10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

[Gnaskar]

Re: 10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

 

An idea my class considered was basically a railgun firing a material with a low(ish) melting point. Let friction do the hard work. It would dissipate rather quickly, but at close to medium range you'd have yourself a plasma shotgun (with the added bonus of being able to fire a solid projectile at long ranges instead). It requires a few leaps in tech (and a lot of unobtainium) but it could work. Makes for a nasty gun to put on a fusion powered tank.

 

If anyone on the boards here would like to make a ballpark guess at the range of the thing I'd be much obliged; our best guesses range from 20 to 2k meters.

[Markdoc]

Re: 10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

 

An idea my class considered was basically a railgun firing a material with a low(ish) melting point. Let friction do the hard work. It would dissipate rather quickly, but at close to medium range you'd have yourself a plasma shotgun (with the added bonus of being able to fire a solid projectile at long ranges instead). It requires a few leaps in tech (and a lot of unobtainium) but it could work. Makes for a nasty gun to put on a fusion powered tank.

 

If anyone on the boards here would like to make a ballpark guess at the range of the thing I'd be much obliged; our best guesses range from 20 to 2k meters.

 

Actually the smaller railguns do this now with a simple steel slug - it (plus part of the armature:)) turns into plasma. However the effective range is only a few centimetres - the plasma cloud is much larger, but diffuses rapidly, losing any effectiveness as a weapon: the terrifying melty-ness of plasma is a bit (read, a lot!) over-rated in science fiction.

 

You can see an example here

http://www.powerlabs.org/movies/plasmashot.mpg

 

cheers, Mark

[dmjalund]

Re: 10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

 

in babylon 5 i got the impression a magnetic soliton wave carried the plasma to the target

[Kristopher]

Re: 10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

 

I'm not sure on how well osmium would work as a penetrator. Yes, it's dense as hell, but I don't think it has the self-sharpening or pyrophoric properties of DU.

[Nyrath]

Re: 10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

 

That being said I can think of at least two real world examples where high energy high density plasma is directed to destructive potential (at least in theory). One is the Casaba Howitzer and other "Directed nuclear weapons" (frex' date=' the Hellbores in the Bolo series). The main example my brain keeps booting up, tho, are shaped charges, such as the ubiquitous IED... the angular blast wave and the shape of the explosives and the copper/metal dish compress and focus the energy of the blast, turning said dish into a lance of superheated high pressure high impulse vaporized metal. So, if the tech level allows for the containment and power supply, why couldn't they do something similar? You'd need cartridges like Drake's Powerguns, or some sort of feeder rod (wire feed plasma guns!), but I don't see why it frankly can't work. Wouldn't look much like most depictions of plasma weapons (except possibly Sgt. Schlock's), being more of a ravening beam of death rather than a explosive "packet", but hey... that's good too [/quote']

The trouble with nuclear shaped charges is that they cannot direct all of the nuclear explosion in one direction. They just direct most of the nuclear explosion in one direction.

In other words, this is NOT the sort of munition you want detonating inside the gun's firing chamber.

 

Now, if one steps into the realm of science fiction and postulates the existence of force fields strong enough to resist contact nuclear explosions, it becomes easy. Your firing chamber becomes a spherical force field with a pinhole. Load in a nuke, aim the pinhole at your hapless target, then detonate the nuke.

 

However, the range is still going to be limited. Plasma is basically hot gas, and hot gas expands. The threadlike beam of plasma will expand and dissipate.

[RexMundi]

Re: 10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

 

The Battlelords RPG approached their Plasma Weapons as basically rods of Iron, superheated to a plasma state then blown at the target via a mass driver effect. Not horribly impressed with the possibilities of Plasma as a weapon myself. I work with plasma cutters for fun, sure they can cut up metal real nice. But Plasma effects are "meh" at best for Sci Fi weaponry (even Gets made fun of in a lot of books nowadays) where as something like the Battlelords thing, or for a better example, Arthur C. Clarkes Stiletto (From the novel Earthlight) (which is being developed by DARPA for MAHEM aka Magneto Hydrodynamic Explosive Munition), seems to make more viable sense then the Pull trigger and your hand held Fusion plant starts spitting out balls of plasma.

