NationStates Jolt Archive

Top-Secret Sharina Military Bulletin:

The Sharina Technocracy has begun researching the possibility of replacing all naval, artillery, and tank guns with Hypervelocity Guns, which is a much more effective weapon than railguns in terms of cost, durability, maintainence, and practicality. This project is estimated to provide Sharina with the additional firepower necessary to overwhelm the constantly evolving armor schemes of today's world.

http://img338.imageshack.us/img338/3833/hypergun15tj.png

Sharina has already constructed an experimental Hypervelocity Gun that is capable of firing projectiles at 20 kilometers per second, or equalivent to Mach 10, giving it speeds comparable to ICBM missiles and railgun rounds. There are several major advantages to the Hypervelocity Gun over a railgun system.

1. There is far less wear and tear upon the barrel than a railgun. A railgun gun barrel must be replaced after several firings, which could become relatively expensive to do so. A Hypervelocity Gun does not suffer this problem, which should reduce costs by a large factor.

2. There is no enormous power requirements necessary to operate the Hypervelocity Gun, unlike a railgun. It is possible to mount several Hypervelocity Guns for the same amount of power as a railgun of a similiar caliber.

3. The Hypervelocity Gun does not need exotic materials in its construction, while railguns do. This reduces costs and increases manufacturing efficiency by several orders of magnitude, as there will be no need to fabricate expensive alloys such as carbon nanotubes, while decreasing the costs and difficulty of repair efforts.

4. The Hypervelocity Gun can achieve similiar speeds as the railgun. This allows the Hypervelocity Gun to offer much more firepower, flexibility, and cost efficiency than railguns, due to the ability to construct and maintain more Hypervelocity Guns per unit than for railguns.

Research is being undertaken on naval and ground based Hypervelocity Guns. A Hypervelocity artillery cannon, SDI system, anti-air defense system, and anti-missile system projects are being considered, as the Hypervelocity Gun shows great promise in a wide range of military applications.

Once Sharina incorporates Hypervelocity Guns within its military, even the vaunted extreme-armored tanks and naval dreadnoughts will have met their match.

[End Report]

==================================================

OOC comments and feedback are appreciated!

This is an atrocity how can you develop these weapons?! What goes around comes aroun and you will be against enemies with such technology. Rail guns are bad enough. There have been hundreds of massacres and genocides brought about by these horific weapons. We beg to disarm and help end the global arms trade.

The people of freedom in tibet

CHINA OUT OF TIBET!

From: Manfred Sieger, Weapons Engineer, DA (Antarctica)
To: Whom it may concern, Sharina
Subject: Hypervelocity Guns

Greetings,

I'm interested in a few clarifications. First of all, is it firing at Mach 10 (Likely) or at 20km/s (Which would be equivalent to about Mach 60, depending on altitude)? I'm sure that scientists so brilliant as to construct a system that can reach this kind of velocity with mere gas compression (Read: exactly what normals gun work with) wouldn't make this typo.

Second, standard ICBM velocity is usually about mach 28, and decidedly below escape velocity (About 11km/s). I'm curious. Did I miss Sharina developig Interplanetary Ballistic Missiles, which would, of course, manage escape velocity? Or are Sharina's ICBMs merely slow, as in, Mach 10 slow?

Third, comparable to what kind of railgun? I know of nations with experimental railguns that manage about 5km/s for a singledigit gram projectile, and I know of others which pull off a hundred km/s with ninety ton projectiles. Which kind of railgun did you base your comparison on?

Fourth, the gas pressure necessary to produce the kind of velocity would still result in excessive 'wear and tear', eventually exploding te barrel. Do you mean that your nations' scientists & engineers are simply incapable of producing a railgun that can withstand the magnetic forces, and instead use a barrel that, though vulnerable to said magnetic forces, is capable of withstanding sheer gas pressure?

Fifth, has conservation of energy been outlawed in Sharina? I'm almost certain that you just get your energy from elsewhere, detonating a charge far in excess of everything 'normal' guns manage, eventually using the low density of hydrogen for a small advantage when compared to 'normal' gunpowder gasses (Assuming that the disadvantage of propelling more mass is comparatively insignificant)? Of course, this still means that you have to carry gunpowder AND hydrogen, both of which tend to be annoyingly explosive, with the hydrogen needing to be pressurised, which in turn requires exceptionally high quality (And thus, expensive) barrels, while at the same time introducing a significantly more complex reloading process that a) takes longer and b) is prone to maintenance issues?

Sixth, I outright disbelieve that a hyperpressure (Yes, right, 'velocity', as little sense as it makes) gun doesn't require exotic materials. I'm fairly certain that you wouldn't like the gun bursting from the sheer pressure.

Seventh, cheaper construction has been sort-of-addressed above, and with regards to fexibility, well... Why?

And again, compared to which kind of railgun?

Sincerely,

Manfred Sieger

OOC: I already use them, under the name Gas Guns, with a few changes/notes:

-Instead of gunpowder to move the piston, I use either compressed air or a linear electric motor. This reduces the complexity of the autoloading systems so you don't need seperate gunpowder charges and bullets feeding in different places.

-Instead of hydrogen, I use some form of explosive liquid vapor (of a type that only detonates under high pressure(an extremely high octane rating)), for ease of storage and power density. Remember; hydrogen is a gas and not a terribly powerful fuel per weight.

