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Navy Tests High-Powered Electromagnetic Railgun

foxnews.com — Futuristic weapon can fire solid projectiles at speeds up to Mach 5.

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  • Ghostman555, on 02/01/2008, -17/+4 This will be out by "2020", well, nothing like getting our new weapons out there to the boys "tick tock", huh? According to the "Military Channel", we have over 100 or more prototypes just waiting.
    One thing that really bother's me. I wonder if our enemies are watching the "Military Channel." I know we don't give up the real stats, but, we give enough to give some of these countries with money some great ideas.
    • gquaglia, on 02/01/2008, -1/+9They say 2020. I wouldn't be surprised if they were deployed sooner. Anyway, the general public probably wouldn't even know if they were or weren't deployed. Look how long the F117 was kept secret before it was revealed to the public.
      • singebkdrft, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1And the F117 is old.

        By the time it was revealed, the Department of Defense had stopped using F designations over 100 for aircraft for almost 20 years.
        • rspeed, on 02/01/2008, -1/+1What? What about the F-22 and F-35? Then again, it really should have been called the A-117.
          • sienar, on 02/01/2008, -0/+3you fail at reading comprehension.
            he said F designations over 100, and he's right.
    • Double0Doug, on 02/01/2008, -1/+8It’s not like this new technology is just sitting around being aged to perfection. They are testing it. We should be glad that they aren’t rushing new technology into the field to be tested by our service men and women.
    • OwdenBowden, on 02/01/2008, -11/+3They are using all of these weapons right now and under real live fire conditions. Like it or not kids - the Iraq war was not only a lie but it was started to (1) Test all of the new tech weapons we have in development. (2) deplete our over stock of conventional weapons to make room for the New weapons and (3) to increase production of weapons, weapon manufacturers and anyone related to defense. I think it was genius but a scary prospect because it was like giving the keys to a candy store to children. I am sure you would have probably heard the following from many a commander - "Hey what does this one do? Lets try it out."
      • Pixelante, on 02/01/2008, -7/+1They really had no choice, after the EU-requested war in the former Yugoslavia. Serb forces managed to down an F-117 and cheated American missiles using plankwood tanks, which forced NATO to bomb civilians among the cheers of liberals everywhere.
        Oh, sorry. We don't mention that. We can't.
    • VitriolAndAngst, on 02/01/2008, -6/+4Well, I've come to the conclusion that our military -- and those of other countries, are really just businesses, whether the people who serve in them or not know it. The #1 Export from the US is weapons. They just want to have the best. If sales are good, then that is fine with them. When sales slump, they need only to leak the technology so that the politicians say; "oh know, they are catching up" or they have someone like Bush start a war. In Iraq, our tax money goes to paying both sides not to kill our soldiers, and our weapons end up being sold to both sides. Everybody wins.

      China isn't going to invade us, but they will compete for "customers" for weapons and grab resources in Africa. Their leaders are probably just as corrupt and compromised and more a threat to their own people. The external threats just allow leaders more power and the ability to steal.
      • Phrag, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1"Everybody wins." except the dead, wounded, traumatized, homeless, orphaned, starving, sick and poor. Dugg up anyway because you acknowledge that we pay off and arm both sides.
    • OMGIAMTHEMAN, on 02/01/2008, -0/+2because all you need are some engineers and a tivo to reproduce our military tech right?
    • Frnnkdlxx, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1Whoever buried you is a moron. There was nothing wrong with the conclusion you came to. Nor Owden Bowden.
  • RGWX, on 02/01/2008, -0/+25Daddy likes.
    • MacEnvy, on 02/01/2008, -1/+25Under my 2nd Amendment rights as a citizen, I hereby demand the ability to purchase one of these at Wal*Mart without showing ID.

      My neighbor's dog is in for such a surprise!
      • alittleroy101, on 02/01/2008, -2/+1You implying that you plan on killing your neighbor's dog?
        • paradigmx, on 02/01/2008, -0/+0with a projectile going mach 5 nonetheless
        • MorbenDK, on 02/01/2008, -0/+2the dog IS the projectile
          • Terr01, on 02/02/2008, -0/+1This was predicted by Gary Larson.

            Specifically, the Dobie-O-Matic gun, which can be used to fire live Doberman Pinschers at burglars.