 

Still, if the Fi is ratcheted up more then the Sci, why not?

 

~Rex

[Old Man]

Re: 10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

 

The trouble with nuclear shaped charges is that they cannot direct all of the nuclear explosion in one direction. They just direct most of the nuclear explosion in one direction.

In other words, this is NOT the sort of munition you want detonating inside the gun's firing chamber.

 

Now, if one steps into the realm of science fiction and postulates the existence of force fields strong enough to resist contact nuclear explosions, it becomes easy. Your firing chamber becomes a spherical force field with a pinhole. Load in a nuke, aim the pinhole at your hapless target, then detonate the nuke.

 

However, the range is still going to be limited. Plasma is basically hot gas, and hot gas expands. The threadlike beam of plasma will expand and dissipate.

 

Well, but plasma isn't the primary damage mechanism for larger warheads--heat is. If the firing chamber could parabolically reflect the electromagnetic energy of the explosion, then the effective range would be a couple dozen miles at least. Granted this is impossible, but then so was the force field.

[Nyrath]

Re: 10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

 

Well' date=' but plasma isn't the primary damage mechanism for larger warheads--heat is. If the firing chamber could parabolically reflect the electromagnetic energy of the explosion, then the effective range would be a couple dozen miles at least. Granted this is impossible, but then so was the force field. [/quote']

 

Yes, but by the same token it would make more sense to attach a thermonuclear fusion warhead to a missile, send the missile however many thousand of miles you need, and manufacture your ball of plasma in contact with the target.

[Old Man]

Re: 10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

 

Ah, but missiles can be intercepted. At great cost, but still.

[Markdoc]

Re: 10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

 

Ah' date=' but missiles can be intercepted. At great cost, but still.[/quote']

 

If you have forcefield that can a) contain the electromagnetic energy of the explosion and be manipulated sufficiently to make a hole such that the energy can be expelled and aimed, then it would seem you have the technology to make a forcefield to block the energy at the target - especially given that energy at target will be necessarily less than energy at source - once it's squirted out, you have radiative effects to contend with.

 

I'm trying to remember the story where lunar secessionists simply used a mass driver to fire red hot bars of steel at the incoming warships. A big ol' lump of steel, moving at high speed would be a difficult thing to deflect: it has no electronics to fry, no skin to puncture with a laser, isn't going to vaporize from a near miss with a nuke, and would be hard to deflect with a smaller, faster-moving missile. The "red-hot" is actually redundant, but you'd likely get it via radiative forcing anyway if you used a mass driver.

 

cheers, Mark

[Nyrath]

Re: 10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

 

Ah' date=' but missiles can be intercepted. At great cost, but still.[/quote']

 

And whatever you use to reflect the energy of the explosion can also be used as a defensive shield by your opponent.

[AnotherSkip]

Re: 10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

 

It works REALLY well to. There's a very instinctive reaction to that kind of uncomfortable.

 

~Rex

 

and the spray from a garden hose can render this item ineffective

[RexMundi]

Re: 10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

 

That, OR now that they are wet, they boil. All sorts of possibilities there.

 

~Rex

[lemming]

Re: 10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

 

If you have forcefield that can a) contain the electromagnetic energy of the explosion and be manipulated sufficiently to make a hole such that the energy can be expelled and aimed, then it would seem you have the technology to make a forcefield to block the energy at the target - especially given that energy at target will be necessarily less than energy at source - once it's squirted out, you have radiative effects to contend with.

 

I'm trying to remember the story where lunar secessionists simply used a mass driver to fire red hot bars of steel at the incoming warships. A big ol' lump of steel, moving at high speed would be a difficult thing to deflect: it has no electronics to fry, no skin to puncture with a laser, isn't going to vaporize from a near miss with a nuke, and would be hard to deflect with a smaller, faster-moving missile. The "red-hot" is actually redundant, but you'd likely get it via radiative forcing anyway if you used a mass driver.

