Some of you are good at knowing this stuff so I have a question to start this thread, What output is needed for a laser to compete with in terms of penetration and damage to say..... a .45ACP within 30 feet?
A lot.
A whole damn lot.
More than you could make portable(even considering an entire plane/train turned reactor)
I'd bet you could build a Gauss rifle to meet your specs and it would be a lot more compact and discreet. Lasers are not very practical for high power mobile applications.
[QUOTE=Tw34k;39669958]I'd bet you could build a Gauss rifle to meet your specs and it would be a lot more compact and discreet. Lasers are not very practical for high power mobile applications.[/QUOTE]
A Man-portable Multi-megawatt pulsed laser running on capacitor charge(or Microfusion cells) could be feasible. The majority of the damage would be surface though, but that comes with setting off every pain receptor in their bodies(due to the burst of EM radiation that causes burns) as well as permanently disfiguring them due to the steam explosion that removes their internal organs. Gauss rifle isn't a DEW, it's a projectile weapon.
Sounds painful.
[QUOTE=Tw34k;39669958]I'd bet you could build a Gauss rifle to meet your specs and it would be a lot more compact and discreet. Lasers are not very practical for high power mobile applications.[/QUOTE]
What about this bad boy
[media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3pO2A5oJyX0[/media]
[img]http://i.imgur.com/tV6YWrM.png[/img]
If a .45 weighs around 0.013kg, going at 330m/s you get ~700 Joules. However a 700W (J/s) laser will not have the same penetrating power, not even close. There is also that lasers don't really have penetrating power in the sense of punching aside stuff, they have to melt whatever is in the way.
How fast it melts and how much energy it needs massively depends on the material. Some softer materials actually do better against lasers than hard ones such as steel, which would do better against kinetic weapons. Kinetic weaponry is a big slug that [B]will[/B] damage whatever it hits to stop (and send a shockwave through the material that will damage stuff behind it, like organs), lasers are a whole lot more complex in their interaction.
General formula to increase heat in a material is E = c*m*(T2-T1) where c is heat capacity for the material, m is mass of the heated material and (T2-T1) is the change in temperature, plus you need the energy for melting which is E = c*m. So if you want to get 1kg iron from 20C to 1434C (melting point), you need about 950kJ (W being J/s, you can work out yourself the needed Wattage depending on how fast you want to heat it up). This is not accounting for energy lost into the nearby matter (since the energy transfer won't be instant, it will keep giving off some of the energy you give it), the fact that the laser loses a lot of energy over distance (very dependent on day and conditions, if you are in a urban fight in the middle east with vehicles throwing up dust you will lose even more) and a lot of other stuff (if more than 25% of the energy leaving the barrel actually ends up heating the target I'd be surprised).
Let's not even get into how the actual laser will be created and how efficient it is (or the more complex photon physics, that up there is just high school stuff).
[IMG]http://media.moddb.com/images/groups/1/2/1312/s640x480.jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]http://jollyroger666.narod.ru/biblio/lazerrevolver.gif[/IMG]
Soviet Laser Pistols. They exist. They use flashbulbs. They most likely suck. :v:
Soviet laser pistols? Some people made home made ones too apparently.
[video=youtube;RUXXGbNS8oY]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RUXXGbNS8oY[/video]
Here's a comparison between power of lasers and illuminating and eventually blowing away the moon
[url]http://what-if.xkcd.com/13/[/url]
Way too much. Stick to conventional pistols, slinging lead at fast speeds has been the preferred way of mankilling for a long time, and it's likely to be for a long time. Sure, lasers are cool, but just cap someone with a .45/few 9mms/a shotgun shell/slug/whatever to the chest and they're down unless they took a cue from Clint Eastwood and are wearing a metal door under their clothes.
[editline]23rd February 2013[/editline]
And hey, you can get the pretty lights too if you get your hands on tracers!
[QUOTE=Unit-05;39688797]Soviet laser pistols? Some people made home made ones too apparently.
[video=youtube;RUXXGbNS8oY]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RUXXGbNS8oY[/video][/QUOTE]
Cool, but can it kill someone??
[QUOTE=Fuckitbucket;39689736]Cool, but can it kill someone??[/QUOTE]
If you keep shooting yes, effectively your enemy will kill you with his fist before that thing kills your enemy.
[editline]23rd February 2013[/editline]
Maybe if you engaged at 500m
[editline]23rd February 2013[/editline]
and he was naked ofc
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