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Bomb war into the middle ages.

Remotely detonate the weapons that might be used against you. Before they get near you.
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This idea stated life as a mine clearing device, then it expanded to include UXO's. then it occurred to me that all bombs that have not been used already might be counted as, unexploded ordinance.

Suppose it was possible to stop anyone from bringing a gun anywhere near you out of fear that you could remotely fire all of the ammunition in its magazine, causing there gun to explode killing or injuring them.

The reason that this may be possible is that almost all explosive based weapons, including guns, depend upon a small amount of primer y explosive in detonator / percussion caps. These primary explosives are very sensitive to electric discharges. They have to be protected from even the micro joules of static electricity.

So use a directional X ray beam as a carrier for a microwave signal, which will induce small currents in everything that the X rays pass through, including primer y explosives.

This bit of the idea started out as an X ray laser, but I could not figure out how to conveniently get temporal coherence However for this idea all that is needed is an intense beam of X rays, and it will manage that. The earliest type of X ray tube had a simple target being bombarded with electrons at a 45 degree angle, with the X rays coming of, in a broad cone, at a right angle to the incident beam. The frequency of the X rays depended on the voltage between the ( cathode ) filament, that is the source of the electrons, and the target ( anode ). The intensity of the X rays depended upon the current At certain frequency’s, specific to each metal. the X rays will be generated by K shell electrons being knocked out of the atom and then being replaced be an atom falling in from the continuum level, a process familiar from the production of emition spectra of ordinary light. Take a stack of such simple X ray tubes, and arraigning them in a line, such that the X rays from the first one passes through the second one from behind, and so on. In the second tube the electrons are knocking electrons out of the atoms K shell, but there is also the X rays passing through it, in the direction that it would normally emit X rays. Assuming that these X ray tubes have the same metal and that they are both being energized enough to produce K series lines. The second, and subsequent tubes, have the conditions necessary for stimulated emission. Similar to that found in a gas discharge laser.

The beam of X rays will be narrower than the cone of a single X ray tube and will have an intensity of about the X ray output from each target added together, minus that witch would be lost by an X ray beam of that intensity passing through the thickness of half of the targets.

Ideally placing a grid electrode between the cathode ( the source of electrons ) and the anode ( the target ) of the first X ray tube, making it a triode valve, will modulate the entire stack. As any signal of sufficient strength that is applied to the grid will modulate the X ray out put of the first tube, and that this signal will be amplified by stimulated emission as it passes through the rest of the X ray tubes. In practice it may be necessary for several or even all of the X ray tubes to be triodes. The entire arraignment would probably be housed in one vacuum tube, rather than separate tubes.

I do not think this will stop war, it will just make it a bit more low tech and personnel.

Question dose any one here have any idea what having a microwave signal induced within them will have on commuter chip?. Are war plains may be more vulnerable than most weapons systems.

j paul, Aug 20 2011


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       //use a directional X ray beam as a carrier for a microwave signal//   

       How does that work? Is it like modulating an X-ray signal at microwave frequencies?
MaxwellBuchanan, Aug 20 2011
  

       Making war more low-tech and personal (I assume this means soldier-to-soldier) is anathema to the goals of modern warfare. Check out a few books about WWI and WWII to learn more about why we've been trying to get away from this approach.   

       As for the effect of microwaves on computer chips, there are many Halfbakers more qualified than I to answer that question, but I know enough to say that they would be inneffective at long ranges unless you had access to a massive power source.   

       Maybe we can get [spidermother] to toss a laptop into the microwave oven and provide us with some physical evidence.
Alterother, Aug 20 2011
  

       I can't see this working on a regular bullet. Primer compounds are far too stable to be set off by X-rays, no matter how powerful.   

