Armed Polite Society
Main Forums => Politics => Topic started by: makattak on February 15, 2018, 09:57:38 AM
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https://www.popularmechanics.com/military/research/a17764166/navy-four-laser-weapons/
Navy is killing the rail-gun and focusing on FRIKKIN LASER BEAMS for the surface fleet.
Now, admittedly, lasers appear an excellent (possible) counter to drones, small ships (boats), and aircraft. A very useful countermeasure to drone or boat swarms and other predictable tactics using today's technology.
How about the rail-gun? Not particularly useful against small-scale attacks. Not particularly useful against aircraft.
Mainly useful against other capital ships and/or buildings. OBVIOUSLY we shouldn't be ever worried about facing some other surface fleet. Or pounding a coast prior to an invasion. That will never happen again, so we don't need to work on the best technology for such a situation.
Oh. And China's working on a rail-gun.
Gee, I wonder how well the laser countermeasures will work against that?
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Seems to me that lasers are preparing for the next war, and dropping gun-fired projectiles is SO War of 1812... :rofl:
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Seems to me that lasers are preparing for the next war, and dropping gun-fired projectiles is SO War of 1812... :rofl:
I'm well aware of the irony of complaining that lasers are cutting-edge enough. Lasers are LOS only, though. Not all threats are in the line of sight.
(Now once we're putting laser on SPACESHIPS, then I'll be quiet... No, I won't. I'll be complaining that we aren't working on photon torpedos.)
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It was my understanding that the reason the Navy put rail guns on the back burner was due to somebody figuring out that a conventional gun firing some fancy sub-munition got the majority of the rail gun's performance for a fraction of the cost. A possible unstated reason could be that we let the Chinese spend the money researching and then we just steal it. Payback and all that.
Also it seems that everyone expects future naval engagements to be characterized by missile spam and the counter to that would be an extremely quick anti-air system which is something you would expect lasers to be good at.
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I'm surprised we aren't putting everything into BVR weapons and then implementing ROE that require visual confirmation.
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Mainly useful against other capital ships and/or buildings. OBVIOUSLY we shouldn't be ever worried about facing some other surface fleet. Or pounding a coast prior to an invasion. That will never happen again, so we don't need to work on the best technology for such a situation.
So we have this newfangled invention (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aircraft_carrier)that has proven really good for pounding shorelines and sinking capital ships. It has significantly better range and can deliver higher payloads than a rail gun too.
I lurvs me some railgun video, but big guns are actually pretty limited in their usefulness.
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Once the Navy bigwigs get their noses into the design, costs go up . . . even the cost of "ordinary" Naval gunfire spikes.
https://www.popularmechanics.com/military/navy-ships/a23738/uss-zumwalt-ammo-too-expensive/
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Once the Navy bigwigs get their noses into the design, costs go up . . . even the cost of "ordinary" Naval gunfire spikes.
https://www.popularmechanics.com/military/navy-ships/a23738/uss-zumwalt-ammo-too-expensive/
I love the ending of the video on the above link (by BAE Systems)..."Precise...Lethal...Affordable." :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:
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So we have this newfangled invention (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aircraft_carrier)that has proven really good for pounding shorelines and sinking capital ships. It has significantly better range and can deliver higher payloads than a rail gun too.
I lurvs me some railgun video, but big guns are actually pretty limited in their usefulness.
As noted, lasers are there to counter current threats. The aircraft carrier (and is accompanying aircraft) are in that "current threat" vector.
Now, put that aircraft carrier up against a rail-gun fleet that can hit a target 250 miles away in 6 minutes. Or a laser equipped enemy that takes down every plane/missile within their line of sight. (or even just "many")
As noted, lasers are a great response to current threats. I'd prefer we be working ahead on future threats, though.
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As noted, lasers are there to counter current threats. The aircraft carrier (and is accompanying aircraft) are in that "current threat" vector.
Now, put that aircraft carrier up against a rail-gun fleet that can hit a target 250 miles away in 6 minutes. Or a laser equipped enemy that takes down every plane/missile within their line of sight. (or even just "many")
I question the physics of that fleet.
Rail Gun projectiles are kinetic kill weapons, they have no explosives and rely on mass and speed for their destruction. I can't do the friction decel calculations in my head for a projectile traveling 250 miles, but I suspect that the initial velocity needed to maintain kinetic kill velocity 250 miles away, in air, is more than BAE can provide. Remember that air resistance is exponential in relation to velocity.
Orbital kinetic weapons use significantly more mass than a rail gun projectile.
ETA: Speaking of which, that's where we need to be putting our efforts. How many Orbital Kinetic Weapons stations can we put up with Falcon Heavies?
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I question the physics of that fleet.
