Gedankenspiel (Weapons Discussion)

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Krulle
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Re: Miscellaneous Umiak/misc. races question-and-answer thre

Post by Krulle »

I guessed s, but it was too nice an error to leave uncommented.
correwk.... I love how these autocorrects are more like "Verschlimmbesserungsmaschinen" (machines for faultily "correcting" actually correct things)...
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Absalom
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Re: Miscellaneous Umiak/misc. races question-and-answer thre

Post by Absalom »

ShadowDragon8685 wrote:
Absalom wrote:The nice thing about the chemical propellants is that they last longer than a capacitor charge. Regardless of whether it's in the bullet or the magazine.
Yes, but the battery in the magazine can be left on a charger storage rack between issuing. Capacitor-caps on the end of each projectile could not, at least, not remotely as simply.
Simple rails connected to common connectors on the outside of the magazine aren't that difficult.
ShadowDragon8685 wrote:
Absalom wrote:It would probably just use the current extraction technology, which is tried & true.
It would not, because current extraction technology requires gas actuation of a piston. You would need to either have a separate battery source on the weapon to electrically actuate the brass extractor, or siphon part of the capacitor discharge from the capacitor-cap. I do not consider either of these options as acceptable as simply not needing to extract brass in the first place.

Obviously, you would still need some kind of manually-actuated lever to extract a projectile you did not want in the chamber that was in there, but except for that one purpose - and the purpose of rendering the weapon visibly safe by jamming a safe flag in the chamber and sticking out the extraction port - you wont need to use it.
More importantly, you need an insertion mechanism. Once you have that requirement, extraction is merely a refinement.

Also, gas actuation is only one of the sequencing mechanisms used in modern guns: I think the motor-actuated systems more likely (the question of whether the magazine contains a spring is unrelated).

discord
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Re: Miscellaneous Umiak/misc. races question-and-answer thre

Post by discord »

the answer is probably, counter intuitively enough this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Explosive ... _generator
but a decent sized such in a magazine to charge the capacitor in the rifle, and you are golden.... gives new meaning to the old 'charging handle'

which of course leads to the question if the electrically powered weapon is actually BETTER compared to the straight explosive powered, the answer is probably not except in specialist situations.

Krulle
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Re: Miscellaneous Umiak/misc. races question-and-answer thre

Post by Krulle »

Until we get to laser pistols or similar.
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ShadowDragon8685
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Re: Miscellaneous Umiak/misc. races question-and-answer thre

Post by ShadowDragon8685 »

Krulle wrote:Until we get to laser pistols or similar.
Barring absolutely unreasonable amounts of power, a kinetic weapon at personal scale is almost always going to be better than a laser.

And by "absolutely unreasonable amounts of power," I mean "the power of a Loroi starfighter cannon in your hands."

Tamri
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Re: Miscellaneous Umiak/misc. races question-and-answer thre

Post by Tamri »

ShadowDragon8685 wrote:
Krulle wrote:Until we get to laser pistols or similar.
Barring absolutely unreasonable amounts of power, a kinetic weapon at personal scale is almost always going to be better than a laser.

And by "absolutely unreasonable amounts of power," I mean "the power of a Loroi starfighter cannon in your hands."
Well, the only place where the laser, plasma or ion gun will be preferable - it is weightlessness, when you don't have the possibility to gain a foothold on something quite inert to compensate for the recoil. Otherwise, the first shot will send you on a long flight in a chaotic trajectory.

Krulle
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Re: Miscellaneous Umiak/misc. races question-and-answer thre

Post by Krulle »

I assume that recoilless pistols will be available by the time one-handed laser pistols become wieldable, and sufficiently powerful.
The advantage of slugthrowers is simply, that all the energy is in that shot, whereas the damage of laser is incremental. And to make the initial openong shot already lethal, ridiculous amounts of energy are necessary.
And once you get a bright red spot on your chest which gets warm, you move, and the already spent energy is lost, except if the pistol has auto-aiming adjustment to keep the "hot spot" on target even if target and hand holding gun are moving.

I agree, for the foreseeable future, chemical explosion bullets will remain the more practical solution.
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charred steppes, borders of territories: page 59,
jump-map of local stars: page 121, larger map in Loroi: page 118,
System view Leido Crossroads: page 123, after the battle page 195

Tamri
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Re: Miscellaneous Umiak/misc. races question-and-answer thre

Post by Tamri »

Krulle wrote:I assume that recoilless pistols will be available by the time one-handed laser pistols become wieldable, and sufficiently powerful.
The advantage of slugthrowers is simply, that all the energy is in that shot, whereas the damage of laser is incremental. And to make the initial openong shot already lethal, ridiculous amounts of energy are necessary.
And once you get a bright red spot on your chest which gets warm, you move, and the already spent energy is lost, except if the pistol has auto-aiming adjustment to keep the "hot spot" on target even if target and hand holding gun are moving.

