisjack7857 yeah, I kinda blew up about the McLaren cars.
As a structural engineer I can confirm that your description of plans being ignored by construction contractors is indeed frequently correct.
As always fascinating story Ian.
Used to use this rifle all the time and I never knew of any of these previous problems. Thanks a lot.
Prior to CNC machining, lathes basically had a gear box that you set to cut threads. If your machine was geared for metric, then it couldn't cut inch threads. That would explain the need for a conversion.. though not why that conversion was so half-assed.
Also, i feel like Imperal to Metric wouldnt be that big of a deal today... just load up the cad file and convert the measurements... in the mid 80s... all that would have to be done by hand and clearly Pylon didnt do that good a job.
Still have to be careful now. Imagine putting metric dimensions into a machine with imperial parameters, 20mm suddenly becomes 20" and you get a mighty bang.
Converting something? Double check, triple check and then check again just incase.
Yeah, you can make metric threads on an inch lathe or vice versa but not quickly. Have to leave it in gear and reverse it back for the next cut, instead of disengaging the halfnut at speed and just cranking the saddle back to the start of the cut.
Source: I live in metricland but my lathe has an inch leadscrew.
By the mid 80's Lathes were starting to be computer controlled. I remember seeing pictures of some being controlled with computers as basic as the Commodore 64 which (considering this was a computer with a 1Mhz CPU and 64kb of total RAM) managed to stay relevant for a very long time. Even computers that basic were more than capable of doing imperial to metric conversions and lathes could also be converted between imperial and metric, granted that was not cheap or easy to do but something that should not be hesitated over for a major order like this.
@@jameslewis2635 Now I think on it,the rule of thumb back then was 3×50 .
That is,$50,000 for the machine new,$50,000 for the conversion to CNC ,and $50,000 for the software to run it. Not including the conversion time (training time) for the operator,who if a small shop ,is God help him,the programmer.
About two weeks from deciding on new item till the first new item successfully came off the machine.
There were a lot of unhappy people those years. I remember that quite well.
Wrecked machinery,amorphous blobs of metal until glitches were sorted,experienced machinists finding new occupations,and so forth.
You brought the topic up in a video not long ago, but this right here is a shining example of why production engineering/manufacture engineering is so important. You have to figure out how to actually make things, but the people figuring out those changes really need to have a proper understanding of how and why the device works in order to make changes that make sense.
2 former pylon employees dislike this video🤣
Now 71 ex-employees LOL
This would honestly make a great movie
"Men in blue overalls built this country .. men in suits destroyed it" (Fred Dibnah)
Fred is a proper legend
Their Portsmouth location is sweet.
Loved this one Ian
You are truly a master of your craft
Didn't know any of this, thanks for the story time Ian, really appreciate it to start the morning
Your profile picture..... 🔥
More of a S.V.E.R. man, myself.
Thank you for including the information about the source material, that sounds like one hell of an interesting story
I used to drive past the old Pylon Industries building every single day on the day to work. I had no idea at all!
Where were they? I was working in Rochester for GEC at the time and don't recall the name ever cropping up as a local competitor. Googling I've turned up a Pylon Industries at Dartford, but that operated 1990-96, so not the same company, though I suppose someone may have tried to salvage part of it.
@@davidgillon2762 I understood Crayford on the road between Crayford and Erith. We've probably seen the same address. Maybe I'm barking up the wrong tree?
This is why a first article inspection is a must when going to any outside shop.
Woah I was literally just re-watching your series on this! 0_0
I wish you did more vids like this one. I drive a lot for work, and I can’t really look at the screen. So when it’s mostly anecdotal as opposed to visual inspections of firearms, I get super excited because I’d prefer to listen to you tell me about all types of armament all day long.
Some of this reminds me about the Canadian ross mkIII rifle the difference being that AI foundout fast enough to fix the problems
Fascinating Ian, I was unaware of the manufacturing woes of the L96, really interesting youtube video 😀
Man, and I thought the 7-round stoppage of the Garand was the worst. Pylon could at least have discussed its changes to the designers.
Ian missed the opportunity to point to the book cover's nice drawing of the protruding firing pin.
I would've "loaded" a random rifle from the run, and handed it to the person responsible for the revised methods. Then told them to demonstrate their faith in the quality of what they had done.
I'd really like to know if anyone would have actually believed in their choices enough to fire the thing. My guess is yes.
