General Atomics' new railgun - Page 2

Hot Soup · 17-Oct-2012, 14:27

Impressive stuff! Be fascinating to see how quickly it becomes practical on ships.

Harry Palmer · 17-Oct-2012, 14:51

if fired level, then the speed is irrelevant unless it has aerodynamic capabilities, if you hold one a meter off the ground and let go and fire one at mach 5 at the same time then they hit the ground at the same time... one is just a lot further away.

EvilGrin · 17-Oct-2012, 15:22

Quote:

Originally Posted by mr_o

Yup!

Is anyone around who is good with the maths that can figure out how much the round would drop over the 50miles at those speeds?

It's a complete pain in the ass to calculate the drag coefficients at supersonic speeds. Plus I'd need to know the mass of the projectile. I could work backwards from the distance I suppose and tell you what maximum size of projectile you could fire and reach a target at that distance, but I'm not that bored.

EvilGrin · 17-Oct-2012, 16:01

Ok I was that bored. Assuming a perfect 1kg projectile and ignoring air resistance fired at Mach 5 at a 1 degree angle (divide by zero is bad) I get 10303m before it hits the dirt, taking 6.06s to get there.

If, however, I fire the same projectile ballistic, at a 45 degree angle I get a total distance of 295218m in 245.37s. However it reaches a height of 129158m. This isn't quite low earth orbit (it's about 1/3rd of the way to the ISS) but it's certainly endangering passing aircraft.

Looks like this railgun would work quite well for AA.

Inertiaman · 17-Oct-2012, 16:04

In the earlier video they indicated that the slug could eject a cloud of shrapnel in front of airbourne targets to further improve AA/AM potential. Fuck flying headlong into a cloud of Mach 5 tungsten pellets tbh.

Eja Cool8 · 17-Oct-2012, 16:08

Silver bullet indeed

http://dvice.com/archives/2011/04/video-railgun-r.php

Harry Palmer · 17-Oct-2012, 17:00

EvilGrin · 17-Oct-2012, 17:11

I think you mean 40,000km there? My numbers above are in metres, so it 'only' travelled 295km. London to Manchester is 265km.

Harry Palmer · 17-Oct-2012, 17:16

Aye, which is why I said NM

EvilGrin · 17-Oct-2012, 19:22

I think you edited the same time I posted

17-Oct-2012, 14:27	#31
Hot Soup to post or not to post Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: Scotland Tournaments Won: 1 Posts: 3,570	Impressive stuff! Be fascinating to see how quickly it becomes practical on ships. __________________ "Thats a lie." "Yes it is. What's your point." Why'd you open your bong hole you smelly hippy? You'd sacrifice a beautiful woman to save a moderately attractive monkey? Hawks of the Luftwaffe!

17-Oct-2012, 14:51	#32
Harry Palmer Gun nut Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: War Zone Posts: 13,996	if fired level, then the speed is irrelevant unless it has aerodynamic capabilities, if you hold one a meter off the ground and let go and fire one at mach 5 at the same time then they hit the ground at the same time... one is just a lot further away. __________________ Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose. Reminder: "Do not look into laser with remaining good eye."

17-Oct-2012, 16:01	#34
EvilGrin click here to reset post count Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: Lancs, UK. Posts: 5,580	Ok I was that bored. Assuming a perfect 1kg projectile and ignoring air resistance fired at Mach 5 at a 1 degree angle (divide by zero is bad) I get 10303m before it hits the dirt, taking 6.06s to get there. If, however, I fire the same projectile ballistic, at a 45 degree angle I get a total distance of 295218m in 245.37s. However it reaches a height of 129158m. This isn't quite low earth orbit (it's about 1/3rd of the way to the ISS) but it's certainly endangering passing aircraft. Looks like this railgun would work quite well for AA. __________________ Edugeek - Techies in Education!

17-Oct-2012, 16:08	#36
Eja Cool8 Member shown actual size Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: Edinburgh, Scotland Posts: 9,026	Silver bullet indeed http://dvice.com/archives/2011/04/video-railgun-r.php __________________ "A friend of mine described her disgust as two Blackwater mercs, shortly after introducing themselves, proposed a two-on-one sex act that involved one of the men ejaculating on the other." Steve Fainaru: "Big Boy Rules"

17-Oct-2012, 17:00	#37
Harry Palmer Gun nut Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: War Zone Posts: 13,996	. __________________ Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose. Reminder: "Do not look into laser with remaining good eye." Last edited by Harry Palmer; 17-Oct-2012 at 17:06. Reason: NM, can't count my zeros...

17-Oct-2012, 17:11	#38
EvilGrin click here to reset post count Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: Lancs, UK. Posts: 5,580	I think you mean 40,000km there? My numbers above are in metres, so it 'only' travelled 295km. London to Manchester is 265km. __________________ Edugeek - Techies in Education!

17-Oct-2012, 17:16	#39
Harry Palmer Gun nut Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: War Zone Posts: 13,996	Aye, which is why I said NM __________________ Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose. Reminder: "Do not look into laser with remaining good eye."

17-Oct-2012, 19:22	#40
EvilGrin click here to reset post count Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: Lancs, UK. Posts: 5,580	I think you edited the same time I posted __________________ Edugeek - Techies in Education!