How effective would a railgun be against an aircraft carrier?
high speed low drag
>>29149572
Prolly a dent. pretty easy fix with a hammer though.
>>29149572
It would punch through the aircraft carrier's fairly thin belt, but you'd need to hit it several times to get it to sink. Carriers are massive, and you'll likely not get a second time to hit them once their aircraft are trained on you.
>>29149572
very effective, if it was able to get up to the speeds we see in movies it could send a hardened steel spike right into the guts of a carrier. Not to mention the ship doesn't have to use explosive chemical propellants
![hqdefault[1].jpg](https://i.imgur.com/SWrrnoQ.jpg "hqdefault[1].jpg")
You'd have to hit very specific areas to do anything since if you miss critical structure it's going to go right on through to the other side
as effective as a 76mm ap round would be against a zeppelin
(not very)
>>29149572
It depends on the trajectory. A railgun could shoot at higher gun elevations which could pierce the deck like a bomb.
>>29152740
What if it was shot on a flatter trajectory at the carrier lengthwise?
>>29149572
the same effectiveness as a tank shell, carriers aren't that well armoured at all
>>29150617
and then what? detonate the ships magazine? cause flooding enough to sink it? render the ship unable to launch planes? cause a fire?
>>29152813
If it doesn't hit critical systems, you want to cause flooding. A flatter trajectory may have an exit point above water.
Railguns are niche weapons. They are best for direct fire applications where the kinetic energy can be used to great effect. To sink a carrier, you either need to hit it with high explosives or break its back by using underwater explosions. Also, we can see through your motives OP. This is thinly veiled Battleship Revival thread, isn't it?
>>29149572
>Short answer
No
>Long answer
No
>>29149572
>Render the deck useless
Could work
>Exploding the magazines or nuclear reactors
Unlikely but still could work
>Sinking the carrier
Whole lot of nope
>>29149572
well they sell rail guns as kinetic killers. lets say the round is travelling mach 12…would it punch a very clean hole? personally i think it would make personnel deaf as fuck
Can't we fire a regular 420mm shell at mach 12 instead of a shit nigger simple not explosive one ?
>>29152997
>exploding nuclear reactors
Nah
>>29152919
Sir, bring around the Sea Spear. Make sure the ERA skirts are at 100%
you guys realize that a railgun can shoot up to hundreds of miles away from a carrier while retaining a tight grouping right? in order for one to retaliate they'd have to send out jets which would take more time than for another shot to be made.
Raily effective
>>29153059
i think he means hitting the main heating chamber and causing a steam + radiation spill.
>>29153254
This is basically what I meant. As long as the carrier can't do flight ops you win.
>>29153080
How are they detecting and targeting the carrier from hundreds of miles away?
How are they avoiding detection by the carrier's escort screen, and by the jets the carrier already has patrolling against exactly the possibility of an enemy ship approaching the group?
Unless you are the United States Navy, your railgun is never going to be targeting a carrier. At best it'll be targeting a DD-X and maybe getting one or two shots off before the destroyer or the planes launched from the carrier behind it rape you in the ass.
>>29153288
>As long as the carrier can't do flight ops you win.
And as long as the carrier *can* do flight ops, you lose.
And since the carrier begins the engagement with the ability to do flight ops, you lose.
>>29153404
This and unless they've figured it out, rail guns still require to be rebuilt after each shot so you've got one shot to do your worse with an unguided weapon system.
>>29153404
>How are they detecting and targeting the carrier from hundreds of miles away?
The same way missiles target ships.
>>29153425
The projectiles will be guided and the rails last hundreds of shots now.
>>29149572
Depends on a lot of things. The ammo you use, the type of carrier, where the shot hits, how many shots you take, how well stocked the carrier is etc, etc, etc.
Rule of thumb is that you're going to penetrate. The Essex class carrier had 5 inches of armor at the most while the Nimitz has half of that and kevlar. In naval terms, that's "very little" and "No" armor respectively. However, aircraft carriers are very big and much of that is just storage space. The engines, fuel and ammo stores, and other things that respond badly to being shot are buried deep in the hull, under the water line. A direct shot would bounce off the water's surface at best. Plunging fire runs into accuracy issues.
Still, you could hurt a carrier. In fact, with the right ammunition you could make an absolute mess of the hanger deck, demolishing most of the planes and a carrier without planes is no carrier at all.
Finally, you have to contend with the aircraft. While railguns would make excellent AA guns, they're still just guns and aren't guerenteed to hit.
So...okay I guess. Depends on what you mount the railgun on, really.
Depends how it hits. In the front it would go right though it, from the side youd need to hit the generator i guess?
>>29149572
You'd effectively have a big-ass cone of shrapnel going down from where it hit pretty deep, given how thin the armor on modern ships is, i'd expect a small hole in the deck, then utter chaos in the hanger deck and probably just as much damage for a deck or two under that. Damage would depend on the size and speed of the shell, but i doubt it would be a one hit kill or anything unless it directly hit a magazine or reactor. I expect fire would be the biggest effect of it.
A better idea might be to airburst a round over the deck and have the shrapnel utterly shred many of the planes on deck, likely also starting fires and secondary explosions if they're armed and/or fueled, which i'd expect they would be, seeing as they're within gun range of an enemy ship.
