What kind of sound does a VRF-GG make? Is it silent like its rifle counterpart, or does it actually make some noise?
VRF Gauss Gun noise?
- Thread starter Blue Ghost
- Start date
I should image the actual travel of the guass darts is silent like its rifle cousin. If they can engineer the rifle not to produce a sonic crack, then they can do the same for the VRF (probably easier given its size and ready power from a vehicle).
The ammo feed system though??? The VRF goes through 30000rds in 1 or two striker combat rounds (1 minute??) Which is a heck of a rate of fire. You will probably hear the feed mechanism, doing a high pitched and fairly loud hum, but that will only be a local effect. I don't think you could do sound ranging on it.
Hope that helps.
Cheers
Richard
The ammo feed system though??? The VRF goes through 30000rds in 1 or two striker combat rounds (1 minute??) Which is a heck of a rate of fire. You will probably hear the feed mechanism, doing a high pitched and fairly loud hum, but that will only be a local effect. I don't think you could do sound ranging on it.
Hope that helps.
Cheers
Richard
Andrew Boulton
The Adminator
The weapon is almost silent (maybe a buzz, hum, or whine from the feed mechanism), but you've got a lot of slugs coming out at mach 5, which will be fairly loud. Not quite sure what it would sound like, since they're too close together to separate the individual cracks. Probably a continuous loud tone.
My understanding of Gauss guns is that they are only "silent" when you "Dial down" the power input to reduce the muzzle velocity of the projectile to below a certain threshold. Ofcourse this also reduce's damage done and range at which damage can be done. Depends what you mean by noise? They have very little "mechanical" noise as there is no "slide", no cpr round exploding in a breach, no casing being ejected etc etc etc. However, at their usual power levels the projectiles are moving very very fast (beyond sound barrier) and that makes noise. FF&S considers gauss weapons to be "suppressed" rather than "silenced" ie if you're being shot at by one you have little difficulty figuring out where the shootings comming from, however if someone over the rise, or in the next urban block over, is shooting at some of your mates the only thing that'll alert you to it is your mates calling for backup
SlightlyLyons
SOC-7
Sonic booms are very loud, but as the bullet goes faster then the speed of sound the guy next to you will fall over dead and then you'll hear it. Like thunder and lightning.
Thanks all. I'll give it some thought. Some good ideas here.
OK, after giving it some thought it sounds like this thing makes noise, but not the racket associated with a 50 cal. So, there's no "bang" from the breach, but there's a crack from a single needle breaking multiple mach barriers. If that's the case, then the ammo feed combined with the round travelling through the air would make a kind of sound that could probably be heard for some distance. The loading mechanism is probably audible given a clear line of site to the firing vehicle, but no louder than a similar ammo drum/box filled with 30 or 50 cal rounds.
Does that sound right? I'm trying to pull all the thoughts together here, because the next game session I run I want to get the VRF sound right... just in case
Does that sound right? I'm trying to pull all the thoughts together here, because the next game session I run I want to get the VRF sound right... just in case
I am not quite sure of the physics involved, but there is something about the less noise created, the less of a barrier there is to break. So if you keep the gun as quiet as possible the secondary effects of breaking the sound barrier would also be lessened.
The other option (not mentioned in any description as far as I am aware) is to pulse the air along the path of the weapon with a thermal laser, allowing you to change the properties in the flight path of the gauss needle. More probably a Rail weapon, as gauss weapons cannot reach the speeds required.
What you need to work out is how much energy is being used, and how much is lost in waste sound energy. At higher tech levels you could probably arrange that the waste energy was in other controlled forms, meaning that your TL14 VRF gauss could be silent (or nearly so) but would have a heat signature that you could pick up from space, or vice versa depending what you wanted to hide from.
The other option (not mentioned in any description as far as I am aware) is to pulse the air along the path of the weapon with a thermal laser, allowing you to change the properties in the flight path of the gauss needle. More probably a Rail weapon, as gauss weapons cannot reach the speeds required.
