Electromagnetic Reactive Armour (The realistic alternative to Shields)

I have read a lot about reactive armor lately, because I am trying to make a Mod in that direction, and I also came across this concept and really think that it is a BAD Idea. A little bit of background:

One of my hobbys is Audioelectronic`s, and therefor I have some Amp`s here. One of them had 10.000uF/85v Caps (arround 36 Joule of stored energy) in its Powersupply. One day I charged them and placed a wire from + to GND and dicharged them. The wire exploded violently.

Point I am trying to make is that the vaporisation is a verry violent process that sets a lot of thermal energy free ( you try to vaporize a conductor that is for example 120mm in diameter. That can carry a LOT of current befor undergoing a meltdow). And yes, it will most certainly build up a Plasma. Which is around 10.000°C and is going to errode your Capacitor plates if you do not stopp the currentflow through it.

EDIT:

But I may have to give it that one:

It would most likely disarm HE-Granades, while the heat may not be enough to vaporize the projektile, it may heat the explosive compound enought to burn out rather then to explode. Making it therefor a "normal" weapon of kinetic force then an explosive charge.

 

The Problem is not the Atmosphere, quite the opposite, electrons LOVE to fly in no Atmosphere enviroments, but that the Plasma is direktly connecting the Capacitor Plates and short circuits them while not having any real resistence. The plasma arc that results will , after it vaporized the Projektile, continue to vaporize the Plates as well due to ther finite heat capacety. I have done some Experiments with tungsten Elektrodes and an 20kV/AC Arc with 120Js , even if it did not errode through partickle transport (due to AC), it simply burned down like a candel over time . It is funny if you put an Office clip in it. Burns down like a sparkler on New Year.

 

Slightly off-topic: Armor like that could cause some hilarious accidents. Show a friend around your new ship, he flies too close to the interesting looking armor and *BZZERT* his body gets flung off into the distance with a startled scream of terror. On that note, this would be excellent for booby traps.

 

I think this could work, if you can figure out the problems 3eepoint pointed out. I'm already thinking that my next big defense oriented ship could have several spaceball launchers to create a cloud around it to stop/ slow small ships or player made projectiles. Then a layer of light, then this, then maybe another layer of armor depending on how heavy I want to make it. All while having an array of turrets located in gaps in the space ball screen and a gravity gun, I know heresy, that welds and launches spaceballs with attached warheads.

 

with the current lack of large ship weaponry other than mods, I honestly think this doesn't have too much use.

 

Oh do not worry about that. As long as you do not close ther circuit of the cap you will be fine

On the Topic of calculating that stuff, I would recommend simulationg it with something like COMSOL. The Joul-heating-module and Plasma-module should work fine. The EM-module could help as well

 

Ahhhh, I was actually hopeful.

 

I would also recommend renting a servercluster if you are going to simulate that stuff in detail. The last time I did a acustic simulation with that software it took me 3 1/2 h on a 2.5GHz Quad core with 8Gb Ram

 

This is the best alternative to shields IMO. Energy charged armour would also allow for SOME EPIC Space battles, give players (or rather their ships) a chance to react to the "first hit" which is usually a surprise, and can be almost immediately crippling. To keep it balanced, they should draw huge amounts of power, basically making it a hard choice between heavy vs energy armour.

• Combat would also be hugely affected, if this energy is the same as the current energy to power the rest of the ship, we could have very interesting "bursty" ships that can sprint for short periods at the expense of shields being down.
• Pilots would need to think twice before firing engines after being hit, as the reactive cap's won't have energy left to recover if the engines are in use.
• Fighters (with reactive armor) docked with large ships would also be able to draw power from the mother ship to stay more shielded than if they were on their own...
• Dog fights would last much longer too (longer fights = more FUN!).

The key take away for Keen here is - This would add such a big/fun element to game play, and code wise is probably not a very difficult thing to do! Add a capacitor block, High Discharge Output, low capacity. Add a new block, before it receives it damage, pull energy from pool to compensate, otherwise damage reactive blocks. Regular armour reacts as is.

 

With any kind of Armorpanels you can already make a compound that tanks the first hit

 

And I honestly not get why everybody is against shields. The first Basic versions are already up and running:

https://www.pro-physik.de/details/news/1118563/Plasma-Fenster_haelt_Vakuum.html

Sorry that it is in German, I did not find an english source. It basically says that they use a Plasma-Window to keep the Atmosphere out of an low-pressure enviroment and are verry fond of it because it does not have the normal Problems a mechanical Vent would have.

Another Approch would be simple Hull-polarisation. By ionizing the Hull it would break up the Atomic bonds of the Bullet and you would only be hit by a blast of atomic dust, which is not verry good in applying kinetic force on an object

 

What do you mean by "physical objects of EM radiation" ?

 

And creating a Plasma is not as much about the energy as the conditions and Ionisation. You can make a plasma with a Battery if needed. Under the right conditions it will become kind of stabel, even with low volteges. (High pressure/Temperature). but it requiers relatively high currents.

 

so it sucks down a bunch of juice to avoid damage. sure the semantics/theory is different, but end result is that it's another shield variant. Really the only big difference here compared to most of the others is that this is block by block instead of a big area effect thing.

 

am I the only one around here who thinks space battles are all about the first hit?

but I do agree that this technology would be nice. it should off curse be able to be turned on and off with a charge time to make people not activate the armour the last second (but four precisely timed seconds before).

on the matter of electrons and oxidized plates. first, we have few oxygen in space. second I don't think one really should worry is the plate with a hole gets more damaged. third, we have these things called faraday cages and an electric fuses

edit:
+0,9 because I, for one, don't like bacon. (I really don't).

 

dammnit control panel!

the thing really needs an overhaul because I was thinking about using radar ( not yyet implemented) to track enemy cannonfire ( not yet implemented ) and activate only the spot that will be hit in order to save up energy.

 

That will be a good day.

 

@SenorZorros

I.am.not.talking.about.oxidation ! Thats an entierly different effect. Plasma gets incredible hot and does with you Armor exactly what it has done with the bullet.

And what would a Faradaycage or a fuse do for you ? Limit the current ? The how will it be abel to deliver enough to disintegrate the Bullet ?

If you are interested in something that tracks Bullets and stops them, you might like this:

New german AA-Gun, even shoots down enemy artillery fire if detected in time.

@Conradian

So you do not consider the Atmosphere an Physical object ? Because it stops exactly that ! I am not sure about EM radiation though........

And it is relatively easy to direct an electrical field in an Area withoud "corner" pices. Most normal Antenna do that.

But enough about that. This is was about the new Armortype and not my thoughts on shields.

So I like the Idea ! I hate it to slap 7.5 Meter of steel on my ship to make it sturdy. We are already limited with the gridsize.

But this whole melting-the-Projektile-before-it-penetrates-thing is physically speaking verry complicated and/or a delicate matter to implement because of the choices to make.

One could also argue that the WS Weapons are simply overpowered and that people should rethink that it is quite difficult to punch through 2.5 Meter of Steel....