[Hugo]

When are we going to get those phasers from Star Trek or blasters from Star Wars? My guess is 50 years at least, but I could be wrong. Not that what we have now is bad but the technology seems due for a leap forward. Metal quality and alloys have definitely improved but for the most part things are not too different. Overall quality is definitely better now than 50 years ago.

I bet John Browning would love the stuff HK makes simply for the clever designs. Hiram Maxim would freak if he saw an MG-42 and it's freaky sound (a shame its makers were so evil). What do you think these firearm pioneers would think of firearms technology today?

I think we can all agree they would dope slap Sarah Brady and give other anti firearm rights groups a long talk. That and they both would love the History Channel. :)

[doctorhumbert]

Right now, I think most of the improvement will be on optics/sighting devices. I really want to see head mounted sighting device via camera on the rifle. It would have to be compact,rugged,and reliable of course.

Screw laser blasters. I think what we need is homing bullets. Just select a target and press the trigger. No aiming required.
I think it's possible through either mass shifting bullet, or miniature missile technology.

[Andrew Wyatt]

They. Need. ACOGs With. LCD. Screens. put the LCD at the same focus as the reticle.


have the input for the screen be some kind of standard connector. now, you can put LLTV, laser rangefinders and all that jazz on a rifle, and still have a weapon that has a decent sighting system when the batteries go dead.

[Skunkabilly]

More detachable mag shotguns.

[Black Snowman]

There are only a few possible improvments that could drasticly change weapons in the near future in a practical way that I can think of.

Materials technologies: Lighter stronger more effective materials. Currently being applied to projeciles more than the firearms themselves. For example the new "smart" bullet. The material stays solid during a point originated impact but fragments in a fluid. Penetrates armor then explodes like a frangible. Scary stuff.

Energy technology: If someone finds a way to make room temperature super-condutors or to store or produce massive amounts of energy in a portable form, magnetic accellerators become practical as a battle field weapon. Lasers too become a practical deployable weapons. If the advancement is extreme enough man portable energy weapons and plasma weapons become feasable.

They've already done the homing bullet on an experimental level with the .50 cal rounds. Laser guided just like the smart bombs.

Something I'd like to see on the civilian market is sabot flachette guns with smooth bores. Just because the military can't use em doesn't mean we can't. They would be awesome high-velocity guns and it wouldn't wear like an SOB. Great for target and varmit shooting.

[Iain]

Bullpups.

You guys are behind on this one, and if you adopt the XM8 then you will be even further behind. Longer barrel, shorter overall length. FAMAS is reputed to be a good weapon.

Less realistically for the time being. Some of the ideas on the OICW program were good, air-burst grenades and stuff. Caseless ammunition is an interesting one.

Things not likely to change too much. Your biggest change is likely to be a new cartridge that you will again force NATO to adopt against the wishes of the other NATO countries ;)

Course someone could neck a 7.62 case down to a .17 round made of depleted uranium and guide it with a laser beam... or some other crazy fantasy.

[Crownvicman]

I'm not sure about the bullpups.

I think most improvement will be in the materials weapons are constructed from. I see plastic cased ammo as something coming along in the near future.

[geekWithA.45]

Since when are awkward reloading ergonomics a step forward?

And those of us who shoot lefthanded beg to differ.

We eat enough brass as it is, without it being thrust directly into our throats.

:neener:

[Werewolf]

Smart Optics!

With the state of miniturization being what it is it shouldn't be too difficult to build a telescopic sight that does the following after it is accurately bore sighted:

1) Prior to a shooting session enter the type of ammo into the sight
2) Lase Target
3) Using temp, humidity, baro, wind and range values (from sensors built into the sight) calculate selected ammo trajectory
4) using internal servos automatically adjust reticle accordingly so that shooter always keeps center of reticle on target

The math required to the above is easily programmed into a handheld calculator like the HP17B I have so a good external ballistics program with an EEPROM data storage area for holding a wide variety of ammo data could be put on just a single chip.

Servos are getting smaller and smaller so adjusting the reticle position is a really trivial engineering problem.

Maybe the computer part could be in a unit connected by IR or a small cable that is in the shooter's pocket if it would be too large to put in the scope.

