Laser Firearms

Originally posted by Druscilla
In otherwords, you walk into any target zone weapon free, go to an electronics store, pick up some parts, wire them together, saute and simmer, then, wallah..
I'm not condoning assassination. I'm bringing this up as a "is this possible?", and "if this is possible, this is scary."

Ah. In that case, no, not at all. A really big laser is a nastily fiddly thing. It's not the sort of thing you can go buy parts at the local Radio Shack and put together a 100kW laser with a soldering iron and a hand torch.

In this case, a C-130 full of fairly reactive chemicals can't do it, not the way you're describing. You could burn someone to a crackly crunch with a THEL but not pfft-hole, and what they don't show you when they show pictures of the business end of a THEL is the 10-12 trucks full of reactants off to the side, nor the huge plume of steam and chemicals coming out the side, and you don't get a feel for how loud it is. Big chemical gas-dynamic lasers are noisy and stinky.

You might be able to set someone's clothing on fire and give them second to third degree burns with a big CO2 laser, but probably not at three miles. You can definitely break windows out with one at a few hundred yards - we used a 10kW CO2 laser on a barge once in a rather expensive determination that you can't control water hyacinths with a laser, and that was a BIG laser for its time. Still pretty big.

For just pfft-hole at three miles, I dunno, maybe a FEL, but now you're taking up the entire roof of that building and irradiating bystanders. And you'll need millions of dollars and lots of technicians, a major power feed.

I can ruck in an M95 and do the deed from half a mile for you easy, I think the gubmint pays about 10 cents a round, although you'd probably want to spend some bucks on nicer ball ammo than the stuff the Army gets. $10 ought to do it. Stuff it in a sports bag, set up, shoot, leave it and walk out.

reply to post by Druscilla


The only flaw i see with laser weapons is... we have gotten damn efficient at redirecting or absorbing radiant energy in armour systems. Weve had alot more trouble with nullifying kenetic weapons systems.

I think lasers and the brief arms race that will insue will only advance industry through its more practical applications in asteroid mining and propulsion.

If you are looking for semi-possible daydream material of major disaster generating proportions, one of my favorites is the home-built cruise missile, which you COULD do.

It wouldn't be straight forward, but if you gave me a few million bucks and said "go make me a design for this and build a couple" we could do it. I used to keep up with a guy in Australia that was working on one but he got Told to stop. Alas.

reply to post by Bedlam


Understood, mostly.

My main concern regarding this, and the article sighted was the no recoil, low signature, no wind, no projectile fall, or arc associated with laser added to a range that's twice that of a Lapua, well outside of and beyond any area of a security cordon, plus instant effect, with light travelling much faster with a much lower profile than even a 20mm cannon.

As a concern, from an asymmetric worry, as stated in another post here, just above, any trigger could walk into any target area, weapon free, basically naked, and just visit an electronics store that isn't going to be on security watch lists like fertilizer dealers, chemical sources, or conventional weapons dealers.

If the wired-together mess can be man portable carried, then, even if extremely awkward at 50lbs, it's just a matter of waiting for prince, prime minister, governor, ayatola, arch bishop, illuminated enlightened, saint, president, khan, king, emperor, significant whomever of significant interest for significant whatever reason to schedule a press conference, speech, appearance at their favorite predictable time honored safe place in the outdoors to do so, and make the point that line of sight from 3 or 4 miles distant is now a something for the next guy to worry about.

Edit: just caught up with your second post, and okay, that answers my concerns as I was basing my concerns off the detailed article linked in the OP that describes solid state diode lasers as being easily and cheaply as well as efficiently available and readily so, as far as feasibility, just not conveniently so.
I was interpreting inconvenience as something along the lines of limited fire rate, and the weight of a crew serve at 50-75lbs.

this could be done with current laser technology if you have the money, although the parts you purchased would be highly suspicious.

if you had a week or two advanced notice of where the event would take place, you could conceivably get all the parts together on a roof, or in a hotel room. the power supply would be the biggest issue, but it could be done.

Originally posted by Druscilla
reply to post by Bedlam

 

Understood, mostly.

My main concern regarding this, and the article sighted was the no recoil, low signature, no wind, no projectile fall, or arc associated with laser added to a range that's twice that of a Lapua, well outside of and beyond any area of a security cordon, plus instant effect, with light travelling much faster with a much lower profile than even a 20mm cannon.

The recoil isn't an issue. I can shoot a Barrett all day. You can compensate for ballistics - people do it all the time.

Yes, it would be nice if you could do it, but it's not practical.

