High Low Weapons for Charis

Hi I was just reading about High Low propulsion weapons when I realized that they could be very useful for more than just grenades. They could use the High Low system for light weight field artillery which would come in very handy for how light weight they are allowing them to be moved about quite easily and allow them to deliver as much fire power as a heavy mortar in direct or indirect fire along the lines of the first weapon that used this principle, the 8 cm PAW 600.

While this would be much heavier than a mortar it would also have quite a bit longer range and it could provide direct fire support which could come in very handy and it would be fairly cheap to make thanks to the light weight of the barrel and the much reduced need for powder.

In addition the low recoil of this type of weapon could allow it to be mounted on merchant ships and give them more than enough fire power to take out any wooden hull privateer.

wiki article about this weapon: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/8_cm_PAW_600

If all they had was the original, smaller mortar I might agree with you. But the newer, larger mortar (can't remember it's designation) kind of fills the role you are describing. I don't have the stats in front of me, but I remember being really surprised how long ranged it was when it was described in the book.

Henry Brown wrote:If all they had was the original, smaller mortar I might agree with you. But the newer, larger mortar (can't remember it's designation) kind of fills the role you are describing. I don't have the stats in front of me, but I remember being really surprised how long ranged it was when it was described in the book.

they have a 4 mile range and the weapon I linked also has a four mile range. Of course it is the first weapon ever to use High Low tech so I would imagine that OWL could give them a much better design.

Now the type of weapon I am talking about is quite a bit more useful as you could load it with canister and it has a much longer range and it is also quite light weight allowing it to be used on merchant ships. Not to mention it would be a fairly cheap weapon and ammo for the capability of an angle gun. The only issue is making the High Low ammo but they are fairly simple.

captinjoehenry wrote:

Henry Brown wrote:If all they had was the original, smaller mortar I might agree with you. But the newer, larger mortar (can't remember it's designation) kind of fills the role you are describing. I don't have the stats in front of me, but I remember being really surprised how long ranged it was when it was described in the book.

they have a 4 mile range and the weapon I linked also has a four mile range. Of course it is the first weapon ever to use High Low tech so I would imagine that OWL could give them a much better design.

Now the type of weapon I am talking about is quite a bit more useful as you could load it with canister and it has a much longer range and it is also quite light weight allowing it to be used on merchant ships. Not to mention it would be a fairly cheap weapon and ammo for the capability of an angle gun. The only issue is making the High Low ammo but they are fairly simple.

How about something that can use ammo that's already in service? The French Brandt company makes a 60mm gun-mortar that can be drop-fired or breech loaded and has a range of approx 2.5 miles. While it will have much more recoil to deal with, the Charisian M97 shell has a range of 4 miles firing as a mortar. Firing as a direct fire weapon a gun-mortar should increase that by a good 50%.

doug941 wrote:

captinjoehenry wrote:
-SNIP-

they have a 4 mile range and the weapon I linked also has a four mile range. Of course it is the first weapon ever to use High Low tech so I would imagine that OWL could give them a much better design.

Now the type of weapon I am talking about is quite a bit more useful as you could load it with canister and it has a much longer range and it is also quite light weight allowing it to be used on merchant ships. Not to mention it would be a fairly cheap weapon and ammo for the capability of an angle gun. The only issue is making the High Low ammo but they are fairly simple.

How about something that can use ammo that's already in service? The French Brandt company makes a 60mm gun-mortar that can be drop-fired or breech loaded and has a range of approx 2.5 miles. While it will have much more recoil to deal with, the Charisian M97 shell has a range of 4 miles firing as a mortar. Firing as a direct fire weapon a gun-mortar should increase that by a good 50%.

Well the main reason I was suggesting this was due to the light weight of the weapon and the fact that this light weight weapon gives them the capability of a full blown angle gun in a much lighter package that can be much more widely used and moved due to its very light weight. And if the mortar is able to elevate to 45 degrees then it already has a max range as a gun and having it in a gun howitzer would just allow it to be used for direct fire.

captinjoehenry wrote:


How about something that can use ammo that's already in service? The French Brandt company makes a 60mm gun-mortar that can be drop-fired or breech loaded and has a range of approx 2.5 miles. While it will have much more recoil to deal with, the Charisian M97 shell has a range of 4 miles firing as a mortar. Firing as a direct fire weapon a gun-mortar should increase that by a good 50%.

Well the main reason I was suggesting this was due to the light weight of the weapon and the fact that this light weight weapon gives them the capability of a full blown angle gun in a much lighter package that can be much more widely used and moved due to its very light weight. And if the mortar is able to elevate to 45 degrees then it already has a max range as a gun and having it in a gun howitzer would just allow it to be used for direct fire.[/quote]

You would have tradeoffs with either option. The high-low system would be lighter but you would have to design, trial and make all new ammo for it. The gun-mortar would be heavier but would use off-the-shelf ammo. The Brandt 60 weighs in at a whopping 165 lbs, the PAW 600 weighed 1,410 lbs for a 8cm barrel, and anybodies guess what a gun-mortar compatible with the M97 would weigh.

doug941 wrote:

captinjoehenry wrote:


How about something that can use ammo that's already in service? The French Brandt company makes a 60mm gun-mortar that can be drop-fired or breech loaded and has a range of approx 2.5 miles. While it will have much more recoil to deal with, the Charisian M97 shell has a range of 4 miles firing as a mortar. Firing as a direct fire weapon a gun-mortar should increase that by a good 50%.

Well the main reason I was suggesting this was due to the light weight of the weapon and the fact that this light weight weapon gives them the capability of a full blown angle gun in a much lighter package that can be much more widely used and moved due to its very light weight. And if the mortar is able to elevate to 45 degrees then it already has a max range as a gun and having it in a gun howitzer would just allow it to be used for direct fire.

You would have tradeoffs with either option. The high-low system would be lighter but you would have to design, trial and make all new ammo for it. The gun-mortar would be heavier but would use off-the-shelf ammo. The Brandt 60 weighs in at a whopping 165 lbs, the PAW 600 weighed 1,410 lbs for a 8cm barrel, and anybodies guess what a gun-mortar compatible with the M97 would weigh.[/quote]

That is true but the design of High Low ammo is actually fairly simple. So once they get the basic idea of it with OWL's help they should be able to fairly easily begin to produce High Low weapon systems. Another advantage of High Low weapons is that they would have much higher muzzle velocity compared to what you are suggesting which would give them a whole lot more uses. Not to mention the fact that High Low weapons use a very small amount of powder which is bound to be a good thing for Charis with their so far low production of smokeless powder.

One thought that just occurred to me has to do with how a High Low weapon accelerates its projectile. Mainly it is a consistent acceleration instead of all at once. This not only reduces recoil but it might have low enough acceleration to permit firing of TNT shells! That would be a big help but I am not sure if High Low weapons have low enough acceleration to do the trick.