After many years, one of my posts finally made it to Slashdot's front page. The story is about the Navy's new 8-Megajoule Rail Gun, built by BEA Systems and recently tested at the Navy Surface Warfare Center in Dahlgren, Virginia.
The Slashdot comments were typical; lots of people commenting without having read the article. Still, a couple of insightful people had a thread on launch loops that is worth reading. I'm sure most people stop reading the paper when they see "Launch track, 2000 km long" :)
Rail guns have been one of those weapons talked about for over 20 years it seems. One of the main problems I've always heard in the past is that the rails are only good for a small number of shots before they are done for. I wonder if they've gotten around this problem. As the energy levels go up, I'd guess this issue would get magnified as well.
ReplyDelete"The Slashdot comments were typical; lots of people commenting without having read the article." -- thank goodness someone else noticed that annoying phenomenon!
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