I have no idea what a setup like the above would cost but it is definitely doable.

[Skofnung]

I agree that most advances in the next few years will be in the field of optics and or sighting systems.

We have been using the same cartridge system for the last 13 decades or so. We have refined that system, but until someone comes up with a more reliable and cost efficient method of detonation than the percussion cap, all of the improvements will be to the platform iself. Electronic ignition has it's merits, but you must have a power source to use it. Caseless ammo looks cool, maybe they will get that system working well.

This is just conjecture on my part, but I can't see "laser" type guns being as viable a "man stopper" as projectile weapons. Sure, burn a hole through a guy and he will die eventually, but seeing as though we are made the way we are, projectile weapons that crush bone, cause blood loss, and strike the CNS make more sense to me, even in the long run. I know Iknow, laser guns will be able to burn a man to a crisp in an instant, but that technology is way on down the line, at least in man portable configurations.

Now directed energy weapons, like a gun that could "short-out" an individuals bio-activities, that would be cool.

[Andrew Wyatt]

You guys are behind on this one, and if you adopt the XM8 then you will be even further behind. Longer barrel, shorter overall length.


with a bullpup, you either have 1. the inability to shoot left handed, or 2. the inability to clear malfunctions without dissassembling the weapon.

[Black Snowman]

Bullpups add complexity and complexity is generally not good. If they were such a great design we'd see a lot more of them. Just about everything has been tried from a design standpoint.

On the "Smart Scope" front you wouldn't need servos at all, you could do it all solid state with a projected dot or reticle. You need power for everything else anyway. Then just have one fixed circle in the reticle to be the zero at 100 meters in case the power or other system fails. That way the shooter would also get feed back on how much they were adjusting their shots.

[Werewolf]

On the "Smart Scope" front you wouldn't need servos at all, you could do it all solid state with a projected dot or reticle. You need power for everything else anyway. Then just have one fixed circle in the reticle to be the zero at 100 meters in case the power or other system fails. That way the shooter would also get feed back on how much they were adjusting their shots.

Excellent point - I just wonder why no one has made one yet - the technology exists and I bet there'd be a demand.

[Tag]

Very interesting thread guys,

I'd like to see magnetic accelerator (rail-gun) technology used in conjunction w/ some of the optical advancements mentioned above. Used with depleted uranium rings or flachette rounds they would make one hell of a sniper rifle, able to shoot through walls, houses, cars, bunkers, ext. Tank mounted versions would be very hard to defend against... :uhoh:

What about a light saber?

[uglygun]

I was going to make the comment about range finding "smart optics" but somebody beat me to it.

As for the way it could work... Perhaps something like a Burris Balisti-plex reticle but with LEDs that would light the points on the reticle that correspond to the correct zero for the estimated range?

Instead of having the actual zero be changed through servos it would be solid state like somebody else mentioned. But could also be something like a balistiplex reticle or that which you find in a Trijicon ACOG scope's balistic reticle, only combined with a laser range finder and illuminated reticle. If the laser range finding system or the LED illumination failed, the optics could still be used as a backup with the basic reticle that had been mechanically zero'd already.


Swarvoski made a range finding scope meant for use on rifles some time back, I remember the promotion going on when they first came out, things were so expensive that they came with something like a Weatherby rifle.

[Snowdog]

I think projectiles will eventually give way to a type of weapon so radical that it would have been difficult to comprehend before its debut.

It should be understood things that are difficult to conceive today (due to our current technological understanding) will become commonplace in the future.

If someone were to ask an Imperial Roman general what kind of siege weapons the distant future held, rockets and bombers wouldn't have crossed his mind as that template of weaponry had not yet existed. It likely would have been a lighter weight onager with double the capacity and twice the range. Nothing more than improving upon the familiar.

Therefore, I'm convinced limiting imagined weapons-of-the-future to mere improvements to those already existing blinds one to the possibilities.