       Furthermore, I've personally witnessed a demonstration in which an M16A4 loaded with live ammunition was put through an airport scanner (why, I don't really know). This took place at O'Hare, not long after 9/11; the airport directors were showing off some fancy new scanner to somebody from the government. I was flying back from SanFran and just happened to be there at the time. I know the gun contained live ammo because it was provided on the spot by one of the National Guard soldiers stationed at the terminal.
Alterother, Aug 20 2011
  

       Bullet primers are sensetive to static electricity? I've been handling them pretty carelessly then.
DIYMatt, Aug 20 2011
  

       Modern cartridge primers are _not_ sensitive to static electricity.   

       Here's more: After reading and discussing this post, curiousity got the better of me. I dragged an old microwave oven that we don't use anymore out on the lawn and hooked it up with an extension cord, then put in six .45 apc shells with the bullets and powder removed. I set the microwave for one minute and raced away on my crutches (still recovering). After watching some interesting pyrotechnics from across the driveway, I returned to find the shell casings scorched but the primers intact. One of them looks a little melty, but that's it.   

       This experiment will be filed under 'things we don't tell my wife.'
Alterother, Aug 20 2011
  

       Bad science. Or rather, very little actuall science, and mostly guesswork and wishful thinking.   

       MIL-spec kit is routinely hardened against NEMP.   

       If you direct an X-ray laser at a sidearm, because of the relative absorbtion, the metal of the weapon will melt before the primers fire. The user will, of course, have long since evaporated.   

       Air is fairly opaque to high energy E-M like x and Gamma rays, and a process called radiation transport causes the initial pulse to be "stepped down" through the UV and visible bands to the IR. This effect is responsible for the classic "double flash" of fission gadgets.
8th of 7, Aug 20 2011
  

       The X ray beam carry s the microwave signal as a simple amplitude modulation.   

       The reason for using a beam, rather then letting the power get spread over a large area, is to deliver a useful amount of power at a reasonable distance.   

       The triode valve was the predecessor of the transistor. The cathode, a hot wire that emits electrons, is the same as the transistors collector. The grid is a mesh in between the cathode and the anode. A voltage applied to the grid effects the flow of electron, the current, flowing from the cathode to the anode. This is the same as the transistors base. The anode, equal to the transistors emitter, is just a flat bit of metal.   

       That objects will absorb X rays is an important part of how the device works. If the X rays pass through unchanged, then they take all of the microwave signal with them. If on the other hand the X rays are completely stooped, then pulses of energy are put into the stopping surface at microwave frequencies. By absorbing the X rays it effectively becomes a demodulator, recreating the microwave signal as deep within the target as the X rays could penetrate!   

       The air port saner mentioned above, was probably not being modulated to induce electric currents, the core of this idea.   

       Some one has said that there is no science here! Some people are hard to please   

       It is a rule in science that. whenever a theory disagrees with a reproducible experiment, it is the theory that is wrong! This device is based upon the assumption that primary explosives are still as susceptible to static discharge as there predecessors, such as Lead Azide. Lead Azide can be detonated by an electric shock of 7 micro joules. if modern primary explosives can stand 60 seconds in a microwave oven 36000 joules, or more, the idea may not work.   

       It as been pointed out that air absorbs X rays. At Tungsten K line frequencies air is about 28 times less absorbent that Lead. This will shorten the range of the device unless a stupid amounts of power is used, especially if more than 10 joules needs to reach the target.   

       Still it might work for mine clearing.   

       I suspected that this would upset some Americans, who might see it as an stack upon there God given second amendment right to harm bears Infarct this idea if it can be made to work is more in keeping with the letter and spirit of the second amendment.
//A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.//
that arms should be keep for the protection of the state and its citizens, not for mugging each other.
j paul, Aug 28 2011
  

       Umm... It's been a while since I took physics, but how exactly can an X-ray carry a microwave?   

       I do seem to recall that they were two different frequencies of electromagnetic radiation...
ye_river_xiv, Aug 29 2011
  

       //The X ray beam carry s the microwave signal as a simple amplitude modulation. //   

       But will that induce anything akin to a microwave in the target? Surely you need some kind of rectification to extract the microwave modulation from the X-ray carrier?
MaxwellBuchanan, Aug 29 2011
  


 

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