Shooting a gun on the moon

[Private Sanders]

As you all know, the moon hass less gravity than Earth (16.7% of Earth's gravity, according to Wikipedia). This brings up an interesting question: if a gun is fired on the moon, how does the reduced gravity effect the round? It would obviously fly further, but how much so. The obvious answer would be somewhere between 5 and 6 times further, as that is approximately the difference between earth and moon gravity, but that only takes gravity and the corresponding weight reduction into account. What other factors do you think would apply? Would any calibres be likely to escape the moon's gravitational pull (I saw this proposed in a fiction novel once, where soldiers on the moon have to use reduced powder loads to to this risk, and was wondering if it has any basis in reality)? Exactly how far would different calibres fly? How would their hitting power be effected, and how this change their effects on the human body? I think it'd be a fun thexcercise to try and figure these things out.  

[Fresnel]

Private Sanders

As you all know, the moon hass less gravity than Earth (16.7% of Earth's gravity, according to Wikipedia). This brings up an interesting question: if a gun is fired on the moon, how does the reduced gravity effect the round? It would obviously fly further, but how much so. The obvious answer would be somewhere between 5 and 6 times further, as that is approximately the difference between earth and moon gravity, but that only takes gravity and the corresponding weight reduction into account. What other factors do you think would apply? Would any calibres be likely to escape the moon's gravitational pull (I saw this proposed in a fiction novel once, where soldiers on the moon have to use reduced powder loads to to this risk, and was wondering if it has any basis in reality)? Exactly how far would different calibres fly? How would their hitting power be effected, and how this change their effects on the human body? I think it'd be a fun thexcercise to try and figure these things out.

Escape velocity on the moon is 2400 m/s. That's 7900 fps. The fastest round I know about, .22 Eargesplitten Loudenboomer, juuuust breaks 4000fps.  

[Das Rabble Rouser]

Actually now I really want to go to the moon to try shooting.  

[Recon_Ninja_985]

well sense the moon has almost no gravity im assuming it would just keep going into space?


a howitzer could probably make it. and when I say howitzer I mean bigger than big bertha huge gigantic nuclear ******** to earth batteries anyone?  

[Fresnel]

Recon_Ninja_985

well sense the moon has almost no gravity im assuming it would just keep going into space?


a howitzer could probably make it. and when I say howitzer I mean bigger than big bertha huge gigantic nuclear ******** to earth batteries anyone?

Space to surface is so much simpler. You could deorbit them with the smallest of rocket motors.
 

[Recon_Ninja_985]

Fresnel

Recon_Ninja_985

well sense the moon has almost no gravity im assuming it would just keep going into space?


a howitzer could probably make it. and when I say howitzer I mean bigger than big bertha huge gigantic nuclear ******** to earth batteries anyone?

Space to surface is so much simpler. You could deorbit them with the smallest of rocket motors.

yeah,but I never ruled out the possibility of such sattelites being shot out of orbit by enemy missiles though.

while moon batteries may involve a painstaking amount of calculating (and money) I believe that theyre perfectly untouchable and can be reloaded again and again with large munitions. and to get around the whole atmostpheric burn up, the rounds should probably have some sort of braking system similar to an odst drop pod.

I and I say untouchable mainly because the escape velocity difference between earth and the moon. a cannon round isnt really capable of being detected like a missle is, which is in the benefit of the moon's firing point because not only are they capable of firing cannon rounds offense wise, defensive wise missles would be the only way of reaching them, and missles can be destroyed.

it's also perfect because it's tidally locked to the earth and is the largest,most solid satellite we have. tons and tons of material can be added over the years without having to worry about it ever falling down in 20 years and losing an investment, it's a more permanent solution that's open to change and can be added onto indefinitely.

of course im thinking way ahead into the future when we have the material delivery systems, and possibly people there to coordinate the whole damn place, but you can always exclude humans and bring it about sooner with use of machines. unless you wanted to start a whole damn moon base

future s**t  

[Recon_Ninja_985]

oh, and another thing. 4,600 fps for the .22 eargesplitten round was achieved on earth.

how much faster do you guys think the bullet will go without significant gravity and without having to push its way through an atmosphere, almost entirely unrestrained?  