I'm also convinced if we were to see the weapons in use as little as twenty years from now, I think we'd be impressed. I'm sure projectile weapons will still be there as the standard, but I think we'd see an emergence of an unimaginable freaky new technology completely alien to familiar concepts that will set the foundations for future weaponry (as the matchlock did for modern firearms).
In two hundred years, this same freakish techology very well may have been refined and perfected to its limits, itself becoming antiquated and giving way to something far greater and complex. Were we to catch a glimpse of that mysterious world, we'd certainly be out of our element.
We would be that unsophisticated Roman general, and we'd know it.

I'll say traditional projectile firearms will reign for perhaps another twenty years, but "this too shall pass".

[geekWithA.45]

Snowdog's post reminds me of something....naturally, the link is long gone from my mind.

The gist of it was that someone was working on a way to generate coherent, columnated _sound_.

As a laser is to a lightbulb, this thing would be as to a loud speaker.

The idea was to generate a sound loud enough to disrupt tissue, but confine it to a small column projected from the device.

Sounds like an ouchie to me.



As for me, though...the juries out on this sort of thing till I see it. I sorta catalog it alongside Tesla's deathray....interesting if true, if not, still interesting.

[DougCxx]

Depends on what use you are speaking: as far as "things used against criminal suspects", I would bet eventually there will be stun-gun type devices that work, even from a distance--and without "taser"-style wires. Something that produces a narrow, pointable EMF signal precisely tuned to disrupt muscular control, not the simple electrical shocks that present devices give (-even though they claim otherwise....). When this happens, regular police will give up their duty guns because they won't need them.
---I also will bet that within 50 years the police will be able to track any motor vehicles at all times by GPS, as well as shut them down/lock them/unlock them remotely. The "tracking" part of that future has already begun with OnStar and LoJack, and people pay extra for it because they see having it as an advantage.
---Also I can see great use of networked monitoring systems, as the video cameras in London today, but much more automated--as that system is hugely expensive to operate and of questionable use. Sensors to detect speeding cars, mics that can automatically detect and pinpoint gunshot blasts, cameras that automatically "turn on" when a nearby car or building alarm is set off. Privacy advocates will wail, but most people simply won't argue against this stuff, and it will make a huge difference in many types of crime--but as old crimes decline, new ones will arise.
-----------
As far as "sporting purposes", aside from caseless ammo I don't see much, aside from possible sporting uses of the "super stun-gun" mentioned above. The point of recreational shooting isn't necessarily to do things the most efficient way. So as far as "solving practical problems", caseless ammo would qualify beacuse it would potentially eliminate reloading errors as far as overloading and incorrect propellant, and the "super stun gun" could be used to safely remove pests or animals without risking making holes in anything nearby.
~

[ShaiVong]

oooooo I can hardly wait! :D

As for the laser beam being less effective as a projectile: Imagine a hand held 50W or better laser that can project half second beams at a time. Think of how much you (Read: I) shake or wobble while sighting offhand at 100 yards... In a half second or more you could cut somebody to ribbons just by your muscle twitch dragging that laser all over them. It would be like getting hit with several shards of high speed razors!

Microwave guns would be cool too; werent they thinking of that kind of stuff for crowd control?

Particle cannons! How about a beam of charged particles rippin through you!

Gee I hope they get to working on this stuff before we dont have the freedom to enjoy them! :banghead:

[Nightcrawler]

Aside from blowing up fruit, you probably wouldn't have much fun with a microwave gun. It wouldn't do anything ot a paper target.

Microwave guns for crowd control? That's SERIOUS crowd control. You know what happens when you explode a potato in a microwave? That's basically what a microwave weapon would do to a person. Literally cook your insides, giving the target what could probably be considered one of the most painful deaths imaginable.

I suppose seeing rabblerousers literally roasted alive would be a deterrent to rioting, though. *shrug*

As far as particle beams, you're looking at more of a weapon of mass destruction than you are a small arm. Lightning is a form of a particle beam, it's just not a direct one. Lightning can blow stuff up pretty good. That's basically what a particle beam would do. It'd require some INCREDIBLE advances in technology to make one that's manportable and safe to use. But an orbital battery of sufficiently powerful paritcle beams could make our current nuclear arsenals seem like kid stuff.

Lasers are more doable, but have serious drawbacks. A rifle bullet, for example, isn't deterred by smoke. A laser is. A rifle bullet can defeat light cover (except, of course, magic fragmenting 5.56mm, which won't penetrate three layers of drywall and sheetrock :evil: ); a laser would expend its energy on whatever it hit. This would include body armor.

