in the late 70s to early 80s HK had been developing a automatic rifle for the german army. this rifle used Caseless ammunition (ie the powder provides the seal and is the charge) a company has also made a 22 sporter rifle that uses caseless ammo. now to my question, why dosnt the military or LE attempt to make a Sniper Rifle that uses lets say a 308 caseless.
Probably for quite a few reasons, the first of which would be cost.
The current method works very well, why change it if it aint broke?
Edit: As you noted before, reasearch started in the 70's. And it is not even a proven concept yet, no one has seen it put into real action. Do not think the U.S. Governemtn hasn't tried the weapon out yet, they have.
Have you seen all of the complicated moving parts it has? Hardly Joe proof.
The G11 didn't have any more moving parts. It actually had somewhat fewer, since you didn't need to eject any casings.
The real problem with caseless ammo is that it's extremely hard to get an even burn of the propellant. And it was especially bad if the propellant got dented or something.
The G11 didn't have to eject the casings, so it was capable of firing said 2000 rpm in 3 round mode. And the G11 was a working concept. A very GOOD working concept. The only reason it was never implemented was because the Cold War pretty well ended, resulting in massive military budget cuts, so instead of buying an entirely new system and ammo, they decided to wait for later.
In 1998 I believe they tried again, with candidates like the Steyr ACR. Then the US military decided to go with the OICW, but that fell out of favor due to A) Weight , B) Maintenence (They claimed the weapon was 100% sealed. According to some people i've talked to, they still managed to get dirt into it and screw it up), and C) Ammo cost for the grenade rounds (6 dollars a pop). Of course they still plan to use it is a grenadier weapon, but not as a general infantry weapon. And, of course, the XM8 is undergoing trials now.
And the aforementioned .22 caliber sporting rifle wasn't HK but made by an Austrian company called Voehre (spelling?) which was a commercial flop due to cost, and not all that many benefits in a bolt-action rifle.
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