imported post
Tomahawk wrote:
I was wondering about the fire, too. Maybe it's the metal itself igniting from the heat.
The shell thing is likely a conductive sabotthat carries the current from one rail to the other, which, when crossed with an orthoganal magnetic field accelerates the slug. But I'm just guessing here, since there's no further info
I also just read, on that same wiki page, that for this to work the projectile must "close" the normally open circuit, so you were correct in thinking that it's a conductive sabot. When I made the post above about the sabot possibly being charged I was also thinking about the fact that if the slug were aluminum, it would need an outer "shell" in order for this to work properly if was being driven by a magnetic field.
The logic behind the design of this weapon is surprisingly simple, it appears that it's just that the implementation of this logic is rather difficult. I get the feeling that they'll have to figure something out (Something ingenious) to solve the problem of the barrel's longevity. The problem I see is that the sabot probably needs to have a very good connection with the barrel in order for this to work properly. I imagine it fits in there pretty snugly, and with those velocities I can't imagine what materials are capable of handling the friction generated.
20 kilometers per second has been achieved with small projectiles explosively injected into the railgun.
Also, It does appear that the fire may actually be from the method they use to introduce the sabot into the barrel initially (This "explosive injection" they speak of).
Edit: Is it just me or are the quote things kind of buggy? I can't ever seem to easily erase them, not to mention that now that I've backed that empty quote up below the first quote, I can't even put the cursor in it. If I hit the up arrow, it just jumps right through the empty quotes and into the box above. lol.:cuss: