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Allen McDuffee writes the US Navy's latest weapon is an electromagnetic railgun launcher that can hurl a 23-pound projectile at speeds exceeding Mach 7 with a range of 100 miles turning a destroyer into super-long-range machine gun able to fire up to a dozen relatively inexpensive projectiles every minute. The Navy says the cost differential $25,000 for a railgun projectile versus $500,000 to $1.5 million for a missile will make potential enemies think twice about the economic viability of engaging U.S. forces. "[It] will give our adversaries a huge moment of pause to go: 'Do I even want to go engage a naval ship?'" says Rear Admiral Matt Klunder. "Because you are going to lose. You could throw anything at us, frankly, and the fact that we now can shoot a number of these rounds at a very affordable cost, it's my opinion that they don't win."
Engineers already have tested this futuristic weapon on land, and the Navy plans to begin sea trials aboard a Joint High Speed Vessel Millinocket in 2016. Railguns use electromagnetic energy known as the Lorenz Force to launch a projectile between two conductive rails. The high-power electric pulse generates a magnetic field to fire the projectile with very little recoil, officials say. Weapons like the electromagnetic rail gun could help U.S. forces retain their edge and give them an asymmetric advantage over rivals, making it too expensive to use missiles to attack U.S. warships because of the cheap way to defeat them. "Your magazine never runs out, you just keep shooting, and that's compelling."
(Score: 1) by Dunbal on Friday April 11 2014, @01:06PM
"The Navy says the cost differential $25,000 for a railgun projectile versus $500,000 to $1.5 million for a missile will make potential enemies think twice about the economic viability of engaging U.S. forces."
Yes, let's just ignore the fact that the railgun itself cost over $3 BILLION per ship. Which means I could fire 2,000 missiles at your little destroyer and still be "ahead" on the balance sheet (because after all, the 3 billion is for the gun, not the entire ship). How many destroyers are equipped to fend off 2,000 missiles? Sigh. Nu math.
(Score: 4, Informative) by dotdotdot on Friday April 11 2014, @01:28PM
The railgun itself does not cost $3 billion per ship. I think you might be getting that figure from here [ibtimes.com] which is for a completely new stealth destroyer.
The development cost which is usually the biggest cost of new weapon technology has been only about $240 million over the past 7 years.
(Score: 0) by Dunbal on Friday April 11 2014, @01:43PM
Actually [foxnews.com] no [bangordailynews.com]. One site has it at $3 billion, another at $4 billion. Where did you get YOUR number from?
(Score: 3, Informative) by dotdotdot on Friday April 11 2014, @01:55PM
From you first link ...
Your second link is also about a completely new ship and not just the cost to put a rail gun on an existing ship.
(Score: 2) by mhajicek on Friday April 11 2014, @01:46PM
Another advantage will be cost effective live fire training. Better trained crews make fewer mistakes, and remain more level headed when shtf.
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday April 11 2014, @02:34PM
But those $3 billion (assuming the figure is right) are sunken cost by the time the battle begins. That is, when making the decision whether to apply the installed railgun the cost of installing it will no longer be important. Indeed, the fact that it was so expensive to install might even encourage its use, to justify the cost of equipping the ship with it.
(Score: 2) by Bartman12345 on Friday April 11 2014, @03:26PM
Indeed, the fact that it was so expensive to install might even encourage its use, to justify the cost of equipping the ship with it.
And also to prevent it from sinking to the bottom of the ocean.
(Score: 1) by theluggage on Friday April 11 2014, @04:07PM
"Sunk costs" may not be the best term to use in this particular context :-)
(Score: 2) by tibman on Friday April 11 2014, @02:51PM
lol, agreed. I'm sure the missile's launcher systems aren't super cheap but nowhere near 3bil. I'd hope that the railgun's R&D cost is in that $3bil as well!
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(Score: 1) by rheaghen on Friday April 11 2014, @08:23PM
according to http://hypertextbook.com/facts/1999/SeanManning.sh tml [hypertextbook.com]
modern missiles travel at about 1.3 miles per second, and if the rail-gun never missed a target, and could stop 1 or 2 missiles per 5 seconds, It could take down a theoretical maximum of 50 missiles, if they were simultaneously launched at the same distance from the weapon.
I'd say 65 missiles per rail-gun is all that is needed. Regardless, you need WAY less than 2000 missiles.