            If only I had a scan of it handy...
    • nihilite, on 02/01/2008, -0/+22yeah, but you know the US navy is just going to get ***** frags by finding a spot and sniping all the time.
    • wolfkeeper, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1Yeah, but do not point gun at daddy, or daddy will get upset.
      • paradigmx, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1also, avoid the little sister... unless you've killed the daddy first
  • ours, on 02/01/2008, -1/+14That thing packs a whole lot of woopass! Look at that huge flame trail behind the slug... and that's without any chemical propellant.
    • zombiecake, on 02/02/2008, -0/+1The rail gun was not originally conceived for use as a weapon. Thanks for wasting our tax dollars on weapons to defend against non existent threats.
  • NoCt1, on 02/01/2008, -2/+20thinking the squirrel problem in my attic would be a good use for this.. fun times.
    • EricAnderton, on 02/01/2008, -0/+3Then might I interest you in purchasing the band new and improved EM117 Rail-gun-o-matic?

      It's perfect for this job. It removes unwanted pests from attics, and unwanted attics from pests.
  • OG1502, on 02/01/2008, -4/+4I guess Gordon Freeman went from Black Mesa to the Navy...
  • flyernut, on 02/01/2008, -18/+0A Railgun? What's next, a V-2?
  • mike2312, on 02/01/2008, -1/+12The REAL video FTA:
    http://www.onr.navy.mil/newimage/railgunSM.wmv
  • ratherbeinvegas, on 02/01/2008, -1/+24Is the BFG next?
  • RicktheBrick, on 02/01/2008, -3/+12It would be far more important if the rail gun could shoot a projectile into orbit around the Earth. We could than put a factory into orbit and construct very useful things there. Huge solar cells to collect energy and transmit it back to Earth is just one example.
    • Double0Doug, on 02/01/2008, -0/+2That is an interesting point. I wonder if you could somehow turn it around and use it to develop thrust. A spaceship could be developed with a nuclear power plant. That would be neat… except for the fallout from an explosion.
      • Number23, on 02/01/2008, -0/+9Nuclear pulse propulsion, the idea's been around for 60 years. The nuclear test ban treaty killed the project.

        http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Orion_%28nucl ...
        • areyouserious, on 02/01/2008, -1/+2Bring it back!
          • Number23, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1Works for me; had we stuck with the project, we’d be a true space faring nation by now. NPP could power a spaceship of virtually unlimited size to speeds of 10% the speed of light!
          • Phrag, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1I'd rather not have a Challenger type incident with a nuclear power vehicle.
          • nimbleprune, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1build them in space
      • ceredron, on 02/01/2008, -4/+1however, thrust would be very difficult. The only thing that's really even affected is the projectile, generally the firing system itself is nearly unmoved.
    • gummih, on 02/01/2008, -0/+16*****, if you can shoot a projectile 200nautical miles from a ship then a bigger land based assembly should be able to shoot projectiles into sub-orbit, enabling to target any place in the world. Similar to ICBMs except you wont be spending a billion dollars per shot, just the price of a metal slug. (And the electricity bill will be a bitch) At mach 5 you reach the far side of the Earth within 4 hours. In 4 hours a single railgun ought to be able to fire thousands of projectiles. This gives HEavy artillery an all new meaning, all harbors are in range and even though your delay means that you can't hit a moving target like an aircraft carrier, the insane firepower of a railgun means that you can carpet a reasonably large area which the carrier is most likely to be in after x-minutes, thus forcing such targets to be under constant evasive action in time of conflict.
      • Feyr, on 02/01/2008, -0/+2iirc, the charge time is such that you can't realistically fire more than once a minute. this isn't your governator's railgun

        they're working on the first part though
        • Number23, on 02/01/2008, -0/+3The Navy thinks it can get to 6 times a minute. The biggest hurdle is that the forces unleashed by each shot tends to destroy the barrel.
      • Phrag, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1Of course the down side of that is even the smallest miscalculation or unaccounted variable could mean missing your target by miles. Collateral damage FTL.
    • Number23, on 02/01/2008, -1/+8Sounds great, but the problem is there’s not much that would survive the acceleration, especially delicate electronics
      • jgzman, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1Electronics, no, but girders would be fine. Actual building materials, see? The electronics can be brought up by shuttle.
        • Archimboldo, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1The nice thing about on-board thrusters is that you can make adjustments with them to correct for things like varying atmospheric density, winds, ... etc. Not sure how well a one-shot fling into space would work. The lack of accuracy might make collecting building materials from multiple shots a problem.
    • ApokalypseNow, on 02/01/2008, -2/+3Unfortunately, the acceleration needed to achieve escape velocity in just a 1-2 mile rail distance would kill any living passengers. Using a longer tube, you could do it.
      • abacadabbra, on 02/01/2008, -0/+4i dont think the person who made the comment about sending stuff into orbit was talking about actual people but cargo that could be intercepted in orbit thus saving lots of money on transporting that material into space.
    • Grym11, on 02/01/2008, -1/+3There are a number of problems with space-based, projectile weaponry.

