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The Particle Projection Cannons


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#81 Toothman

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Posted 03 June 2012 - 11:51 AM

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

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


Gauss Guns vs. Rail Guns
Jon Paul Nollmann Updated 1998/05/22
Theory-wise, gauss guns and rail guns are perfectly symmetric, because the relationship between voltage and current is identical to the relationship between electrostatic and electromagnetic forces.
In either case, the purpose of the gun is to convert electrical energy into kinetic energy through some intermediate energy storage field, either electrostatic or electromagnetic.
The basic idea behind the electrostatic gun (rail gun) is that a charged particle, allowed to drift in an electric field will "fall" in the direction of the field, extracting energy from the field in the form of kinetic energy as it does so.
In the electromagnetic gun (gauss gun), the basic idea is that any particle which bears a current, when allowed to drift in a magnetic field will "fall" in the direction of the field, extracting energy from the field in the form of kinetic energy as it does so.


I'll post the URL at the bottom for anyone who wants to read the entire thing. Point is they are different but no where near "exact opposites"

http://www.reeza.com...says/gauss.html

#82 GoLambo

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Posted 03 June 2012 - 11:54 AM

But articulation is everything. Tanks easily have enough power to reach 160kph (over 1,500hp for most modern turbines and turbodiesels), they're not geared for it, but they could be. It's not even that they're aerodynamically unstable or anything ether, it's that any traditional vehicle runs into limitations with suspension and articulation over rough terrain. It's not just 6 foot sheers that affect this, its heavy foliage, rocks, trenches and steep grades at odd angles. You hit a rock at 30mph in a tank and you might seriously break something. Leg's are giant shock absorbers, they wouldn't even flinch. Look at animals, tigers and their ilk barely slow down over dense jungle terrain, including very muddy terrain, and they weigh over 600lb's. They can RUN through mud that would stop a jeep dead. RUN. They don't get stuck. Mechs would have such obscene power (amusing they're fusion powered and all that) they would have zero problems dealing with mud or snow. It would take mud up to their knees to even slow them down! Remember, legs work like a pogo stick, they don't operate under nearly the same constraints. As long as you can push and pull you won't get stuck, and with sufficient power you probably won't even slow down. You're even less affected by gradient changes, so not only can you handle more terrain you can do it over grades faster. Not to mention nearly instant acceleration (you're only moving the limb, not having to deal with drag and friction from the ground). No, as a form of locomotion animal movement beats the pants off any wheel equivalent. You could put a 5,000hp engine in a tank, and I don't mean that as a hypothetical. You could probably tune a high end turbodiesel in a tank to pull those kinds of numbers. All it'd do would spin the treads on the dirt and kick up a mighty dust storm. You run into traction limitations. Tread tension limitations. Tank suspension is very primitive stuff designed for high load applications, look up torsion bars. The treads themselves sheer off at high speed. The reason the M1 has a governor is related to this, it could easily do 60mph (95ish kph) and has the gearing to do so, except for the fact that it tends to break really fast when it does! Unless you really half *** making your big scary robot, there is no way it'd have less mobility per ton than a comparable traditional tank. It would be probably easier to go faster, over more terrain, all of the time. 4 legs or 2, 20 tons or 70.

As for the rest, there is something to that, but perspective counts. Tanks are only "stable firing platforms" under 40kph, which is painfully slow in perspective. Any more than that and the computer has a very hard time adjusting for the motion of the vehicle unless you're on some really flat surfaces. Both vehicles would have trouble at high speeds, and its a bigger hurdle than a lot of people might realize. Now the "stable gun platform" in relation to recoil is a real problem, one I think some creativity could work with, but its true that tanks are pretty stable. It has a lot to do with their wide, low stance and big thick turret rings. For example, the Striker 105mm MGS can only shoot a few degrees to the left and right of itself, any more and without stabilization it will tip over! Of course the french and italians manged to do it just fine with their armored cars so clearly we just suck, but it is an issue. ;) Tanks really aren't very special. They're armored cars with treads, that's it. Modern tanks have extremely heavy front armor (almost 3 feet thick in most cases) and are effectively invincible to eachother from the front, but at the cost of a pittance for armor anywhere else. Long barreled 30mm Autocannons can side pen the M1 Abrams at 1000 meters. even the slightest off angle attack could go right through a modern tank like butter. There is a lot of talk about how the modern tank, while cool, really isn't designed very well for modern conflicts. Better proactive countermeasures and significantly better protection against infantry based guided missiles is a huge priority. So maybe if you make a tank didn't spend so much effort being invincible from the front, but stands a fighting chance to live through hits to the rest of it, that would make more sense in a modern combat environment. Tanks are really cool and I will always love them, but It's not the only way to make a combat vehicle, and it's not the only way they're ever going to be made, ether.

