I Need One of These

[texasjohn]

Wonder how large the hole is that it drills into the target. Might give whole new meaning to pinpoint accuracy! Bet the delay between "fire" and "target destroyed" is near the speed of light!

Match it up with this rifle system which makes deadly shots at long range while riding a zip line...well, that would actually be awesome!

Official Site

 

[dave1949]

Wonder how large the hole is that it drills into the target. Might give whole new meaning to pinpoint accuracy! Bet the delay between "fire" and "target destroyed" is near the speed of light!

Match it up with this rifle system which makes deadly shots at long range while riding a zip line...well, that would actually be awesome!

Official Site

How it works:
Press the tag button to designate an impact point.
Align the reticle with the tag.
Squeeze and hold the trigger.
The Precision-Guided Firearm does the rest.

Hunh? The gun must take control of your body. :laughing:

 

[texasjohn]

Yep...in the video you can see a moving coyote get tagged with a red dot on it's chest...it continues to run and the red dot stays on it's chest automatically thanks to the pattern recognition computer embedded in the gun/scope...The gunner decides that the red dot is properly placed and "pulls the trigger"....the gun does not fire until the red dot aligns with where the bullet will land...calculations for windage, distance, bullet drop, etc is all done automatically by the computer, knowing the characteristics of the hand loaded bullet it has. My understanding is that the target and gunner can both be moving and, once tagged properly, a target will be accurately hit.

Kinda makes a sniper out of anyone with this gun.

Although I haven't visited the factory, it is about 30 miles from where I live.

 

[bajabum]

Back when I was doing satellite control, we had to keep a useless old F1 satellite in orbit because the different branches of the military were each testing their Laser weapons on it trying to shoot it down. During the years I was on the project, no one ever succeeded. We hated keeping that old satellite up there as it took a lot more work to maintain than the newer ones. I almost lost my job when I jokingly mentioned we should have the Russians shoot it down since they had a working laser and had already proved that they could shoot one down. That was back in the 80's.

That Satellite was shot down (up?) in 1985. I was tracking it at VAFB when it was hit...(VTS-A)
The folks that were still using the data were P*ssed, nobody asked them first.

Solwind - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[bajabum]

On the vids, it looks like they were targeting some kind of pyrotechnics.
Way too much boom for just burning a hole...

 

[mddorange]

That Satellite was shot down (up?) in 1985. I was tracking it at VAFB when it was hit...(VTS-A)
The folks that were still using the data were P*ssed, nobody asked them first.

Were you in the Air Force then or a contractor? I left that project for NORAD late in 84.

 

[bajabum]

Contractor with Ford Aerospace.
I was driving the 60 foot dish that day.
Iron 2265

 

[mddorange]

Back in those days, the Air Force was planning on launching their own Space Shuttles from VAFB. Each time we launched a new bird, we dealt a lot with dish operators around the world during Early Orbit. VAFB kept promising us "Turn Around would be within 60 days but never made it."

 

[texasjohn]

That would answer my confusion regarding the size of the explosion...I guess that it provides instant feedback to the operator about target acquisition...wonder how much power is actually there to burn a hole into an airplane/ship, reach critical components, and disable it.

On the vids, it looks like they were targeting some kind of pyrotechnics.
Way too much boom for just burning a hole...

 

[bcp]

Maybe this thread should be moved to the welding forum.

From:
http://rt.com/usa/213583-navy-laser-gun-drones/

LaWS works by focusing beams from six solid-state commercial welding lasers into a single strong beam, which can be used both as a blinding warning shot or as a weapon capable of setting fire to anti-ship arms or other threats to US warships, especially small, fast-moving targets.
-------------------

Another article said the Navy considered this a light duty weapon, and not protection from anti-ship missiles and fighter jets. For that threat they wanted 100 to 150 kilowatt lasers minimum, instead of this 30KW system.

Bruce