Comment on Japan shows off futuristic 'railgun' at defence expo
knightly@pawb.social 5 weeks agoAnd then some, of course. The advantage of energy weapons is the speed of light, but they have negligible kinetic energy and zero penetration, relying on surface heating to cause damage. It typically takes them several seconds on target to knock out a drone, and even longer on missiles designed for hypersonic flight.
Tar_alcaran@sh.itjust.works 5 weeks ago
Once you’re talking hundreds of kilowatts of average power (usually pulsed in much shorter increments) you’re not really talking about “surface heating” but more about “metal instantly vaporizes” if you focus that beam on target.