I agree, for the foreseeable future, chemical explosion bullets will remain the more practical solution.
Recoilless guns have many shortcomings, and most important of them is that the recoilless scheme is applicable only to the kinetic weapons on chemical explosives. Any manual EM-accelerator for blanking pulse shot will require from gunner a minimum firmly hold on to something quite inert, which would compensate for the recoil force. Firmly stand on their feet as an option.

Plus, recoilless weapons can not be used in confined spaces, for the same reasons as the jet weapons. Although lower in comparison with orthodox firearms initial velocity of the projectile is attractive in light of the danger in the clashes damage the hull. In the rest - no significant advantages it does not have.


The problem of laser in comparison with kinetics - that the kinetic projectile, having a mass, delivers all gived (or at least most of it) in it energy concentrated pulse in one target. While lasers, masers and other -sers to deliver the same energy demand for some time, plus, photons don't have the mass, because of which the permeability at the lasers so-so. All together leads to the fact that lasers cause good superficialis damage, but they have a very bad penetrability and instant damage.

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icekatze
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Re: Miscellaneous Umiak/misc. races question-and-answer thre

Post by icekatze »

hi hi

Lasers are complicated. Very complicated. Depending on how they are constructed, how they are pulsed, and what their aperture is, some lasers will absolutely have good penetration capabilities. The problem with lasers as small arms is that the main advantage of a laser weapon, its range, is totally wasted terrestrial or shipboard combat. It is that light seconds worth of range that makes their waste heat problems something worth dealing with.

Futuristic self-guided missiles get my vote for deadliest person-to-person weapon. ;)

Absalom
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Re: Miscellaneous Umiak/misc. races question-and-answer thre

Post by Absalom »

Tamri wrote:
ShadowDragon8685 wrote:
Krulle wrote:Until we get to laser pistols or similar.
Barring absolutely unreasonable amounts of power, a kinetic weapon at personal scale is almost always going to be better than a laser.

And by "absolutely unreasonable amounts of power," I mean "the power of a Loroi starfighter cannon in your hands."
Well, the only place where the laser, plasma or ion gun will be preferable - it is weightlessness, when you don't have the possibility to gain a foothold on something quite inert to compensate for the recoil. Otherwise, the first shot will send you on a long flight in a chaotic trajectory.
Laser might have that advantage, but plasma and ion won't for usable power levels.

Krulle wrote:I agree, for the foreseeable future, chemical explosion bullets will remain the more practical solution.
I partially disagree, because I thought of three specialized cases:
1) strong weight limits, large expected amounts of used ammunition, and reliable access to power: the rechargeable electrical options will allow the ammo weights to be dominated by projectile;
2) long-distance attack: combine a high-power laser with a "laser round" (a projectile with a mirrored finish on it's base to provide a focusing surface) that carries propellant that strongly absorbs at the laser frequency and you get a laser-based version of a mortar, bazooka (at least possibly), and/or recoilless rifle;
3) high-power toroidal fusion mass generator/projector: supposedly toroidal magnetically-self-confined plasmas detonate (via releasing all of their magnetic energy) when they strike metal - I don't know if it's true, but if so then it could be used as a kind of demolition weapon like bazooka equivalents are used for today (I am assuming that initial space colonies are likely to have mostly metal walls, due to aluminum oxides being almost as common everywhere as silicon oxides).

There, three weapons that could conceivably make for realistic electric guns.

Tamri wrote:
Krulle wrote:I assume that recoilless pistols will be available by the time one-handed laser pistols become wieldable, and sufficiently powerful.
The advantage of slugthrowers is simply, that all the energy is in that shot, whereas the damage of laser is incremental. And to make the initial openong shot already lethal, ridiculous amounts of energy are necessary.
And once you get a bright red spot on your chest which gets warm, you move, and the already spent energy is lost, except if the pistol has auto-aiming adjustment to keep the "hot spot" on target even if target and hand holding gun are moving.

I agree, for the foreseeable future, chemical explosion bullets will remain the more practical solution.
Recoilless guns have many shortcomings, and most important of them is that the recoilless scheme is applicable only to the kinetic weapons on chemical explosives.
Also, they aren't really recoilless: the Germans apparently invented them for use as artillery in places conventional artillery couldn't go, but that doesn't mean they were expected to stay on-target while on ice or something.

icekatze wrote:Futuristic self-guided missiles get my vote for deadliest person-to-person weapon. ;)
So, smart bullets, handheld smart rocket-grenades (think of a normal grenade with a sensor, a little extra space for a model rocket engine, and some guidance equipment), and smart mortar/bazooka equivalents? Seems likely enough, though primary-weapon bullets will probably still be "dumb", given no sensible opportunity for any smarts that can't be built into the gun (dial-a-range is a really stupid feature when you're not behind cover).

