On Fri, May 6, 2016 at 2:04 PM, Richard Aiken <xxxxxx@gmail.com> wrote:

On Thu, May 5, 2016 at 2:05 PM, Grimmund <xxxxxx@gmail.com> wrote:

Actual gyrojet weapons were pretty flimsy, IIRC, since they had to withstand pretty minimal launch forces and no recoil to speak of.

I like how GURPS treated gyrojets. They were slugthrowers firing explosive rounds, except without appreciable recoil (unless fired on full auto) and with IMPACT (as opposed to explosive) damage based on how far the round had accelerated. Also, the warheads had a minimum arming distance on (IIRC) of about 12 feet (4 meters), so that you didn't take frag damage from your own round.

All of which meant that when it came to fighting inside a starship, shooting someone with a gyrojet was roughly equivalent to punching them with your fist, except you could do it from across the room.

That's going to depend on the round.

First generation were 13mm, second were 12mm.

From Wiki:

"Velocity on leaving the tube was very low, but increased to around 1,250 feet per second (380 m/s) at 30 feet (9.1 m). "

"The rocket leaves the barrel with low energy, and accelerates until the fuel is exhausted at about 60 feet (18 metres), at which point the rocket has a velocity of about 1250 feet per second (FPS), slightly greater than Mach one, with about 50% more energy than the common .45 ACP round.[While test figures vary greatly, testers report that there was a sonic crack from some rounds, but only a hissing sound from others, suggesting that the maximum velocity varied from slightly below to slightly above Mach 1."

You could probably improve that quite a bit. If you intended it for shipboard, close quarters use, you could likely change the propellant to get something that had hit Vmax within 3 meters.

(Presumably, rifle rounds are bigger, ouchier, and optimized for slightly longer ranges, compared to pistols.... YMMV.)

I'd suggest explosives, but that's probably not a good idea for a weapon you plan on firing inside the ship.

"Any sufficiently advanced parody is indistinguishable from a genuine kook." -Alan Morgan