From: utzoo!decvax!cca!steve@BRL@sri-unix
Newsgroups: net.physics
Title: Re:  rail-guns
Article-I.D.: sri-unix.4742
Posted: Wed Dec  8 08:39:22 1982
Received: Thu Dec  9 03:30:38 1982

From:     Stephen Wolff <steve@BRL>
	"I believe that in some tests they have accelerated
	small lexan cubes up to escape velocity.  Thinking
	about the energy of a small cube (of almost any mass)
	travelling at 11m/sec will show you why the military
	is interested."

That's 11 Km/s, surely.

Yes, that will show you why people might THINK the military is interested.

Some military are however supremely **uninterested** in dragging great lumpy
capacitor banks about your average battlefield, and there are already rather
more direct methods for using explosives to accelerate projectiles of various
sorts to quite high speeds.