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Post by Crazy Tom on Oct 7, 2016 1:29:47 GMT
So I'd like to present my thoughts on what the spinal weapon design should look like: Pictured is a long, thin railgun that uses an external truss structure to prevent barrel deflection - a more lightweight option to simply making the barrel thicker. We have a power loader at the end, and maybe recoil dampening springs on all the attachment points to not stress the mounting as much when firing. Ideally, I would wrap this in six or so long, think propellant tanks, both for protection, and to minimize the head on cross section without having this thing stick out of the ship like a mosquito's proboscis. Baring that I'd like the ships armor to cover it. I'll use a drone as an example of this: On the left: Current armor wrapping scheme. On the right: What I want for spinal weapons.
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Post by morrigi on Oct 7, 2016 1:34:03 GMT
Yes please.
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Post by tukuro on Oct 7, 2016 1:41:27 GMT
The ability to at least wrap the ship's armour around the barrel would be a huge step in the right direction.
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Post by bigbombr on Nov 6, 2016 16:00:33 GMT
This deserves a bump.
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Post by ross128 on Nov 6, 2016 16:14:05 GMT
Would be useful, especially since bracing the barrel with a strong, cheap material like Osmium or steel would really help with rail/coilguns. Copper is a great conductor, but not so great as a structural material. If we're going to be wrapping our barrels in silica aerogel though, we'll probably want a forced-cooling loop.
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Post by thorneel on Nov 6, 2016 16:38:08 GMT
We would also need the ability to put module around (or even through) it. For example make it go through the tank cluster.
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Post by wafflestoo on Nov 6, 2016 19:38:01 GMT
Would be useful, especially since bracing the barrel with a strong, cheap material like Osmium or steel would really help with rail/coilguns. Copper is a great conductor, but not so great as a structural material. If we're going to be wrapping our barrels in silica aerogel though, we'll probably want a forced-cooling loop. I was full for the idea... right up until you said, "cooling" and I remembered that the barrels are cooled through radiation. We would need an alternate cooling system to do this (which I wouldn't think would be undo-able or unreasonable... but we can't expect to have our cake and eat it too).
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Post by jonen on Nov 6, 2016 19:45:10 GMT
I was full for the idea... right up until you said, "cooling" and I remembered that the barrels are cooled through radiation. We would need an alternate cooling system to do this (which I wouldn't think would be undo-able or unreasonable... but we can't expect to have our cake and eat it too). Added option in design menu for wrapping the barrel in cooling, choosing cooling medium and output temperature, and strap on radiators?
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Post by wafflestoo on Nov 6, 2016 19:49:25 GMT
I was full for the idea... right up until you said, "cooling" and I remembered that the barrels are cooled through radiation. We would need an alternate cooling system to do this (which I wouldn't think would be undo-able or unreasonable... but we can't expect to have our cake and eat it too). Added option in design menu for wrapping the barrel in cooling, choosing cooling medium and output temperature, and strap on radiators? Seems like a reasonable solution to me.
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reviire
New Member
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Posts: 44
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Post by reviire on Nov 7, 2016 0:13:07 GMT
Could be possible to use propellant as cooling maybe. Along with that, how about hollow propellant tanks, so you could have a singular propellant tank with a spinal weapon going through the centre.
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Post by argonbalt on Nov 7, 2016 2:00:16 GMT
Could be possible to use propellant as cooling maybe. Along with that, how about hollow propellant tanks, so you could have a singular propellant tank with a spinal weapon going through the centre. Yes the Shis-ka-gun idea is certainly appealing for armour and mass as well. aiming would be difficult, so outside of multi Km/s staging, a missile oriented system would be great.
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Post by squalltemnov on Nov 7, 2016 6:49:01 GMT
I was asking the same on steam. Yes, spinal weapons with modules built around it would be great. Also, would be great to extend the upper cap of the barrel length. With spinal mount, 200-meter long railgun sounds more plausible.
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Post by zuthal on Nov 7, 2016 14:03:23 GMT
Also, one weapon that would be amazing as a spinal mount, I feel, would be a free electron laser. You could have the undulator right along the long axis, surrounded by accelerator tracks to accelerate the electrons as they are fed back into the undulator. (Yes, I know FELs are not in the game yet, but I feel they could be... after all, they are real technology, that works, even for making x-ray lasers).
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Post by bigbombr on Nov 7, 2016 14:18:52 GMT
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Post by boomertiro on Nov 7, 2016 18:46:17 GMT
Honestly I was hoping for something more like KSP's building abilities so that non cylinder ships would be easier. But the game not only wants cylinders only but spinal weapons are impossible which makes no sense. Spinal guns and guns aimed by the ships rotational controls and rotational thrusters all need to be in game.
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