 

cheers, Mark

 

"The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress" perhaps?

 

And while I was trying to find something else in case I did stumble upon this which looked interesting http://www.permanent.com/t-massdr.htm

[McCoy]

Re: 10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

 

"The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress" perhaps?

 

And while I was trying to find something else in case I did stumble upon this which looked interesting http://www.permanent.com/t-massdr.htm

Nope. In Mistress mass drivers were used to throw rocks at targets on the ground. Only anti-spacecraft weapons were adapted from drilling lasers.

[lemming]

Re: 10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

 

Nope. In Mistress mass drivers were used to throw rocks at targets on the ground. Only anti-spacecraft weapons were adapted from drilling lasers.

 

That's how I remembered it. Thanks. Hmm, now to look for the anti-spacecraft version...

[Sundog]

Re: 10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

 

You're slightly misremembering. The Book is Earthlight, and the battle is between an Earth-Moon government fortress (which launches the white-hot steel rods as their primary weapon) and three Colonial Federation warships for control of recently discovered heavy metal deposits on the Moon.

[Old Man]

Re: 10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

 

And whatever you use to reflect the energy of the explosion can also be used as a defensive shield by your opponent.

 

But that's far more expensive than just buying Missile Deflection.

[Markdoc]

Re: 10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

 

You're slightly misremembering. The Book is Earthlight' date=' [/i']and the battle is between an Earth-Moon government fortress (which launches the white-hot steel rods as their primary weapon) and three Colonial Federation warships for control of recently discovered heavy metal deposits on the Moon.

 

That's it! Yeah, I probably did misremember - I read the book more than 30 years ago...

 

cheers, Mark

[RexMundi]

Re: 10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

 

And DARPA is making a run at that tech right now for their MAHEM project (as previously noted.)

 

~Rex

[Nyrath]

Re: 10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

 

I'm trying to remember the story where lunar secessionists simply used a mass driver to fire red hot bars of steel at the incoming warships. A big ol' lump of steel' date=' moving at high speed would be a difficult thing to deflect: it has no electronics to fry, no skin to puncture with a laser, isn't going to vaporize from a near miss with a nuke, and would be hard to deflect with a smaller, faster-moving missile. The "red-hot" is actually redundant, but you'd likely get it via radiative forcing anyway if you used a mass driver.[/quote']

As others had pointed out, this is Sir Arthur C. Clarke's EARTHLIGHT, which as one of the most cinematic "spaceships attacking a fortress" battle scenes I have ever read. Check it out.

 

The fort threw a bolt of molten metal with a sort of mass driver. This is because the force fields around the attacking spacecraft were only Energy Defense, they had no Physical Defense. In Doc Smith terms, they had Ray Screens but no Repulsors.

 

And as already pointed out, DARPA is looking into this as project MAHEM.

http://www.newscientist.com/blog/technology/2008/04/science-fiction-inspires-darpa-weapon.html

[RexMundi]

Re: 10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

 

Sounds like a good system to build into my Fleet of Orion Drive Space Battleships.

 

~Rex

[DusterBoy]

Re: 10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

 

Can someone please tell me what a "Casaba Howitzer" is? I've been Googling it (and Googling it) but can find no solid information at all. (Y'know, I dream of the day when someone comes up with a decent search engine which is case and context specific and doesn't make you wade through ten shedloads of irrelevent and/or useless trash before you (maybe) find what you want.)

[megaplayboy]

Re: 10 Sci-Fi Weapons That Actually Exist

 

Can someone please tell me what a "Casaba Howitzer" is? I've been Googling it (and Googling it) but can find no solid information at all. (Y'know' date=' I dream of the day when someone comes up with a decent search engine which is case and context specific and doesn't make you wade through ten shedloads of irrelevent and/or useless trash before you (maybe) find what you want.)[/quote']

 

Well, it's pretty much a shaped charge nuke which discharges most of its radioactive plasma in one direction, like a, well, howitzer. Definitely not "light artillery".