Handheld weapons in space? - General

First off PyromanDan is right, throw the heaviest som-bitch at your enemy and watch the outcome. Forget about rockets the amount of thrust required to push an object where you want it to go is a lot. Unless you have thrusters every where it will be unguided. Basically the only thing we currently have today that is remotely plausible is the experimental "Gauss Rifle" the experimental one is about the size of a football field. Think to that gun on the ship from Transformers 2 just less awesome. Hope that answers your question.

[QUOTE=Captain Lawlrus;22380923]Gunpowder cannot burn without oxygen.[/QUOTE] as said before, gunpowder has an oxidizer in it so there's no real need for oxygen. it's potassium nitrate if i recall correctly

Vera needs oxygen around her to fire. [img]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v625/lostncybr/Fire%20Fly/FireFly%20TV%20show/Jayne%20Cobb%20-%20Jayne/Jaynes%20TV%20Guns/Jaynes%20TV%20Vera/vera-large.jpg[/img]

Not to "dampen" anybody's fire. But it seems to me that you guys are over thinking the whole general idea of space "guns".

[QUOTE=M..BISON;22380734]No air in space= No explosion to propel boolet forward.[/QUOTE] It's been proven that most bullets contain enough air to support the combustion. All Russian cosmonauts until the first joint Soviet-American missions carried a convertible weapon designed to not jam in super-cold conditions like space. Just in case.

[QUOTE=TheRamshankler;22384184]Not to "dampen" anybody's fire. But it seems to me that you guys are over thinking the whole general idea of space "guns".[/QUOTE] I "like" putting quotes around "words" that don't "need" them as "well"! [QUOTE=DarkendSky;22384710]It's been proven that most bullets contain enough air to support the combustion. All Russian cosmonauts until the first joint Soviet-American missions carried a convertible weapon designed to not jam in super-cold conditions like space. Just in case.[/QUOTE] Oh, I misunderstood that one guy.

The Russians did have a gun in space. It was a shotgun that could fire a variety of specialty shells and flares as well as a built in rifle that fired 5.45mm AK-74 ammo. Although it was exclusively for the possibility of landing back on earth out in buttfuck nowhere.

I could see how that would be useful.

[QUOTE=Herr Sven;22380233]What are we going to use it for? The answer is obvious: War. But should war really be brought to space? We study the cosmos to learn, to help humanity, so should we fight about it? And about what?[/QUOTE] Think Space colonization, then think of all the military tracking satellites in space currently. When warfare is waged in space to destroy an enemies' information flow, it makes the ground combat easier. If your troops don't have GPS, the homelands don't have any way to communicate- you have made an uninformed, vulnerable enemy.

Fucking Railguns man. Magnets man propelling shit in space Let this demonstration with music describe it for you [media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AhdXa7nHODw[/media] Combine that with rocket propelled ammunition and you might make a rather lethal weapon, even though a railgun is lethal enough. Obviously magic

[QUOTE=Comtochus;22381292]There was a family of experimental firearms called the "Gyrojet" which in theory could all fire in space. The main problems with the Gyrojet firearms were that instead of bullets they used small rockets. [/QUOTE] Boltguns. :science:

I thought we were going to use lasers in space?

[QUOTE=Captain Lawlrus;22380923]Gunpowder cannot burn without oxygen.[/QUOTE] It can, apparently saltpetre has the oxygen required, you think there's actually enough air inside a puny barrel for such a violent explosion?

[QUOTE=Herr Sven;22380233]On topic: No, I've not heard about any projectile-based weaponry made to be used in space.[/QUOTE] [img]http://img10.imageshack.us/img10/4599/gyrojet2019602001.jpg[/img] Fires tiny rockets.

Looks like a knock-off Gyrojet. [IMG]http://world.guns.ru/handguns/gyrojet-1.jpg[/IMG]

[QUOTE=M..BISON;22380734]No air in space= No explosion to propel boolet forward.[/QUOTE] You don't need air for it. There exist explosives which "burn" without oxygen. The answer to the question in this thread: Yes, you'll get a kick back which makes you rotate around your axis. You can only compensate this with thrusters.

