Oh's No's! Real Ray Guns Coming Soon!

[pirateboy]

I think Tesla was the first who thought of this with his death ray.
Gonna be great if we have these lasers pointed at us from orbit. We will be like ants under a magnifying glass. Yaay.

 

[DeadlyPredator]

I think the most lethal use would be to mount it on a several satellites with a lot of solar panel, since solar panels are very very effective in space. That would create a unstoppable weapon which could fire everywhere with gps precision if you put tracers on your target, or you could just use a camera and a scope on the satellite and you shoot what you see. That will help USA to keep the control of space and prevent those d*$n communists to control the world.

 

[blackened144]

"Looks at the facts: very high power, portable, limited firing time, unlimited range. All you'd need is a big spinning mirror and you could vaporize a human target from space. "

 

[tenor77]

Hammer of Dawn is Online

 

[ckthecerealkiller]

[citation][nom]eklipz330[/nom]the u.s. army already fitted a laser on a humvee a while ago[/citation]

That was only a 10kW beam and that was about 1/2 the size of what this is, at least. This is the first beam to hit the 100 kW mark without causing breakdown of plasma around the beam, a very big step for us.

The first use of this should be for ABM's, an area of defense that is lacking greatly. I don't think the treaty with the Soviets is still active, but I'm not sure.

 

[Tindytim]

[citation][nom]blackened144[/nom]"Looks at the facts: very high power, portable, limited firing time, unlimited range. All you'd need is a big spinning mirror and you could vaporize a human target from space. "[/citation]
The range isn't unlimited, especially through air.

 

[grieve]

[citation][nom]Tindytim[/nom]The range isn't unlimited, especially through air.[/citation]
Agreed...
even if the beam had the power to go "forever" the Earth is round!

OMG!! I missed and hit the moon...

 

[dlvonde]

[citation][nom]deadlypredator[/nom]I think the most lethal use would be to mount it on a several satellites with a lot of solar panel, since solar panels are very very effective in space. That would create a unstoppable weapon which could fire everywhere with gps precision if you put tracers on your target, or you could just use a camera and a scope on the satellite and you shoot what you see. That will help USA to keep the control of space and prevent those d*$n communists to control the world.[/citation]

people's understanding of solar technology is grossly out of touch with reality...even in space do you know how many solar panels it would take to generate a sustained 100kw????

 

[dlvonde]

I'll not be impressed until the 1,210,000w model comes out.

 

[Tindytim]

ITT: People who don't understand science.

 

[The Schnoz]

How long until they can attach these so called "lasers" to a freakin' shark?!

 

[stevo777]

This article has some pertinent info, but is missing a few key points. Nowhere was it stated that chemical lasers have gone way beyond the 100k threshold. Chemical lasers are a very messy business though and run out resources very quickly. For clarification, this is the first electrical based laser to get passed the 100k mark.

A tank or plane (especially a high flying modern high tech blimp) with a sufficient generator could definitely sustain a very long pulse of laser that this technology affords. Pretty much everyone thinks of a single beam coming out of the laser. Why? Consider a DLP chip in the way it uses micro mirrors to split the light up. By controlling micro mirrors via computer, you could split the 100k+ beam into hundreds of smaller beams. With laser's intense concentration of light, even a few tens of watts would be very deadly to soldiers. You could theoretically kill thousands of soldiers per second by flying a single vehicle well above the battlefield and emitting many hundreds of beams simultaneously. The switching times for the mirrors would be extremely fast--way under a second.

 

[blackbeastofaaaaagh]

I would be interested to know how they got around the traditional problems facing laser weapons research of past:
1) If the laser is too intense (this limit is well below weapons grade), the air becomes plasma (blooming) causing the beam to spread and dissapate.
2) Atmospheric conditions often causes laser to loose focus.
3) Any material vaporizing of the target surface would partially or substantially block the laser beam. In fact, one possible sceme to defeat a laser weapon would be to use a coating releases the heat as vaporized particles that also serve to block the incoming beam.

For any laser system to work, the beam must be tight and narrow and it must carry an intense concentration of energy.