(Oh, and not to ignore your little story, it's smart but I think I obviously disagree on whats possible. While they would excel in the role I don't think mechs would have to be limited to being a light raider.)

Edited by golambo, 03 June 2012 - 12:32 PM.


#83 tynaiden

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Posted 04 June 2012 - 03:04 AM

This topic is so derailed I might as well pick at the carnage.

It is not an issue to use known sciences to show what is supposed to be going on. It becomes one when you try to force it as empirical in a fantasy universe.

As in traction -- CBT put in rules to simulate the lower traction afforded in some circumstances by having different things happen to different modes of locomotion on a surface like roads. You can easily say 'mechs have less ground contact than a tracked vehicle so having them lose traction easily on a road makes sense.

However, stating that a 'mech's foot uses mechanisms to grip the surfaces is a wild goose chase because we neither have 'mechs to obtain measurements from nor the IP rights to say how exactly 'mech feet interact with terrain.
Should there be an official source that states 'mech feet actively clamp onto surfaces then there could be cause to bring up that the amount of traction provided by a clamping foot system does not seem to match the rules stating 'mechs slip on a certain surface easier than tires or maybe tracks.


On-wards to other things posted up-topic.
The only major advantage Battlemechs have over more conventional vehicle frames is their agility and utility due to the design being similar to our own physical structure and being partially controlled through Neurohelmets. Throughout the source books is a plethora of information concerning the exact game mechanics on all these. I also feel rather certain there is fluff text in some source books stating roughly the same. However; go take a look at all the rules regarding vehicles and 'mechs and you will see the differences unbiased.

For the record, ground vehicles can mount jump jets as well [http://www.sarna.net/wiki/Kanga][construcing jump jet vehicles is Level 3 rules IIRC]. Any ground vehicle can also ram a 'mech before it tries to kick, punch, club or lift it (lifting is very peculiar and requires a large disparity in weight between the two subjects).


To get a tad more on topic and add my opinion:
CBT states any time a 'mech takes 20 damage or more in a round (regardless of weapon source), it has to make a piloting skill roll to check for knockdown.

I feel there should be none or almost no recoil from taking a PPC hit. The basis for PPCs is a stream of accelerated particles but they are microscopic particles and have extremely low mass. Plus, it already causes 'electrical' interference by way of scrambled HUD elements in-game.
Keeping the heavy hit recoils to ballistic weapons also gives them a more defined damage role to counter their limitation of ammo.



If you have an opinion on something that you think or feel should be, that is fine. Just be careful in how you put that out there as some of these posts look like they are making factual statements but contradict rules long set in print.

#84 Arogantfool

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Posted 04 June 2012 - 04:38 AM

Another Thing to note on the Mechs VS Tanks situation, their weight. Now i do not know very much about how the legged mechs handle their tonnage, but tanks are limited in weight by their suspension. Perhaps in the future a tank's suspension will be more capable but there is a reason why the super heavy tanks from the end of WW2 where abandoned. They were simply impractical to produce or transport to battlefields.

so for those boasting that in reality tanks would be superioir, perhaps they would, but not in comparison to the immense weight a mech is able to lug around with it's mobility.

#85 Tarskin

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Posted 04 June 2012 - 04:56 AM

I want to add my 2 cents in regards to the original 'PPC discussion'. You will have to forgive the scientist in me taking over and citing recent/relative literature which won't be accessible for the most of you (complain to publishers for asking thousands of dollars annually to access relevant scientific literature).

/science_on

I want to suggest reading an article about 'Plasma wakefield acceleration experiments' written by Hogan et al, 2010 (linky). This article is most certainly to technical for the most people but it does describe some very nifty experiments being done on high-energy accelerators.

/science_off

The article describes a few things and what I personally found very interesting is how they can use the wake to accelerate additional particles (within a time/energy period). Applying this to BT canon it would imply a laser-like PPC and not a 'ball' which makes more sense to me personally :)

EDIT: Added an oversimplified conclusion of the relevant part of said article

Edited by Tarskin, 04 June 2012 - 05:03 AM.


#86 Jacob Davion

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Posted 04 June 2012 - 06:56 AM

Well, lets see here. There's the Warhawk. Popular mech. But the Hellstar isn't popular. It doesn't make sense. Yes, the Warhawk has a TC, but it doesn't have the heat sinks to sink all of the ppcs while the Hellstar does. I think the reason the Hellstar isn't popular is because its overpowered, and it does the impossible. Thus, making it impossible to make. :) (jk) Honestly. I mean, whenever you have four clan er ppcs and you have the heat sinks to use them, you're pretty much an Awesome on MEGA-steroids!

