98 replies to this topic

[Lt muffins]

Most of the technology used in Battletech is atleast partialy based on reality or what seems physicaly possible.
The piece of technology that has enticed me the most is the Particle Projection Cannon (PPC), Since I am the one that wants to know how everything works I have done some research in to find out the orgin of this weapon concept and it has led me to Nickola Telsa.

http://www.tfcbooks..../1935-00-00.htm (one of the documents mentioning a device similar to a PPC)

I have learned a bit from reading some of his writings, but they have been a bit vague for my taste.
So I ask if anyone else shared my curiosity in this matter and found out anything else other than what i have found.

(I promise I wont build one in my back yard.)

[Dirk Le Daring]

Lt muffins, on 22 April 2012 - 08:15 PM, said:

Most of the technology used in Battletech is atleast partialy based on reality or what seems physicaly possible.
The piece of technology that has enticed me the most is the Particle Projection Cannon (PPC), Since I am the one that wants to know how everything works I have done some research in to find out the orgin of this weapon concept and it has led me to Nickola Telsa.

http://www.tfcbooks..../1935-00-00.htm (one of the documents mentioning a device similar to a PPC)

I have learned a bit from reading some of his writings, but they have been a bit vague for my taste.
So I ask if anyone else shared my curiosity in this matter and found out anything else other than what i have found.

(I promise I wont build one in my back yard.)

You may not, but I would.

[Rejarial Galatan]

mm a PPC of my own <drools>

[LordDeathStrike]

well basically the theory of the ppc is you take a chamber of particles, like a plasma ball held in magnetic stasis, and electrify the ever mother loving **** out of it. these now ultra super charged plasma particles are very excited, very dangerous. now you channel the magnetic field to fling them out of the weapon in a direction, using a magnetic barrel i would think, and whammo, its fast like a laser, its arcy sparky like lightning, and it packs a hell of a punch when it runs into uncharged armor (ions/heat/all sorts of destructive forces to be at work on the target).

currently its not overly practicle to build such a device, but 1 good break through in projected plasma tech and we could be useing ppcs on tanks and battle ships o yes.

[Rejarial Galatan]

Why do I suddenly think the LHC in Cern is now nothing more than an over grown PPC that circles itself? Is this some first step to PPCs and they just wont tell us?

[Ramien]

Look up laser-guided lightning for an example of early-model PPCs.

[Lt muffins]

LordDeathStrike, on 22 April 2012 - 08:24 PM, said:

well basically the theory of the ppc is you take a chamber of particles, like a plasma ball held in magnetic stasis, and electrify the ever mother loving **** out of it. these now ultra super charged plasma particles are very excited, very dangerous. now you channel the magnetic field to fling them out of the weapon in a direction, using a magnetic barrel i would think, and whammo, its fast like a laser, its arcy sparky like lightning, and it packs a hell of a punch when it runs into uncharged armor (ions/heat/all sorts of destructive forces to be at work on the target).

currently its not overly practicle to build such a device, but 1 good break through in projected plasma tech and we could be useing ppcs on tanks and battle ships o yes.

From the way that Tesla described it he used a Van Der Graaf generator of sorts to charge the particles then used an electomagnet to attract the particles together, then reversed the polarity to expell them. (i am very much oversimplifing it) so techincaly you could make one but i dont know of the way to make it travel in a straight line vs the device exploding.

Ramien, on 22 April 2012 - 08:30 PM, said:

Look up laser-guided lightning for an example of early-model PPCs.

So basicaly the laser heats up the air and since electricity takes the path of least resistance it follow the path of the laser.
That is pretty clever


EDIT: Fixed spelling (thx Rejarial Galatanand and Alaric Wolf Kerensky)

Edited by Lt muffins, 22 April 2012 - 09:18 PM.

[Rejarial Galatan]

Lt muffins, on 22 April 2012 - 08:32 PM, said:

From the way that Tesla described it he used a van graaf generator of sorts to charge the particles then used an electomagnet to attract the particles together, then reversed the polarity to expell them. (i am very much oversimplifing it) so techincaly you could make one but i dont know of the way to make it travel in a straight line vs the device exploding.

so sorry, spelling nazi in me begging me to fix this: not van graaf, but van DER graaf... srry muffins, that was eatting me alive

[Lt muffins]

I have been digging around a bit more and i found the main reason Telsa had problems with his Device was that he did not have a generator that cound produce enough energy for his device to work correctly. For what I can tell the amount of energy that needs to be stored for it to be used as a viable weapon needs to be about 10,000,000 to 12,000,000 Volts, and in the 1930's that was quite a bit but using a capacitor the electricity to charge the particles can be gathered relativaly easy. (though your electric bill would probably kill you)

Edited by Lt muffins, 22 April 2012 - 08:52 PM.