[Fresnel]

Recon_Ninja_985

Fresnel

Recon_Ninja_985

well sense the moon has almost no gravity im assuming it would just keep going into space?


a howitzer could probably make it. and when I say howitzer I mean bigger than big bertha huge gigantic nuclear ******** to earth batteries anyone?

Space to surface is so much simpler. You could deorbit them with the smallest of rocket motors.

yeah,but I never ruled out the possibility of such sattelites being shot out of orbit by enemy missiles though.

while moon batteries may involve a painstaking amount of calculating (and money) I believe that theyre perfectly untouchable and can be reloaded again and again with large munitions. and to get around the whole atmostpheric burn up, the rounds should probably have some sort of braking system similar to an odst drop pod.

You just suggested a braking system on a kinetic energy weapon. That is a perfect parallel to what is commonly known as "pulling punches". ******** braking, make it out of tungsten. s**t ain't gon' melt.

Quote:

I and I say untouchable mainly because the escape velocity difference between earth and the moon. a cannon round isnt really capable of being detected like a missle is, which is in the benefit of the moon's firing point because not only are they capable of firing cannon rounds offense wise, defensive wise missles would be the only way of reaching them, and missles can be destroyed.

it's also perfect because it's tidally locked to the earth and is the largest,most solid satellite we have. tons and tons of material can be added over the years without having to worry about it ever falling down in 20 years and losing an investment, it's a more permanent solution that's open to change and can be added onto indefinitely.

of course im thinking way ahead into the future when we have the material delivery systems, and possibly people there to coordinate the whole damn place, but you can always exclude humans and bring it about sooner with use of machines. unless you wanted to start a whole damn moon base

future s**t

If you can hit a satellite, you can hit the moon. All other arguments apply equally to both, except for the idea that you may be able to mine the moon robotically and make more projectiles on-site. Dunno what the tungsten content of the moon is, though.  

[Recon_Ninja_985]

Fresnel

Recon_Ninja_985

Fresnel

Recon_Ninja_985

well sense the moon has almost no gravity im assuming it would just keep going into space?


a howitzer could probably make it. and when I say howitzer I mean bigger than big bertha huge gigantic nuclear ******** to earth batteries anyone?

Space to surface is so much simpler. You could deorbit them with the smallest of rocket motors.

yeah,but I never ruled out the possibility of such sattelites being shot out of orbit by enemy missiles though.

while moon batteries may involve a painstaking amount of calculating (and money) I believe that theyre perfectly untouchable and can be reloaded again and again with large munitions. and to get around the whole atmostpheric burn up, the rounds should probably have some sort of braking system similar to an odst drop pod.

You just suggested a braking system on a kinetic energy weapon. That is a perfect parallel to what is commonly known as "pulling punches". ******** braking, make it out of tungsten. s**t ain't gon' melt.

Quote:

I and I say untouchable mainly because the escape velocity difference between earth and the moon. a cannon round isnt really capable of being detected like a missle is, which is in the benefit of the moon's firing point because not only are they capable of firing cannon rounds offense wise, defensive wise missles would be the only way of reaching them, and missles can be destroyed.

it's also perfect because it's tidally locked to the earth and is the largest,most solid satellite we have. tons and tons of material can be added over the years without having to worry about it ever falling down in 20 years and losing an investment, it's a more permanent solution that's open to change and can be added onto indefinitely.

of course im thinking way ahead into the future when we have the material delivery systems, and possibly people there to coordinate the whole damn place, but you can always exclude humans and bring it about sooner with use of machines. unless you wanted to start a whole damn moon base

future s**t

If you can hit a satellite, you can hit the moon. All other arguments apply equally to both, except for the idea that you may be able to mine the moon robotically and make more projectiles on-site. Dunno what the tungsten content of the moon is, though.