#87 Athena Hart

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Posted 04 June 2012 - 07:41 AM

Kartr, Have to disagree with you on a few points.. about Tanks handling all terrain better. The one thing no tank or wheeled vehicle (with a few specialized exceptions) can do is traverse water. Even the M1a1 cannot tread water. A shallow stream/river yes (with enough speed), but typically Tanks and Wheeled vehicles need bridges and boats. A Battlemech simply walks across. As for your statement about them not getting proper traction on terrain? First the 'mechs weigh more than any tank, and the feet of 'mechs are likely ridged to provide additional traction. Sure, there are hills/mountains the 'mech would have to go around, but so would the tanks. Neither can scale a sheer rock face, nor can either scale a mountain. The one advantage a tank might have is to simple drive through a tunnel to the other side.. assuming that the designer of the tunnel didn't take Battlemechs into account when digging it (Which in the Battletech universe would be unlikely).

Also The treads/Wheels on tanks are very fragile. Take out a tanks tread and its immoble same with flat tires. The mechs feet are just as armored as the rest of the mech so it retains its mobilty. So what you are really trying to say is "I like tanks". Good for you. Personally we like 'mechs. If you like tanks so much, go play WoT. :) But at least get your facts straight, you just make yourself look silly.. and Um... weren't we supposed to be taling about PPC's?

BTW, Wether they would work realistcally or not... I still like them, and to the OP.. Why wouldn't you make one if you really could? Silly, you know you would.. admit it.. you just wouldn't tell anyone you did. :)

#88 Roland

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Posted 04 June 2012 - 07:45 AM

In general, if you can solve the balance problem, legged entities can maneuver over broken terrain far better than wheeled or tracked vehicles can.

Being able to direct force in any direction using legs gives you far greater control than being limited to directing force tangentially to the ground's surface.

#89 Kartr

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Posted 04 June 2012 - 08:05 PM

I will get around to posting a response some time, but this and next week are my finals weeks so a little swamped for time. Haven't had a chance to really sit down and read through peoples replies let alone write a post going into why tracks are better than legs for military vehicles.

#90 UncleKulikov

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Posted 04 June 2012 - 09:17 PM

View Postgolambo, on 03 June 2012 - 11:54 AM, said:

But articulation is everything. Tanks easily have enough power to reach 160kph (over 1,500hp for most modern turbines and turbodiesels), they're not geared for it, but they could be. It's not even that they're aerodynamically unstable or anything ether, it's that any traditional vehicle runs into limitations with suspension and articulation over rough terrain. It's not just 6 foot sheers that affect this, its heavy foliage, rocks, trenches and steep grades at odd angles. You hit a rock at 30mph in a tank and you might seriously break something. Leg's are giant shock absorbers, they wouldn't even flinch. Look at animals, tigers and their ilk barely slow down over dense jungle terrain, including very muddy terrain, and they weigh over 600lb's. They can RUN through mud that would stop a jeep dead. RUN. They don't get stuck. Mechs would have such obscene power (amusing they're fusion powered and all that) they would have zero problems dealing with mud or snow. It would take mud up to their knees to even slow them down! Remember, legs work like a pogo stick, they don't operate under nearly the same constraints. As long as you can push and pull you won't get stuck, and with sufficient power you probably won't even slow down. You're even less affected by gradient changes, so not only can you handle more terrain you can do it over grades faster. Not to mention nearly instant acceleration (you're only moving the limb, not having to deal with drag and friction from the ground). No, as a form of locomotion animal movement beats the pants off any wheel equivalent. You could put a 5,000hp engine in a tank, and I don't mean that as a hypothetical. You could probably tune a high end turbodiesel in a tank to pull those kinds of numbers. All it'd do would spin the treads on the dirt and kick up a mighty dust storm. You run into traction limitations. Tread tension limitations. Tank suspension is very primitive stuff designed for high load applications, look up torsion bars. The treads themselves sheer off at high speed. The reason the M1 has a governor is related to this, it could easily do 60mph (95ish kph) and has the gearing to do so, except for the fact that it tends to break really fast when it does! Unless you really half *** making your big scary robot, there is no way it'd have less mobility per ton than a comparable traditional tank. It would be probably easier to go faster, over more terrain, all of the time. 4 legs or 2, 20 tons or 70.

