Hwasŏng H35

The Hwasŏng H35 is a prototype assault rifle family designed in Menghe as a prospective replacement for the JS-103. As of October 2019, the it has not been officially adopted by the Menghean Army, and as such it has not received a formal Type designation, though Hwasŏng plans to market it internationally under its H35 designation and some Menghean special forces soldiers have been spotted with H35 rifles.

Typical of earlier Hwasŏng designs like the JS-103 and JS-67, the H35 is designed to achieve high durability and reliability with a low production cost, while still meeting the MoND's quality and performance requirements. Compared to the JS-103, the H35's new features include fully ambidextrous controls, a non-reciprocating charging handle, a MARS Rail covering the entire upper receiver, and greater modularity.

Development

While the JS-103 earned a favorable reputation in the Menghean Army, it came with a number of shortcomings that limited its future growth potential. The weapon's construction prohibited the mounting of MARS rails on the upper receiver, which was not firmly attached to the barrel forward or behind the rear iron sight and could lose zero easily. The JS-103 was also uncomfortable to shoot left-handed, and while Menghean Army doctrine dictated that all recruits train in right-handed shooting, the inability to switch to left-side handling when shooting from cover was a situational liability.

In 2016, after reviewing combat reports filed after the Innominadan Crisis, the Menghean Ministry of National Defense issued a design requirement for a new assault rifle with the following characteristics:

• The upper receiver must be firmly mounted to the barrel, allowing a Type 111 rail (MARS rail) to be mounted along its full length.
• The safety, magazine release, and charging handle must be fully ambidextrous.
• The cartridge ejection system must allow for ambidextrous operation.
• The handguard (or lower handguard) must be replaceable so as to allow the mounting of a grenade launcher module or other handguard options.
• The barrel must be fixed to the trunnion so as to allow the installation of a different barrel with minimal tools.
• The standard buttstock must be replaceable so as to allow the mounting of different standard buttstocks.
• The weapon must be chambered in 5.7×40mm (5.7mm Quinn)
• The weapon must be compatible with standard-issue magazines for the JS-103; new magazines may be introduced but they must be reverse-compatible.

Beyond these requirements, the MoND stated that submissions "will be judged according to ergonomics, weight, accuracy, durability, and simplicity of manufacture."

Hwasŏng Arsenal 55, one of Menghe's leading small arms designers and the makers of the original JS-103, responded by beginning work on a competitor to meet the new MoND requirements. Unlike the Insŏng New Arsenal, which sought to create a dedicated special forces weapon, Hwasŏng still envisioned its submission as a "conscript's rifle:" simple enough for a fresh recruit to master, rugged enough to stand up to abuse in the field, and cheap enough to mass-produce in enormous numbers. At the same time, the designers were aware that the Deep Mission Troops, Marine Infantry, Airborne Forces, and Kimsŏng divisions would receive first priority in the production and delivery of a new weapon, and that their weapon would have to meet professional soldiers' standards.

Design

Operation

Unlike virtually all previous Hwasŏng designs, which used a long-stroke gas piston, the H35 relies on a short stroke system. This results in reduced felt recoil and muzzle climb, at the cost of increased complexity, though trials of the weapon are still in progress. It fires from a closed rotating bolt and is selective fire, with semi-automatic and fully automatic settings on the base variant. Modified trigger groups with a 3-round burst mode are also available.

The charging handle on the weapon is located over the handguard, and is non-reciprocating. By default it is mounted on the left side angled upward, but the user can easily switch its side and angle to suit their dominant hand or drill preferences. The charging handle's location, combined with its non-reciprocating nature, allows the weapon to be operated ambidextrously, and reduces the risk that the charging handle will strike the user's hand or body.

The ejection port is located on the right side of the upper receiver. It is not reversible to the left side, but it does have a large protruding plate directly at its rear. This ensures that ejected cartridges fly forward or sideways. Combined with the forward location of the ejection port, this makes the weapon safe to handle left-handed. Relocation of the charging handle also means that there is no need for a charging handle travel slot behind the ejection port, through which dirt and mud could enter the rear of the action.

In inheriting the JS-103's magazines, the H35 also inherits its simple bolt hold open system: once the magazine is empty and the follower has risen to its upper limit, the advancing bolt carrier strikes the flat rear of the follower, providing the user with a visual and tactile indicator that the weapon is empty. The bolt then falls forward once the empty magazine is removed, requiring the user to pull and release the charging handle once a new magazine is inserted.

Construction

In another departure from the JS-103, the H35 mounts the barrel to the upper receiver, which extends in a single piece all the way from the front of the handguard to the start of the buttstock. This allows for the mounting of a stable MARS rail on a surface with a direct connection to the barrel, reducing the risk that optics will lose zero during disassembly and reassembly. On the first few prototypes, the upper receivers are made from stamped steel, but Hwasŏng has also produced weapons with extruded aluminium upper receivers as a weight-saving measure.