As a concern, from an asymmetric worry, as stated in another post here, just above, any trigger could walk into any target area, weapon free, basically naked, and just visit an electronics store that isn't going to be on security watch lists like fertilizer dealers, chemical sources, or conventional weapons dealers.

A big laser is FAR more than bits and pieces you can pick up at an electronics store. Even a small laser, for that matter.

A big enough laser to kill someone from 3 miles away, much less hole punch them, is going to be way more than 50 lbs. A couple hundred kW output with really REALLY tight collimation isn't going to be small, light, or simple.

Originally posted by Druscilla
Edit: just caught up with your second post, and okay, that answers my concerns as I was basing my concerns off the detailed article linked in the OP that describes solid state diode lasers as being easily and cheaply as well as efficiently available and readily so, as far as feasibility, just not conveniently so.
I was interpreting inconvenience as something along the lines of limited fire rate, and the weight of a crew serve at 50-75lbs.

Well, small diode lasers ARE available. You're not going to do much with one. Blind someone from a few yards away, maybe. Hole punch them from 3 miles, the Navy would like to hire you as a designer. Navy's looking at banks of solid state lasers that would fill several 18 wheelers, but the long term goal is FEL.

edit to add:

If you're worried about getting away, if you know where the guy's going to do his speech ahead of time, you could have previously put into place something as outlandish but more implementable, like a ground-to-politician missile. A remote aimed LAW or something similar on the eve of a building, with the controls and camera over cell phone. Zip, boom, not even there to be caught. Sort of the lower-tech version of a predator.

reply to post by Bedlam


Thank you so much for your input!

The article detailed chem and gas lasers as well as solid state diode and made it sound like with a fat enough capacitor array, any geek with a tickle to vaporize things could do so with the right LEDS, mirrors, cap-array, and other bits.

Well, you can build a 1KW laser with this diode.
www.sony.net... I bet that would hurt.
The navy has a cool one:
www.popularmechanics.com...
Some kid is going to make one and he does not care if it is illegal, since America does everything illegal anyway.
www.natscience.com...
It might be better to slowly irradiate your target over time. A ten dollar microwave emitter under their bed.

Originally posted by Druscilla
reply to post by Bedlam

 

Thank you so much for your input!

The article detailed chem and gas lasers as well as solid state diode and made it sound like with a fat enough capacitor array, any geek with a tickle to vaporize things could do so with the right LEDS, mirrors, cap-array, and other bits.

Lasers are pretty straightforward up to maybe 100W output, after that you get into more and more arcane design problems. Millions of your tax dollars were spent on developing a C130-filling flying assassination laser and IT couldn't punch holes in people, it fries them like a french fry. You only get about a dozen shots per flight, too, although it could do so from 9 miles instead of 3.

Originally posted by earthdude
Well, you can build a 1KW laser with this diode.
www.sony.net... I bet that would hurt.

Yeah, they built a one-off. Can you find the cost or availability of even one of the sub-modules, the 60W one, much less the concept demo they built? Yeah, that's what I thought. Now, envision the optical complexity of beam-combining maybe a thousand of the 60W modules, complete with water cooling and power for each. Now you're up in the range where you MIGHT be able to fry someone at four miles. But only if you are really good at high power optic design. Again, show me a kid that can do that and the Navy'll snap him up in minutes.

The navy has a cool one:
www.popularmechanics.com...

That's a FEL. FEL design requires a lot of high-vacuum engineering, superconducting magnets, tricky engineering, huge amounts of electrical power. Your average assassin isn't going to manage it.

Another ACME type assassination device you might try would be the catapult with kinepak in it. Fling a couple pounds of kinepak from the top of a nearby building onto the guy. You could even test the aim out with a dummy load of plasticine prior to the guy's arrival, and you can get kinepak just about anywhere, or make it yourself if not.

i've been interested in plasma weaponry and particle accelerator weapons for some time, more so than lasers. yeah, the range and projectile speed of a homemade plasma weapon would be limited, and the charge time could be limiting, but i think it has potential.

i'm just hypothesizing, but maybe using several microwave emitters shielded in lead pointing to a confined space with some element that turns into a plasma and holds the energy well, then construct a barrel with electromagnets to bring the plasma into a tight beam and propel it out. it wouldn't last long in the atmosphere, but i bet it would be cheaper to make and do more damage than a laser.