As for the rest, there is something to that, but perspective counts. Tanks are only "stable firing platforms" under 40kph, which is painfully slow in perspective. Any more than that and the computer has a very hard time adjusting for the motion of the vehicle unless you're on some really flat surfaces. Both vehicles would have trouble at high speeds, and its a bigger hurdle than a lot of people might realize. Now the "stable gun platform" in relation to recoil is a real problem, one I think some creativity could work with, but its true that tanks are pretty stable. It has a lot to do with their wide, low stance and big thick turret rings. For example, the Striker 105mm MGS can only shoot a few degrees to the left and right of itself, any more and without stabilization it will tip over! Of course the french and italians manged to do it just fine with their armored cars so clearly we just suck, but it is an issue. ;) Tanks really aren't very special. They're armored cars with treads, that's it. Modern tanks have extremely heavy front armor (almost 3 feet thick in most cases) and are effectively invincible to eachother from the front, but at the cost of a pittance for armor anywhere else. Long barreled 30mm Autocannons can side pen the M1 Abrams at 1000 meters. even the slightest off angle attack could go right through a modern tank like butter. There is a lot of talk about how the modern tank, while cool, really isn't designed very well for modern conflicts. Better proactive countermeasures and significantly better protection against infantry based guided missiles is a huge priority. So maybe if you make a tank didn't spend so much effort being invincible from the front, but stands a fighting chance to live through hits to the rest of it, that would make more sense in a modern combat environment. Tanks are really cool and I will always love them, but It's not the only way to make a combat vehicle, and it's not the only way they're ever going to be made, ether.

(Oh, and not to ignore your little story, it's smart but I think I obviously disagree on whats possible. While they would excel in the role I don't think mechs would have to be limited to being a light raider.)
This post made me think of this



The ATATs don't sink into the snow pack at all.

#91 Liquid Leopard

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Posted 25 March 2013 - 07:18 PM

View PostGoLambo, on 03 June 2012 - 11:54 AM, said:

Look at animals, tigers and their ilk barely slow down over dense jungle terrain, including very muddy terrain, and they weigh over 600lb's. They can RUN through mud that would stop a jeep dead. RUN.


I think we need to watch more Animal Planet and less Empire Strikes Back. Or better still, go have an "analog" experience with mud. If your jeep is stopped dead in some mud, get out and sink into the mud and then tell me how superior legs are. Animals can run over mud (not through it) if they're light enough. Big cats have low ground pressure because of the way their paws are designed, and because they don't weigh 600lbs. (Only a liger is that big, and it's a freak bred in zoos.) Those cats don't deal with mud if they can help it. They might go into the mud if they see an animal stuck in it, such as a hoofed animal with its weight concentrated on a relatively small area. Try getting an elephant to "run" through mud. If you're on the elephant, you're in for a long day as it sinks in and has to pull its feet back out one at a time. There are few animals with legs that aren't bothered by jeep-stopping mud. That includes frogs and lizards, which are small and light, or crocodiles and alligators, which pretty much slide across the mud on their bellies. In snow, predators have paws that are bigger and fluffier than their warm-climate counterparts, so they don't sink so much. Yet, they still sink, so foxes, wolves and cats often have to hunt belly-deep in the snow. For humans to traverse snow, we spread out our weight with skis, or snow shoes. If we're lazy and want an animal to pull our skis, we use dogs weighing less than 100lbs, with big paws bred for snow. ...Except for one bizarre race, where a sled pulled by 200 Siberian kitty cats beat all the dogs.

#92 Liquid Leopard

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Posted 25 March 2013 - 07:37 PM

View Post3Xtr3m3, on 24 April 2012 - 10:11 AM, said:

In your mind construct a nssty strecth of land with rough terrain with rolling angles, sharp changes in heigth, throw in some railroad tracks, ditches, trenches, use your imagination. Now, would you be better rolling over all that at speed? Trying to fly over it with the ground pushing back at your hover? Or is the logic of Battletech proving itself by being able to RUN over that ground?

Subtract the railroad tracks, and you've just described Afghanistan. Is the US Army taking bids on mecha? Any place they can't go in a tank, they go in a helicopter. Or, did you want to justify the 2-story robots by having them shoot over the roofs and tree tops? Oh, wait...the Army has helicopters for that, too. There is no "logic of Battletech". It's a game. If you've ever been in touch with reality, fighting robots require a LOT of suspension of disbelief. The "logic" on this forum is actually making that more difficult for me.

#93 Davers

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Posted 25 March 2013 - 07:47 PM

We really needed to bring this old thread to life so we could talk about how animals can run through mud?