@@eljefeamericano4308 exactly, and if they did actually attempt to fire it, I would pull the contract from them
Sounds like it might have blown up before you got to hand it to them.
@@Motorman2112 I would've never put live rounds in a rifle with those flaws, only made them believe I had.
Reminds me of a joke about building planes by apprentices: a bunch of professions have a team of apprentices build a plane and for its maiden flight, the masters are the passengers, long story short: only the IT master actually boards and does so without fear, upon being questioned, he responds: „my guys can’t make it move anyways, so why be afraid of it crashing…“
I just love "Story Time With Ian"!
Steve Houghton’s book is spectacular. Highly recommended!
Thank you ☺️
I have both of the books, excellent reference sources, thoroughly researched. The author was in my regiment, the Royal Green Jackets.
@@jasonwebb7574 Likewise, Jason. Steve is a great guy and have always enjoyed my interactions with him.
@@eplane Scarily he knew both the RSM when I joined the Bn & the one who succeeded him...
@@jasonwebb7574 Just for clarity I didn’t serve with the Green Jackets, just I have both books. I have had many interactions with RSMs and they’re always scary, all those years of command experience. They had no time for idiots, but I always listened to what they had to say, always the best policy. I reckon Steve would be a good guy to have a beer with and hear some solid soldiering stories.
I work as a mechanical engineer with a bunch of international suppliers - i thought i had it bad, but this puts it all into perspective
I can imagine a gun Gordon Ramsay going around Pylon and yelling at everyone for messing up the guns.
I know nothing about guns but god damn I love hearing this guy talk about them
No gun or metallurgy knowledge.
Let's make a rifle.
Proceeds to accidentally make one of the greatest weapons of its class.
They didn't need any knowledge--- they were given the exact instructions.
@@calholli and still managed to cock it up so bad they went bust
Kind of funny story with the whole metallurgy thing.
Before they actually made the PM, they used to build replica colt revolvers based on reference pictures. Apparently, these revolvers were very faithful replicas and this is what caused someone to suggest to the two Daves to build their own competition rifles. Also, they were both competition shooters themselves.
Why didn't the British government award the contract to Sterling? It would've made much more sense as Sterling had long experience of producing firearms .
Note to self for once I’ve completed my design for the best rifle in the world ever (including some completely left field and possibly French design details to keep Ian happy)
Make sure to have enormous penalty clauses for any subcontractor who fails to follow the signed blueprints as provided.
Gotcha 👍
Might have had a dodgy start... but man do I want one! 👍
Ian has done previous videos on the L96A1 and its successors.
Apparently when the L96A1 became end of life they were rounded up, cut into pieces and dumped in the North Sea. Happy hunting.
@@aetch77 so all I need is a diving suit and a welder and I'm all good right? 😂😂😂
You have one of the best shows here on the tube, thank you for your work.
Why on earth didn't the MOD pick a gun manufacturer to manufacture a gun? Madness.
And they clearly didn't learn their lesson, if the L85A1 is any indication
Desk jockeys not knowing to check deeper - pylon was a missile maker, a weapons manufacturer. Guns are weapons. Ergo...
Well guide lamp didn't manufacture firearms, or singer etc... a whole bunch of companies had no firearm (or tank, artillery) experience prior to being pressed into production for WWII. Key differences being they actually could produce quality goods to spec and they were overseen by people with weight and authority behind them.
@@bengrogan9710 Something similar happened to the Stryker MGS (Mobile Gun System), originally designed to essentially be a mobile field-cannon with a 105mm gun and had such a gun designed specifically for it.
Some bean-counter somewhere figured, "Hey, we have all these spare 105mm guns lying around from upgrading all our M1 tanks to M1A1s with 120mm guns, let's just use those." The M1 guns were high-pressure guns designed for something over 60 tons, the original MGS gun was a low-pressure gun designed for something under 20 tons. The current MGS can't traverse and fire it's gun more than 45-degrees or it'll knock the vehicle on it's side and they had to add a muzzle-brake because without it if you fire the gun straight ahead the muzzle blast will crush the driver's compartment.
@SaeedTheDoomer RSAF Enfield, whose prior experience were just making cheap af Stens iirc
I live a short walk from that shed.
I hope to own one one day.
It's a long way to the nearest long range though.