I'd expect after several shots from guns, the carrier would be sunk with missiles, seeing as whatever anti missile defense it had would be long gone. Who would win this battle would mostly depend on how good the AA of the attacking ship is, along with range of both aircraft and weapons, with whoever getting the first shot in being at a huge advantage, given the almost total lack of armor of modern ships.
>>29149572
It'd be as effective as any other gun
but the whole point of the aircraft carrier is that it never gets exposed to that kind of shit
if it did someone is either not doing their job or all of its aircraft are away somewhere else for some reason or they can't launch for some reason all of its aircraft are fucking dead
either way it would be redundant shooting an aircraft carrier that can't into aircraft
BUT that is not what you're asking.
So it would be as effective as any other shell piercing a whole through the ship.
>>29149572
>How effective would a railgun be against an aircraft carrier?
Not verry, Aircraft carriers dont use Picatinny
>>29150879
10/10
>>29150879
nice
>>29152919
>Railguns are niche weapons. They are best for direct fire applications where the kinetic energy can be used to great effect.
The hyper-velocity projectile is designed to air burst. Any personnel or sensitive equipment in the vicinity of the passing hypersonic round is going to have a bad time.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2QqOvFMG_A
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UhvMU3Pm-F0
>>29150565
That depends on the time it takes to get another shot out. There's a high possibility that fielded railguns have a fairly high rate of fire.
>>29157819
If railguns use electricity to propel the projectile, why is there flames?
It depends where it hits, just like shooting a person.
>>29152841
Aim for the bridge, and then snipe the captain.
>>29158082
friction and heat is still a thing
>>29158082
The air in the barrel is being compressed by the rapidly accelerating projectile, heating it to incandescence.
>>29149572
Not effective at all cos the carrier would launch a fighter to dogfight with the projectile.. It would be shot down in minutes.
>>29158373
>>29158373
can the f35 turn with a railgun projectile tho
>>29158437
Most certainly it can. an F35 has significantly better aerodynamics and maneuvering ability than a railgun projectile.
Just keep making it bigger until you can fit a nuke in there
>>29158082
High end railgun shots are going so fast that the air in front of them is super compressed. Think atmospheric re-entry.
>>29158702
...actually not that bad of an idea but keep it secret . If a nuke goes off in someone's back yard the world is going to assume you used your railgun to fire it and retaliate.
>>29158373
>>29158437
>>29158481
Railgun rounds travel at Mach 5. An F-35 travels at Mach 1.61 at most.
Good fucking luck.
>>29149572
Like most Anons have said, it would probably go right through it, the issue is aiming it.
If you could hit a critical component like a reactor or the bridge, you could probably cripple the carrier for a bit while the crew tries to do damage control. You're unlikely to sink it, though
>>29159222
Speed does not matter cos the projectile is coming towards the plane anyway.. not like its going to turn around to secape the f35.
>>29159285
But at that speeds neither the pilot, the F-35 computer,
The closing distance will be about 6836 mph which gives the typical AIM-9 sidewinder only about 11 seconds to engage it.
Unless the railgun is firing solid shot in which case the fragmentation warhead on an A2A missile is going to do fuck all.
>>29159439
Well they could use a warhead that is not fragmentating. Also the pilot could use his plane to stop the round. Hit it with a wing and then eject.
>>29157819
I don't know much about such things but it impresses me that the camera can follow that.
>>29149572
Solid-ap type ammo? Yeah it'd punch right through it, be a pain to fix, might hit something vital, might not.
You can use different ammo with railgun too of course. That much HE on top of the kinetic force might well break a carrier in two.
>>29152841
If it is an American carrier, aim for the reactor compartments, that would render a mobility kill/mission kill.
>>29160582
You'd need a HEAT warhead and you can't fit that inside an A2A missile. Too thin.
Trying to intercept a railgun round with a plane is not only unbelievably risky but also arguably a win for the railgun.
Which actually brings up another point, Railguns as anti-air guns. Current testing railguns fire 23 lb shots while the AIM-9L/M/X all have 21 lb warheads. Without rocket motors, electronics, sensors, or even control surfaces anti-air railgun rounds would be incredibly cheap compared to typical SAMs. Accuracy would be more of an issue but in this case massed fire would be more effective. Enemy aircraft would need to constantly evade and maneuver to avoid the radar guided hypersonic rounds.
>>29159186
Someone needs to tape a roach to the tip and see what happens.
>>29158082
>>29158368
>>29158369
>>29159186
>>29163086
Somewhat-ish kinda true but 99% of the fire you're seeing is armature.
Railguns work by passing a giant fuckton of current from one rail to the other through the armature. The armature flies down the rails, moved by the Lorenz force, and carries the projectile. By the end of the trip, the armature has turned into plasma, the projo exits as fire comes out of the railgun.
>>29152841
This isn't World of Warships, anon.
>>29159439
We need to combat the projectiles with A-10s. Get them flying right at it and unleash a mighty BRRRRT cloud that the projectile will be unable to dodge.
>>29153054
duuuuude lmao?
>>29158353
nice
>>29149572
Depends on the muzzle velocity and projectile in question.
