Chinese Outflank US Navy, Develop First Railgun for Ready for Warships

a reply to: StallionDuck

A $10M reduction isn't evidence that they plan to do anything but shoot more targets, not actually put it to use, or even test it on a ship.

a reply to: StallionDuck

Yes. That video is just a repackaged ancient piece. It talks about the railgun going to sea in 2016...and it hasn't and we're two years past that deadline. Now they are not talking about putting it out to sea until AT LEAST next year.

The Navy has dithered and its cost us a huge lead.

a reply to: TonyS

You're indignation puts you into another collection of folks. So, another collective. However, your response fits the original assignment very well. Thank you for your cooperation.

Nuclear weapons are generally considered a step too far. It's total war then. A weapon of mass destruction. You can't use that in a limited confrontation, say, in the South China Sea. Not every time you want to use force ought to have world ending potential.

The Dreadnought when it was commissioned made every battlewagon before it obsolete. In this case, it would make every surface ship obsolete.

And I do differ with Zaph on whether or not a railgun would be good for killing missiles: I think it'll be good as an intermediate range killer. Say, from 30 nm to 60 nm: at Mach 7, it can close that distance at ~20 seconds for the short range and ~40 seconds at long range. With this iteration, at 70 miles might be a touch too far. Closer and you might as well use a laser.

Yeah not on anything moving near that kind of velocity and kinetic kill system is much harder to defend against sea sparrows and the CWIS will not be able to target it and even if the CWIS managed to land a few rounds it’s highly doubtful that it’s going to alter the course significantly i.e not enough to defend a surface combatant. Not to mention the speed and size of the the projectile will make it extremely difficulty to be detected even by SPY-1 equipped destroyers and cruisers, and the time from detection would be too short to get a firing solution even if the CWIS was set to automatic attack and not controlled by a weapons system operator. Missile that fast are already a huge problem a minuscule in comparison projectile will make defense extremely problematic.

a reply to: anzha

Look at the problems the EKV has had. And that's in vacuum. You're talking in thick atmosphere, where air resistance has to be taken into account. That's going to make the equations that much more complicated.

originally posted by: TonyS
a reply to: anzha

First, just let me say that "All because of our collective American arrogance" is pretty insulting! I'm not part of any damned collective, American or otherwise.

got that off my chest!

Your conclusion that this is a dreadnought moment is quite interesting, but...........hasn't that moment already sort of come and gone? I mean, seriously, one nuke and an entire carrier task force is toast. And that could be delivered by a B-52!

My guess, and its just a guess, is that the US Navy pretty much knows that. Unless I'm missing something, it certainly seems like for the most part, the US Navy has opted for the Arliegh Burke Destroyers as its primary Carrier support vessel with a few Cruisers serving as fire control centers. So I'm guessing that the US Navy has pretty much figured out that other than serving as troop support in places like Iraq and Afghanistan from Carrier task forces, the whole concept of a "surface" navy is obsolete in and of itself in terms of a WWIII scenario.

The chances of a direct hit on a CTF at flank speed would not be that easy of a task and the US Navy has a history of amazing dance control. You’d be surprised the amount of ships that survived a near direct hit of two different atomic bombs granted they were Farman yields. Some of the ships took days and weeks to sink and that was from lack of any damage control. The surface fleet would play a significant role in a WW3 scenario they’re not sitting ducks yet IMO.

a reply to: Zaphod58

I'm aware.

I doubt it will be in the first few years of the railguns being on a ship, but otoh the dollar cost of missing 20 times is still less than the incoming missile. You would probably need some sort of seeker though. Think EXACTO on roids. That'd increase the costs significantly, but...even if it was 10x, it'd still worthwhile.

They have AA rounds for the 76mm, don't they?

a reply to: BigDave-AR

You don't have to sink a carrier though. But a big hole in the deck, or cause damage to her propulsion, and she's out of the game for awhile. That's their big drawback. Once they can't launch aircraft, they're essentially done.

originally posted by: Zaphod58
a reply to: BigDave-AR

You don't have to sink a carrier though. But a big hole in the deck, or cause damage to her propulsion, and she's out of the game for awhile. That's their big drawback. Once they can't launch aircraft, they're essentially done.

Very true it’s a reach but a marine air wing on a carrier could still have have limited capability with F35Bs.

a reply to: BigDave-AR

Very limited. They'd only be able to really use the short takeoff, with a fairly limited payload.

originally posted by: Zaphod58
a reply to: BigDave-AR

Very limited. They'd only be able to really use the short takeoff, with a fairly limited payload.

