Posted on 06/09/2005 6:21:36 AM PDT by anguish
Scientists at the Sandia National Labs in Albuquerque, New Mexico have accelerated a small plate from zero to 76,000 mph in less than a second. The speed of the thrust was a new record for Sandia's "Z Machine" - not only the fastest gun in the West, but in the world too.
The Z Machine is now able to propel small plates at 34 kilometers a second, faster than the 30 kilometers per second that Earth travels through space in its orbit about the Sun. That's 50 times faster than a rifle bullet, and three times the velocity needed to escape Earth's gravitational field.
The ultra-tiny aluminum plates, just 850 microns thick, are accelerated at 1010 g. One g is the force of Earth's gravity. Doing so without vaporizing the plates was possible because of the finer control now achievable of the magnetic field pulse that drives the flight.
Z's hurled plates strike a target after traveling only five millimeters, or less than a quarter-inch. The impact generates a shock wave -- in some cases, reaching 15 million times atmospheric pressure -- that passes through the target material. The waves are so powerful that they turn solids into liquids, liquids into gases, and gases into plasmas in the same way that heat melts ice to water or boils water into steam.
One purpose of these very rapid flights is to help understand the extreme conditions found within the interiors of giant planets in our solar system. By creating states of matter extremely difficult to achieve on Earth, the flyer plates provide hard data to astrophysicists speculating on the structure and even the formation of planets like Jupiter and Saturn.
Didier Saumon, an astrophysicist at Los Alamos National Laboratory, noted that the internal structures of Jupiter and Saturn are composed mostly of hydrogen. So knowing its equation of state -- how hydrogen and its isotopes behave at pressures from one to 50 million atmospheres -- is highly relevant to how scientists infer the interior properties of these planets.
An upgrade of the Z Machine is planned for next year and is expected to achieve higher plate velocities.
No need to ping you to this thread I guess. Sure sound like it would make an interesting Ma Deuce replacement. LOL
Correction: A blast with greater force would be needed to compensate for the added mass of the projectile.
Actually it's a quest for a fusion reaction, where the energy out exceeds the energy necessary to induce the reaction. I don't know where this 'speed' bullcr@p is coming from. But it amounts to a pop science take on a very serious, expensive and promising experimental program.
LOL!
This is some truly amazing technology, though.
Aside from the fact that you now need twice as much power (huge), I'll let you work out the remaining difficulties with the approach. ;-)
Hillary will probably buy one.
Maybe I can use it to take out my neighbors cat, the one that likes to torment my dog at the fenceline. The wrists rocket hasn't worked yet.
Still not fast enough to drive on I-75 through Atlanta.
Heh. I think that would take out the fenceline too.
Maybe you should get a super soaker.
Ok, I HAVE to get some work done now. LOL
My thoughts exactly. I don't think that the Los Alamos National Laboratory is a place where they study astrophysics for it's own sake (e.g. "One purpose of these very rapid flights is to help understand the extreme conditions found within the interiors of giant planets in our solar system...".)
Read the first paragraph of their Mission Statement:
The mission of Los Alamos National Laboratory is national security.
I think space weapons might be the target application here. There are many other possibilities.
Man! That'll snap your head back!
" I can see a billion military applications for this kind of gun -- if they can make it stable enough."
Yes, we spend billions for research in this country and the first thought is "how can I use this to kill someone?". If Joe Blow came up with a cure for cancer and the government found out you could use it for a weapon it would disappear in the blink of an eye.
Fascinating - incredible technology. Wonder how long they've had it?
:~)
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Scientists at the Sandia National Labs in Albuquerque, New Mexico have accelerated a small plate from zero to 76,000 mph in less than a second. The speed of the thrust was a new record for Sandia's "Z Machine" - not only the fastest gun in the West, but in the world too.
The Z Machine is now able to propel small plates at 34 kilometers a second, faster than the 30 kilometers per second that Earth travels through space in its orbit about the Sun. That's 50 times faster than a rifle bullet, and three times the velocity needed to escape Earth's gravitational field.
Man and I thought the 'X' wife could hurl plates...76,000 MPH Whoa!
Way faster than my '57 Chevy - but do they have a convertible?
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No problem for my '57 Chevy - but I have supercalifragilisticexpialidocious exhaust pipes !!! ;-))
You may have a point - let's do the math. The bullet must be big enough not to burn up in atmosphere -- a kilogram or so in size, and is going like holy hell.
The delta-V imparted on the launcher is directly proportional to the mass and velocity of the projectile, and also the mass of the launcher.
If we presume that there's enough power to accelerate 1 kg to 34 km/sec, the impulse imparted will be 34,000 kg-m/sec, the opposite of which will be imparted on the launcher. If the launcher mass is 1700 kg, the delta-V would be 20 m/sec, primarily radial. Not too bad, IOW, in terms of what it does to the orbit, but the jolt would play holy hell on the structure -- especially the big solar arrays that'd be necessary to provide power for recharging the batteries.
You'd get less of a jolt with a more massive launcher, but it's still going to be an instantaneous jolt, which are Bad Things, as far as long solar arrays are concerned.
However, as Jerry Pournelle and Stefan Possony once pointed out, there's really no need to use all that power: it's easy enough to settle for a relatively low initial velocity, and let gravity do the rest. The energy of a 1 kg steel rod, travelling at something like 8,000 m/sec, is rather substantial...
shore wouldn't get much dinner eatin' offa one of dem der plates
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