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mircea_popescu: the large guns, esp of ww1, are an utterly lulzy subject of anthropology.
mircea_popescu: and yes the chamber varied, so they had a "top-up" propellant depot nearby
mircea_popescu: yup. fired like 50 shots, send the barrel back to krupp
mircea_popescu: no pretty sure the germans had ordnance in numeric order
mircea_popescu: so much so the projectiles fired were actually of increased caliber over time
mircea_popescu: fun fact : the large cannons, much like the rail guns, actually wore down considerable metal off the barrel
mircea_popescu: well, so in 60 years "de impliniri marete" we got from 50 to 200 mile railroad artillery. only costs about 5000x. neat.
mircea_popescu: mats ah i guess you're right, it never went past 50 mi.
mircea_popescu: so yes, there is ONE possibly useful application of a military railgun : making the deep space interdictor. but this is slight.
☟︎ mircea_popescu: and this isn't "in orbit". too much friction there. this is in outer space.
mircea_popescu: that's the point here. a 10 gram pellet that got accelerated for 200kJ is now moving at 5km/s
mircea_popescu: think what speed you'd have to have to bother me angularily at that distance.
mircea_popescu: no, the point is, the dust in the rings of saturn doesn't enter spontaneous fusion because it all moves ~the same direction and ~the same speed. so sure, leave it there, it'll make a nice bing sound as it hits the outer casing.
mircea_popescu: asciilifeform it means that they never hit you with a speed in excess of say 100m/s. and if they do, it's goodnight
mircea_popescu: note however that rubish is mostly stationary, and ships move kinda slowly. whereas railgun allows very fast pellets.
mircea_popescu: asciilifeform supposedly this is a battlefield far, far away.
mircea_popescu: and your 100kw won't actually allow you to make a laser strong enough to cut al alloy or w/e ther fuck i use.
mircea_popescu: well... you gotta aim more precisely than i do ; and light-matter interaction is much weaker than matter-matter
mircea_popescu: let's agree that a hit means an interaction which delivers 1MJ ; let's agree we start our engagement 1mn km apart.
mircea_popescu: now then. you happy with 100 kW per each of your 15 zergs ?
mircea_popescu: i fire them at a rate of three a minute, meaning each 10 gram pellet acquires an energy of 200kJ
mircea_popescu: alright. i shall employ this to accelerate 10 gram pellets ; at the usual loss of 99.99% i will then have available 10kW for my pellets.
mircea_popescu: ok. so for the interdictor : can i have 1 MW of power ?
mircea_popescu: long range artillery is if i can bombard washington from vancouver.
mircea_popescu: 200mi is not long range artillery. railroad artillery of ww2 vintage shot that far.
mircea_popescu: you could actually make bullets shoot 10x as fast as they do now. it's not worth doing.
mircea_popescu: mats how long range any item is depends on air friction and little else.
mircea_popescu: em is very expensive. think : i want to shoot a ship 5500 km away. how do you em it ?
mircea_popescu: ben_vulpes expensive ; yes. but comparable to trying alternative weapon systems. whereas on earth - not comparable.
mircea_popescu: space encounters also have much easier a time hitting targets.
mircea_popescu: spaceships suffer very much from the problem of transformers discussed ealier - no practical way to armor them.
mircea_popescu: ben_vulpes the "interdictor" is this item which has a railgun, a supply of pellets, and a huge array of solar panels etc to power them. this item can then shoot fast pellets towards any other ship, crippling it.
☟︎ mircea_popescu: mats it hasn't been understated by me, last we discussed this.
mircea_popescu: (the outer space idea being that you get up there a thing with immense rtg / solar panels, and a supply of bb shells. because far from heavy grav fields (as per definition of outer space) all shots are guided by default - you just gotta get close enough. fast flying bb projectile hitting the other ship is ~doom.)
mircea_popescu: actually, it's only suitable in outer space fights, and even there very dubious.
mircea_popescu: they dun really have the proper buckshot-lattice firing devices up and running, but nature will teach all.
mircea_popescu: no. this is jules verne stuff. dun work as per 1800s maffs.
mircea_popescu: ben_vulpes of the total energy available to the projectile, some % is given at launch and some % is given in flight. if you got a bullet (100-0) ballistics dun work. if you got a missile (0-100) ballistics work
mircea_popescu: ballstic works for missiles, not for "10km/s at muzzle and no self power" railgun ammo
mircea_popescu: it's a dynamic pressure problem - on the bottom it's high on the top it's low, your projectile trajectory curves badly.
mircea_popescu: nono. think. railgun is a direct fire superfast projectile. if its target is not taller than 1m above "waterline", both the "ground effect" of flying so close to water and the actual wave/spray will make your trajectory impossible.
mircea_popescu: (railgun is not useful as ballistic fire, because well, air friction ; as short range direct fire it has the obvious problem : your firing platform kinda has to be afloat too.)
mircea_popescu: this is ~already the logical trend ; and used in some applications (the ones where idiots and imbeciles weren't involved)
mircea_popescu: mats by becoming <1meter above water. waves will protect you.
mircea_popescu lolz at the notion of a railgun array. because slow to fire and not really directionable.
mircea_popescu: china got infinite slaves. usg got infinite expectations. you know, like elliot, peace be upon his name.
mircea_popescu: any of them whipped today ? any of them dead from whipping this morn ?
mircea_popescu: slavers my foot. any of them naked ? any of them work when dun feel like it ?
mircea_popescu: asciilifeform we're not discussing the aspie 14% fantasy here. usg dun got no money nor any workers.
mircea_popescu: aegis being, of course, the one remaining "us superiority" item.
mircea_popescu: mats yeah, except the usg is in no position to offer anyone anything. but w/e, all sorts of charlies ready to suicide, so.
mircea_popescu: i dun imagine teh isis can afford to lose their only port.
mircea_popescu: on the other side, desperation tends to paint the map - they're now considering whether to declare az, georgia or utah blue.
mircea_popescu: o hey check it out, gingrich and giuliani backing up the democrat election fraud trump thing.
mircea_popescu: but hey, references from their own subreddit are apparently wikiplopedic now.