Dahak
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Re: Miscellaneous Umiak/misc. races question-and-answer thre

Post by Dahak »

Tamri wrote:Plus, recoilless weapons can not be used in confined spaces, for the same reasons as the jet weapons.
Messerschmitt-Bölkow-Blohm came up with a solution for that with the Armbrust. While scaling it down is an issue it wouldn't be impossible. Just unlikely to be sufficiently easy to be worth while.

discord
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Re: Miscellaneous Umiak/misc. races question-and-answer thre

Post by discord »

tamri&dahak: http://www.tactical-life.com/gear/carl- ... -launcher/ another example of recoiless rifle used in confined space... and if you want to scale it down.... gyrojet actually works.

Dahak
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Re: Miscellaneous Umiak/misc. races question-and-answer thre

Post by Dahak »

discord wrote:tamri&dahak: http://www.tactical-life.com/gear/carl- ... -launcher/ another example of recoiless rifle used in confined space... and if you want to scale it down.... gyrojet actually works.
The problem with Gyrojets is they didn't work terribly well. As in sticking your finger in the barrel was sufficient to stop the person with it from being able to shoot you.

And even with the HEAT 655 CS confined space rounds Carl Gustaf's still need you not to have friends in a roughly two meter space behind you and getting on for 25 cubic meters of space in the room for the pressure to dissipate. The lounge I'm in at the moment is smaller than the recommended minimum for firing the confined space rounds due to the launches blast overpressure.

Image

The Armbrust can be fired without issue from in a phonebox if you don't mind decorating the inside with plastic confetti. Baring major manufacture defects it doesn't generate overpressure.

Absalom
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Re: Miscellaneous Umiak/misc. races question-and-answer thre

Post by Absalom »

discord wrote:tamri&dahak: http://www.tactical-life.com/gear/carl- ... -launcher/ another example of recoiless rifle used in confined space... and if you want to scale it down.... gyrojet actually works.
Dahak wrote:The problem with Gyrojets is they didn't work terribly well. As in sticking your finger in the barrel was sufficient to stop the person with it from being able to shoot you.
Gyrojets have two flaws, both of which can be overcome, one of which is intrinsic to the version that's actually been produced:
1) Gyrojets have low launch velocities. Simply put, gyrojet rounds need a two-stage firing system, sort of like the M79/M203 Hi-Lo system, but designed for Fast burn-Long burn action instead of High pressure-Low pressure action. This will provide a relatively high launch speed (through an ordinary pistol-like 1st stage burn) and longer-than-a-bullet acceleration (through a semi-conventional gyrojet round).

2) Gyrojet rounds had a manufacturing & design defects.

Early runs had a crimp or something to put the nozzle plate onto the projectile, but later runs used some sort of press-fit operation that deformed the nozzles themselves. The result was that the actual rocket action didn't function correctly, producing reduced usability (but not reliability... they would reliably have this defect). This is a matter of designing the entire manufacturing process to avoid such deformations.

At the same time, gyrojet rounds were much more sensitive to moisture than ordinary rounds, due to reduced sealing compared to conventional bullets, reducing reliability. The two-stage method I mentioned above would help with this.

discord
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Re: Miscellaneous Umiak/misc. races question-and-answer thre

Post by discord »

dahak: golly g, the first ever produced gyrojet had some issues, shocking, what it did was prove that it was POSSIBLE.

and it's actually 22.5m3 which means 3x3x2.5 which is rather confined according to most definitions.... would actually be difficult as bloody hell to reload the damn thing if it was much smaller.
and the CG is 84mm while as the armbrust is 67mm, size does matter, one is disposable the other multi use, one is a dedicated ant tank the other is very multi purpose....very different beasts indeed.

<edit> and i would not want to stand behind someone firing the armbrust either, so rather pointless data there.
</edit>

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Mr.Tucker
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Re: Miscellaneous Umiak/misc. races question-and-answer thre

Post by Mr.Tucker »

Actually, gyrojet low exist velocity can be overcome. From what I understand, modern day RPG rounds, like the RPG-32 and RPG-30 combust all their fuel inside the tube. That is technology aplicable to a gyrojet

novius
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Re: Gedankenspiel (Weapons Discussion)

Post by novius »

Slugthrowers can be quite powerful. I've stumbled across an article where it has been described that a half-ton shaft covering had been propelled to a speed of 66km/s or faster by a nuclear explosion. Of course this is well above earth's escape velocity, so it or its remains could easily have left earth's gravity well. At the very least, the shaft covering has never been found again.

http://nfttu.blogspot.de/2006/01/nuclea ... annon.html
http://nfttu.blogspot.de/2006/01/nuclea ... art-2.html

A mass of half a ton propelled to a speed of 66km/s. Meaning, kinetic energy must be at about 1.1TJ.

