Another Technology Leap - The Self-Guided Bullet

I think it's amazing that they could engineer and build the electronics to survive the g-forces required to launch the bullet. With a muzzle velocity of 2400 fps, and even assuming a three-foot barrel, you're talking about tens of thousand of "g"s.
 
I believe they already had such technology to survive the Gs in cannon rounds. What is nifty is that they got all of it into such a small package.

Lasing the target will need to be from fairly close range such that the bullet hits the specific target. From too great of a distance, the size of the laser dot is large. This wasn't so much a problem with laser guided bombs that being a few feet off didn't matter.

I haven't seen anywhere yet where they have stated just what the size of the target was. Bullets have very little destructive power and unlike bombs, a near miss isn't going to be terribly damaging.

Still, it is cool technology.
 
I saw a report years ago where the military was developing a bullet with a pivoting tip to guide it into the target. It used a micro chip and some fibers that can vary their length slightly under a small electrical charge.:cool:
That was at least 8-10 years ago and haven't heard anymore about it. I bet the government would never let Joe American have anything like it though!!
 
What I don't understand is that the bullet trace in the video clearly shows the bullet dipping below a ridge that obscures its "view" of the target. Yet the explanation is that the bullet "homes" to a laser dot on the target.

So how did it "know" what to do when the target disappeared behind the ridge? Apparently it did, because it did a little corkscrew motion and went up over the ridge and then down behind it to hit the target.
 
00, You can designate a small target with one of the current hand held Raytheon or NG laser designators from "many miles" away, and an aircraft mounted device from much farther, both well out of small arms fire.

As to the bullet 'dipping below' the ridge line, it's not clear it can't see the dot from our perspective, or may have memory as to where it needs to go.
 
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Pretty neat, a mini-Copperhead round. Now take that little guy, eliminate the laser and laser operator, make it fire-and-forget, with a nose camera and facial recognition software chip, some loiter time while it waits for the dude to come out of the privy, then you've got a real game-change.
 
From too great of a distance, the size of the laser dot is large.
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Computer controled Variable Geometry Lenses. Currently used in telescopes and long range lasers to compensate for atmospheric conditions. Basically long range lasers work by one laser beaming onto the target, an optical sensor measures the areas of distortion and the working laser with the variable compensating lense is then used. The lense distorts the laser and the atmosphere actually corrects the beam. Pretty cool stuff.
 
"I think it's amazing that they could engineer and build the electronics to survive the g-forces required to launch the bullet. With a muzzle velocity of 2400 fps, and even assuming a three-foot barrel, you're talking about tens of thousand of "g"s."

The technology to survive that kind of acceleration and rotational force has been around a lot longer than most people know...

During World War II the first proximity fuses were fielded, first for the 5"/38 guns on warships for use in an anti-aircraft role, and then as the concept was proven it was shrunk progressively smaller, eventually down to 20mm.

More amazingly, that technology was developed and successfully fielded pretransistor, and preintegrated circuit.
 
00, You can designate a small target with one of the current hand held Raytheon or NG laser designators from "many miles" away, and an aircraft mounted device from much farther, both well out of small arms fire.
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Yes, I am aware of laser designated bombing applications and know they can be done long range. Once again, however, the issue of precision and destructive forces. At long distance, the laser dot can be quite large, certainly larger than a human.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?NR=1&v=a8LS7QWHyks&feature=endscreen

So if your target is lased from miles away and you are shooting this little 4" long bullet, where in the giant dot of the laser at the target is the bullet going to impact?

A small target can be designated from many miles away? You mean like hitting a man's head with a bullet or hitting somewhere on a small building?
 
This is a pretty neat development. I wonder what the rifle it will be fired from will look like (Field version, not laboratory version).

I do know the military was working on the laser problem years ago, because like Double Naught said, it became a pretty large signature over large distances. (Perhaps, it takes more than a mile?)

But it sounds like they found a way to fix this, according to Teeroux.

How long before Walmart starts selling them in a white box?
 
Not to worry Highvel...

I am sure the gubmint is already drafting legislation to ban this from non-LEO/Military use.
 
I wonder what the price point of a guided bullet would be?

I heard that the 20mm "smart" grenades that the OICWS fired cost over $1000 a piece.
 
Right, but there is a break in price after the first 50,000 units to $990 each. Buy 40 million units and they are almost cheap. :D

I am not so sure about its ability to hit targets...
http://gizmodo.com/5880537/this-bullet-from-the-future-flies-itself

It appears to have hit the ground, gone dark, went light, and headed into the atmosphere.
http://gizmodo.com/5880537/this-bullet-from-the-future-flies-itself
Maybe the target was Earth?

Larger image...
https://ip.sandia.gov/image.xhtml?id=100&techID=78

Maybe the target in the second image was the bush and ground, but nothing that looks like a "target" such as the one seen in the foreground or the ones in the background where the bullet isn't going.

The test looks to be a failure if they were aimed at the same target.
 
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I saw a different report and started a thread (closed) wondering how it's guidance system worked. From the info in this thread, it looks like the target has to be "painted" the whole time. I'm wondering how workable that is on a real battlefield at the ranges some small arms battles might be fought. Not every battle is going to be in a desert or in wide open spaces.
 
I am also curious about that DNS. Sure lasers can reach further than that, however is there anyway that they designed it to hit exactly in the center of the laser which at those distances resemble a small round flashlight

.
 
Do you think the army would ever incorporate this into small arms?
The extra cost and the complications that could come with it seems as though it'd be impractical to give every future soldier this style of small arm.

Its almost at the stage where the soldier on the ground is just an unnecessary risk, and they could put this technology on Drones and have the whole Army computer controlled.
 
Its almost at the stage where the soldier on the ground is just an unnecessary risk, and they could put this technology on Drones and have the whole Army computer controlled.
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I think we're getting very close to that. Maybe they'll name the computer "Skynet".
 
they could put this technology on Drones and have the whole Army computer controlled.
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And have a cyber attack destroy the entire Army in one stroke, defeating the nation without a shot fired......

I worry about the .mil becoming too tech-dependant.... a larger, lower tech enemy could concievably attack the satellites, computers, or electrical grid and change the balance of power instantaneously......
 
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