Rail guns: the future?

A rail gun is not a particularly practical space based weapon because of the amount of power required. That, and it's basically overkill when there is already that much gravitational potential energy available from orbit.

Railguns and other types of energy weapons, such as those which boil the water on the surface of the skin to cause extreme discomfort (already in use) are the most likely future of weaponry.

That, and while it's becoming harder and harder to keep secrets, it's a good idea to always assume that any publicized military tech is 8-10 years behind what the R&D people are actually working on.

Case in point: the F-117. First flight in '81, operational '83, acknowledged to exist and revealed to the world in '88
 
The magnetic currents are on either side of the barrel of the gun, and it launches a pure metal projectile because the magnetics kinda pull it up and out of the barrel at ridiculous speeds. like mach 7.
 
I'MA FIRIN MAH RAILGUN...
firinglazers.jpg
 
This thread is fun. As far as the State of the Union, it's pretty solid knowledge that there are multiple escape routes that go well underground, specifically deep enough to not be effected by a nuclear attack. Now, a rain gun? Not sure if they're up to speed on that.

Lets talk lateral damage from a rail gun. I live 2 miles outside of DC, about 10 miles from the white house. I understand that everything I know and love will be obliterated from a nuclear attack, but what about a rail gun? I'm trying to picture it in my mind, would it just physically destroy whatever is its target and maybe some surrounding stuff via explosions etc, or are we talking huge cloud of dust that goes barreling out in a circle and wrecks everything withing a 50 mile radius? Picture when Soron 'dies' in the Fellowship of the Ring, but on a more devastating level.

What about even more large scale damage from a rail gun, similar to a large earthquake? Are we looking at severe damage throughout the whole mid-atlantic?
 
You know that scene in Independance day where the giant alien spaceship goes in and goes "I'MA FIRIN MA LAZARR" all over the white house?

Think that.
 
Hmm... Thats what I was thinking, and surely the scene causes anxiety, but I just watched that clip, and at the end of the clip the hole is only one or two miles wide. Can we speculate on some numbers here? Is the huge dust cloud explosion that results just going to be more visually stimulating or actually catastrophic? Heres the clip, I only found a french version but the actual meteor strike is around 1:10

 
Thats pretty crazy it seems like it would take a huge amount of resources to develop though and I don't see what advantages it would provide over conventional munitions.
 
Same way as a bullet train works. The round is magentised, and there are rings of electromagnets in the in the barrel of the gun. The rings of electromagnets fluctuate between positive and negative polarity, which attracts and repels the round. Doing this in quick enough succession accelerates the round. Very similar to the way the Large Hadron Collider works.
 
the rail guns that exist thus far would destroy like a house and then some. the whole Rod from God thing in the article i posted earlier would essentially be a nuclear blast without radiation poising, with a 8.0 super concentrated earthquake right after.
 
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that fire is just from the projectile, its moving so fast that the friction it creates with the air is enough to create a flame/explosion. its like a metior crashing through the earths atmosphere.
 
that shit's fucked.. there's no way NASA or really anyone can explain anything in that video and relate it to current technology.

That wasn't a dust particle, it was a large object miles and miles away, and NASA never even tried to explain the streak of light. It's not a shooting star, it CAME FROM THE EARTH.

And the bright globe thing and the 3 relative objects above the lightning storm (which was pretty cool by the way) are either super advanced military vehicles (..this isn't video games I really doubt it), or aliens? ahhhhhhhhhhh mindfuck
 
That wouldnt be from a rail gun, but more from the giant tungsten rods fired from space. Which are not rail guns, just really heavy things that go fast because of gravity and are super dense so they dig big holes in the ground.
 
The human race will kill ourselves off before we have a chance to colonize in space. Its all a matter of time I'd say probably 200 - 400 years left.
 
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