What stops the rail gun from being put on the battlefield. It such a cool weapon and it can be used to launch nukes that bypass loopholes in the geneva convention.
What stops the rail gun from being put on the battlefield. It such a cool weapon and it can be used to launch nukes that bypass loopholes in the geneva convention.
holy shit shit are you moronic
>verification not required
One, the Geneva Convention doesn't stop nukes.
Two, there isn't any international treaties that favor railguns over rockets
Three, there really wasn't a need for railguns. Yes, it's cool but it's also expensive for no real gain.
Not exactly actually, that is because the USA never actually continue to develop an anti nuclear missile shield but Railguns hypersonic ammo could be more precise than a missile and able to stop nukes. Also, ammo costs far less than missiles. I mean it's not practical but it's a good technology, maybe not on ships but on fixed guns who knows.
Cool, yes one shot of a railgun could potentially cost less in materials but what about the maintenance, power, and y’know everything else about railguns that make them fricking worthless right now?
not to mention frick knows what the barrel life will be.
theres a reason the US hasnt bothered with it anon. Stop being 12 years old and learn how the world operates instead of wishing it was more like your video games.
They were still developing them until recently to send that money to hypersonic programs. In real life you spend R&D on something that has potential and not just give up everytime there is some downside to something
>that is because the USA never actually continue to develop an anti nuclear missile shiel
ding dong ur wrong
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ground-Based_Midcourse_Defense
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/RIM-161_Standard_Missile_3
>What stops the rail gun from being put on the battlefield
Congress.
It's called materials science. It's really hard to make a 2-piece barrel that also has to conduct several hundreds of amps of current at any significant voltage.
It's a lot harder than making a barrel for a normal gun.
but why do the physical barrel and the conductor barrel have to be the same? If the holding barrel is inert to the field, then your conductive barrel takes very little of the brunt and you replace the holding barrel as needed.
OH MY GOD, ANON YOU DID IT, YOU FIGURED OUT WHAT WE'VE BEEN MISSING.
Someone call the DoD.
obviously not, i was just asking why. its a thread of speculation anyway
>but why do the physical barrel and the conductor barrel have to be the same?
Physics. Rail guns work by a principle called Lenz's law. The exact same physics which generates the force which accelerates the projectile is also trying to push the two conductive rails apart. There is no "barrel" per se in a rail gun, just two parallel rails. And the exact same forces which act on the "bullet" also frick with the rails. Not to mention there's also the electrical arcing involved which erodes the rails just like the contacts in an arc lamp or a welding electrode.
If your design is fixed so it will work at all, you just invented a coilgun. Congrats. Also year 10 physics has all the answers you need and you must be 18 to post.
Currently they're still experimental and have terrible reliability. The rails shit themselves after just a couple of shots. Meanwhile the guns that the US, UK, China, etc, have tested are about as powerful as a 1930's era 5" naval gun....except a 1930's era 5" naval gun is actually better since it can fire quickly, doesn't shit itself after two or three shots, and has the benefit of firing a wide variety of ammunition, including having a fuse setter for AA shells. Current railgun tech is actually worse than what was being fielded during WWII.
try several millions of amps
>100 rounds
lol. they can't even get ten.
>lol. they can't even get ten.
Nah they can do a dozen or two
> But the barrel on tested railguns, Clark said, had to be replaced after about 12 to 24 shots were fired
but beyond like 30 it's shot.
Bryan Clark is an expert on submarine nuclear reactors. He has no knowledge of railguns and his quotes on the topic are unfounded.
Even if he is, it's still not less than 10 fricking rounds.
Here is from the Navy 2017 program guide
> INP Phase I (FY 2005-2011) successfully advanced foundational enabling technologies and explored, through analysis and war gaming, the railgun’s multi-mission utility. Launcher energy was increased by a factor of five to the system objective muzzle energy of 32 mega joules (110 nautical miles range) and barrel life was increased from tens of shots to hundreds of shots
>and his quotes on the topic are unfounded.
as opposed to unsourced assertions on a kyrgystani cocaine laundering forum?
How about the CNR telling Congress the current barrel lifetime is over 400 shots... back in 2014. Is that a good enough source for you?
The only reason they're not building railguns right now is because Burkes are trash, the Zumwalts are a self-inflicted dumpster fire, and the destroyer replacement is 15 years away. There is no viable platform for the foreseeable future.
Once the Chinese prove it's an advantageous technology, the USN will scramble back to it, just like hypersonic missiles.
...you realize the chain you replied to was refuting that it only lasted less than 10 shots right?
>>100 rounds
>lol. they can't even get ten.
>Nah they can do a dozen or two
>> But the barrel on tested railguns, Clark said, had to be replaced after about 12 to 24 shots were fired
They weren't using the Bryan Clark quote to prove it was more than 10, not to prove it was low.
You agree with the point the poster was making, you just assumed he was using the quote in the opposite direction and sperged out.
>They weren't (sic) using the Bryan Clark quote to prove it was more than 10, not to prove it was low.
He's refuting the <10 shots statement and claims its a 30 shot barrel. He justifies this claim by citing a bad source. I called the source into question because the source doesn't have the appropriate background. Both of the barrel life estimates are wrong.
When a 3rd party calls my assertion into question, I provided a snippet of congressional records stating barrel life, which is a higher quality source of information than a defense tabloid.
Sure, but you're just being pedantic, you support his argument to begin with and are simply providing further evidence to support it.
You posted as if you disagreed with them, as opposed to the person they were disagreeing with that originally claimed only 10 shots.
Your argument should be with the moron claiming it can only fire 10 rounds, not the person saying it can fire more.