On a military scale - we got that, it called Tactical High Energy Laser, THEL:


And on a small scale, a youtuber's got one that killed a spider:


And its not hard to intuit how to do a lot more than that - though its prolly not wise to say how... so I won't other than to say a deadly home-made weapon for a $1000 or so wouldn't be hard to build at all. But if you wanted it to burn through steel you'd need serious power. Oh and if you only wanted to start a fire, the blue lazer in Blue Ray DVD burners can do that.

reply to post by reitze

Holy Guacamole! I didn't know we could shoot artillery shells in flight, and that was 10 years ago. I thought this stuff was classified. I may have seen a test of it. Wow. Imagine what they can do now. One could use a smaller version to intercept bullets fired in an assassination attempt. What a reversal of topic. A good defense.....................

This Terminator robot is wielding a plasma rifle. In my opinion the reason these weapons are so powerful is because they lack recoil. That's pretty cool don't you think? Imagine firing lasers with great accuracy right?

I have made a Nd:YAG laser that can pop holes in a razor blade with no Q-switch (shortens pulse duration and rises peak power). I have put the beam of it on my hand and it felt slightly warm (10 pulse per second at about 32Joules per pulse), then I focused it and it was just a bit hotter, it felt like a fiber glass piece thats rubbed the wrong way. There was no mark or burn, however if it was Q-switched, I could have done a first deg. burn but thats it ( 1000W input and maybe 30W avg. output). The problem is, heating up alot of water fast enough to turn it into steam, then how do you heat the carbon thats left over to the point that it "explodes" out of the way. Its the same deal with plasma. It takes alot less energy to push the water and meat out of the way with a well placed slug of copper and lead.

Diode lasers can blind and honestly, what use is a soldier who can't see? If you can not see, you can not aim.

Originally posted by XL5
I have made a Nd:YAG laser that can pop holes in a razor blade with no Q-switch (shortens pulse duration and rises peak power). I have put the beam of it on my hand and it felt slightly warm (10 pulse per second at about 32Joules per pulse), then I focused it and it was just a bit hotter, it felt like a fiber glass piece thats rubbed the wrong way. There was no mark or burn, however if it was Q-switched, I could have done a first deg. burn but thats it ( 1000W input and maybe 30W avg. output). The problem is, heating up alot of water fast enough to turn it into steam, then how do you heat the carbon thats left over to the point that it "explodes" out of the way. Its the same deal with plasma. It takes alot less energy to push the water and meat out of the way with a well placed slug of copper and lead.

Diode lasers can blind and honestly, what use is a soldier who can't see? If you can not see, you can not aim.

Can you please elaborate more on yourr YAG laser rifle? What is its range? How many watts is it?

I have heard of phase 4 lasers, is it a phase 4 laser? Does it cause radiation? Could it cause cancer? Does it produce any recoil????

You said it could cause blindness, what about sunglesses? How about a robot like one of these, would this robot be better suited to use lasers?

Originally posted by XL5
I have made a Nd:YAG laser that can pop holes in a razor blade with no Q-switch (shortens pulse duration and rises peak power). I have put the beam of it on my hand and it felt slightly warm (10 pulse per second at about 32Joules per pulse), then I focused it and it was just a bit hotter, it felt like a fiber glass piece thats rubbed the wrong way. There was no mark or burn, however if it was Q-switched, I could have done a first deg. burn but thats it ( 1000W input and maybe 30W avg. output). The problem is, heating up alot of water fast enough to turn it into steam, then how do you heat the carbon thats left over to the point that it "explodes" out of the way. Its the same deal with plasma. It takes alot less energy to push the water and meat out of the way with a well placed slug of copper and lead.

Diode lasers can blind and honestly, what use is a soldier who can't see? If you can not see, you can not aim.

Well what I resisted saying in my previous post for fear of it being "classified" appears public now too. At least I can point to someone else saying it here: Can a laser be used as an electrical conductor between two points that are not in physical contact?

Two laser beams have also been successfully used to provide a current path for a kind of optical (no wire) TASER. The two beams take the place of the usual two wires. When they are shone on the body of the person to be stunned, a high-voltage pulse is injected using the two ionized beams, resulting in a non-lethal, but debilitating shock.

Spock, set your PHASER to KILL!

+ BTW, a small projectile that smokes or distributes a vapor or liquid could easily enhance the effect and once the electricity flows it would enhance the ionization. And it would look like the phasors on Star-Trek too - remember those seemed to project like they were slower than bullets but then sustained the beam for a while.

EdwardKill, The laser that I made has no recoil (lasers don't have recoil). It takes alot of power input to make a tiny amout of output. In my last post I said it had an output of 30Watts for 1000Watts input, I was mistaken, it's more like 1Watt for every 1000 Watt input (I was thinking about laser rod efficiency). Its also not a gun and the thing is not really portable.

Sunglasses will not work at all, they need to be ones made for that colour of beam.