The receiver lower section is held to the upper receiver by two captive pins, for easy disassembly. This section contains the pistol grip, fire selector, trigger group, and magazine release. In a welcome improvement over the JS-103, the fire selector is ambidextrous, and comfortably further forward. It is also slightly recessed into a dip in the lower receiver surface, to prevent the lever of the fire selector from striking the top of the user's raised index finger. The lower receiver can be replaced to suit the user's needs, for example by adding a 3-round-burst trigger group or a different magazine well. Hwasŏng has floated the idea of offering all-polymer lower sections for export weapons, though all prototypes produced thus far have used stamped or extruded lowers with a polymer pistol grip.

The lower handguard is mounted to the upper handguard by means of a rear captive pin and dovetail slots along the upper edges. Both polymer and aluminium options are available, though the latter is more common. The standard carbine/rifle lower handguard has MASS slots along the sides and bottom, to allow the mounting of laser sights, flashlights, foregrips, bipods, and MARS rail adapter segments.

The buttstock attaches as a single unit to the combined upper and lower receiver, and a variety of buttstock options are available. The standard-issue type is made from solid polymer and is adjustable for length of pull, though not for cheek height. It can be folded to the right when not in use, and it locks into place through contact with the cartridge ejector peg.

Barrels

The barrel of the Hwasŏng H35 is free-floating: it connects at the breech to a trunnion bolted to the upper receiver, but it has no other connections to the handguard or upper receiver. This ensures that the barrel's precise alignment is not affected when heavy attachments are mounted to the handguard or when a bipod is used.

One interesting feature of the H35 is its interchangeable barrel, a feature carried forward from Insŏng's In-21 at the MoND's request and absent on the first H35 prototype. Once the lower handguard is removed, the barrel can be unlatched from the trunnion using a wire handle and tensioning ring on its lower side, without the need for special tools. Although the full procedure takes too long to be performed in the field - roughly 2 minutes, according to Hwasŏng brochures - it does allow a single receiver to be converted between the rifle, carbine, and LMG/DMR barrel lengths at a base camp, simplifying production and granting greater flexibility to special forces teams.

Ammunition

By default, the H35 is chambered in the Glasic 5.7mm Quinn cartridge, which Menghe adopted as its main intermediate round in 2003. Yet because the barrel, bolt, and magazine well can all be swapped out with no special tooling, the H35 can be re-chambered in any intermediate cartridge at the customer or user's request. Hwasŏng claims to offer a 5.45×39mm conversion kit to allow the Deep Mission Troops to use captured Maverican ammunition when working behind enemy lines, though no 5.45mm H35s have been spotted in testing.

The standard H35 magazine well uses the same rockback, back-locking system as the JS-103, and is compatible with the JS-103's magazines. This allows it to accept the same set of 10-, 20-, 30-, 60-, 75-, and 100-round magazines produced for the JS-103 and its own derivative family. Hwasŏng took the unusual step of producing an all-new clear polymer magazine with a steel back edge and locking lug, as well as locking ports on each side which allow a second ready magazine to be attached to the one in the receiver. These magazines are believed to be compatible with the JS-103 family.

The magazine release is centered behind the magazine, with no quick-release button within reach of the trigger finger. As with the JS-103, training manuals advise depressing the release tab with the thumb while removing a magazine for storage, or using a second ready magazine to knock the inserted magazine free with a strike from behind.

Sights

Early production models of the H35 have a set of fold-down iron sights mounted directly to the upper receiver, though the sight types differed between early and late prototypes. In some brochures, Hwasŏng has offered illustrations of an export variant with no permanent sights and a rail all the way along the upper receiver, allowing users to mount the iron sights of their choice. No such weapons are known to have been produced thus far.

In contrast to the open patridge sights with adjustable rear tangent used on prior Menghean assault rifles, these are aperture-type iron sights, offering a better sight picture and more parallax reduction. The rear sight is adjustable for ranges of 0 to 900 meters, in 100-meter increments, and is also adjustable for windage. Both sights can be folded down to the rear to clear the field of view for other optics or reduce the risk of snagging, and in both the extended and folded positions they are sturdily held in place.

The rest of the upper receiver is taken up by a single MARS rail for the mounting of custom optics. This is one of the H35's key advantages over the JS-103: because the barrel is fixed to the upper receiver, and disassembly involves removing the lower receiver only, repeatedly firing or field-stripping the weapon will not cause the mounted optics to lose zero. On stamped models, the rail is welded onto the upper receiver, while on extruded aluminium models it is integral to the receiver.

Users

• Menghe (limited service, possibly as part of trials and evaluation)