Pulsar Ballistics

TFLYTSNBN wrote:
Well this is disappointing. Only 2,000 meters per second muzzle velocity from a pulsar pistol. Heck, the sabot rounds from an Abrahms tank is about 1,400 meters per second.

It is interesting as well as easy to estimate the average recoil force from a full auto Pulsar. They come in various calibers and projectile masses. Assume a projectile mass of about 23 grains or about 1.5 grams, a muzzle velocity of 2,000 meters per second, and a fitting rate of 600 rounds per minute or 10 rounds per second.

The mass flow rate is then 15 grams per second or .015 kg per second. Multiply by muzzle velocity of 2,000 meters per second and you get a recoil force of 30 Newtons. This is the equivalent of a 3 kilogram weight in a one gee gravity field.

TFLYTSNBN wrote:Well this is disappointing. Only 2,000 meters per second muzzle velocity from a pulsar pistol. Heck, the sabot rounds from an Abrahms tank is about 1,400 meters per second.

It is interesting as well as easy to estimate the average recoil force from a full auto Pulsar. They come in various calibers and projectile masses. Assume a projectile mass of about 23 grains or about 1.5 grams, a muzzle velocity of 2,000 meters per second, and a fitting rate of 600 rounds per minute or 10 rounds per second.

The mass flow rate is then 15 grams per second or .015 kg per second. Multiply by muzzle velocity of 2,000 meters per second and you get a recoil force of 30 Newtons. This is the equivalent of a 3 kilogram weight in a one gee gravity field.

jtg452 wrote:
Modern handgun ammunition rarely exceeds Mach 1.2 or 1.3 (14-1500fps), so a 4 fold increase in velocity would have a tremendous impact on any calculations.

On the other hand, RFC's pulsers are reliant on that velocity to do any sort of damage since the projectiles themselves are extremely light weight. Modern ammunition still has enough projectile weight that momentum retention has an impact on penetration. Mass (weight) retains momentum. Light weight bullets need higher velocities because they shed that momentum faster. A softball rolling on the ground can be stopped by putting your foot on it. Doing the same with a 4 pounder cannon ball leads to the loss of the foot.

Low velocity rounds as the 19th Century buffalo gun rounds (which had muzzle velocities equal to modern handgun rounds but were using bullets that weighed 4 times more) had such remarkable penetration abilities. Muzzle velocities of 12-1400fps were common- yet they were used to kill off the American bison to the point of extinction in little more than a decade.

Your own numbers quoted above put a pulser dart's weight at about 2/3 that of the most common .22LR bullet. At that weight, it had better have some serious velocity if it's going to have any sort of effectiveness down range.

On Basilisk Station wrote:his pulser turret was already in action, each barrel spitting fifteen-millimeter explosive darts cased in ceramic frag jackets at a cyclical rate of over a thousand rounds per minute.

Short Victorious War wrote:The carefully phrased "leaks" Jessup had arranged to test-flight the idea had provoked riots in virtually every Prole housing unit, and, two months later, Kanamashi had put twelve explosive pulser darts into Frankel's chest, requiring a closed-coffin state funeral.

Field of Dishonor wrote:Explosive darts ripped their way up the stairs the waiters had used—the stairs Nimitz would have used—and shredded the end of the dining platform, and Neufsteiler cried out as a jagged splinter drove into his back.
[...]A sawed-off pulse rifle flew through the air as LaFollet's target went down, but someone was still firing.

House of Steel wrote:The standard shoulder arm of the RMMC is the M32 series grav pulse rifle in 4 x 37 mm caliber. The M32A5, introduced in 1918 PD, is the latest variant of this versatile weapon system. The M32 has two magazine wells, each of which will accommodate a single hundred-round magazine. Pulser darts come in two basic varieties: a solid, non-explosive, antipersonnel round and a superdense, explosive round designed for antiarmor or general suppressive fire. A shorter carbine version, the M19, is designed for shipboard use. The standard sidearm carried by officers is the M7 pulser and its short-barreled variant the M9.

