Ah, finally, a market for my steam powered traversal vehicle!
Also working on one for the water!
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I was wondering if it would be an effective anti-piracy measure, but I suppose Somali pirates are piloting boats far too primitive to be affected by it…
Well, maybe not soon…
Yeah, I’m not too sure what this is intended for. Stopping cars from ramming embassy/military outpost gates? Though maybe it has no uses in its current form. To stop cars in extended car chases, you’d still have to have a unit nearby, and it would have to be significantly smaller and lighter (to fit in every nth cop car, so there would always be one in any given area).
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The embassy protection would come from the more powerful stationary version.
Our high speed chases in LA seem to last a long time and draw police units from a wide area. I could see this ultimately supplanting spike strips. 400#s isn’t that crazy heavy. The two cops in the patrol car probably weigh that.
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From the article:
For more random truck attacks, like the one in Toronto, the directorate is working on a stationary version about three times the size. Augmented by an amplification device and a larger dish, this one would have a range of a “few hundred” meters, Law said. If you could figure out the most likely locations for a vehicle-borne terrorist attack, you could pre-position the device. A video of a live demonstration of the technology is below.
and:
Placed strategically around cities, it could prevent attacks like the ones in Europe, Canada, the United States, and elsewhere. There are, however, some tricky legal issues involved in using electronic and radio jamming devices in the United States.
I see nothing in the article about what it would do to someone with a pacemaker (my initial thought), or other electronics caught in its path, but:
The directorate hopes to have a working prototype by FY 2019.
(eta)
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True, but you’d have to devote all the car’s trunk space to it, at least. Then there’s the big “horn” that comes out of it as well. So I don’t see a lot of cop cars carrying this, at least in its current form. (If they can replace the generator with a battery/capacitor and do something about the antenna, then I could see them in cop cars.) Specialized units that carried this would have to be scattered around LA for them to get to a specific chase in time, given how long it takes to get anywhere. I suppose that’s not so unlikely.
The video was as interesting as saw dust, I’m being kind too.
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To be fair, if the person is trying to kill you…
A 300-kW gas-turbine generator is big. Even a so-called “micro” turbine generator would fill a box truck. So they can make these mobile, but you won’t be able to drop one in the back of a pickup.
We are also assuming that the prototype size is the final size. I would imagine that a police department would be ok with a reduced range of say 25m or even 10m instead of 50m. Then the inverse square law could really matter wrt to powerplant size. Make a custom trunk lid that is the horn and you might even be able to rotate that horn enough to take out UAVs instead of just cars.
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No problem.
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Yeah, that’s true - although if you still had to carry around a generator, I would think that would be limiting.
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Have there been reports (or even suspicions) from the military of such attacks on US drones and aircraft?
Also interesting: Syria Is Now ‘The Most Aggressive Electronic Warfare Environment On The Planet,’ SOCOM Says and Su-25SM3 Attack Aircraft With Modern Electronic Warfare System.
I think Syria is becoming a staging area for world powers to flex their technology. More Cold War by proxy bullshit.
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I am thinking that the device only affects the ECU - unless it also applies the brake?
At the device’s range of 50 metres a vehicle traveling at 60mph only needs to be steered for 2 seconds before the explosive laden device reaches target. Presumably also, the HERF is not the target but is some distance from it and the device provides some screening protection. Range seems awfully short tho.
Then there’s the obvious- if it’s a delivery of explosives (ala suicide bomb), why would one travel at a (sedate) 60 MPH? Around these parts, people routinely cruise the freeways at 70-75+. someone wanting to deliver a van full o boom would undoubtedly floor it once they have line of sight to the front entrance, and go for the added mess of a kinetic strike as well as a boom.
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Pshaw. You’d get passed driving that slow on IL 355. By old ladies and nuns.
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300 kw = approximately 400 hp
I think the keyword in this article is “experimental”
And my 1950 Studebaker Champion remains unfazed.
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Forty comments, but not a single Nerf gun joke. I’m disappointed!
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