Welcome to Gaia! ::

Ok then.
thats it?

never read the thrawn trilogy did you?
I recomend it.

Actually, the building was made of wood and it only collapsed, it wasn't completely destroyed or anything. And he is a better shot than most, he hit critical weak points in the structure, which, by the way, was not government contracted, but rather constructed by primitive people living next to a mountian.

Huh, it seems like nearly all of Star Wars weapons are plasma or energy based.
Do they even have rail guns?

And when you say 'handled', what do you mean? I hear they're building prototypes now, and they're thinking about designing a battleship based around one. So, it's not like they can't exist.

a small railgun seems impractical. The amount of energy required to propel something worthwhile could be put to a more effecient use.

the strength of the railgun is that its like the futuristic version of the Trebuchet. Just find a really big rock and throw it at someone. Buta smaller version just isn't worth the effort..

You mean like the ones in development for the US Navy?

It throws big enough rocks (and i use that term loosely) to be useful.

Its just that for infantry, currently at our state, the energy is too much for something so small... Not to mention, it might not have enough of a launch tube for hand held usage. I mean, it probably wouldn't create enough power, or too much in that case...

i imagine a hand held railgun would just be a fancy nailgun... exept with magnets instead of pneumatics.

You know, gauss guns and railguns are terms that i find people use infrequently.

I cannot remember the true definition of the weapons at the present. When I think of a railgun, i think of weapons that use a magnetic launcher to fire a bullet or other projecitle by means of super fast magnetic pulses.

Gauss guns... hmm.. its been so long since i've talked about those, i can't rightly remember. I keep getting the impression its a machine gun, but i know that's not right...

Perhaps Nospai has some reasearch on hand to clear it up... I've never been really heavy into rifle theory though. I shoot. I don't care much about the weapon, so long as it works. I know what i prefer, but past that, its not my real concern.

gauss and railguns are practically synonimous; both use electromagnets to propell dense, inexpensive projectiles at rediculous speeds. 'gauss' is just a fancier, more sci-fi sounding name though, and incorporates some other stuff i'm not sure about (prolly just fictional).

an important member of this family is the Mac cannon; it works basically like the railgun, but uses no rails. therefore, it has less friction and can go much faster, but is less accurate. if i'm not mistaken, the gauss is more akin to the mac cannon than the rail gun.