I am making a desk ornament for my son ....it is a test projectile slug that was fired from one of those EM rail guns - fired at NSWC Dahlgren in Virginia. He acquired the test slug when he was doing an internship as part of a “super Senior thesis project” while attending USNA. My son gave me the the slug when he completed the internship - but I figured I would make it into a nice desk ornament for him in the future. When completed, it will be a nice ornamental paper holder that is as intriquing as the metal plates with the hole in it!! (The slug is a small aluminum billet that weighs about 4 lbs....and has some interesting deformations. It was fired into a sand-pit to absorb/dissapate the kinetic energy.)
Rail guns sound great, but there are many big technology hurdles remain to be solved before a suitable rail gun will be put into operation! The “ALL ELECTRIC” ship basically means that your power generation is electric first, and then you have electric motors connected to the propellors (instead of the turbines - through reduction gears, driving the propellor.) The ship might be making flank bell - and then temporarily shift power from the shaft to the EM rail gun energy bank - it might take 10 seconds to charge the energy storage bank - then power is switched back to propulsion. [sounds very Trekkie - charge phasor banks, shift power from life support to shields ....etc.!!]
I watched the video. Why is there an explosive flash if there are not explosive propellants?
The rail gun works by electromotive force ....consider the "gun barrel" to have a top electric rail and a bottom electric rail.
The projectile is conductive (aluminum slug) ...so that electric current can flow from one rail to the other rail - through the slug. Very high current flowing also generates a magnetic field...and the projectile moves because of the magnetic forces. (Think of a motor ...the rails are the stator - stationary, the slug is the moving part - a rotor on a motor...) As the projectile exits the rails - the electric current breaks apart ....drawing a very humongous spark!
Think of the slug having a half-million amps flowing...and suddenly the electric circuit is interrupted/broken. One heck of an arc!