What you need to work out is how much energy is being used, and how much is lost in waste sound energy. At higher tech levels you could probably arrange that the waste energy was in other controlled forms, meaning that your TL14 VRF gauss could be silent (or nearly so) but would have a heat signature that you could pick up from space, or vice versa depending what you wanted to hide from.
the orignal guass weapons were silent. by orignal i mean VRF, Rifle, and later the pistol. The way they were silent was because you are not using primer in a bullet but insted using electromagnets to propell the slug down the berral of the gun. this eleminates the sound of the denotanting primer which sends the bullet flying. also the speed was only a little faster than today's guns, keep in mind also that the VRF is the machine gun counterpart to modren day weapons.
now also you have to remeber that even if there is no sound by the gun and the bullet, the guy bing hit is another story. like today most people will scream when hit with a bullet unless hit in the right place.
now if only i could findout a modren day equivlent to an assult rifle.
now also you have to remeber that even if there is no sound by the gun and the bullet, the guy bing hit is another story. like today most people will scream when hit with a bullet unless hit in the right place.
now if only i could findout a modren day equivlent to an assult rifle.
Spiderfish
SOC-12
Doesent matter if he screams as long as they dont hear were it comes from he can make as much racket as he likes.
The putative supersonic 'crack' of a gauss needle is a very poor means of locating the shooter because it is made by the projectile not the projector. If you had a linked array of observers you could backtrack, perhaps, but not from a single point of observation.
I like the idea of using a coax laser as a negative noise generator for a supersonic round...
Whether the noise of the action is audible will depend on how the breech is shrouded; if it's turret-mounted I'd not expect it to be noisier than the carrying vehicle (grav drives hum or whine, I reckon). Higher tech weapons will have shrouded actions if low audio signature is important. High tech battles would be strangely quiet, lacking the roar and clatter of tracked AFVs and vastly fewer large quantities of volatile compound being detonated... Of course you might have a battledress sensorium that translates its interpretation of the wild EM environment into flashes, bangs and other AV effects to generate the correct instinctive responses.
I like the idea of using a coax laser as a negative noise generator for a supersonic round...
Whether the noise of the action is audible will depend on how the breech is shrouded; if it's turret-mounted I'd not expect it to be noisier than the carrying vehicle (grav drives hum or whine, I reckon). Higher tech weapons will have shrouded actions if low audio signature is important. High tech battles would be strangely quiet, lacking the roar and clatter of tracked AFVs and vastly fewer large quantities of volatile compound being detonated... Of course you might have a battledress sensorium that translates its interpretation of the wild EM environment into flashes, bangs and other AV effects to generate the correct instinctive responses.
BetterThanLife
SOC-14 1K
If you want a clue as to what these sound like the easiest equivalent would be to listen to an A-10 on a firing run, (Or any of the Vulcan Cannon cousins, the 20mm on most aircraft, or ground mounted. A Modern Machinegun has too low a rate of fire but the modern miniguns, and 20mm-30mm Gatling guns have rates of fire that would approach the rate of fire of a VFR Gauss Gun. And you really don't want to fire at a rate of fire much higher than 6000 rounds per minute. (Rate of fire for the 20mm Vulcan and m134 7.62mm minigun.) The Avenger Cannon on the A-10 is either 2000 or 4000 rounds per minute. The reason being that most situations you can't carry more than a couple of thousand rounds. (An A-10 carries 1000 rounds. That is either 15 or 30 seconds worth of ammo. At 6000 rounds per minute a 1000 round hopper is 10 seconds worth of ammo. Granted a 4mm needle isn't all that big but eventually the damn things add up. A Vulcan cannon going off sounds like a cross between a chainsaw and a loud fart. (Unless you are really close then it is of course so loud that you aren't hearing much anyway.
Usually fired in short bursts, 2-3 seconds. Now if a plane is travelling at Mach 2 and the muzzle velocity of the bullet is Mach 3, then the bullet is actually travelling at Mach 5 when it leaves the barrel. (High Explosive Incendiary rounds now have special problems.
)
Andrew Boulton
The Adminator
Ah yes, the A-10: the only aircraft ever built with a spinal mount 
Okey dokey, let's give out a few numbers here:
Speed of sound is 340 m/s (assuming STP).
FFS tells us that we can design a weapon with a muzzle velocity of up to 6000 m/s, which is roughly Mach 17.5. It is noted that we can design our weapon to fire at 300 m/s, which is subsonic, and very nearly silent.