On the plus side, though, lasers have advantages. No leading of the target is necessary, for one, and they'd lack any recoil. The sound would probably be like a loud hiss (vaporizing water in the air), but would probably be quieter than a gunshot. They'd be safe for use indoors and such, as they'd be incapable of overpenetrating a target.

[Black Snowman]

The crowd control versions of the microwave guns are at a frequency specificly designed to not signifigantly penetrate skin. So, only the tissue down to the first nerve endings it actually "heated" but doesn't generate enough heat to actually harm the person. It just feels like they're standing next to a huge bon-fire. Saw it on "Modern Marvels" the sonic weapon too. Although it's in much earlier stages of development.

A somewhat uncommon sci-fi weapon that has been touched on but not mentioned specificly is a "nerve scrambler" which is an EMP weapon designed to disrupt the nervous system with power levels ranging from muscle twitching to instant brain death. The technology to produce this weapon isn't even on the horizon at this point.

I like this thread. So Snowdog begs the questions "Who wants to think far enough outside the box to come up with this new weapon?" Many of the things discussed may be military or law enforment successes and applications but not very fun for the average shooter.

Laser gun, how stead can you hold it. No bang, no zip. Just a nice hole in your paper. Magnetic accellerators have potential since they're still a balistic weapon, you'd still get a nice sonic boom from them and probably a fun little hum from the magnets. Plasma weapons get my vote for replacing full autos as the "fun gun". Burst of short lived white-hot plasma that can vaporize almost anything. Heck ya, now that's a fun addition to Knob Creek ;)

[Nightcrawler]

Hey Black Snowman, do a search on The Firing Line for a thread about Plasma Weapons. I had much the same curiosity, and fortunately there was a physicist (Bog) who answered a LOT of my questions. :D

[Dave R]

Meanwhile, back in this decade...

I would like to see an advance in propellants. Last major advance there was a century or so ago.

More potent propellants would give us smaller cartridges, smaller magazines, and smaller/lighter firearms. Imagine a .22lr case with the velocity of a .223. Or maybe a .45acp case with the power of a .45-70.

OTOH, I'm sure particle/lazer weapons will get here eventually. My giuess is the limiting factor is battery/powerplant size and lazer component size foe a uselful level of power.

An amateur futurist could probably plot the rate of decrease in size/weight of batteries and lazer components, and make a reasonable forecast about when they get practical.

[mrming]

Current cases are mostly empty air. Your only putting 20 some odd grains into a 223 case.. you'll notice a double charge, but its still empty air. If you can make it work without having to keep the air intake to maintain the pressure curve great but.. I suspect you'll windup with a massive increase. Great, so you've increased your carrying capacity. Maybe even enough to warrent switching everyone over to FA. New tactics, but its still a pretty mild change.. just going from broadsword to a rapier. Different tactics and techniques, same methodology and priniciples.

I'm betting on focused sonic weaponry. Sonic vibrations already can have a noticeable effect (speakers in riced out cars, flashbangs, etc), and as a previous poster pointed out. A light bulb is to a laser as a speaker is to.... our next step in weapon development. Sound power drops exponentially with distance (if im remembering correctly) so range will be limited. However, if it is effective its going to be destructive to flesh, able to damage things that currently qualify as cover, and maybe even be a streaming weapon rather than pulsed. That could cause a major tactic rethink. Most people with sonic boomers, and a handful with sniper grade assualt rifles in a 6mm? Or perhaps everyone with a caseless 6mm / sonic boomer. Under a 100 yards and need FA? Use the boomer. Past that? Use the 6.

Think about it. Instead of having survivable sweeping fire from current FA, you've got a constant stream. If your emitter ever crosses the path of the target, its toast (presuming its in range and these aren't rushed into the field before they are suitably powerful. Think a 12 gauge with infinite size load at a constant velocity, but with better range and cohesion). If it works like I'm thinking, fix and manuever doctrine could become very costly in urban enviroments. I could be wrong, but it'd probably be the end for heavy machine guns too. A SAW in 6mm would have the same advantages in a urban enviroment and weigh less. for distance work, and the 6/boomer combo rifles would allow everyone to be both a hyper-effective SMG and a rifleman.

