China is rushing to put railguns on warships, but the superguns are likely worthless in a war

[Feng Leng]

https://amp.thisisinsider.com/china...th-railguns-that-may-not-matter-in-war-2019-1


China is rushing to put railguns on warships, but the superguns are likely worthless in a war

China claims it's winning the race to bring long-range superguns to its growing fleet, but experts say that even if these weapons work, they won't make a difference in high-end conflict.

China announced it will "soon" be arming its warships with railguns, a technology which uses electromagnetic energy rather than explosive charges to fire rounds farther than conventional guns and at seven or eight times the speed of sound. The US Navy has spent more than a decade pursuing this technology, but naval affairs experts contend that even the best railguns have huge problems that make them a poor substitute for existing capabilities.

"You are better off spending that money on missiles and vertical launch system cells than you are on a railgun," Bryan Clark, a defense expert and former US Navy officer, told Business Insider.

The Chinese navy made headlines when images of a Chinese ship equipped with a suspected railgun first surfaced in January 2018. Photos showed the vessel, initially nicknamed the "Yangtze River Monster," docked on the Yangtze River at a shipyard in Wuhan. That same ship - the Type 072III Yuting-class tank-landing ship "Haiyang Shan" - reappeared in late December, having possibly set sail for sea trials.

The Pentagon is working on a sour grapes cannon to replace their failed railgun -- it's called the "grape shot"

 

[Dil Pakistan]

They behave as if China is brainless and putting railgun on ships is stupid thing to do.

A country that can proceed to make a rail gun and then install on ship got to have at least some brain.

 

[zectech]

There are so many platforms a rail gun could be used in the future. Start with the easiest, a surface fleet and progress from there. And are very useful on surface ships.

 

[F-22Raptor]

"The US has found that a working railgun, even if it met all the promise of a railgun system, is going to have very limited utility in strike or air defense," Clark concluded, explaining that this technology is a tool which advances the narrative that China is a formidable force.

https://www.businessinsider.com/chi...th-railguns-that-may-not-matter-in-war-2019-1

The US Navy is right.....railguns don't have the range or durability to be operationally useful. An they require huge amounts of energy which limits there effectiveness even further.

The US military is taking the correct approach in pursuing the hypervelocity rounds. 20 were fired aboard the USS Dewey last summer at RIMPAC. They can fire at 50 miles at Mach 3 for under $100K a shot.....and can store hundreds of rounds on the ship. This will revolutionize US missile defense.

Further quotes:

In 2016, Robert Work, the Obama administration's deputy secretary of defense, advised the incoming Trump administration to consider investing in hypervelocity projectiles rather than in railguns.

“We thought railguns were something we were really going to go after, but it turns out that powder guns firing the same hypervelocity projectiles gets you almost as much as you would get out of the electromagnetic rail gun, but it’s something we can do much faster," Work said.

The U.S. military is hoping that it can leapfrog China's own railgun advancements by equipping existing guns with Mach-7 shells. "We now think that we can do pretty revolutionary things with existing powder guns -- think howitzers, [U.S. Army] Paladin [self-propelled artillery], the Navy’s five-inch guns," William Roper, who then headed the SCO, said in 2016. "We’ve shifted emphasis to that."

“We have a thousand powder guns," Roper added. "We have very few railguns."

 

[MastanKhan]

Hi,

Actually this "Railgun" thingy has put nations following the tail lights of a truck.

Its utility is not as substantial as compared to missiles---. I would rather have the capacity to launch 30 missiles thru a VLS than a railgun---.

The author is correct in his assessment---.

 

[nang2]

When tanks first came out, they were so unreliable that they hardly made a difference. But subsequent technological improvements changed everything. It is a common mistake to assess the future of a new technology based on its current status.

 

[Menthol]

If USA successfully implant railgun, this article will praise it rather than condemn it.

Language and human psycolopsy...

 

[zectech]

What I was going to post...

just a western psyop. When the Washington regime develops a rail gun...

If USA successfully implant railgun, this article will praise it rather than condemn it.

Language and human psycolopsy...

 

[艹艹艹]

Technology is not mature at present

 

[Beast]

"The US has found that a working railgun, even if it met all the promise of a railgun system, is going to have very limited utility in strike or air defense," Clark concluded, explaining that this technology is a tool which advances the narrative that China is a formidable force.

https://www.businessinsider.com/chi...th-railguns-that-may-not-matter-in-war-2019-1

The US Navy is right.....railguns don't have the range or durability to be operationally useful. An they require huge amounts of energy which limits there effectiveness even further.

The US military is taking the correct approach in pursuing the hypervelocity rounds. 20 were fired aboard the USS Dewey last summer at RIMPAC. They can fire at 50 miles at Mach 3 for under $100K a shot.....and can store hundreds of rounds on the ship. This will revolutionize US missile defense.