      For one, if your projectiles are going to carry a lot of mass, the price to launch it is going to quickly be prohibitively expensive. Getting a satellite into orbit takes a lot of energy and fuel, so every pound you add makes it much more expensive. Even a "low-cost" radar satellite can be effectively $10,000 per pound.

      Secondly, Issac Newton's third law of motion comes into play real hard in space. For every action there is an equal but opposite reaction. Of course, this isn't as big of a deal on land. A battleship can launch a heavy projectile at Mach 5 and it won't move a bit. But in space, there's nothing to counter this force. Now you COULD fire a rocket to counter this force, but that would require a lot of fuel, which would have to also be launched and, again, would not be cheap.

      Lastly, what's the point? The United States has utter domination of the seas. There's no to spend out the nose for the kind of range you're talking about when we already effectively have the capability to strike anywhere in the world in a short period of time via our navy.
      • jgzman, on 02/01/2008, -0/+2Not space based, but sub-orbital. Like ICBS.
        Fire from here, make a HUGE arc, land in Russia. Or Iran. Or wherever.
  • solidhayter, on 02/01/2008, -6/+3"Metal Gear!!?!??"
  • SuperVepr308, on 02/01/2008, -3/+2Damn! that ***** is cool. Props for the Gordon Freeman reference...
  • nachochease, on 02/01/2008, -2/+9When's the handheld version coming out? I've got a demon infestation RIGHT NOW!
    • ToadLeg, on 02/01/2008, -0/+2Here's one: http://video.google.com/url?docid=6335930423805021 ...

      There's smaller ones. You just need electromagnets and a metal slug. Why is everyone here acting like railguns are some kind of new technology? The news is that they're finally coming out with their big production warship model, which has been in development for some time.

      oh, I think there's some instructions here: http://www.anothercoilgunsite.com/nf-projects.htm
    • Ciffirakkun, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1I believe what you are showing is a coil gun. There are very subtle differences that end up making a huge difference in the end. They use different methods of propelling a projectile. Coil guns have a limited muzzle velocity while rail guns, as you can see, do not suffer from the same restrictions.

      There is no real feasible way to make a portable rail gun due to the massive amount of power needed to propel a projectile at worthwhile speeds. This is why they are in development for mounting on tanks and or battleships. As someone else mentioned, NASA is also interested in the technology to put things into orbit.

      Either way, it's pretty frickin' cool and would definitely be a fun DIY project at with the kids. I mean... who doesn't like home-made weaponry?
  • CapitalIdea, on 02/01/2008, -5/+1One Step Closer to Metal Gear.
  • GiJoeBob, on 02/01/2008, -1/+9I hope when they actually put this on a ship they rig it up like the Wave Motion Gun from Star Blazers.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Battleship_Yama ...
    • waluigi14, on 02/01/2008, -0/+2Hell yes!
      "Searching for a distant star / heading off to Iscandar / Leaving all we love behind / Who knows what dangers we'll find! etc."
      That theme is going to be stuck in my head forever.
    • Picaroon, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1Or MACs from Halo.
      http://halo.wikia.com/wiki/MAC
  • Dan11023, on 02/01/2008, -1/+5I Really hope this is in GTA IV,

    This reminds me of the Fusion Rifle In Ratchet: Deadlocked.
  • KarlH, on 02/01/2008, -0/+10"A joule is defined as the energy needed to produce one watt of electricity for one second."