Cauldron of Ghosts wrote:The side hatch of a cargo van parked near the garage exit slid open as the limousine approached. The 10 mm heavy tri-barrel pulser positioned within the cargo compartment began firing as soon as the limousine came in sight. The weapon was firing super-dense 65 gram explosive rounds with a maximum rate of fire of up to 3,000 RPM (1,000 per barrel).

More Than Honor wrote:The pinnace screamed up in a near-vertical turn, passing near the scarred, smoking side of the Committee tower, then looped over again and began another run down the Avenue of the People. This time she was working from the rear of the crowd forward, towards the building the mob had hoped to overrun. To either side of her nose heavy tri-barrel pulsers raved in long spears of white light, sending thousands of heavy explosive projectiles down into the street below.

jtg452 wrote:Modern handgun ammunition rarely exceeds Mach 1.2 or 1.3 (14-1500fps), so a 4 fold increase in velocity would have a tremendous impact on any calculations.

On the other hand, RFC's pulsers are reliant on that velocity to do any sort of damage since the projectiles themselves are extremely light weight. Modern ammunition still has enough projectile weight that momentum retention has an impact on penetration. Mass (weight) retains momentum. Light weight bullets need higher velocities because they shed that momentum faster. A softball rolling on the ground can be stopped by putting your foot on it. Doing the same with a 4 pounder cannon ball leads to the loss of the foot.

Low velocity rounds as the 19th Century buffalo gun rounds (which had muzzle velocities equal to modern handgun rounds but were using bullets that weighed 4 times more) had such remarkable penetration abilities. Muzzle velocities of 12-1400fps were common- yet they were used to kill off the American bison to the point of extinction in little more than a decade.

Your own numbers quoted above put a pulser dart's weight at about 2/3 that of the most common .22LR bullet. At that weight, it had better have some serious velocity if it's going to have any sort of effectiveness down range.

Jonathan_S wrote:Well, reliant on velocity when shooting solid darts - they also have explosive darts; which wouldn't rely as much on velocity and terminal ballistics for damage.
Though in something as tiny as a pulsar sidearm's dart they'd probably need much a more powerful explosives that any explosive round/shell we have today in order to get any useful effect out of it.

On Basilisk Station wrote:his pulser turret was already in action, each barrel spitting fifteen-millimeter explosive darts cased in ceramic frag jackets at a cyclical rate of over a thousand rounds per minute.

Short Victorious War wrote:The carefully phrased "leaks" Jessup had arranged to test-flight the idea had provoked riots in virtually every Prole housing unit, and, two months later, Kanamashi had put twelve explosive pulser darts into Frankel's chest, requiring a closed-coffin state funeral.

Field of Dishonor wrote:Explosive darts ripped their way up the stairs the waiters had used—the stairs Nimitz would have used—and shredded the end of the dining platform, and Neufsteiler cried out as a jagged splinter drove into his back.
[...]A sawed-off pulse rifle flew through the air as LaFollet's target went down, but someone was still firing.

House of Steel wrote:The standard shoulder arm of the RMMC is the M32 series grav pulse rifle in 4 x 37 mm caliber. The M32A5, introduced in 1918 PD, is the latest variant of this versatile weapon system. The M32 has two magazine wells, each of which will accommodate a single hundred-round magazine. Pulser darts come in two basic varieties: a solid, non-explosive, antipersonnel round and a superdense, explosive round designed for antiarmor or general suppressive fire. A shorter carbine version, the M19, is designed for shipboard use. The standard sidearm carried by officers is the M7 pulser and its short-barreled variant the M9.

Cauldron of Ghosts wrote:The side hatch of a cargo van parked near the garage exit slid open as the limousine approached. The 10 mm heavy tri-barrel pulser positioned within the cargo compartment began firing as soon as the limousine came in sight. The weapon was firing super-dense 65 gram explosive rounds with a maximum rate of fire of up to 3,000 RPM (1,000 per barrel).

However I'm not sure if the pistol-sized pulsers have them too - in HotQ and SVW we get a couple explicit mentions of a pistol/sidearm pulser being loaded with or firing non-explosive darts. But I don't know if the reason non-explosive was explicitly mentioned was because they're also capable of firing explosive ones, or if that was just intended to contrast with the explosive dart ammo available for the larger pulser based weapon.

tlb wrote:Interesting that only the explosive rounds are described as super dense, while the others might be ceramic. Although a ceramic that incorporated osmium might be very dense also. However, as has been pointed out, anything too dense would make the extremely rapid fire difficult to control without some Honorverse "magic".