Further quotes:

In 2016, Robert Work, the Obama administration's deputy secretary of defense, advised the incoming Trump administration to consider investing in hypervelocity projectiles rather than in railguns.

“We thought railguns were something we were really going to go after, but it turns out that powder guns firing the same hypervelocity projectiles gets you almost as much as you would get out of the electromagnetic rail gun, but it’s something we can do much faster," Work said.

The U.S. military is hoping that it can leapfrog China's own railgun advancements by equipping existing guns with Mach-7 shells. "We now think that we can do pretty revolutionary things with existing powder guns -- think howitzers, [U.S. Army] Paladin [self-propelled artillery], the Navy’s five-inch guns," William Roper, who then headed the SCO, said in 2016. "We’ve shifted emphasis to that."

“We have a thousand powder guns," Roper added. "We have very few railguns."

Lol... Becos US dont have the tech to get these railgun works to its full potential not becos of the dismay performance.

Days of US always being number one on all fronts are over. There is a peer called China

Cant eat the pie and claim its sour. It is so sad american american has reached that stage. Indeed, US is on the stage of decline.

Hi,

Actually this "Railgun" thingy has put nations following the tail lights of a truck.

Its utility is not as substantial as compared to missiles---. I would rather have the capacity to launch 30 missiles thru a VLS than a railgun---.

The author is correct in his assessment---.

Lol... If u know nothing, better keep it to yourself.

Railgun has far more powerful projected compare to traditional chemical powder rounds. Minus the chemical, the rounds fire is much smaller and safer with just the explosive warhead. That means a warship originally can carry 500 rds , can easily increase to 700 rds due to smaller rds but with same storage space. No expended chemical means firing a rd using railgun is far safer compare to explosive method to project a rd.

Most importantly, the barrel shelf life will be much longer and range achieved is far more longer.

 

[MastanKhan]

Lol... If u know nothing, better keep it to yourself.

Railgun has far more powerful projected compare to traditional chemical powder rounds. Minus the chemical, the rounds fire is much smaller and safer with just the explosive warhead. That means a warship originally can carry 500 rds , can easily increase to 700 rds due to smaller rds but with same storage space. No expended chemical means firing a rd using railgun is far safer compare to explosive method to project a rd.

Most importantly, the barrel shelf life will be much longer and range achieved is far more longer.

Hi,

So---who do you think you are going to fire this weapon at---?

 

[Beast]

Hi,

So---who do you think you are going to fire this weapon at---?

Are you taking this thread like a joke? Why ask irrelevant and absurd question?

 

[Feng Leng]

Hi,

So---who do you think you are going to fire this weapon at---?

Most of the railguns are deployed in Tibet.

https://defence.pk/pdf/threads/china-deploys-electromagnetic-railgun-in-tibet-to-cover-delhi.570761/

 

[jhungary]

Hi,

Actually this "Railgun" thingy has put nations following the tail lights of a truck.

Its utility is not as substantial as compared to missiles---. I would rather have the capacity to launch 30 missiles thru a VLS than a railgun---.

The author is correct in his assessment---.

This topic again have been debated to death, there are several limitation with railgun design, under current technology, we need a very powerful system to power a small output rail gun (6 millions ampere and 68MW to power a 30KJ/9MW railgun), which in term of damage and range, it is only a bit better than a WW2 era 8 inch gun shell.

The problem is energy dissipation, we cannot translate electricity power effectively to kinetic energy without losing it to heat and friction, which mean for a small railgun, you need a big power generator and a lot of capacitor.

Another issue with how to shield the crew from EM wave and the heat is a problem. One shot of a railgun in an enclosed ship, it kills everyone inside.

And bear in mind, there are only 1 ship class in the world are deck out for railgun deployment, and there are only 1 known working railgun in the world, and they are Zumwalt's and GD/BAe 32MJ EMLRG.

 

[Feng Leng]

This topic again have been debated to death, there are several limitation with railgun design, under current technology, we need a very powerful system to power a small output rail gun (6 millions ampere and 68MW to power a 30KJ/9MW railgun), which in term of damage and range, it is only a bit better than a WW2 era 8 inch gun shell.

The problem is energy dissipation, we cannot translate electricity power effectively to kinetic energy without losing it to heat and friction, which mean for a small railgun, you need a big power generator and a lot of capacitor.

Another issue with how to shield the crew from EM wave and the heat is a problem. One shot of a railgun in an enclosed ship, it kills everyone inside.

And bear in mind, there are only 1 ship class in the world are deck out for railgun deployment, and there are only 1 known working railgun in the world, and they are Zumwalt's and GD/BAe 32MJ EMLRG.

The Pentagon is right. The future is going to be shooting extremely sour grapes at hypersonic speeds to corrode enemy ships with the sourness of the grapes. Advanced biotech in the US has created grapes with sourness unlike any seen on Earth. The Zumwalt super-destroyer will be the first to deploy the revolutionary "grapeshot". China beware!