    Minor nitpick: a watt is defined as one joule of energy per second. It's derived from the joule, not the other way around (and there is no need to bring in the concept of electricity). A joule is defined as the amount of energy expended by a force of one newton moving one meter along the direction of the force.
    • thandle, on 02/01/2008, -1/+2I suppose since they get a bill from the power company every month, the readers of foxnews would have a better chance of knowing what a watt was rather than a newton. . .and the writers of foxnews too for that matter. but I totally agree, the writer should have written "a joule is the energy. . .". the definition is certainly the other direction.
      • vanimal, on 02/01/2008, -0/+2If they wanted to use an energy unit that people would be familiar with, they would have just listed the output of the rail gun in kilowatt hours, because that's what shows up on everyone's electric bill. However, 10 megajoules makes the technology behind it sound a lot more impressive than 2.777 kilowatt hours.
    • enicholas, on 02/01/2008, -1/+5Just what I was thinking. It's basically like saying "a mile is defined as the distance travelled when traveling at a speed of 1MPH for 1 hour."
  • gubin09, on 02/01/2008, -1/+6foxnews has a patents and innovation center?
  • CATSCEO, on 02/01/2008, -2/+7One step away from the BFG9000.
  • jammit, on 02/01/2008, -3/+0phwoar! bang bang!
  • g0blin, on 02/01/2008, -0/+11Head Shot
  • raada, on 02/01/2008, -10/+2People play too many computer games.
  • Chromatik, on 02/01/2008, -0/+15/Quake 3 announcer voice:

    IMPRESSIVE!!!

    Now if the could only get it down to the size of a rifle we'd have the ultimate sniper
    • ApokalypseNow, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1At smaller scales, it is often more efficient to store energy in chemical form through the use of explosives (gun powder, gasoline in a fuel-air mix, etc). Getting that much electrical power into that small of a platform could prove problematic. Further, one has to wonder just how much acceleration you will be able to get out of rails that are only a couple meters long at most.
      • ceredron, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1Mach 2, actually. We've created a small one with half-meter ceramic conductive rails.

        Aw man, shooting this thing is a real bitch, though. We had to get like 8 big capacitors.
        • SleepingOrange, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1uhm... link? Sounds like something i'd love to read about.
    • ours, on 02/01/2008, -0/+2Yeah, only if you put the rifle on a tripod and freaking drill the tripod to a concrete floor 'cause when Newtonian physics kick in, be ready for a world of hurt with the "for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction". Even a smaller caliber round will send one hell of a kick when you see the speed at which it's going off.
      • ApokalypseNow, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1It is not so much the caliber of the round but rather the weight involved. At the speeds you could achieve with a system like this, even a sewing needle could be deadly.
        (Sci-Fi Geek Mode ON)
        In fact, a sewing needle sized dart, with tiny fins, could be great for this sort of system. Very light weight projectile, would penetrate skin easily enough, and I bet it would do a number on bone as well. Due to drag differences, once it enters the body it would probably tumble and tear itself to pieces (much like a .223 round), with the metal fragments shredding soft tissue. I wonder if the fragments would have enough energy to exit the body as well, and what kind of exit wound it would make? Further, I wonder about the lethality of such a projectile - would one be enough? Or would this have to be a flechette-style weapon system, with multiple projectiles?
  • david76, on 02/01/2008, -7/+3This is really old news. This technology was featured on the Discovery channel years ago.
    • Voxxov, on 02/01/2008, -2/+8RTFA
      "In the demonstration Thursday,"
      -Not old
      "The previous railgun power-use record was"
      -In fact news
      They're not reporting on the fact that there is a rail gun, they're reporting about the latest record breaking test.
    • ours, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1I've seen both videos, this new one is certainly more powerful. Just look at the trail of the slug. In Future Weapons you get a Matrix-style "warp" behind it. In the new video, there's a bug ass fire cone behind it.
  • Double0Doug, on 02/01/2008, -0/+2So what happens if the ship carrying these weapons loses power in an attack? Will they be helpless?

    Seriously, are the guns on Navy ships purely mechanical or do they tie into the main electrical system today? I’ve never really thought about it. I guess most of the weapons would be tied into the ships power for targeting, but maybe they are independently targeted with a local power source?