I initially made no such claims about barrel life. I objected to a bad source. Maybe you should get checked out for Asperger syndrome.
Yes I know that, because you're incapable of reading context or just an autistic pedant
Take your pick
yeah they could get more life if they just use a primer to get past sticktion and prime the plasma arc.
barrel life. 100 rounds and it needs a new barrel.
Sounds like a great concept to get more tax dollars by selling the same amount of guns.
Just make a better barrel
You’re a genius anon, you should go to special ed.
they've been working on that for over a hundred years.
>it can be used to launch nukes that bypass loopholes in the geneva convention
he thinks if you used a nuclear warhead inside of a railgun shell it would magically allow you to launch a nuclear strike 100+ miles away without using a missile/rocket.
The smallest nuclear warhead is way too large for a reasonable railgun barrel size though.
I also wonder what will happen with the physics package when it's subjected to the moronic amount of acceleration of a rail gun projectile
>first test
>be random army idiot
>press button
>nuclear explosion directly in the barrel
>hfw
Metal Gear isn't real life OP
rail and barrel replacement
missiles end up cheaper, more accurate, and longer range.
It's not that special, just an incredibly complicated, fragile and expensive electric gun that can fire a shell at 3-5 times faster than a tank gun. It isnt the moon cracker gundam makes them out to be.
capacitor and charging technology isn't anywhere close to being ready
Rail guns are a massive waste of energy. Air resistance increases exponentially with velocity.
It will decelerate the projectile very quickly and melt or even vaporize it as kinetic energy is transferred to heat. If you need high range and want efficiency missiles are the way. The only reasonable use case for rail guns is for short range defense against hypersonic weapons.
The rail ends up destroying itself
>It such a cool weapon and it can be used to launch nukes that bypass loopholes in the geneva convention.
I fricking love those heckin railgunarinos!
Edit: Thanks for the gold kind stranger!
>Launch nukes that bypass the Geneva convention
Wait what did you just take that from Metal Gear?
>your city gets obliterated by mega railgun
>well they didn't use a nuke so i guess i won't respond with nukes
It would be usable if it didn't destroy itself every few rounds.
inb4 op is underage
US is not capable of making a barrel that can last long enough to be cost effective vs traditional artillery
- a potable powersource (that is more efficient than chemical propelant preferably, but not necessarily if the weapon outclasses conventional canons sufficiently).
- electromagnet barrel rails that don't melt them self through induction heat.
- a projectile coating that prevents barrel abrasion but also does not gunk it.
etc and/or v3 style multi charge canons will be more efficient for a while
>What stops the rail gun from being put on the battlefield
1) Energy requirements: about 95% of the non-moronic sci-fi concepts out there are just waiting for us to come up with better ways to produce and store electricity at a reasonable cost.
2) Materials Science: Best of luck building a railgun that doesn't tear itself apart after a couple of shots
3) Money: Even the American military doesn't have unlimited funding, and for what the railguns, laser, hypersonics etc we can build at the moment do there are better ways to manage that job for now.
I just wanted to see the Yamato rebuilt with a nuclear powerplant and massive frick-you railguns so that we could have kino battleship duels again instead of this moronic gay shit where everything is about carriers and naval aviation. Is that too much to ask?
>kino battleship duels
You realise that a railgun battleship duel would just be two ships firing on radar contacts from beyond visual range, right? It would be functionally identical to cruisers flinging missiles at each other, but with no defences possible. It would be infinitely less cool.
You realize that by the end of the historical relevance of battleships, that was how it already worked? Iowas were at their best in BVR radar gun duels.
I thought that by the end of their relevance Battleships either just got wrecked by carrier aircraft, or served as glorified monitors supporting marine forces landing in hostile territory?
So make a nice cartoon and you can have the images you seek. You don't DO things to interact with real warships so stay in your fantasy lane and make up all the hardware you like.
This is the fricking transformers 2 rail gun they use to shoot at the pyramids.
Last I checked, the rails kept melting after a couple rounds because electric currents make things hot (this is a gross oversimplification, but I’m explaining it in terms you can understand). Also you’re moronic, the Geneva convention doesn’t have anything in it on nuclear weapons.
If you bypass loopholes, doesn't that mean the loopholes don't matter? Or what the frick? Do you think before you write?
Usurious metered energy paradigm cracking at the seams with the introduction of low heat, low maintenance, high portability nuclear reactors, such as teased for FOB power sources by the US military several years ago.
Take the F-35. Was it really a boondoggle, or was that budget an interest payment for wildly exotic tech, while the plane was cobbled together from 20-30 year old off the shelf mature hand-me-down tech? It's not just the appearance of capable enemies that has to be gassed up (like Saddam's phantom WMDs, or Russia's shitassed Soviet Union mk. II effort ongoing), but one's own breakaway capabilities publicly ratcheted down (if only to keep the budget flow coming).
> railguns can be used to launch nukes!
This is your mind on video games.
They are simply too devastating. There's a high risk of projectiles penetrating the the crust of the earth, opening a rift straight to hell, and flooding the earth with demons.
>he invests into railgun instead of mobile tungsten spike launcher satellites
>or microwave beam that can snipe cruise missiles
>or hypersonic ICBM
The railgun doesn't know where it is at all times.
But does it know where it is not?
No, or else it would know where it wasnt, and since it doesnt know where it wasnt, and doesnt know where it isnt, it cant know where it is
>What stops the rail gun from being put on the battlefield.
rapid rail degradation issues.
>barrel shits itself in rail guns
So what are the problems with coil guns right now then?