Police could finally be deprived of lethal weapons except for a few extremely special duty units. Defense against it? Counter sonic's probably wouldn't work.. not enough of a response time, and the emitter for the counter would have to be just as powerful as the original weapon. Dampening ? It'll look funny walking around in 3 feet thick dense rubber. Dampening with metal/ceramic hybrids isolating the individual? Well... now we are talking about mobile armour suits. Dealing with that isn't a civil matter, but a military one.

Being a fool, I doubt lasers will ever rule the battlefield. Sonics impart energy by forcing the next atom to vibrate. Lasers work by passing a coherent stream of photons. To my primitive mind, it would seem two very different technologies. Lasers would fall into the same catagory as particle projection. Why push photons when you can push protons or neutrons? More mass, more inherint energy

[c_yeager]

Whatever great new things are in store for the future of weapons you can be assured of one thing, it wont find its way into OUR hands anytime soon. They are already outlawing things even before they exist "just in case"

[Werewolf]

DougCxx postulated:
Depends on what use you are speaking: as far as "things used against criminal suspects", I would bet eventually there will be stun-gun type devices that work, even from a distance--and without "taser"-style wires. Something that produces a narrow, pointable EMF signal precisely tuned to disrupt muscular control, not the simple electrical shocks that present devices give (-even though they claim otherwise....). When this happens, regular police will give up their duty guns because they won't need them.
---I also will bet that within 50 years the police will be able to track any motor vehicles at all times by GPS, as well as shut them down/lock them/unlock them remotely. The "tracking" part of that future has already begun with OnStar and LoJack, and people pay extra for it because they see having it as an advantage.
---Also I can see great use of networked monitoring systems, as the video cameras in London today, but much more automated--as that system is hugely expensive to operate and of questionable use. Sensors to detect speeding cars, mics that can automatically detect and pinpoint gunshot blasts, cameras that automatically "turn on" when a nearby car or building alarm is set off. Privacy advocates will wail, but most people simply won't argue against this stuff, and it will make a huge difference in many types of crime--but as old crimes decline, new ones will arise.

A truly Orwellian Vision - let us all hope that your prescience never comes to pass. At least not in the USA - I don't really give a hoot about the rest of the world.

[bdhawk]

i think caseless ammo will be the way in the future. no extraction, no extraction ports, no extractors, a closed system. primers and propellant will be a solid chemical, ignited by a small spark, primers will burn up with the propellant. magazines will be disposable, part of the packaging. no touching the ammo by your fingers, no magazine loading. no more ammo boxes with the styrofoam or plastic trays. the trigger will be hooked up to a micro switch. full auto will be sped up or slowed down with a rheostat. optics will be built into the polymer frames. maybe using mini tv cameras and mini lcd's or plasma screens, instead of scopes. open sights will have diode dots instead of tritium. conduit or wires will be cast into the polymer frames, for sights, scopes, lights, lasers, etc. rifles and handguns will have adjustable egronomics and switchable for right or left handed shooters. barrel systems will be modular so you can easily change from caliber to caliber to fit the need of the mission.

[DougCxx]

A truly Orwellian Vision - let us all hope that your prescience never comes to pass. At least not in the USA - I don't really give a hoot about the rest of the world.
-I bet your car has license plates on it, don't it?
There once was a time when people protested that, too.
Funny thing about Orwelian visions; they tend not to actually come true. The more data that can be collected, the more trouble it is to find the data that is really worth having.
-----------
As far as caseless ammo goes, that depends on when it's sold as a small-caliber & low-priced product. The only portion of the recreational shooting community that expects to avoid reloading hassles is the rimfire market, and they want low-priced guns and ammunition. As far as I have read, the only company making it right now has never promoted it as a potentially low-priced product.
~

[Dave R]

Caseless ammo has been played with for a long time. I remember a Popular Mechanics article on it when I was a kid.

Problem is, there are a lot of virtues to that stupid brass case.