#94 Liquid Leopard

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Posted 27 March 2013 - 06:07 PM

I was really disappointed to see this thread bogged down with fanboys trying to rationalize mecha. They’re from cartoons, and have no basis in reality. I liked Battletech because it was a nifty game, but if I try to rationalize it, I don’t enjoy the game any more.
I came to this thread for the discussion on PPCs, a system which is somewhat plausible. Such things have actually been built, if only in labs. In the 1980s the "Strategic Defense Initiative" put zillions of dollars into testing particle beams and lasers in the hopes that they could be mounted on satellites and used for missile defense. Maybe I'll do a search and see if I can find a video of one of those particle beams...though I doubt it. Any good information, if it still exists, is probably classified.

Edited by Liquid Leopard, 27 March 2013 - 06:08 PM.


#95 Kaspirikay

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Posted 27 March 2013 - 06:23 PM

I recall reading an artical about someone who got blasted with a large amount of particles from a partical accelerator, he didn't explode, he just developed problems in the long run.

Not the most promising use as a weapon for war.

Here we go,

http://en.wikipedia....natoli_Bugorski

Edited by Kaspirikay, 27 March 2013 - 06:24 PM.


#96 Liquid Leopard

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Posted 27 March 2013 - 06:44 PM

View PostKaspirikay, on 27 March 2013 - 06:23 PM, said:

I recall reading an artical about someone who got blasted with a large amount of particles from a partical accelerator, he didn't explode, he just developed problems in the long run.

Not the most promising use as a weapon for war.

Here we go,

http://en.wikipedia....natoli_Bugorski

Doh! The Russians would have an accident like that.

Edited by Liquid Leopard, 27 March 2013 - 07:08 PM.


#97 Liquid Leopard

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Posted 27 March 2013 - 06:56 PM

Well, I learned from my search results that SDI was much more interested in neutral particle accelerators than charged particle accelerators. Battletech lore is pretty specific about PPCs shooting charged particles, right? I intuitively thought charged particles would be useful (if only in space) and might have a side effect like an EMP. My intuition was wrong on this, and that’s why we do a search rather than believe in the ion cannon on Hoth.

Wikipedia says, among other things “Charged particle beams diverge rapidly due to mutual repulsion, so neutral particle beams are more commonly proposed.”

[color="#0000ff"]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Particle_beam_weapon[/color]

The Global Security web site implies that a neutral particle beam would be bad-@$$, and says:
“high energy neutral particles propagate in straight lines unaffected by the earth's magnetic field and have a very brief flight time to targets even at extended ranges. In addition, the neutral particles become high energy charged particles upon interaction with the surface of a target and penetrate deeply into the vehicle, thus making shielding relatively ineffective.”

http://www.globalsec...systems/npb.htm

They become charged particles? So, beam of protons or alpha particles is useless with current technology, but a neutron gun could zap electronics? Then again, the article has at least one error, saying “friction” where I’m pretty sure they meant “fraction”. Who knows what else they got wrong. Maybe they got stuff wrong on purpose, to obfuscate the facts.

It seems to me that the explanations of Battletech weapons were based on what was predicted as of 1985. A lot of real-world research has been done since then, and new and interesting information has been published as a result. I wonder if it might be worthwhile to overhaul certain things like the explanation of the PPC. Maybe the regular PPC could still be explained as a charged particle gun, and the ER PPC shoots neutral particles? Or maybe that's too much rationalizing, and I should just enjoy the glowing death rays on my screen.

Edited by Liquid Leopard, 27 March 2013 - 07:03 PM.


#98 Scratx

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Posted 27 March 2013 - 07:00 PM

.....................................................

You resurrected an old thread for this? Oh, dear.

#99 Zolaz

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Posted 27 March 2013 - 09:20 PM

A PPC is 3 oz grain alcohol, 2 oz peppermint schnapps:


It has four other variations the only difference is the liquor you mix with the Grain alcohol.
The one first described is called the Steiner variant.
The others include:

Davion: 2 oz Bourbon or Tequila
Kurita: 2 oz Sake
Liao: 2 oz Plum Wine
Marik: 2 oz Ouzo

Bottom's up, and oh by the way if it's the Steiner variant of the drink, open you throat and send her down. DO NOT! KEEP IT IN YOUR MOUTH, OR IT WILL FEEL LIKE THE ENAMEL IS COMING OFF YOUR TEETH.

If you are a merc, you just go ahead and add another 2 oz of grain alcohol. Mixed drinks are for losers. Clanners just go for the suppository version.





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