Possible space weapons of the future 'Rods from God' and beyond

post-gazette.com ^ | Monday, July 28, 2003 | Jack Kelly

[mvpel]

How long would the rail gun have to be, and how much power, to juice up a 10' sphere to near c?

[Phsstpok]

So how am I supposed to prevent that?

you work that out after Saddam is monkey chow. Ask for forgiveness, not permission. There's really no clear law on "air rights" for ballistic reentry vehicles, which is what these would be. The Space Shuttle goes through the air space of lots of unfriendly countries on it's way home (depending on definitions). The Russian's reentry vehicles are even more likely to pass through other peoples "owned" airspace. It's really meaningless at this point.

[mvpel]

No, just dayvear, eveningvear and svimvear.

ROTFLMAO!! :-D

[RippleFire]

tungsten rods perhaps 20 feet long and one foot in diameter

Rods? Sounds more like a metal telephone pole.

[risk]

Also, the late great Robert Heinlein was a towering role model for us Libertarians and those men who aren't afraid to be men.

Oddly enough, he was increasingly bereft of traditional mores as he aged. What a coincidence!

[risk]

>>>> The book was that good.

LOL, that's good.

[Destro]

You can't. But the international system that governed relations between nations via treaty is dead or wounded. It has been since Clinton violated the international system to go to war in Kosovo. International law is really self-limitations that sovereign nations impose on themselves in order to create or bring some order to the "law of the jungle" that is the reality of geopolitics.

[StriperSniper]

BTTT

[Kozak]

The technical term is "SPLAT"

I like FOG: Finger Of God

[null and void]

I don't believe we can legally station weapons in orbit.

Not nuclear ones...

[Denver Ditdat]

How much mass does a 1 X 25 foot tungston rod possess and how many can a Saturn V put into orbit (if any)?

The biggest probelm with lifting the rods into orbit on a Saturn V is that we have no flight-worthy Saturns, and haven't for about 30 years. Restarting production would be problematic, too. Many off-the-shelf components used to manufacture the big boosters haven't been produced in decades. Some of the companies that built those components are out of business or merged out of existance. The "institutional knowledge" carried in the brains of those who designed and built the Saturns is gone - the majority of those folks are either retired or dead.

Our only real choices for heavy lift capability are to purchase it from the Russians, or to design a new Saturn on a clean sheet of paper.

I vote for the latter.

[skinkinthegrass]

"Rods from God," was technically "Project Thor" back in the 60s and I believe it was one of the programs Pournelle was involved in. The idea was to drop tens of thousands of smaller steel rods unguided into the Fulda Gap as the Soviet tanks came through.

Thats' what I hear, from the late 70s.

[Imal]

Oddly enough, he was increasingly bereft of traditional mores as he aged. What a coincidence!

I think it was all carefully planned, myself. ;^)

[MissAmericanPie]

The Supreme Court better not find out that they are calling them "Rods from God".=o)

[Imal]

I'm sure they will rename them "Rods of Social Justice" before trying to run their funding past the Democrats on the Armed Services Committee.

[RightOnTheLeftCoast]

Well that explains your screen-name! You're right, of course: Footfall. My bad. I've met Pournelle a couple times too, but nothing he'd remember. He's a regular at the Katofest chili extravaganzas. One thing's for sure about Pournelle: he's sure to be the loudest guy in the room.

[wattsmag2]

"the only thing that can kill lots of people is political corruption." Like communism and liberals.

In other words, Democrats

[risk]

The Supreme Court better not find out that they are calling them "Rods from God".=o)

LOL, that's too funny!

[Kozak]

Absolutely amazing !! Almost unbelievable !! Now that's a HAMMER !!

I get about 64,000,000,000 joules per rod at impact. Thats about 165,000 times the KE of a Gau 8 30 millimeter round from the A 10 gattling gun.

[1stFreedom]

>>Mach 10.74.

Your figure differs from the figure the article mentions. (Mach 12).

Sound moves at different speeds. Your calculation uses sound at sea level, which results in your figure.

However, could the altitude account for the difference in Mach figures?