Have you seen how much gunk--err, by-products of combustion--gets kept inside the case? It would otherwise go into the chamber and action, making chamber/action foul a whole lot sooner.

Also, when that brass is ejected, it carries a lot of heat from combustion with it. Keeps the chamber/action cooler.

The case also protects the propellant from contamination. WIth caseless ammo, you'd have to have some special kind case to transport it, I think, and to protect it from anything from water to oxidation. Couldn't just throw a few shells in your pocket and be on your way...

Granted, those are solvable issues, but the benefit from eliminating the case seems small in comparison to keeping the action cleaner and cooler.

[ShaiVong]

Anyone here familiar with the Warhammer 40K universe?

I would love to see Bolt rifles, Melta guns, las rifles, needlers and the Executioner rounds of the Adeptas Arbites.

Bolter shells are bullets that eject from the weapon, and then propel themselves with little rocket engines. They are armor piercing and mass reactive. Thus the burrow then detonate. Awesome.

Melta guns are basically plasma flamethrowers. Trash anything.

Lasrifles are pretty much what they sound like: Laser rifles. Needlers are guns that fire little HV darts which are also usually toxic. Executioner rounds are homing shotgun slugs. Fire those suckers around corners :evil: .

That and you can't beat the power armor of the Adeptas Astartes. The Space Marines :what:

They are my bulwark against the terror
They are the defenders of humanity
They are my Space Marines
And they shall know no fear

[Cosmoline]

The last big improvements in firearms came in the 1890's and early 1900's. Most everything since then has been improving around the edges. The big burst in the 1890's was the result of one thing--smokeless powder. It allowed firearms to be much smaller, operate with higher pressure, and made fully automatic actions much easier.

Judging from this, we won't see any similar spike in development until someone creates a new means of propelling the bullet. Perhaps bullets will propel themselves, allowing firearms to be freed up from the job of absorbing recoil.

[ShaiVong]

Whatcha need is two gravity accelerators! Say a couple of singularies to propel a bullet! That way you could just carry bullets, and not cases :D

[Nightcrawler]

Whatcha need is two gravity accelerators! Say a couple of singularies to propel a bullet! That way you could just carry bullets, and not cases

Get two electromagnetic accelerators and you could do the same thing without all of the quantum physics and/or possibilities of opening a new black hole a foot in front of you. :)

[ShaiVong]

Bah! Magnet Smagnet. You would still need tons of coils and stuff. With a singularity all you need is a quantum phase shifting inverter to valence the fuzzy logic of both singularitys in a Brier inference to allow a probability time rod to extend to the bullet and pluck it out of the matter buffer transducer. That and some aluminum foil on your head to keep the empyrium astropathica psyker radiaton from turning you into a canidate for demon posession! Otherwise you could get off with just a few pounds and a trip to your local craft store!

[Snowdog]

ShaiVong,

Although I do have most of those components sitting idle in my basement left over from my time machine, I don't know if an aluminum foil helmet is sufficient protection where singularities are concerned. Don't forget the movie Event Horizon... that really happened, I was there.

:p

[ShaiVong]

Hahah! I had forgotten about that stinker!

Awesome premise (almost like the Hellraiser movies, another good premise) poorly executed :rolleyes: .

Anytime something involves "Gateway to Hell", you've got my attention :evil:

What can I say, I just want to get home! :banghead: :neener:

[johnrobe]

I thought you folks might find the following articles interesting. The first one is about the next generation of weapons being developed for the U.S. Navy.....including some of the things mentioned here: high energy lasers, rail guns, microwaves, and particle beam accelerators. The second is about the U.S.A.F. testing "Star Wars" style lasers on fighter planes.

