We as a team often get asked what the current ‘best practice’ with regard to SAAI delivery is. Now, with WI/SAAI re-assessments taking place around the organisation, the question is asked even moreso. With that in mind, we are currently looking to produce a flyer, similar to our ‘Guide to Candidates’, that outlines the best practice for things like Beginning and End of Lesson drills. The idea being, it could go out to all qualified WIs/SAAIs as a form of policy update to ensure everyone was delivering in the required manner.
One thing we wanted to include was a ‘Top 5 Fads’ from around the organisation, with an aim to reduce fads and incorrect drills. And this is where we’d like to open up the floor to the ACC community…what are the most commonplace fads you see with regard to L98 drills out and about?
To start us off, the most common error we see is the constant insistence that cadets leave their sights at the ‘low light aperture’ setting after the unload, because of the mistaken belief that this is the ‘battle setting’.
Interested to hear your thoughts as we create our ‘Top 5’ list.
My pet peeve is an instructor/RCO nominating the safe direction, rather than cadets being properly taught about selecting a safe direction.
The caveat to this, is of course, on a range or during the latter stages of a WHT where you should tell a cadet to carry out firing drills aligned onto either a real or representative target.
I’m not in the ACO, but I am a CFSAAI. The usual ones I find are:
The “cadet wave” when checking the safety catch
Holding the working parts to the rear on the function test
Cocking the rifle instead of carrying out the pre-strip NSP - usually done by cocky senior cadets.
Making the student apply the safety catch before taking control of the rifle at the start of a WHT
A kind of “reverse fad” is not checking up the barrel prior to reassembly. Very few do it!
The safe direction bit is a good one. The way they drilled that one out of students on my course was to have two lines of staff facing each other, and make us hand the rifle over to the person opposite, with the intention that we select a “safe direction” between the students in the opposite line.
I can understand the sights being neglected on the A2 as the main sight does not stand proud as the old A1 did and is therefore less prone to being damaged. Flicking them back on the Ready is more important than flicking them forwards on the Unload.
Anyhoo…
The Cadet Wave - this is still a thing it seems.
Insisting on a 7 point check for NSPs
The “magazine sweep” on NSPs/Unload
Looking for movement in the working parts when releasing the trigger part of the serviceability checks
Insisting that TMH locking pins are put back into the body during stripping
My concerns of all of those are not so much about the student carrying them out but more about instructors/testers insisting upon it and failing students who do not carry them out.
I do that and I’ve done it forever because it is what I was trained to do. I see that the test makes no such requirement and I will probably stop doing it now
The talk around WHTs is interesting. Anecdotally, when we cover the Conduct of WHTs on the SAAI course we often hear of:
Instructors insisting that you cannot test a cadet/CFAV you have trained.
Instructors insisting that if a cadet/CFAV fails part of the WHT they must retake the entire test.
Instructors insisting you can only test one person at a time, or as many as you feel comfortable with.
All of the above are fads. The second two points were made clear in the 2013 re-write of Cadet Trg SAA.
Also, the talk of the ‘cadet wave’ which is another thing we discuss on the course. Our line on it is that it should never be taught, however, at the start of a WHT you may explain to a cadet that for this test only, he/she should make it clear to the instructor when they are checking the safety catch.
I was taught (by CTT) that the wave is not required, a good SAAI will move themselves to a position where application of the SC can be seen.
the student should carry out the drills as taught and as they would on the range.
ie what is taught, what is tested and what is done on range should be identical.
it is when it is NOT identical we see waves occuring on the range “because FS Jones said i should make it clear what i am doing”
of course this only solves the SAAI issue…there are RCOs who are not WI/SAAIs who don’t keep up with current best practice and expect to see waves…
one FAD i have seen more often than not is with regard to time.
instructors whizzing through lessons/taking shortcuts. such as teaching lesson 2 and 4 together, making it 90 minutes long may save 30minutes in teaching but loses 30 minutes in practice for the student.
and generally lessons which should and do take a hour completed in 30minutes. how can an instructor be at lesson 6 by lunchtime and finished lesson 8 at the end of the day??
Not sure this is what the OP was after… but anyone who insists on SAAI being delivered via EDIP is guilty of a fad.
“Instructors are […] allowed latitude in the method they adopt to teach individual lessons providing they do not deviate from the facts and skills laid down.”
i have seen them break/bend from getting stood on, faffer about with or dropped It’s good practise to do so. It takes seconds.
By your logic, dry training on a weapon should be banned, because it puts wear on the weapon.
And to the other poster who doesn’t like EDIP, how are you delivering your lessons? Through the medium of dance or something?
EDIP works. It’s simple. It’s effect. It gets the job done.
7 point check takes seconds. Even on Ops I was doing it. To not do so is complacency and that gets people killed.
Whats wrong with looking for the fall of the hammer during the function test?
Other than that they are errors of drill and not required, nothing much in practice.
The problem arises when people develop an incorrect understanding of what the drills ac
As per the RCO’s brief, these actions are to be carried out with the weapon pointing horizontally at the bullet catcher.
That still leaves leeway of whether that means perpendicular to the firing point (ie, where the target will be) or at any point on the bullet catcher.
There is a wider question about what actually counts as a “safe direction” - do we just ensure we are pointed vaguely away from people/risk or do we aim to apply the same general concept as during WHTs and have nobody in front of the line of firers (say, a 180º arc) ?
Are we still in the realm of fads or are we approaching thread split?
This for me would be a nominated direction (not necessarily the target, but most likely the bullet catcher) by virtue of the fact that for NSPs they will all be in one line and I would have told them where to stand for this.
My point instead refers to the instructor that at the start of a WHT can be heard standing there saying ‘That is your safe direction’. Meaning you’ve given the cadet no freedom of movement to do their initial individual NSP in a safe direction of their choosing. It’s unrealistic - you wouldn’t expect a cadet to walk onto a range and from the moment they walk through the door have the muzzle pointed at the target. Hence it’s more important to teach them about selecting a safe direction.
This repeatedly then becomes an apparent problem, when for example, issuing wpns from an armoury with the working parts to the rear, and you get multiple questions from cadets asking where their safe direction is to carry out the Ease Springs.
So in short, to answer your question. NSPs, given that they are under an instructor’s direction (having just been checked) they should be down range, but not neccesarily at the target [Remember that the PAM calls for the cadet to ‘operate the trigger’, not ‘take an aimed shot’ - another fad].
[quote=“SAAT, post:5, topic:2545”]
Instructors insisting that you cannot test a cadet/CFAV you have trained.
[/quote]I was always under the impression that this was considered ‘best practice’ - ie have someone else test, if possible (but do it yourself if not).
[quote=“SpinADit, post:2, topic:2545”]
My pet peeve is an instructor/RCO nominating the safe direction, rather than cadets being properly taught about selecting a safe direction.
[/quote]Whether I nominate a direction or not largely depends on the environment - in a classroom (somewhere that weapons are unlikely to be used except for dry training) I will because there’s little to chose from each wall that doesn’t have someone standing in front of it; outdoors or on a range I would expect cadets to work it out.
Apart from being an incorrect drill, it has literally no purpose on the L98A2 function test. You are about to release and then operate the trigger. If that does not happen as expected, then you know there is a problem. If it works properly then the hammer was in the right place. With the L86A2, checking the position of the hammer is part of the test and fulfills a purpose.
At the risk of thread drift - I would always point in a vaguely safe direction 99% of the time, and at a specific point when operating the trigger. In the very unlikely event of an ND, I would like to know exactly where the round has ended up.