I never said the projectiles were of tungsten, I mentioned them as being nuclear. I mean sure, they could be tungsten too, just dont include a braking system

also, the moon has room for missle defenses, a satellite only really has room for it's payload.  

[Fresnel]

Recon_Ninja_985

Fresnel

Recon_Ninja_985

Fresnel

Recon_Ninja_985

well sense the moon has almost no gravity im assuming it would just keep going into space?


a howitzer could probably make it. and when I say howitzer I mean bigger than big bertha huge gigantic nuclear ******** to earth batteries anyone?

Space to surface is so much simpler. You could deorbit them with the smallest of rocket motors.

yeah,but I never ruled out the possibility of such sattelites being shot out of orbit by enemy missiles though.

while moon batteries may involve a painstaking amount of calculating (and money) I believe that theyre perfectly untouchable and can be reloaded again and again with large munitions. and to get around the whole atmostpheric burn up, the rounds should probably have some sort of braking system similar to an odst drop pod.

You just suggested a braking system on a kinetic energy weapon. That is a perfect parallel to what is commonly known as "pulling punches". ******** braking, make it out of tungsten. s**t ain't gon' melt.

Quote:

I and I say untouchable mainly because the escape velocity difference between earth and the moon. a cannon round isnt really capable of being detected like a missle is, which is in the benefit of the moon's firing point because not only are they capable of firing cannon rounds offense wise, defensive wise missles would be the only way of reaching them, and missles can be destroyed.

it's also perfect because it's tidally locked to the earth and is the largest,most solid satellite we have. tons and tons of material can be added over the years without having to worry about it ever falling down in 20 years and losing an investment, it's a more permanent solution that's open to change and can be added onto indefinitely.

of course im thinking way ahead into the future when we have the material delivery systems, and possibly people there to coordinate the whole damn place, but you can always exclude humans and bring it about sooner with use of machines. unless you wanted to start a whole damn moon base

future s**t

If you can hit a satellite, you can hit the moon. All other arguments apply equally to both, except for the idea that you may be able to mine the moon robotically and make more projectiles on-site. Dunno what the tungsten content of the moon is, though.

I never said the projectiles were of tungsten, I mentioned them as being nuclear. I mean sure, they could be tungsten too, just dont include a braking system

also, the moon has room for missle defenses, a satellite only really has room for it's payload.

There's no point in making it nuclear. It's actually harder that way, because that means you have to launch a nuclear payload into space, create a braking system, work up containment, deal with fallout from the strike, etc. Kinetic energy projectiles from orbit offer a similar blast force with no actual explosive.

Passive defense. You can't hit what you can't see, and if you can see it, it's still really small and that s**t's hard to hit from the surface, especially with the thermal warning you get from an ICBM launch. Just kick the attitude adjustment motors, and by the time the missile gets to where it was aimed, you're a half-mile away. On top of that, the original Project Thor was pitched as two satellites; a targeting computer and a magazine/launch platform. Then when you empty the magazine, you could simply launch a new one and connect it to the existing targeting computer, which saves cost, and incidentally gives you two targets, each half the size.  

[Recon_Ninja_985]

but they can be seen.

both the US and china have succeeded in shooting down satellites  

[Fresnel]

Recon_Ninja_985

but they can be seen.

both the US and china have succeeded in shooting down satellites

The US shot down a satellite that was de-orbiting already, it was already in the atmosphere when we hit it. I dunno China's story.

And really, a fairly small satellite like that could easily hide in the space trash we have floating around up there already. But it's not like it emits any kind of signals. It doesn't have to send except when actively firing. It doesn't emit infrared, radio, or light. They could power it on a weak nuclear reactor instead of solar, like they're doing with space probes now, and it would hardly even reflect the sun. Space is big, and s**t is hard to see, even when it's close.  

