“And it exploded”

 AARRRGH, awesomeness, Hmm..., news, politics, russian empire, weapons, youtube, ಠ_ಠ  No Responses »
Mar 022022
 

Based on the timing, seems like they were about 1.7 miles from the second detonation. That kind of light from that far away probably indicates a pretty sporty explosion… thermobaric bomb of great magnitude, or a hit on an ammo dump. One person suggests the first explosion was nuclear; I would *guess* that the yellow-orange nature of the flash would argue almost immediately for a chemical explosion. A nuclear one – at least one measured in the kiloton range and beyond – should be white, perhaps blue-tinged, like a welding arc. If you see *that* kind of flash light up the sky… well, go perpendicular to the wind, then turn into the wind and get out of the fallout zone.

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 Posted by at 11:42 pm

Javelins

 awesomeness, news, rockets, weapons, ಠ_ಠ  No Responses »
Mar 012022
 

An interesting video about the Javelin anti-tank missile currently being used, apparently with some success, to relieve Russia of some of their excess armor:

The Javelin is, unlike an RPG, a guided and fairly long-range missile. It has a two stage motor, with an initial fast-acting booster that tosses the missile out of the launcher without sending a blast into the face of the guy who pulled the trigger. This has the result of making every launch look, for a split second, like a failed launch; the thing just sorta lobs out of the tube, starts to fall to the ground… then ignites the motor and launches itself into the sky.

Here’s a video from before the invasion that describes the missile in some depth:

 

Apparently they’re fun to dance with:

 Posted by at 7:30 pm

Firing a Fliegerfaust

 aircraft, awesomeness, Crazy, history, rockets, weapons, youtube  No Responses »
Feb 272022
 

It’s more relevant than ever: home expedient man portable anti-aircraft missile systems. It is as yet undetermined how successful (or not) manpads have been at swatting the aircraft buzzing over Ukraine, but it’s likely a safe bet that solutions dating back to World War II are unlikely to be terribly effective. Nevertheless, as wonky as this thing is, it is undeniably entertaining as hell. The “fliegerfaust” was a late-war German desperation weapon designed to bring down low flying aircraft by launching a swarm of small unguided rockets. It is unlikely that this sort of thing would have *ever* worked against Shturmoviks or Jugs, much less against Hinds or Frogfoots… but it still seems to be unreasonably *fun.*

 Posted by at 3:44 pm

Welcome to Ukraine. Here, have a cocktail.

 AARRRGH, awesomeness, Crazy, news, politics, russian empire, weapons, youtube  No Responses »
Feb 262022
 

I’ve always figured that a Molotov cocktail would be minimally useful against an armored vehicle. Sure, it’s liquid fire, but it’s not that much when you consider it’s spread over perhaps several square years of several inches of steel armor.

But then there’ s *this:*

Reasonably certain it got a little warm in there.

UPDATE: Original video removed for some reason. Why? Dunno. One possibility: like so many videos and photos… *maybe* it’s not actually from the current conflict, but from something else. Hard to tell. However, here’s a copy:

 Posted by at 4:15 am

Huh. AR-15’s for nobody/everybody

 Forward!, Hmm..., news, politics, weapons  No Responses »
Feb 252022
 

From the already-terminated once, soon to be terminated again Twitter account “Defiant L’s,” which posts screenshots of hypocritical Tweeters, comes this masterpiece regarding the need for assault rifles:

Related:

 

 

 

 

 Posted by at 5:24 pm

500 Auto Max

 art, awesomeness, weapons  No Responses »
Feb 202022
 

This seems like *maybe* a bit much for home defense. But I’m not gonna judge.

The AR 500 From Big Horn Armory — Half Inch Holes

The 500 Auto Max round compared to a 5.56. Note that the itty-bitty 5.56 is often called “high power” by political hacks; imagine what they’d think of the larger round. Nine rounds fit in a magazine that would approximately fit 20 rounds of 5.56. Big and powerful as the round is, it appears to be short range only, losing a lot of velocity pretty quickly. Not surprising since its aerodynamics seem to more closely approximate that of a cannonball than a bullet. Twenty rounds seems like it’ll set you back fifty to seventy bucks, so unless you’ve got a financial agreement with the Chinese like the Bidens, make sure you hit where you’re aiming. A rifle itself runs about two grand. Seems like it’d be fun on the range.

 

 Posted by at 3:55 pm

Exploding a .50

 awesomeness, Hmm..., science, weapons, youtube  No Responses »
Feb 162022
 

Kentucky Ballistics revisits the accident that nearly killed him. Serbu provided him a second gun for the specific purpose of blowing it up. The evidence suggests strongly that the problem was over-powered ammunition.

Props for tackling the issue head-on. A lot of people wouldn’t touch something that nearly killed them.

 Posted by at 3:18 pm

Gun Jesus and the Gauss Gun

 art, awesomeness, Hmm..., science, weapons, youtube  No Responses »
Feb 112022
 

The one where Forgotten Weapons takes a mass driver to the range:

 

I think I’ve mentioned this “weapon” hereabouts before. It remains interesting-yet-meh, shooting a half-inch diameter slug of steel at seventy some meters per second. This is *really* subsonic (something like Mach 0.2) and unlikely to prove fatal barring a good head shot at close range. Still: it’s early days for this technology. Jack up the muzzle velocity by a factor of ten (require a factor of >100 more energy being dumped into the projectile, a non-trivial task) and they’ll really have something… a “firearm” capable of proper firearm performance, requiring no gunpowder and, by the time it becomes available, largely 3D printable by the average home printer… with the non-printable bits being distinctly non-firearm components, thus unregulated.

 Posted by at 2:33 pm
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