Re: Gauss Weapons

On Tue, 25 Apr 2000 12:23:45 -0400 (EDT), Roger Books
<books@mail.state.fl.us>
wrote:

>> [Bri] Again True. However, against soft targets (ie. people), you may
want
>> to trade impact for kinetic transfer.
>
>I don't think this is really an issue with a high enough velocity. 
What
>are the words, hydrostatic shock?

I thought hydrostatic shock was a function of kinetic energy over the
impact
area. In other words, a projectile with a tiny cross section travelling
at
very fast speeds will do less damage to the human body than a slow
moving,
large projectile. In fact, if the projectile goes fast enough, it might
even
cauterize the wound via friction.

However, since all troops will have some form of body armour in this
era,
armour penetration becomes a bigger issue. You may end up with warfare
with
cleaner wounds, in the sense that you might get lots of small holes with
comparitively little damage.

That's another thing, chemically propelled weapons are dirty. Not only
aren't
they sterilized, the crap that the projectile carries is pretty nasty (I
have
a book that explains complications due to death by gunshots; for a
quicker
summary, there is a great scene in "Three Kings" that details it). Gauss
projectiles would probably result in fewer side effects.

Allan Goodall		       agoodall@interlog.com
Goodall's Grotto: http://www.interlog.com/~agoodall/

"Surprisingly, when you throw two naked women with sex
toys into a living room full of drunken men, things 
always go bad." - Kyle Baker, "You Are Here"