[errorabbit]

Well... I'm sure many different writers made different claims about the PPC, but I'd go with the Sarna explanation, where it states it's essentially a particle accelerator not unlike the LHC or something like that (though more likely a linacc rather than a synchrotron)

In other words, it uses electric fields to accelerate charged particles (ions,protons electrons et cetera) and fire them at targets.

Plasma doesn't play into that at all...

A stream of charged particles like this really would have electric effects on the targets. In reality though, the main problem would be that charged particles with the same charge repel each other. This includes inside a beam.
So the whole thing would loose focus over distance because the protons repel each other... in fact, a real life particle cannon would be kind of opposite of the PPC as it works in BT/MW, as it would be limited to close range fire.
Particle accelerators used by physicists these days fight this natural defocussing by having electromagnets that focus the beam along the beam path. But you can't start putting magnets all the way between you and your target in combat.

Edited by errorabbit, 22 April 2012 - 08:54 PM.

[Zakatak]

Doesn't it fire a bolt of superheated ions (or protons) at near light speed? Like a weaponized lightning bolt?

I don't know the specifics, but I measured the power in comparison to HGR. I got 288MJ, or 288 million joules.

Edited by Zakatak, 22 April 2012 - 08:58 PM.

[Volthorne]

Rejarial Galatan, on 22 April 2012 - 08:33 PM, said:

so sorry, spelling nazi in me begging me to fix this: not van graaf, but van DER graaf... srry muffins, that was eatting me alive

And the Grammar Nazi in me is shuddering at your terrible sentence structure (and missing words).

[Lt muffins]

i found another article that was published after the one i originaly posted (previous being 1937 this one being 1940)

http://uforeview.tri...adeathray2.html

Edit: added text
According to this text he has improved on the design and increased the estimated voltage cost. (60,000,000)

No wonder the PPC on Mechwarrior has a fairly long recharge time

Edited by Lt muffins, 22 April 2012 - 09:13 PM.

[Alaric Wolf Kerensky]

Lt muffins, on 22 April 2012 - 08:32 PM, said:

From the way that Tesla described it he used a Van Der Graaf generator of sorts to charge the particles then used an electomagnet to attract the particles together, then reversed the polarity to expell them. (i am very much oversimplifing it) so techincaly you could make one but i dont know of the way to make it travel in a straight line vs the device exploding.




So basicaly the lazer heats up the air and since electricity takes the path of least resistance it follow the path of the lazer.
That is pretty clever


EDIT: Fixed spelling (thx Rejarial Galatan)

You missed your other spelling errors. Laser is spelled with an 's', not a 'z'.

[Lt muffins]

Alaric Wolf Kerensky, on 22 April 2012 - 09:15 PM, said:

You missed your other spelling errors. Laser is spelled with an 's', not a 'z'.

I don't know why but that is a spelling habit of mine I just can't seem to break it.

[Gun Bear]

Volthorne, on 22 April 2012 - 09:04 PM, said:

And the Grammar Nazi in me is shuddering at your terrible sentence structure (and missing words).

There, their, they're. It's going to be okay. (That is how to comfort a grammar nazi)

[Pel Morba]

The power requirements for such a weapon are, as noted, enormous. If we ever lick the cold fusion problem, then we can build whatever we like.

The US Navy is close to deploying Gauss rifles on their warships and it's only a matter of time before the technology trickles down to tanks, albeit after some severe minaturization.

I'm very intrigued that CERN might just be a testbed for Battletech fans with particle physics doctorates.

[Felicitatem Parco]

Lightning and PPC-fire are about as related as Shockwaves and Rifle Bullets.

PPC's don't shoot electricity; they shoot a burst of tinytinytiny particles by accelerating them through an electromagnetic field. This blast may cause dialectric breakdown of the surrounding air, though.

[Felicitatem Parco]

Pel Morba, on 22 April 2012 - 09:47 PM, said:

The power requirements for such a weapon are, as noted, enormous. If we ever lick the cold fusion problem, then we can build whatever we like.

The US Navy is close to deploying Gauss rifles on their warships and it's only a matter of time before the technology trickles down to tanks, albeit after some severe minaturization.

I'm very intrigued that CERN might just be a testbed for Battletech fans with particle physics doctorates.

You mean Railguns, right? They use the exact opposite principle as the Gauss Rifle.

[pursang]

Prosperity Park, on 22 April 2012 - 10:03 PM, said:

You mean Railguns, right? They use the exact opposite principle as the Gauss Rifle.

THANK YOU! I'm glad I'm not the only person who realizes the two are very different weapon systems.