The weapon itself is going to make noise feeding ammo from the hopper into the barrel. Probably an electric motor whining. Imagine the minigun in Predator, after he'd expended all the ammo. Something like that for loudness.
Now, objects traveling at Mach 17.5.... Hmmm, I'm pretty sure that's not going to be quiet. Each round having several (hundred?) kilojoules behind it, you can be sure it will make a LOT of noise.
Unfortunately, I can't find anything quick and simple to tell me what that would be in dBa (audible decibels), but in electronic terms, that's 80 dBm (if delivered in 1 second, to make it watts instead of joules). If by some miracle that translates directly into dBa, then that's pretty loud.
So: the weapon itself will not make a lot of noise; not much more than most guns do nowadays (not counting the explosion of the powder). The round will make considerably more noise than modern guns, but there won't likely be a single loud bang. Perhaps imagine playing an explosion-sound on your computer, which crashes RIGHT in the middle of it and you hear the sound persistently... that might be what a VRF sounds like when firing it.
Hearing exactly where the round came from... I don't know. I DO know that I don't want to get in the way! Firing a stream of rounds is likely to get you found, though.
Speed of sound is 340 m/s (assuming STP).
FFS tells us that we can design a weapon with a muzzle velocity of up to 6000 m/s, which is roughly Mach 17.5. It is noted that we can design our weapon to fire at 300 m/s, which is subsonic, and very nearly silent.
The weapon itself is going to make noise feeding ammo from the hopper into the barrel. Probably an electric motor whining. Imagine the minigun in Predator, after he'd expended all the ammo. Something like that for loudness.
Now, objects traveling at Mach 17.5.... Hmmm, I'm pretty sure that's not going to be quiet. Each round having several (hundred?) kilojoules behind it, you can be sure it will make a LOT of noise.
Unfortunately, I can't find anything quick and simple to tell me what that would be in dBa (audible decibels), but in electronic terms, that's 80 dBm (if delivered in 1 second, to make it watts instead of joules). If by some miracle that translates directly into dBa, then that's pretty loud.
So: the weapon itself will not make a lot of noise; not much more than most guns do nowadays (not counting the explosion of the powder). The round will make considerably more noise than modern guns, but there won't likely be a single loud bang. Perhaps imagine playing an explosion-sound on your computer, which crashes RIGHT in the middle of it and you hear the sound persistently... that might be what a VRF sounds like when firing it.
Hearing exactly where the round came from... I don't know. I DO know that I don't want to get in the way! Firing a stream of rounds is likely to get you found, though.
Hmmm, I'm thinking that all these silent or near silent weapons make suppressive fire tactics rather interesting. After all, how do you suppress enemy infantry if they don't even realise they are being shot at? I suppose the increased lethality of weapons with advanced sighting and targetting systems would serve to announce the shooter's presence once the bodies start to fall, but there's a lot to be said for the shock value of some old fashioned "shot and thunder"!
There was an article about silenced multi-mach projectiles somewhere...
it is apparently possible to get small, hypersonic rounds to leave a cavitation that doesn't "Crack."
Keep in mind that most bullets do not operate in the same regime of physics as larger objects; air resistance, drag, nd cavitation are drastically affected at that small an object.
Heck, the sound of most rounds winds up being a wizz unless it hits something... Most of the "Crack" is the supersonic muzzle-escape of gasses.
Gurrent railguns, when last I checked (OK, it's been 9 years now...) , were still noisy beasts... that much EM generates harmonics in various nearby pieces of gear, plus ionizes a huge chunk of air (Due to water vapor).
it is apparently possible to get small, hypersonic rounds to leave a cavitation that doesn't "Crack."
Keep in mind that most bullets do not operate in the same regime of physics as larger objects; air resistance, drag, nd cavitation are drastically affected at that small an object.
Heck, the sound of most rounds winds up being a wizz unless it hits something... Most of the "Crack" is the supersonic muzzle-escape of gasses.
Gurrent railguns, when last I checked (OK, it's been 9 years now...) , were still noisy beasts... that much EM generates harmonics in various nearby pieces of gear, plus ionizes a huge chunk of air (Due to water vapor).
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