PS. I expect the police have explosive rounds available for the bigger guns in their rapid response squads, but not for general issue to cops on the beat.

M32A1 Pulse Rifle The standard shoulder arm of the RMMC is the M32A1 grav-pulse rifle in 4x37 mm caliber. The M32 has 2 magazine wells, each of which will accommodate a single 100-round magazine. A standard M13 power cell is inserted behind the magazines, and provides power for the weapon, targeting subsystem and any attachments.
Pulser darts come in two standard varieties: a solid, non-explosive, anti-personnel round and a super-dense, explosive round designed for anti-armor or general suppressive fire. The M32 is designed to accept one magazine of each and to switch back and forth between them at will. Conversely, the weapon may be loaded with 2 magazines of the same round, providing 200 rounds of fire without reloading.

The M32 operates as a linear-feed grav coil weapon, with few
moving parts aside from the magazine selection mechanism.
Muzzle velocity is adjustable up to a standard of 2,200 meters per second. The rate of fire is user configurable up to a maximum of 2500 RPM with a default setting of 400 RPM for full automatic fire and 2000 RPM for a 3-round burst.

The M76 Electronic Sight consists of a laser designator and
rangefinder, combination visual, IR and low-light sensor and a
multifunction display. Standard day mode is a reflex sight with an IR signature overlay for signatures above a preset threshold level. Additional modes are available for different attachments, such as the grenade launcher, with computed ranging, airburst and ballistic information relevant to the type of round being fired. The maximum effective range is 3,000 meters in one standard gravity, but opportunities to take advantage of such ranges are rare in combat.

jtg452 wrote:When ya'll pick one subject, I'll pipe back in.

tlb wrote:

jtg452 wrote:When ya'll pick one subject, I'll pipe back in.

Don't hold your breath, it is extremely rare for a thread to fail to explore side issues. Too bad in a way, because your post was useful. But you should have seen that coming in, since this thread already included comments on the prehistoric extinction of the mega-fauna in North America.

jtg452 wrote:

TFLYTSNBN wrote:Well this is disappointing. Only 2,000 meters per second muzzle velocity from a pulsar pistol. Heck, the sabot rounds from an Abrahms tank is about 1,400 meters per second.

It is interesting as well as easy to estimate the average recoil force from a full auto Pulsar. They come in various calibers and projectile masses. Assume a projectile mass of about 23 grains or about 1.5 grams, a muzzle velocity of 2,000 meters per second, and a fitting rate of 600 rounds per minute or 10 rounds per second.

The mass flow rate is then 15 grams per second or .015 kg per second. Multiply by muzzle velocity of 2,000 meters per second and you get a recoil force of 30 Newtons. This is the equivalent of a 3 kilogram weight in a one gee gravity field.

Modern handgun ammunition rarely exceeds Mach 1.2 or 1.3 (14-1500fps), so a 4 fold increase in velocity would have a tremendous impact on any calculations.

On the other hand, RFC's pulsers are reliant on that velocity to do any sort of damage since the projectiles themselves are extremely light weight. Modern ammunition still has enough projectile weight that momentum retention has an impact on penetration. Mass (weight) retains momentum. Light weight bullets need higher velocities because they shed that momentum faster. A softball rolling on the ground can be stopped by putting your foot on it. Doing the same with a 4 pounder cannon ball leads to the loss of the foot.

Low velocity rounds as the 19th Century buffalo gun rounds (which had muzzle velocities equal to modern handgun rounds but were using bullets that weighed 4 times more) had such remarkable penetration abilities. Muzzle velocities of 12-1400fps were common- yet they were used to kill off the American bison to the point of extinction in little more than a decade.

Your own numbers quoted above put a pulser dart's weight at about 2/3 that of the most common .22LR bullet. At that weight, it had better have some serious velocity if it's going to have any sort of effectiveness down range.