Rail Gun projectiles are kinetic kill weapons, they have no explosives and rely on mass and speed for their destruction. I can't do the friction decel calculations in my head for a projectile traveling 250 miles, but I suspect that the initial velocity needed to maintain kinetic kill velocity 250 miles away, in air, is more than BAE can provide. Remember that air resistance is exponential in relation to velocity.
Orbital kinetic weapons use significantly more mass than a rail gun projectile.
ETA: Speaking of which, that's where we need to be putting our efforts. How many Orbital Kinetic Weapons stations can we put up with Falcon Heavies?
Current projections (that I can find) are a 5 inch projectile at around 16,000 m/s. What's the math on that? (Oh, that's METERS/second, not miles, in case anyone gets confused. Not sure this warning is necessary because that would be 8% of the speed of light.)
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Current projections (that I can find) are a 5 inch projectile at around 16,000 m/s. What's the math on that? (Oh, that's METERS/second, not miles, in case anyone gets confused. Not sure this warning is necessary because that would be 8% of the speed of light.)
The math is beyond me. I know my limits.
Drag is (sorta, at slow speeds) calculated as D = 1/2*p*Cd*A*v^2 where p is the density of air, Cd is the coefficient of Drag, A is the area of the projectile, and v is velocity.
For this problem Density is changing (going down and back up) as the projectile arcs, and velocity will be dropping from the very beginning. SO you can see that the drag acting on the projectile is going to be a moving target. I suspect there are some integrals that could approximate it, or computer models that could crunch a ton of numbers and come close, but both are well beyond me. Birdman would have to chime in.
I'm just spitballing that with a velocity that high, drag is going to do all sorts of weird things to slow that projectile down. Look at all the energy that is being used to ignite the air behind that thing. for all that they put 32 megajoules into acceleration it's dumping energy fast. Once it gets under 1000 or so m/s it's just a normal 5" gun with no explosives.
I could be really off, but 250 miles is a LONG way through air with no boost.
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If you have anti-aircraft that can sweep the sky horizon to horizon then I am not sure an over the horizon KE weapon will be able to zero in on the target very well. Also, a laser strong enough to take out targets at distance can probably do a number on spy satellites a little higher up (among other weapons). Of course, that also assumes the laser ships have eyes out past the horizon also.
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Navy won't need to, if the Air Force does this...
http://www.businessinsider.com/air-force-rods-from-god-kinetic-weapon-hit-with-nuclear-weapon-force-2017-9
Kinetic Weapons from space. Why bombard the beach from ships if you can just destroy it all from space?
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Navy won't need to, if the Air Force does this...
http://www.businessinsider.com/air-force-rods-from-god-kinetic-weapon-hit-with-nuclear-weapon-force-2017-9
Kinetic Weapons from space. Why bombard the beach from ships if you can just destroy it all from space?
That's how the Centauri do it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GImJdrCSOFA
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You can shoot the rail gun projectile out of any 5 inch gun. And those existing guns don't have to be designed around the power needs of the rail gun.
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Navy won't need to, if the Air Force does this...
http://www.businessinsider.com/air-force-rods-from-god-kinetic-weapon-hit-with-nuclear-weapon-force-2017-9
Kinetic Weapons from space. Why bombard the beach from ships if you can just destroy it all from space?
System redundancy.
What happens when that fancy killer satellite gets taken out?
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We need a base on the moon with a catapult system to launch cargo containers filled with moon rock at our enemies.
He that holds the high ground...
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We need a base on the moon with a catapult system to launch cargo containers filled with moon rock at our enemies.
He that holds the high ground...
That has the makings of a good book. Do you mind if I steal that idea?
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We need to prepare for the last wars that did not happen. In the age of expeditionary warfare everything else has suffered. I think we have a great Navy, loved being in it, but we need to get back to a reality that one day we can find ourselves in an environment of more hostile missiles than we can shoot back at, submarines that don't care for us and in general challenges to the idea that we control the sea. Which we should continue to do. Rehabilitate ASW, it is hurting. Murder the LCS. Want to see a littoral combat ship? Israeli Saar 4.5. It has more armament than most frigates and it is small and expendable. We need newer DDGs with the best missile systems we can field but also more than one gun tube per ship. In a future conflict I could see missiles quickly depleted by hostile missiles and drones. Then what? Oh, and maybe train our crews on effective and real fire fighting, skip a few sexual harassment gender identity workshops.
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I thought that hypercavitating torpedoes with nuke-warheads made US Navy battle groups obsolete.
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No one is "allowed" to put weapons in orbit according to various treaties. Is that correct?
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This reminds me of Millennium Challenge 2002- war games where the "bad guys" (playing the role of Iran) defeated the US navy using tons of missiles and tiny boats...
I am afraid the implications of this were ignored.
http://military.wikia.com/wiki/Millennium_Challenge_2002