The US Navy's Newest BFG

/media/news/22971/0.jpg

Late last year, the United States Navy took delivery of a 32-megajoule rail gun at its Surface Warfare Center in Dahlgren, VA.

Rail guns, like laser weapons, are something out of the science-fiction world. Projectiles are driven by electrically-charged magnets, accelerating them to extremely high speeds without the use of a chemical propellant like gun powder or rocket fuel.

Yesterday the Navy completed a test run of the weapon, firing a 90mm round at 8,270 feet per second, or 5,640mph (source did not cite this information), at 10 megajoules - only a third of the gun’s potential power.

Unfortunately for the Navy (and rail gun enthusiasts), the weapons have a few limitations.

… drawing on tremendous amounts of electricity to generate the current for each test shot. That, of course, is the problem with rail guns: Like lasers, they’re out of step with modern-day generators and capacitors.

…

Effective rail guns will require a major breakthrough in materials between now and 2020, to keep the guns themselves from being shredded by each high-velocity barrage.

The Navy hopes to have a future version installed on their DDG 100 destroyers, or the DDG's next-generation older brother the CG(X), by around 2025. Such a weapon would be able to hit a target 200 miles away with GPS-enabled rounds at a possible speeds of Mach 5 or more.

punk assumes there will be no duck and cover.

web address: http://suicidegirls.com/news/geek/22971/The-US-Navys-Newest-BFG/