    Either way, I would imagine it takes a lot less power to run a traditional gun compared to these ultra-cool electromagnetic whatsits.
    • ApokalypseNow, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1With the rail guns, it might be that they have to turn the entire ship to face the target - not sure how much recoil is involved there.
      However, they might not be entirely helpless with lost power - if they had had built up a charge prior to losing power, they could still get off a few shots. The energy for this system is basically stored in a big-ass flywheel (or array of flywheels), with enough juice stored up for several shots. Power may be down, but the flywheels are still spinning, so firing is still possible. Aiming, on the other hand, that might be an issue.
      • Pixelante, on 02/01/2008, -0/+0With a gun that can sink a capital ship with one shot, turning the entire ship wouldn't be considered much of a hassle. It's like you have the Wave Motion Gun. Open targetscope!
        • ApokalypseNow, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1Given US naval superiority, I don't see that we'd be usinig this to shoot at other naval vessels so much as land targets. A Mach-5 projectile weighing a few tens of pounds will have as much destructive force as a cruise missile simply in kinetic energy. It also travels faster and is smaller, so less chance of being detected and/or shot down.
    • ours, on 02/01/2008, -0/+4Today a warship is a sitting duck anyways without power. Those cruise missiles and gun turrets don't turn themselves, there are electric motors and fire tracking systems. Plus no radar, no proper shot.
      Actually, naval warships depend on power for quite some time. I remember reading about the sinking of the Yamato (WWII) and something that helped the US win that is that they had a lucky hit which shut down it's electrical power and the anti-air guns would no longer track anymore because they where on electric motors.
      Anyway, this gun is intended for the next generation of destroyers and those will be 100% electric powered (including the engines). The fuel will power electric generators and this will feed the engines, weapon systems, computer systems etc.
      • Double0Doug, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1That is kinda what I was thinking too.
    • fzammetti, on 02/01/2008, -0/+12Modern ship armaments do typically need electricity for things like loading mechanisms. In the old days it was literally a couple of guys flinging rounds down a convey belt and manually loading them. On modern ships, i.e., those built over maybe the last 10-20 years, it's more like one guy pressing the right button, watching the round come down the belt, pressing another to get it into the chamber, and making sure the whole process goes smoothly. It's not *quite* that simple, but I have a relative that's a life-long Navy guy and he described it to me and it really is pretty close to that. So, most modern ships, if they were to suffer a complete loss of power, would be seriously in trouble. Now, there *are*, as I understand it, some degree of manual ability to fire, so they aren't totally defenseless, but not in good shape to be sure. More importantly though, the engineering that goes into these ships is amazing: the possibility of losing power completely is about as close to zero as makes no odds, to quote Douglas Adams. I dare say that any ship armed with rail guns will be using nuclear power, and the engineering in those things is even *more* robust. So losing power probably isn't any real concern, it's probably the case that if you lose power then the ship was probably going down anyway.

      The big things that makes rail guns attractive is safety, supplies and kinetic kill potential. As the article points out, not having to store explosive rounds onboard is a huge advantage. For a long time it's been true that to sink a ship you kinda have to get lucky and hit a storage magazine, which are naturally protected *very* well. Short of that, it's pretty damned tough to sink a modern warship. More improtantly though, there's quite a few more accidents that happen onboard ships than you'd like to think there are. Most aren't all that catastrophic, but there's certainly been a couple of biggies over the years. Getting rid of that danger alone is worth the money it costs to develop these things. Also, although I don't know this to be true, I'd be willing to bet that the overall weight of the ship can be brought down fairly significantly by not having to carry ammunition (I'm guessing a metal rail gun slug weighs less than a traditional chemical projectile, but I might be wrong there).

      Also important is the issue of supplies. Think of it this way: if you have nuclear power, you've pretty much got an unlimited supply of energy for all intents and purposes. Instead of carrying maybe 300 conventional shells, which will definitely take up more space than a rail gun slug, you can carry maybe 2-4 times as many slugs. You can hang longer in a fight, plain and simple.

      Lastly, rail guns offer higher kinetic kill potential, meaning the kinetic energy at the point of impact is greater. Modern warships are designed to be able to take a hell of a beating. They are designed to that modern conventional weapons will have a hard time penetrating the hull. And even if that happens, they are designed with enough resiliency so that a hull breach isn't automatically a kill. With rail guns though, they are traveling *so* much faster than any conventional weapon that the force of impact is vastly superior. They can, in theory, simply tear through a ship's hull, defeating virtually any kind of redundant design that might be employed to protect against flooding. A hole in one side of a ship you can deal with if it's designed properly, a hole blown *clear through* a ship's hull from side to side isn't nearly as easy, maybe even impossible. And besides, if rail guns can deal with Wraith darts and even hive ships, they've got to be good! :)
      • Double0Doug, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1Hey, that was a fantastic explanation, thanks!!
    • wrillo, on 02/01/2008, -0/+3i imagine this would be placed on nuclear warcraft... that way they wouldn't need to worry about power consumption
    • Phrag, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1A better question would be, 'What happens when a ship with these weapons gets hit by a FCG?'. Can you say 'floating target'?
      http://www.active-duty.com/MI_FCG_FluxCompressionG ...
  • stephendv, on 02/01/2008, -16/+5The most aggressive nation on earth now has better guns. Nice one.