Although, crucially, it's also far _too_ long a way to the nearest long range.
Last time I was this early, the Brown Bess was in vogue
I know a great many people have watched this video and gone "But how can this happen?!"
I watched this video and nodded along. Speaking professionally this sort of thing can happen ALL THE TIME.
If you have a good working relationship with your manufacturers you can work this stuff out, and depending on what you are making it is often easier to get them involved at the design stage of some parts to get their feedback on what you are trying to make and ensure they can achieve your masterpiece.
On the other hand you get people that just gob smack me. Had a project. Needed a bunch of weld studs applied to some 3mm sheet so we could fit a COTS part using the OEM's mounting flange.
- "We need to mount this part. As you can see we don't have a lot of play so we need to have a fair degree of geo tol applied to these studs. Can you achieve this?
- "Oh yes"
- "Cause we need this. Or it won't fit. Which would be bad."
- "All good. We understand the problem."
So we get them back and some of them fit. Our flaw was because we were a bit shoestring on resources our end we didn't do a full inspection of the entire delivery and only spot checked a few before accepting the delivery.
Problem was after we were once bitten and called them out on some items we weren't happy with. So I got a story from their engineer where I was told they had to deliver something with 100 riv nuts to a different client and 3 out of the 100 riv nuts hadn't gripped properly... but the others had... cause sometimes riv nuts don't grip.
So I am on the phone in utter shock. Sure, not all riv nuts bite, so you allow 3% re-work, add that into your quote and ensure that when you deliver you have 100% pass. Seriously I was in shock.
So yeah, these things happen.
A lot :(
*Pylon:* We manufacture missiles for the glory of the British Empire.
*Also Pylon:* manmufamcturinmg
Ian is an American treasure 💯 So grateful we have him and his knowledge
Hi Ian, fantastic story. What's interesting, it seems that the British Government has a long history of awarding contracts to businesses having no capacity of delivering these. In this case all went OK (well, not necessarily so for the poor injured marine). But in other cases it only shows government's complete negligence in dealing with taxpayers' money.
In preparation to Brexit Mrs. May's government (and specifically Transport Secretary Chris Grayling) signed a contract for people and cargo shipping services across the English Channel (there was a risk that there would be a need for more providers as the problems with the Eurotunnel were anticipated) with a company that had no shipping experience, had no ships and had no history of ever delivering this kind of service.
Take care and thank you for all your work.
Fantastic video thanks for sharing
I swear I had heard the AWP(Essentially a more developed version of this gun in .338) in Counter Strike being referred to as the "Green Meanie" before.
Pretty sure the AWP (Arctic Warfare Police) is in .308
The AWP in CS is actually an L96. And AWPs are chambered in .308
Its a beatiful rifle in bf4 too,good cycling rate,high damage and great açcuracy :)
"Oh for fucks sake, we're ACCURACY International, you can't just make our rifles so sloppily"
Thanks Ian...Always a pleasure to watch..
Contract Manufacturing: A short story
Manufacturer: We'll make some changes, it will be fine.
Narrator: *It wouldn't be fine*
If there isn’t one already this would make an awesome movie.
It never ceases to amaze me in engineering how bigger established companies always think they know best... Even when they are contracted as a sub contractor... I've seen this first-hand.. the exasperation of AI clearly has made it the company it has become..
Thanks
“Hey boss it says to use this type of steel for the firing pin”
“Yeah I know it says that, but if we use pot metal it saves us a couple pounds each firing pin, let’s go with the pot metal”
Thank you , Ian .
Your choice of shirts is fantastic. I truly like it.
Very interesting video. I used the A1 in early-mid 90s. I loved it. Thank you!
here in denmark we had a brand new hospital that was built following the blueprints too closely, because when the hospital was due to open, someone discovered that there were no toilets anywhere in the entire building lol
uh oh how did they solve the problem
@@kkwun4969 yes but only after i think 1 and a half year delay to re model the layout to make space for the bathrooms and plumbing and such. the architect was not popular after
Very informative video sir, thanks much. Having spent most of my working life in manufacturing, I can tell you that in my experience this isn't unusual in many, many cases. Specs are changed without telling anyone else by someone who has no idea or sometimes concern for the consequences.
First day in physics 101: how to convert metric to imperial
How does a missile manufacturing company miss that?
I live 2 mins down the road from that shed where it all began!