[QUOTE=aVoN;22389782]You don't need air for it. There exist explosives which "burn" without oxygen. The answer to the question in this thread: Yes, you'll get a kick back which makes you rotate around your axis. [B]You can only compensate this with thrusters[/B].[/QUOTE] I imagine in the 'future' this will be one of those things that your super-duper space suit could do automatically. Though projectile weapons in space are pretty unlikely as it is. Space combat is so utterly different to standard ground combat. There's nothing to get in the way of energy emission weapons. You don't worry about the horizon getting in the way of your artillery, you worry about gravity wells. Distances are astronomical (no shit). The list goes on. Everyone who wants to get seriously pedantic about what little we do know about 'space combat' bar sci-fi and speculation should read this website: [url]http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/index.html[/url] [editline]03:38PM[/editline] Here's the page on 'Slug throwers', which is the category conventional Earth guns fall under. [url]http://www.projectrho.com/rocket/rocket3l1.html[/url]

How about no guns, but lasers? Simply enough, you reflect a beam of light around some mirrors until it is amplified enough to cause damage, then release it from the gun barrel, and cook some shit up!

Would the gun push you backwards instead?

[QUOTE=CoolKingKaso;22392638]Would the gun push you backwards instead?[/QUOTE] [quote=Atomic Rocket]If you are sure you won't hit anything but the space pirate, a standard handgun like a .45 automatic might do. One might think that the recoil would be uncontrollable in free fall, but both Dr. Schilling and Erik Max Francis are of the opinion that such recoil is vastly overrated. In a firefight, you'd be trying to keep behind some cover (or you'd be dead) so you'd be braced in some fashion. Any bracing at all would take care of the recoil. Erik (working with somebody else's figures) calculates that the recoil will spin you at the minuscule rate of a few degrees per second. (bullet momentum 4 kg m/s, fired from 40 cm from the center of the axis, the angular momentum imparted to the marksman is thus 1.6 kg m2/s. Divide that by marksman's moment of inertia, and you get an angular speed of 0.05 rad/s, or less than 3 deg/s.) If you wanted to use your handgun for propulsion, Trip the Space Parasite calculates that a .45 automatic will give 0.12 m/s of deltaV to a 50 kg person.[/quote] So, in short, no, it wouldn't push you back much at all.

[QUOTE=CoolKingKaso;22392638]Would the gun push you backwards instead?[/QUOTE] In Space, gun shoots you! Awesome, does that mean that we'll get Yakov Smirnoff, but in space?

Spacewalking pack has thrusters on it, i assume you could link up these thrusters to fireing mechanism to push you forwards as the gun pushes back. That or you could use Gauss, i think magnets work in space, but who really knows how they work...

Waiwait, so Minmatar Artillery cannons wouldn't work in Eve online? Shit.

Who needs bullets when you have laser beams? I think (I hope) that when war will reach zero-gravity environments, humanity will be advanced enough to have some pew pew zappy guns.

and I had the thought of winning the world cup with Ghana on my mind scary, it's just a game, not real life.

[QUOTE=jimhowl33t;22392926]Who needs bullets when you have laser beams? I think (I hope) that when war will reach zero-gravity environments, humanity will be advanced enough to have some pew pew zappy guns.[/QUOTE] We already have the technology for pew pew zappy guns, but the power packs are the size of a sedan, if not larger. What we need are better batteries.

[QUOTE=roflcakes;22393016]We already have the technology for pew pew zappy guns, but the power packs are the size of a sedan, if not larger. What we need are better batteries.[/QUOTE] weren't nuclear batteries in developement somewhere? [editline]05:38PM[/editline] SHIT YEAH! [url]http://www.facepunch.com/showthread.php?t=939475[/url] Now let's lazor the fuck out of everything!

[QUOTE=eatdembeanz;22392492]How about no guns, but lasers? Simply enough, you reflect a beam of light around some mirrors until it is amplified enough to cause damage, then release it from the gun barrel, and cook some shit up![/QUOTE] It's not that simple how it sounds. And you need a huge power supply because of generating a 100W laser beam (100 W laser-light is much but still not effective as a weapon), you need around 10 times more electrical power. Also the reflections which happen once you hit your target are dangerous not only for the target but also for you.

Fine, screw it, let's just throw rocks at them with slingshots. Should damage the helmet and shit like that. Might actually work.

I only read the OP, someone probably already said this, but W/E; Guns won't work in space. They require oxygen to ignite the cordite, or gunpowder if you want.