The Program Executive Office for Ammunition’s Enhanced Performance Round program shaved off greater than $20 million dollars in a price engineering project aimed toward renovating the bullet production lines and improving the program’s purchasing strategies.
The M855A1 Enhanced Performance Round, or EPR, is the latest member of the Army’s small-caliber family of munitions fired from the 5.56mm family of weapons. It’s replacing the M855 cartridge.
The M855A1 EPR’s new bullet design provides Soldiers with better hard-target penetration and more consistent soft-target performance at increased distances. Additionally, as it is lead-free, the M855A1 allows training exercises to occur on ranges where lead projectiles aren’t any longer permitted.
The M855A1 5.56mm EPR ball cartridge costs had been reduced by incorporating low-cost component manufacturing methods, improving production efficiency to the high speed SCAMP (Small Caliber Ammunition Modernization Program) cartridge production line, and embellishing purchasing strategies and competitive buying.
Many of the modifications began in fiscal year 2011 and continued until all improvements were realized inside the fiscal year 2013 contracts. The changes reduced cost while maintaining the specified performance and quality of the cartridge.
The savings will further support the M855A1 program.
MANUFACTURING
Manufacturing improvements helped reduce the round’s cost. Since the bullet assembly production equipment was aging, several units were rehabilitated to revive the equipment back to close original capability. These renovations improved the producing quality.
The M855A1 has a reverse drawn jacket with an exposed penetrator projectile that is different than some other projectile in mass production at Lake City Army Ammunition Plant.
This projectile configuration, with complex and tight tolerances, required significant engineering work by engineers on the Armament Research, Development and Engineering Center at Picatinny Arsenal, and Alliant Techsystems contractors at Lake City, Mo., to facilitate large scale manufacturing.
Another key within the low-cost manufacturing of the bullet was the implementation of the M855A1 projectile onto the SCAMP line, which will assemble projectiles at a high rate. This included the refinement of the tooling package and changes to the in-process handling. Currently, the SCAMP process now manufactures the identical projectile because the bullet assembly presses with a similar performance capability.
In the fiscal year 2013 PEO Ammunition’s assigned VE goal was $10 million. This project helped PEO Ammunition exceed its organization goal with a complete savings of $43.599 million.
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