The Heavy Anti-Materiel Modifiable Enhanced Rifle, or HAMMER, is a heavy Sniper Rifle developed by Valkryie Industries.
Hammer Sniper Rifle, caliber .50 BMG with EATS scope
History
The HAMMER was build to compete with similar sniper rifles, such as the RM-160 or the I36 Marksman Rifle, the HAMMER was not based on any sporting rifle or such, but was developed from the ground up as a High-Presicion Sniper Rifle. Development began only 2 months after the first desing was drawn, and the final model was completed excatly after 1 year, in july 2012.
Also, Raplh Kruse, the founder of Valkryie Industries, wanted to prove with the HAMMER that the statement " Only Bolt-Action Rifle are true and accurate sniper rifles" was wrong and the HAMMER exceeded all expectations when he first introduced it at the Tulsa arms show.
The standard scope of the HAMMER, the EATS, short for Enhanced Automatic Targeting System, was developed at the same time as the HAMMER and is, based on the NRA's review, a scope in a class of its own.
To test its maximum effective range, a specially designed HAMMER in .50 BMG was used with the brand-new military issue Cartrige, Caliber .50, M1024 (New experimental military round only available for snipers using .50 BMG rifles, variation of the Hornady .50 BMG Match A-Max 750 grain), while using a specially designed MILSPEC cold-hammer forged, chrome-lined barrel, achieved a Sub-MOA of 0.3 at 5000m out on the White Sands Missile Range, with special allowance from the US Goverment.
Late 2012 Valkyrie Industries celebrated their 10'000th HAMMER rifle sold on the civilian market. In Febuary 2013 the HAMMER rifle was updated to a newer version that featured a titanium alloy reciever, which reduced the weight of the rifle by 2 kg.
Specifications and features
- Firing Modes: Safe and Semi
- Chambering/Calibre: 7.62mm NATO (Also accepts .308 Winchster), .300 Win Mag, .338 Lapua Magnum and .50 BMG.
- Magazines: Specific Magazines for each calibre, factory standard is for each calibre 10 rounds.
- Barrel Length: 508mm
- Overall Length: 1054mm/1.054m
- Weight: 18kg when chambered in .50 BMG and fully loaded with a 10 round magazine.
- Whole body made out of titanium and carbon fibre to reduce weight
- Can be dismanteled in under 2 minutes for ease of transport
- All Calibres except .50 BMG have a free floating barrel, the .50 BMG HAMMER has a recoiling barrel.
- Comes by default with a standard EATS scope, but is removable.
- Ejects casings down behind the magazine, allowing for ambidextrous use.
- Built in Bipod, comes with pre-installed mountings for tripods.
- Version without EATS available for worldwide civilian use (All calibres except .50 BMG)
- Accuracy: Sub-MOA for all calibres (with standard rounds) up to 800m, longest (standard manufacterer ammo) Sub-MOA is the HAMMER in .338 lapua, which is true up to 1.4 km.
Firing System
The HAMMER fires from a closed bolt which means that when the trigger is pulled, the bolt is already foward and around the round when the firing pin hits the round. The main advantages are that the weapon is more accurate and silent compared to open bolts, but can overheat more quickly during prolonged firing because the closed bolt traps heat.
Enhanced Automatic Targeting System (EATS)
The EATS is the standard scope of the HAMMER, but is not "standard" by any means.
The Enhanced Automatic Targeting Sytem, or EATS with its scope view, showing the windage and elevation the HAMMER user has to point the crosshairs in order to hit the target.
With most scopes, the user will have to gauge the distance by himself, but with EATS, not again. The patented WETS (Windage-Elevation Target Settings) function of the EATS will almost ensure that your round will hit the target. When activating EATS, it will fire a infrared beam at the designator point inside the crosshairs. The beam will bounce back, thereby determening the targets distance to the user. In addition it uses 4 gryroscopes, 2 gps beacons and 1 minature directional radar to find the neccessary scope elevetion and windage to hit the target so it can perform a lethal kill or a non-lethal decapacitaion hit. (Adjustable by button). This process takes 4 seconds maximum to complete and then EATS will then direct you with on-scope arrows where to point the weapon to hit the target spot on.
WETS uses the gps beacons to access local weather information, and with the help of a built-in windprobe, EATS also adjusts the direction arrows to the current wind and weather.
EATS is also capable of ajusting the zoom from 1x magnifiaction to 20x mag via a scroll button and viewing in Infrared, X-Ray and Night Vision. EATS can by fully submerged for 48 hours and will be still fully operational. In case of an EMP detonation, the EATS circuitry will automatically register the blast and go into "Safe Mode" in which all circuitry is competley shut down and the battery source cut off. One has to manually open the EATS protective casing to restart and activate EATS by hand. When turned off, EATS functions as a normal magnified scope, the magnification, windage and elevation adjustable by 5 knobs while the scope view only shows crosshairs, windage/elevation markings and the target center dot.
Also, EATS can be used for all follwing chamberings: 5.56mm NATO, 7.62mm NATO, .300 Win Mag, .338 Lapua Mag, .375 and .408 CheyTac and lastly .50 BMG. EATS can store up to 4 different caliber ballistics and these can be electronically swapped by plugging EATS into a USB connection socket.
Worldwide miliatries state that the soldiers equipped with EATS like it so much that they started to not use their standard means to look at situations, e.g. a binocular or overhead satelite image, but instead remove the EATS off its picaninny rail and use it as a sperate telescope, since all batteries and equipment is built-into EATS by default.
But all this comes at a price. While included in the HAMMER package, a seperate EATS sytem costs approx. 4000 US dollars.
Reception
The HAMMER was prasied by the whole world as an incredibly lethal sniper rifle (partly due to the EATS). SAS, Delta Force, GSG-9 and IDF are immediatly switching to the HAMMER Platform. The US Marines Corps, the Royal Anglians and the US Rangers have decided to refit all sniper rifles in their service with the EATS scope. Spetznas has also expressed an avid interest in the HAMMER and EATS, but the US Army stated that it will only buy the HAMMER if the HAMMER was banned for sale to Russian and East bloc militaries. However, is is stated that black market dealers are making millions by selling blueprints to the East bloc militaries.