[Recon_Ninja_985]

Fresnel

Recon_Ninja_985

but they can be seen.

both the US and china have succeeded in shooting down satellites

The US shot down a satellite that was de-orbiting already, it was already in the atmosphere when we hit it. I dunno China's story.

And really, a fairly small satellite like that could easily hide in the space trash we have floating around up there already. But it's not like it emits any kind of signals. It doesn't have to send except when actively firing. It doesn't emit infrared, radio, or light. They could power it on a weak nuclear reactor instead of solar, like they're doing with space probes now, and it would hardly even reflect the sun. Space is big, and s**t is hard to see, even when it's close.

dude, it's not like someone is just going to walk outside and look into the sky with their own eyes and be able to point out satellites, no

to think we cant detect satellites with the current technology available is just silly, there are computers,sensors, telescopes,radar and a hell of a lot of other equipment that makes finding them very easy.
and the fact that their super reflective solar panels make them kinda stand out only makes the job that much easier and narrows the search down..

it's probably not much different than how astronomers track space debris that are in orbit and beyond.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GS_5VOEcKs0
the one hit by china was just as high as any other satellite  

[Fresnel]

Recon_Ninja_985

Fresnel

Recon_Ninja_985

but they can be seen.

both the US and china have succeeded in shooting down satellites

The US shot down a satellite that was de-orbiting already, it was already in the atmosphere when we hit it. I dunno China's story.

And really, a fairly small satellite like that could easily hide in the space trash we have floating around up there already. But it's not like it emits any kind of signals. It doesn't have to send except when actively firing. It doesn't emit infrared, radio, or light. They could power it on a weak nuclear reactor instead of solar, like they're doing with space probes now, and it would hardly even reflect the sun. Space is big, and s**t is hard to see, even when it's close.

dude, it's not like someone is just going to walk outside and look into the sky with their own eyes and be able to point out satellites, no

to think we cant detect satellites with the current technology available is just silly, there are computers,sensors, telescopes,radar and a hell of a lot of other equipment that makes finding them very easy.
and the fact that their super reflective solar panels make them kinda stand out only makes the job that much easier and narrows the search down..

it's probably not much different than how astronomers track space debris that are in orbit and beyond.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GS_5VOEcKs0
the one hit by china was just as high as any other satellite

If you can make a stealth plane, you can make a stealth satellite. It's easier, too. There's more natural chaff in space. Most visible satellites are only seen because of the solar panels. Eliminate the solar panels like I suggested earlier, and that's out. Telescopes really can't see s**t that small. To give some perspective, there is not currently a telescope in existence that can see Tranquility Base. Radar is thrown off by the same space junk we've got in orbit, both natural and artificial. Toss in a bit of stealth tech, and it'd blend in perfectly. I'm not sure how satellites are currently tracked, but if I had to guess, I'd say it was through transponders that generate a constant signal that we can follow from the ground. That's why our spy satellites aren't meant to be not tracked, they're simply registered as NOAA weather satellites and s**t.

Or we could just do that. Register it as a GPS satellite and hide that b***h in plain sight. Again, it's not like you can look through a backyard telescope and go "heeeeey, THAT'S not what a GPS satellite should look like..."

Long story short, while the moon base thing would work, I think it's a lot more work than is worth the reward. You'd have to actually BUILD A MOON BASE, you can't just drop that s**t in orbit and be done with it.

Oh yeah, and I'm pissed at that video. Christ, I can't believe our country does that. "CHINA DEVELOPED A WEAPON THAT'S NOT DANGEROUS BUT CAN STILL COMPROMISE OUR MILITARY SUPERIORITY? SOUND THE ALARMS! TO THE UN! NOBODY IS EVER ALLOWED TO BE EVEN MARGINALLY BETTER THAN US!"