Hence why I said limited they could at least fly some CAP missions I doubt they would have much punch for ground attack ops operating of an “auster carrier deck”.

a reply to: BigDave-AR

It would also depend on the damage to the deck. If they still need a few hundred feet, so if it's bad enough, they'd still be screwed.

originally posted by: Zaphod58
a reply to: BigDave-AR

It would also depend on the damage to the deck. If they still need a few hundred feet, so if it's bad enough, they'd still be screwed.

For a low fuel load and just A2A missiles for limited CAP could they not use the vertical take off regime or even say 80% upward thrust and a very short take off run?

a reply to: BigDave-AR

Vertical takeoff is really just a neat airshow trick. At best you'd be looking at a pair of missiles, and half fuel load. They might be able to shorten it a little, but they'd probably still need around 400 to 500 feet. And that would be an absolute bare minimum load.

originally posted by: Zaphod58
a reply to: BigDave-AR

Vertical takeoff is really just a neat airshow trick. At best you'd be looking at a pair of missiles, and half fuel load. They might be able to shorten it a little, but they'd probably still need around 400 to 500 feet. And that would be an absolute bare minimum load.

Didn’t think the “pony”/ helo carriers had that much longer of a flight deck and the ‘B is designed to operate off them no?

a reply to: anzha

First of all it is wrong, the US has had ship mounted Railgun technology for decades and has been testing it since at least the 90's in a specially adapted destroyer, not a tiny little rail gun but a full on ship length railgun.
Secondly the US definitely has space and missile defense rail gun technology which is definitely still classified as above top secret most likely based in large subterranean facility's including so called D.U.M.B sites and also definitely develped magnetically assisted non rocket satellite launch system's.

Also they fire on the odd UFO now and then, this is definitely not ice crystal's and that is a rail gun firing at it.

www.popularmechanics.com...

originally posted by: LABTECH767
a reply to: anzha

First of all it is wrong, the US has had ship mounted Railgun technology for decades and has been testing it since at least the 90's in a specially adapted destroyer, not a tiny little rail gun but a full on ship length railgun.
Secondly the US definitely has space and missile defense rail gun technology which is definitely still classified as above top secret most likely based in large subterranean facility's including so called D.U.M.B sites and also definitely develped magnetically assisted non rocket satellite launch system's.

Also they fire on the odd UFO now and then, this is definitely not ice crystal's and that is a rail gun firing at it.

I’m not sure about the veracity of these statements I’d love if we actually had all those toys. If you assume it’s some sort of weapon what makes you think it’s a rail gun and not an energy weapon?

a reply to: BigDave-AR

It appears to be a high velocity slug to me, not a missile (it seem's way too fast for most of our rocket technology as well) but it is definitely leaving a lot of ionization in it's wake just like a meteor, if it was not that it come's up out of the earth's atmosphere that is what I would assume it was so something fast enough to have the burn up affect as it leaves the atmosphere, something fast enough to nearly hit that potential UFO and make it get out of the way fast.
It's SDI technology.

Energy weapon's would be fine in space but would suffer huge energy dispersal in the atmosphere and even a plasma type weapon would be highly inefficient if it was used as a ground based anti satellite system for example but other types of energy weapon's are viable such as molecular resonance destabilization systems using harmonic resonance generating radio or microwave beam's on a target, they too though would suffer huge energy loss through atmospheric absorption while a rail gun on the other hand while the projectile would still suffer ablation would nevertheless reach it's target in orbit with enough of it's core intact to cause significant kinetic damage.

Also it's well know that the US was testing a rail gun at sea as far back as the early 90's but perhaps even further back, this was not the small public demonstration model but one that occupied nearly the entire length of a converted us navy destroyer.

The Chinese want the world to think they have this and that for propaganda reason's but the US is still hiding it's military secret's since it has currently no reason to brag about it's secret advantage's and to do so merely for warn's potential enemy's.

Here is a wiki with publicly available information.
Scroll down to Hypervelocity Railgun (Checmate)
en.wikipedia.org...

Now remember how big Cern is, that is a civilian particle accelerator, so how big would a subterranean construction have to be to house, supply and power an anti missile/satellite space defense system based around advanced rail gun technology, such a facility would even be able to aim the gun by changing the magnetic influence on the flight path of the projectile before it leave's the accelerator.

a reply to: BigDave-AR

The Wasp and new America hulls are 843 and 844 feet respectively. The minimum takeoff distance for the F-35B is 550-600 feet.