Israeli Weapon Industries, well-known for their military-grade ACE, Tavor and X-series rifles and bullpups, is announcing a new AR-type rifle called the ARAD. Like many of their products, IWI is producing the ARAD for military and police use, but down the line we could see a commercial variant.
In its launch configuration, the ARAD is a compact assault rifle chambered for 5.56 NATO with a short hammer-forged, chrome-lined 11.5-inch barrel. It is gas-operated, using a short-stroke piston system instead of the standard direct impingement system on the bulk of AR-based rifles and machine guns.
The gas system has two operating modes for suppressed and unsuppressed fire and uses a regulator to ensure reliable operation under a wide range of conditions.
The ARAD is a very up-to-date design with a free-floating modular handguard, fully ambidextrous controls, a light and compact stock, and a slightly angled pistol grip. The handguard has a 12-o’clock full-length Picatinny rail and 3-, 6- and 9-o’clock M-Lok slots. The ARAD has four quick-detach sling points, two on both sides of the handguard and two on the stock.
The upper rail is monolithic and a single extension of the upper receiver. This allows users the option of mounting optics directly to the top rail without having to worry about losing zero.
Under the handguard the ARAD uses a quick-change barrel system that IWI says takes only seconds to swap. This not only makes it possible to change barrel lengths easily it also means that the ARAD can quickly swap calibers as well.
This opens up the possibility of using other popular intermediate cartridges like 300 AAC Blackout and even pistol calibers like 9mm Luger with just a few component changes. While this makes the ARAD very flexible for different roles and missions, it also makes it somewhat future-proof for users.
See Also: IWI Masada 9mm On Sale In-Store and Online
The ARAD, with its short barrel and minimalist stock, weighs just 6.3 pounds unloaded. It’s an interesting firearm all-around, with a lot of features common to higher-end consumer and competition rifles but a design built for hard use.
Unfortunately, for now, the ARAD isn’t headed to the U.S. market, but IWI routinely develops commercial versions of their military guns for export and foreign production.
If their other recent products are any indication, we could see ARAD in the U.S. and other markets in the near future.
If they would have changed out the AR for MSR when it came to civilian market it would have not have been as bitter in their mouth to say! The only machine gun out on civilian market is a class 3 item, but yet the semi-auto is getting all the fodder.
Still waiting on a 308 Tavor. I guess they must have dropped that idea.
You mean the Tavor 7, which is literally on sale right now?
Exactly. It has been on sale for over a month.
Assault rifle?????? What is an assault rifle?
A rifle chambered in an intermediate cartridge capable of firing in semiautomatic and fully automatic using a detachable box magazine. The term was coined by the adoption of the STG-44, or the Sturmgewehr. Meaning storm rifle, or assault rifle, used to refer the German blitzkrieg tactic of overwhelming the enemy with enormous firepower.