To put it into perspective,
  • the "Dicke Bertha", an artillery cannon used in WWI shot 1.2-ton shells at about 500m/s, having a kinetic energy of 114MJ at the muzzle, which is shaved off by air drag and such down to 58MJ on impact after nine kilometers of flight.
  • one kiloton TNT equivalent is measured as 4.2TJ (4.184*10^12 Joule), which put the kinetic energy of our nuclear spud cannon in the range of a quarter-kiloton blast.
Well, now I remember a scene from Mass Effect - If the shaft covering is still in one piece (unlikely, since it may have broken down into bits on passing the atmosphere), someone, in a few thousand years, on a far away planet, will have a very bad day...

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Mr.Tucker
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Re: Gedankenspiel (Weapons Discussion)

Post by Mr.Tucker »

Probably burned up in the atmosphere. Iron oxidates (burns) pretty energetically at the temperatures produced by friction at such speeds. Probably got torn up into a million bits just by atmospheric pressure before it burned.

Dahak
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Re: Miscellaneous Umiak/misc. races question-and-answer thre

Post by Dahak »

discord wrote:dahak: golly g, the first ever produced gyrojet had some issues, shocking, what it did was prove that it was POSSIBLE.
Actually it proved that despite large sums of money they managed to produce a pistol whose effective range was only marginally above its minimum range. And which no one has thought worth attempting to improve in 40 years.
discord wrote:and it's actually 22.5m3 which means 3x3x2.5 which is rather confined according to most definitions.
The lounge I'm in complete with a sofa is smaller than that. There's only one room in this three story building that might be big enough, and it would be marginal.

Of the buildings around here there are only two (The Church and the Pub) guaranteed to have rooms that large.
discord wrote:... would actually be difficult as bloody hell to reload the damn thing if it was much smaller.
and the CG is 84mm while as the armbrust is 67mm, size does matter, one is disposable the other multi use, one is a dedicated ant tank the other is very multi purpose....very different beasts indeed.
Which is why the Armbrust are being replaced with the larger but similar launch system MATADOR and Panzerfaust 3s.

Still doesn't make the Carl Gustav a good thing to fire from a confined space. Note of course while being fired from a confined space the CG isn't a multipurpose weapon. Only the HEAT 655 CS is considered safe to be fired in the volume you mention.
discord wrote:<edit> and i would not want to stand behind someone firing the armbrust either, so rather pointless data there.
</edit>
It's a mild inconvenience cleaning the plastic confetti off. No blast and no flame jet, since the launch gasses are confined in the launch tube by the pistons.

Which is why scaleing them down is a problem
Mr.Tucker wrote:Actually, gyrojet low exist velocity can be overcome. From what I understand, modern day RPG rounds, like the RPG-32 and RPG-30 combust all their fuel inside the tube. That is technology aplicable to a gyrojet
Which leads to the emission of flames Discord understandably doesn't want to stand in the way of. And which while reduced the CG still produces when firing HEAT 655 CS.

Remember the problem for a recoilless sidearm rather than an over the shoulder missile is avoiding setting the user alight (Which is the issue with the Carl Gustav's illumination shells, since you want to fire them at a steep angle rather than horizontally).

You'd also prefer a continuous burn to keep the projectile on a flat trajectory at a constant speed, which helps with things like the MATADOR's variable fuse times.

Overkill Engine
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Re: Gedankenspiel (Weapons Discussion)

Post by Overkill Engine »

If one has sufficiently solved the power supply issue well enough to deploy antipersonnel scaled railguns or lasers, then other types of directed energy weapons should be viable as well which would also allow bypassing some of the issues of the prior mentioned weapon types.

Directed Energy Weapons

Of particular interest are the microwave and electrolaser types. Neither should require much in the way of moving parts, nor kinetic rounds. Both would work against organics and insufficiently shielded electronics; and are unlikely to put an unexpected hole in a ship hull, which is of understandably immense concern in shipboard combat. Also, neither should have any notable recoil since they do not use kinetic energy. The electrolaser may be more power efficient than a standard laser weapon due to only needing a laser powerful enough to ionize a path for an electric charge to travel.

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