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EXACTO demonstrates first-ever guided .50-caliber bullets

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Re: EXACTO demonstrates first-ever guided .50-caliber bullets

#81

Post by noonespecial »

ErikRogneby wrote: post #27

I wonder what each bullet will cost once production starts? I sometimes think about the origins of the second amendment and if it's intent was to empower citizens against a potentially oppressive government then it has failed. US military technology might as well be black magic. What can a "well regulated militia" do against smart bullets, M1 Abrams, Apache helicopters, etc? Thank goodness we are kept fat and happy.

The 2nd isn't really to protect you from the combined might of an oppressive nation-state. If it gets that far, its really already too late. The 2nd is to protect you from Bob down at the police station in Podunksville deciding that he might like to have a go at running the town his way and helping himself to your stuff. Its the safety valve on the local-est kind of corruption.

Re: EXACTO demonstrates first-ever guided .50-caliber bullets

#82

Post by gamegoblin »

melvinmt wrote: post #80

I wonder if there are any startups in weapon technology.

AFAIK Boston Dynamics was a decently small company that produces cool military tech. (Now bought by Google).

Also, there was a small company that had a show on the Discovery Channel for ~2 seasons called Howe & Howe Tech that produced a cool lightweight continuous track vehicle.

Re: EXACTO demonstrates first-ever guided .50-caliber bullets

#84

Post by zobzu »

rayiner wrote: post #63
ErikRogneby wrote: post #27

I wonder what each bullet will cost once production starts? I sometimes think about the origins of the second amendment and if it's intent was to empower citizens against a potentially oppressive government then it has failed. US military technology might as well be black magic. What can a "well regulated militia" do against smart bullets, M1 Abrams, Apache helicopters, etc? Thank goodness we are kept fat and happy.

The basis of American freedom isn't some libertarians with rifles. Its the fact that the U.S. military consists of poorly-paid kids who care more about family and community than they do about abstract ideas. That and the fact that the military and its arsenal is physicislly distributed over numerous states. More powerful military technology makes us more free, not less. It just means it takes fewer people to break ra…

That also relates to the why the police is generally enforcing whatever a government wants, while the military always sides with the people when things go really wrong.

Re: EXACTO demonstrates first-ever guided .50-caliber bullets

#85

Post by seany »

RyJones wrote: post #47
seany wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Between 880-930meters/sec. I would think that a gps would have a hard time fitting inside a typical 50bmg bullet anyway. They only weigh about 45grams.

there is a lot of wasted space in a 50 BMG cartridge - you could easily make the bullet much longer without using up needed powder capacity. As long as you make it the same mass, you should be OK to fire it in guns currently chambered in 50 BMG. If you need to trivially prove this, pick up a loaded round and shake it. You can hear the powder jostling around in there. Why is there wasted space? As powders become more…

Looks like something around 40-60gr worth of powder space depending on bullet and desired COAL. (I don't have any of my reloading manuals near by so that's based off wikipedia/handloads.com info)

Re: EXACTO demonstrates first-ever guided .50-caliber bullets

#86

Post by dragonwriter »

noonespecial wrote: post #81
ErikRogneby wrote: post #27

I wonder what each bullet will cost once production starts? I sometimes think about the origins of the second amendment and if it's intent was to empower citizens against a potentially oppressive government then it has failed. US military technology might as well be black magic. What can a "well regulated militia" do against smart bullets, M1 Abrams, Apache helicopters, etc? Thank goodness we are kept fat and happy.

The 2nd isn't really to protect you from the combined might of an oppressive nation-state. If it gets that far, its really already too late. The 2nd is to protect you from Bob down at the police station in Podunksville deciding that he might like to have a go at running the town his way and helping himself to your stuff. Its the safety valve on the local-est kind of corruption.

The 2nd was initially more to assure the states the means to protect themselves against encroachment by the central government (and thereby dissuade such encroachment), a concern that was within vivid living memory for the framers, and was of particular concern to skeptics of the centralization that the Constitution represented compared to the Articles of Confederation.

Like all of the Bill of Rights, it was about constraining the Federal government, not the Podunksville Police.

Re: EXACTO demonstrates first-ever guided .50-caliber bullets

#87

Post by [deleted] »

zobzu wrote: post #84
rayiner wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The basis of American freedom isn't some libertarians with rifles. Its the fact that the U.S. military consists of poorly-paid kids who care more about family and community than they do about abstract ideas. That and the fact that the military and its arsenal is physicislly distributed over numerous states. More powerful military technology makes us more free, not less. It just means it takes fewer people to break ra…

That also relates to the why the police is generally enforcing whatever a government wants, while the military always sides with the people when things go really wrong.

[deleted]

Re: EXACTO demonstrates first-ever guided .50-caliber bullets

#88

Post by RyJones »

seany wrote: post #85
RyJones wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

there is a lot of wasted space in a 50 BMG cartridge - you could easily make the bullet much longer without using up needed powder capacity. As long as you make it the same mass, you should be OK to fire it in guns currently chambered in 50 BMG. If you need to trivially prove this, pick up a loaded round and shake it. You can hear the powder jostling around in there. Why is there wasted space? As powders become more…

Looks like something around 40-60gr worth of powder space depending on bullet and desired COAL. (I don't have any of my reloading manuals near by so that's based off wikipedia/handloads.com info)

you don't get many rounds out of a keg of powder, that's for sure. If you're not magazine feeding them, of course, you can get a longer COAL. I don't know of anyone doing compressed loads (why would you?) but I assume it's possible. If we assume a 50BMG-shaped round that isn't actually to standard, you could load it with titegroup or something exciting, but I think making something like that which would chamber in a 50 BMG would be borderline criminal.

Re: EXACTO demonstrates first-ever guided .50-caliber bullets

#89

Post by hueving »

ArikBe wrote: post #22
fractalsea wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That may explain how the target corrects its trajectory towards the actual target, but how does the bullet determine what the "actual target" is in the first place? I would imagine this would be simple in test cases, but in the real world, what about a hostile target may differentiate it from a friendly ally that is nearby?

I commented below that it's marked by laser, but the counterargument was that if you can aim a laser you can aim a rifle. Let me rephrase: the goal of this system is to correct for deviations from the actual target which occur in the air. Because of wind, temperature, rotation of the earth (when taking really long shots) and other factors a marksman might have to adjust his or her aim and actually aim off-target to g…

Why would the rotation of the earth matter? It's a constant speed and the person that fires it is rotating with the earth so the rotation is already part of the trajectory of the bullet. So is the wind for that matter.

Re: EXACTO demonstrates first-ever guided .50-caliber bullets

#90

Post by oftenwrong »

noblethrasher wrote: post #57
ErikRogneby wrote: post #27

I wonder what each bullet will cost once production starts? I sometimes think about the origins of the second amendment and if it's intent was to empower citizens against a potentially oppressive government then it has failed. US military technology might as well be black magic. What can a "well regulated militia" do against smart bullets, M1 Abrams, Apache helicopters, etc? Thank goodness we are kept fat and happy.

We should probably be more worried about the non-lethal weapons that can be used to effect control and compliance — like the mobility denial and active denial systems. At least firehoses, dogs, and guns have a chance of illiciting sympathy from onlookers (e.g. the international community). Protesters on a big slip-n-slide will probably just end up on /r/funny.

Especially because "non-lethal" is a misnomer. For example, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Victoria_Snelgrove and all of the people killed by tasers.
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