  • WoundedCow, on 02/01/2008, -11/+1I want one to hunt deer. We should be able to do that right? Hunt deer with weapons like this. Right?

    Some hillbilly would ruin it for everyone by putting it on the gun rack in his truck.
    • ApokalypseNow, on 02/01/2008, -0/+8Hitting a deer with a projectile going mach 5 = pink mist.
      You can't eat a pink mist.
      • nbcaffeine, on 02/01/2008, -0/+2delicious pink mist

        just condense it and drink it. Ewwwww
      • Pixelante, on 02/01/2008, -0/+2The new fad will be: "Don't eat a deer: breathe it."
  • brainflakes, on 02/01/2008, -0/+4The big question is, do the rails need to be rebuilt after each firing or have they worked that bit out now?
    • noahhoward, on 02/01/2008, -1/+1So far as I know they've had that sorted for a while.
    • ceredron, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1ceramics!
    • ours, on 02/01/2008, -1/+2Not in every shot but it survives only 2-3 shots. So I wouldn't count that as sorted unless wars get very very short.
    • Devilboy666, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1Yea the last I heard the rails were really a problem and pretty much got destroyed with every shot. However from whatching this video I think what they're now doing is launching the slug from a bracket that just keeps it centered for a short distance - and after that it's propelled through a tube slightly larger than the slug which means nothing gets damaged since the slug is not touching anything.
      • df12, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1The damage doesn't come from just the slug contacting the barrel. Additional damage comes from the current arcing between the barrel and the slug. The huge current involved effectively erodes the barrel material. In addition to this erosion there is the matter of the vaporized material from both the slug and the barrel re-depositing as it cools.
  • widgetmaker, on 02/01/2008, -8/+3People dig fox articles!?
    • steelystan, on 02/01/2008, -1/+2Hahahahahhahhaha. Fox sucks my balls.
  • ZeroFeetAbove, on 02/01/2008, -1/+41We'll have railguns before we have Duke Nukem Forever...
    • mike17032, on 02/01/2008, -0/+14We will have ***** Warp Drive before we have Duke Nukem Forever.
  • Iconoclast25, on 02/01/2008, -0/+25" projo at 5500 fps MV? Who needs a laser?
  • EelfinnTy, on 02/01/2008, -0/+3This test was at 10 megajoules and it's max is 32 megajoules!
    • russelbutt, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1i've got your mega-jewels right here buddy.. *shaky fist*
  • sindex, on 02/01/2008, -5/+2Wow. Way to find a 1+ year old story, FoxNews....
    http://fredericksburg.com/News/FLS/2007/012007/011 ...
    • Hypermarkalan, on 02/01/2008, -1/+1Oh, cut'em some slack. They still haven't gotten the hang of this "news" thing.
  • shniken, on 02/01/2008, -3/+7Hhahahhaha
    [A joule is defined as the energy needed to produce one watt of electricity for one second.]
    Get some learning fox
    • Zeeeeeeeeeee, on 02/01/2008, -0/+2wikipedia says its "The work done to produce power of one watt continuously for one second".

      Sounds pretty similar. Pls explain how they are wrong?
      • JackHarkness, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1Joule is the independent variable. A watt is defined as 1 J/s, so 1J is 1 Watt* 1second? It's basically like saying "a mile is defined as the distance traveled when traveling at a speed of 1MPH for 1 hour."
    • JackHarkness, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1as for wikipedia, whilst being utterly correct, it's more like trivia(it's also written like that, just in case you were confused)
  • gordonj, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1What makes this better than current weapons? Is it just more powerful, or can it target more specifically?
    • Kythas, on 02/01/2008, -0/+2As explained in the article, the move to fully electric propulsion instead of chemical propulsion for the rounds eliminates the chance of explosions.

      Many ships in battle are actually sunk when their ammunition stores explode due to the chemical propellants in the rounds cooking off. Removing the chemical propellant from the ships removes the chance of their exploding when the ship takes a hit, and improves the survivability of the ship and the crew.
      • cawpin, on 02/01/2008, -3/+1"eliminates the chance of explosions."

