Record-Breaking Laser Burns Through 200 Feet of Steel per Second

[cray]

Have you ever heard of airburst rounds?

Yes. And when they burst directly over the fox hole, you've got a readymade kettle for the resulting chunky salsa. In the mean time, you've got a dandy shelter for all the airbursting rounds that did not explode overhead.

Your making this weapon into a multi million doller sniper rifle. There are a lot better uses for it. sm

I don't recall saying, "This weapon should be limited to shore bombardment."

[worktroll]

One thing to my mind that's being missed in all this is that you're not going to be mounting your laser on the tip of the mast. At best, it'll be an aiming mirror. That's sensible - you only expose a replacable component, and bury the actual lasing mechanism safely in the hull, and keep the bit that needs to move as small as possible (eg. easier to aim and stabilise). This has its own challenges - maintaining an optically clean surface (dirt on the mirror absorbs laser light, causing a small explosion), and probably cooling.

Question to sailors - I assume modern warships have optical sensors mounted around the place exposed to the weather. How often did they need to be cleaned, and did such lenses close to the waterline need more or less cleaning than sensors mounted on the mast? Feel free to answer in generalities if I'm touching on Top Sekrit stuff :)

W.

[cray]

One thing to my mind that's being missed in all this is that you're not going to be mounting your laser on the tip of the mast.

I did say, "If you put the emitter turret high on a ship's mast, then you can get a decent range," referring to a "simple" mirror like the ABL's turret (the laser is in the body of the aircraft, not the turret). However, I can see my statement could be construed to refer to the whole laser.

[worktroll]

Just knowing how fiddly the 90s Star Wars optical surfaces were, I do wonder how easily that'll translate into the field.

W.

[cray]

Desert Storm was a crash course in developing durable military optics. Too many helicopters and fighters had their optics sandblasted to garbage.

Coatings on laser mirrors might be another issue, but there's been steady advances in coating application.

[worktroll]

It'd be interesting to be able to find out the current state of the art. It's all down to the reflectivity - with 99.9% reflection, the mirror for a 5-megawatt laser has to manage 5,000 watts of heat without having the surface degrade.

And I've always wondered how much beam direction you could get by playing with Fresnel lenses. While the low material volume helps with avoiding energy loss, I just can't see how to cool them in any way which doesn't impact on the light path, alas. Where's that force field when I need it?

W.

[I am Belch II]

Thats some firepower.

[Demon55]

Sounds like a good weapon to have.  Spy satellite hunting anyone?

[Solarmech]

???  Virtually everyone I know who's been infantry says that the first thing you go after you dig your fox hole, time permitting, is to hollow an alcove in it to protect against such attacks.

Time permiting and soil conditions permiting. :(  Modern warfare is getting more and more mobile and weapons getting more accurate. If it stays still, it's highly vulnerable. There will always be a place for a foxhole, but it of limited use faceing a modern foe. Against more backwards foes it is of great use as they tend not to have so much heavy arty avaliable.

Yes. And when they burst directly over the fox hole, you've got a readymade kettle for the resulting chunky salsa. In the mean time, you've got a dandy shelter for all the airbursting rounds that did not explode overhead.

Unless you have the alcove mentioned above, you will find a foxhole is vulnerable than you think. You don't need to have the round go off  directly overhead in order to be hit. My estimation would be that at anything less than 40/45 degrees you can still get hit (depending on the dimensions of the foxhole).

I don't recall saying, "This weapon should be limited to shore bombardment."

I never claimed you did. All I am saying is that it is an ineffective and innapropriate for shore bombardment. sm

[cray]

More useful technical information than Fox provided.
http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/02/unexpectedly-navys-superlaser-blasts-away-a-record/

First, it's cutting 20fps, not 200. I'm still not sure how they're gauging that, but they're also giving some handy wattage values that Fox skipped. The current version is way weaker than the chemical ABL, and the final version will still be 1/10th of the ABL (100kW vs. 1MW). Never mind shore bombardment with that.

[Von Jankmon]

First, it's cutting 20fps, not 200. I'm still not sure how they're gauging that, but they're also giving some handy wattage values that Fox skipped. The current version is way weaker than the chemical ABL, and the final version will still be 1/10th of the ABL (100kW vs. 1MW). Never mind shore bombardment with that.

The figures are probably accurate but rather misleading if informative nonetheless.  Stats like that could possiblty tell us more than the designers would want to let out.

I think 20 feet per second is the distance cored as if the weapon was able to be fired for a second. Its like Metalstorm the million rounds a minute gun, that might be its rate of fire, but it doesn't mean it could fire for a whole minute.

It sounds to me like you get a single very intense pulse from this laser measured in fractions of a second in duration unleashing all that energy at once for the desired effect. It's a single shot 'cannon', probably with a long reload time not a ray gun with a 'cutting beam' effect.  Its possible that its effect is subtle enough that unless you are watching a datascreen linked to the weapon or its power support you would be unaware that it had fired.

[OverKill]

So what you are saying is that I won't be mounting one of these on my Mazda 6 any time soon?

[Von Jankmon]

So what you are saying is that I won't be mounting one of these on my Mazda 6 any time soon?

What I am saying is that is has 'ammo' of some sort rather than a power plant and an on switch.