-I use a springloaded crank type device to insure the piston doesn't hit the front of the cylinder, that also allows it to use some of its energy to recycle (meaning less compressed air/electricity for the next shot if autofiring).

-Gas-Guns are larger than normal guns but their velocity is higher, therefore it makes more sense to use smaller calibers.

-In the field, for gritty things like tanks, etc. you shouldn't expect to get Mach 10 shots off. Most of the time, Gas Guns should just be getting maybe twice or three times normal cannon velocity, because its much easier to maintain a lower performance model. For SDI, go for the gold.

Top Secret Sharina Military Bulletin:

Sharina has determined that 20 km/s is an achievable goal, given that the Japanese have been building a Hypervelocity Gun that is capable of this.

The mathematician that had been converting data has been reprimanded for his error. He calculated 60 seconds / minute instead of 3600 seconds / hour. He has revised his calculation from Mach 10, roughly 10,000 km/h to the correct calculation of 72,000 km/h. This would be roughly equalivent to Mach 70+, a speed unparalleled in modern warfare.

In light of this revised calculation, the promise of Hypervelocity Guns has increased. The correct calculations have indicated that Hypervelocity Guns are capable of surpassing railguns by several factors without the inherent problems of railguns.

Sharina ICBM's travel at Mach 10 - 15, as Sharina has yet to develop hyper-velocity missile systems. Research into the applications of the Hypervelocity Gun technologies might enable Sharina to achieve Mach 20+ speeds with its missiles at some point in the near-future.

Sharina has been making comparisons to railguns technologies of 2000 - 2020. Sharina has yet to ecounter railguns capable of launching projectiles capable of breaking the 10,000 meters per second speeds documented. At any rate, the problems of reliable railguns are insurmontable at this point in time, due to the problems and extreme expenses of exotic materials, constant replacement of gun barrels, and colossal energy requirements.

Research is being undertaken on a viable material, gas, and propellant for the Hypervelocity Guns to achieve high-end velocities of its shells and ordiance.

[End Report]

============================================

OOC: Reference here...

Astrobiology in Japan

Author: Seiji Sugita and Takafumi Matsui

We are currently working on establishing a nation-wide Astrobiology program in Japan. Although there has not been an official astrobiology program so far, there is a large body of researchers actively involved in astrobiological research in Japan. The coverage of the research is very wide, ranging from organic chemistry, paleontology, field geology, geochemistry, planetary science, and astronomy. Combining our expertise, we have been studying astobiological problems, such as the formation of our own and other planetary systems, the evolution of hydrospheres of Earth and other planets, and the origin and evolution of life.
In fact, we have a number of ongoing key research projects in these fields of science. For example, University of Tokyo is building a hypervelocity gun facility (V ~ 20 km/s) in order to study the chemical effect of impacts of asteroids and comets on early Earth and other planets.

(snip)

University of Tokyo

Note the bold and underline emphasis, the (V = 20 km/s) in the quote. This can be found here at the following link....

http://nai.arc.nasa.gov/ec/ec_meeting_03272004_abstracts.cfm


This aside, keep in mind, this is a work in progress. I don't have those 20 km/s Hypervelocity Guns already built and ready to go. I'm working out the problems and issues, and I'm designing this within a 2005 - 2030 timeframe (start in 2005 because of the abovementioned Japanese gun).

Top-Secret Sharina Research Report 2-A:

Sharina engineers have proposed a process that utilizes the controlled release of energy from combustion of natural gas and air to compact powders at high pressures, upwards of 150 tsi. This eclipses the previous attempts at firing shells at a slower and gentler loading rate, providing Sharina engineers with a glimmering hope that the extreme pressure problem may be solved.

In this new process, three steps are employed. At first, the Hypervelocity Gun chamber is filled with a mix of gas and air at high pressure. Second, during the filling phase, the piston is moved down, pre-compressing and removing air from the powder in question. Finally, the gas supply is closed and ignited, causing the pressure to drastically rise to the maximum of 150 tsi, compressing the powder to its final form for the actual firing process.

This new process is based on utilizing the direct conversion of chemical energy to produce compaction. The process inherently include a pre-compaction step preparing the powder for the final compaction load.

This method shall be researched more throughly, as Sharina engineers hammer out the specifications, correct compositions, and hammer out any flaws in the design. This could be a bold step forward in the Hypervelocity Gun, or HVG, project.

[End Report]

(My only thing is, all those research gas-guns and whatnot are massive things, the one at the Lawrence Livermore Lab is 20m long and only gets up to 8km/s. I basically wouldn't expect super high velocity out of portable type stuff...)

(My only thing is, all those research gas-guns and whatnot are massive things, the one at the Lawrence Livermore Lab is 20m long and only gets up to 8km/s. I basically wouldn't expect super high velocity out of portable type stuff...)

OOC:

Probably not. However, I'm looking for a ceiling of 3 - 5 km/s for tank and APC sized Hypervelocity Guns (HVG), 7 - 8 km/s for artillery versions, 10 km/s for anti-air and anti-missile versions, and 10 - 15 km/s for naval versions (naval ones can be huge due to the space available on naval ships).