        No, it doesn't. It just greatly reduces them. I used to work with a guy that worked at Motorola on the radios for the Apollo missions. He told me of a test site he went to one time where they were testing a railgun type device. It was powered by a tractor trailer size capacitor bank. One day they went to fire it and it didn't. So now they had all this energy, and heat, stored with no way to release it. They finally got it to fire safely but there were more than a few very nervous people out there.
    • ours, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1Add the planed GPS-guided warhead and yes it will be quite accurate. Plus no pesky explosives to store and handle.
    • Suricou, on 02/02/2008, -0/+1Firepower - a chunk of metal at mach-lots will do a lot more damage than a chunk of explosive at lower speeds. Range, for the same reason: Faster projectile goes further. Cost - rather than a precision engineered self-propelled shell with guidance, you just put a chunk of metal in the end thats been lathed to the right size (0.1mm tolerance, I would estimate?). Storage - slugs are smaller.
  • macwac, on 02/01/2008, -0/+5Futuristic weapon? isn't it a weapon already developed?
    • diggB, on 02/01/2008, -1/+6Developed, perhaps. Deployed, not by a long shot!

      (Thank you, thank you. I'll be here all night!)
  • mrevaaaaa, on 02/01/2008, -4/+0Wow. I'm pretty sure thats around 1.2 miles per second. Beat that Flash Gordan!
    • rspeed, on 02/01/2008, -0/+2I think you mean the Flash. Flash Gordon was a normal human, IIRC.
    • SlimFastForYou, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1Buried for inaccuracy.
      3 700 mi/h = 1.02777778 mi / second
  • Rocketmac, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1I was working with a group of engineers, engineering majors and physicists while I was in college on this very thing.
    Our application, was to launch a 10 Lbs pumpkin, but the same idea applies. Also, about 15 years ago, the navy did test-fire a 1st generation rail gun.. it was mounted to the forward deck of a frigate.

    Speaking as an engineer, these things are still a little bit away for practical battlefield use.
    Speaking as a red-blooded American from the Mid-West.... Awh yeah!
    • cawpin, on 02/01/2008, -1/+1Speaking as an engineer, and a red-blooded American from the Midwest, I'll tell you that you need to check your dates. The Navy tested rail guns far more than 15 years ago. My dad was in the Navy from 1968 to 1972 and he recalls people working on them.
  • sngecko, on 02/01/2008, -1/+2Oh sure, since the railgun does not use gunpowder, this eliminates the possibility of explosion.
    Bull! I've seen the big capacity, quick discharge capacitors that I believe this weapon uses explode, and it will be just as energetic and likely to kill nearby persons as an equal energy yielding gunpowder. Remember, that energy is stored somewhere, if not chemical (gunpowder), then electromagnetic (capacitor).
  • highorbit, on 02/01/2008, -1/+3I wonder how fast it could project Dick Cheney if he was fired from the White House lawn towards the Atlantic ocean?
  • Malakii, on 02/01/2008, -2/+1I'm so conflicted. On one hand, this comes from Fox News so I'm ingrained with the idea of hating / mocking it. But on the other hand, its a giant mother-f***in railgun!
  • kjpuck, on 02/01/2008, -1/+2This was invented by Kristian Birkeland in 1901. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kristian_Birkeland
  • grenden, on 02/01/2008, -0/+3http://youtube.com/watch?v=N-HKYp1bWYI youtube loads waaayyy faster for me, probably the same vid. Or this one http://youtube.com/watch?v=y54aLcC3G74
  • physco827, on 02/01/2008, -0/+2Replace the 120mm with this railgun on an m1a2, and call ourselves GDI.
  • Avaseal, on 02/01/2008, -1/+1I got all excited before i saw it was on Fox News and realized that it probably never happened.
  • JedicodeWarrior, on 02/01/2008, -0/+2It's always comforting to know that a 19 year old kid can operate a weapon that will propel my brains *OUT* of my skull at mach 5.
  • DiFosfor, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1Dugg for bringing back fond memories of the Quake2 railgun..
  • HanSolo69, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1This is really old. It was first on Digg when somebody from the newspaper I work for covered the story at Dahlgren which is right down the road.
  • CommodorePerry, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1Does my concealed weapons permit cover something like this?
  • yujie, on 02/01/2008, -0/+1This is perfect against an alien invasion fleet
  • dkern, on 02/01/2008, -2/+2Care to go hunting with me Mr. Cheney?
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