Jane's Defence article (http://www.janes.com/defence/naval_forces/news/jni/jni030617_1_n.shtml)

Air Force 'Star Wars' (http://www.knoxstudio.com/shns/story.cfm?pk=JEDIWEAPONS-06-24-03&cat=AN)

Enjoy!
JR

[DougCxx]

I guess as far as our current firearm rifles are concerned, I'd bet you'll see smaller, faster calibers--5000, 6000 FPS+. What these will be good for outside of beaning prarie dogs I don't know, but we can already shoot very large, very slow "bullets" out of shotguns. The only way to go is smaller and/or higher-speed.
-----------
One thing for sure: we could assume that copper-jacketed lead wouldn't work for this; maybe solid-steel bullets in aluminum sabots? ....I have read that trying to get accurate ammo while using plastic sabots is rather a waste of time. I have not seen mentioned any small arms using sub-caliber bullets with harder sabot materials.
?
I have seen these pistols chambered for bottleneck cartridges (357 sig comes to mind first) and I am wondering why you simply can't just use aluminum or some harder plastic sabots to allow shooting smaller faster bullets out of a conventional caliber such as 9mm or 45. Would cost of ammo be the preventing factor with this? You might be able to get away with just a metal base disk, and plastic to keep the little bullet centered.
~

[uglygun]

That 30 Tokarev or whatever it is, they have been making saboted rounds with that thing... available 30cal plastic sabots with a .224 varmint bullet moving it to pretty silly speeds. Accuracy I can't report on but the velocities are right on the heals of that shown for the .224Boz that is a necked down 10mm Auto.

[DougCxx]

This is wandering way off topic, but I found it rather surprising.
Not that the FBI would want to do such a thing, but that the feature was present.
The linked story concerns the FBI activating a suspect's OnStar vehicle emergency system for the purposes of surveillance.
The GPS-feature I knew about (for finding stolen vehicles), the in-car-microphone-hooked-to-a-cell-phone feature I did not:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/55/34100.html
.....
The argument here seems to be that what the FBI was doing was improper only because it disabled the actual emergency features of the car's OnStar system. :eek:
~

[BevrFevr]

that does not heat up a barrel or get it dirty and cartridges are light as a feather. Also is small small small. Maybe even would work in a plastic barrel or carbon fiber maybe.

In the near future I would like to see invisible tracer ammo. :D Only visible with night vision etc.

The real changes aren't going to be the guns it's gonna be the terminator airships and tanks. They will be able to see what we can't, take G's that we can't, temperatures, etc.

-bevr

[ShaiVong]

Somthing that would kick current NV @SS I think would be a cheap compact THERMAL vision. I know they have thermal cameras for this and that, but they need to be as large as NV goggs: I.E. Splinter Cell.

Way easier to find tangos in the dark with TV rather than NV... Stick out like a sore thumb!

[Balog]

Ah, good to see that even in space, Marines kick butt :) :)

[Tag]

Thinking some more,

The use of composite ceramics in better, and possibly even self contained, body armor, complete with optics, communications, vital monitors... ext. Weapon systems could be integrated with the armor heads up display or maybe a split screen monitor system.

Man portable rail guns, complete with nuclear power supply, would probably be able, when used in conjunction with an assisted targeting systme, to shoot down fighter jets.

Does anyone have any information on Rail Gun volocities? Think depleted uranium slug at 20,000 fps. Very loud!



:what:

[HankB]

Imagine a hand held 50W or better laser that can project half second beams at a time. 50W? Better move the decimal point over a couple of places. I work with lasers in this power range, and while impressive to the uninitiated, they're a long way short of being powerful enough to use as weapons. (Unless you want an "eye popper.")

I agree that the next leap forward will be in optics - 'scopes with built in laser rangefinders have already been sold commercially (Swarovski?) but they're big, bulky, and expensive. But give the technology another decade or so, and the same thing, with automatic trajectory compensation, ought to be available at the price of a "premium" 'scope.

Hmmm . . . diamond has a very low coefficient of friction. And they've been synthesizing diamond coatings for a while, with improved results every year. I wonder if a diamond-lined bore - or even a solid diamond barrel - would allow for improved ballistics?

The whiz-bang directed energy weapons (as well as rail guns and their variants) will have to wait for improvements in energy storage technology - we'll need several orders of magnitude improvement over today's batteries before we'll have something man-portable and practical.

And there's the matter of increased complexity leading to increased vulnerability. What if an EMP device fries your weapon's electronics? What if your weapon produces some RFI/EMI leakage that the other side can detect? (Gordon R. Dickson alluded to this in his "Dorsai-universe" novels. Combatants had switched to "spring guns" which were simple, reliable, and couldn't be disabled by the other side's jammers.)