Silent Ammunition Questions

[Kallatari]

Originally Posted by lexington

Simply: if you want a silent M16 orMP7 you'll have to invent a completely new round and a new chamber to hold it.

Yep. So, what would this take? How much would it cost (ballpark)? And could it still use normal ammo interchangeable?

Originally Posted by lexington

Realistically people who want to be stealthy load sub-sonic ammunition and attach a silencer rather than play with anything really complex.

That's what I'm guessing. My players have that already, but are trying to see if they can get something better. I have my doubts, but I'm not the expert, thus the post on the forums...

[HANS]

Originally Posted by Kallatari

Yep. So, what would this take? How much would it cost (ballpark)?

You can't do it.

Originally Posted by Kallatari

And could it still use normal ammo interchangeable?

No.

Cheers

HANS

[ronom]

I believe there were experiments with piston ammo, but these went nowhere and silencer technology improved.

[HANS]

Originally Posted by ronom

I believe there were experiments with piston ammo, but these went nowhere and silencer technology improved.

In the West -- yes. The AAI Teleshot designs developed for shotguns and grenade launchers went nowhere. In the East -- no. There are several Russian designs using the captured piston approach (=Silent Ammunition). The problem with all of these is they are extremely low-powered and really only work well in manually-operated weapons. The PSS pistol is the only semiautomatic gun, and it's basically an arm's-length assassination weapon.

Cheers

HANS

[Kallatari]

Hans, thanks for all the definitive answers! I had my suspicions that "no" was the answer to all my questions, but nice to have it confirmed by an expert.

[HANS]

Silent Ammunition is inferior to any ordinary cartridge fired with a modern, well-designed sound suppressor. It may be a mite quieter, but the effectiveness of round and weapon is pathetic. You can't design that away. In fact, even if you could (for example, making it more powerful by increasing muzzle velocity), you would torpedo the whole idea, since more velocity means more sound. It's one of those things that just Can.Not.Be.Done.

Cheers

HANS

[Anthony]

In the end, it takes a certain amount of energy to kill someone, particularly faster than they can scream, and that's not going to be silent. Closest you could come would probably be some form of high powered crossbow, speargun, or dart slingshot.

[johndallman]

Originally Posted by Anthony

Closest you could come would probably be some form of high powered crossbow, speargun, or dart slingshot.

By which time the squelch of the hit, and likely screams, are becoming a problem. Killing people instantly and silently is hard.

[malloyd]

Originally Posted by Anthony

In the end, it takes a certain amount of energy to kill someone, particularly faster than they can scream, and that's not going to be silent. Closest you could come would probably be some form of high powered crossbow, speargun, or dart slingshot.

Note that all of these approach the energy problem much the same way, fire a slower but more massive projectile. I don't see any reason you couldn't in principle design a fully automatic weapon (perhaps with an electric motor since gas operation obviously useless and containing the propellant gases is going to greatly reduce recoil) firing confined piston ammunition with weights around 0.1 lb per shot that could be pretty lethal. It's not going to look much like a conventional weapon, and the weight of the gun, and especially enough ammunition to make autofire worthwhile, is likely to be pretty prohibative for troops that aren't in cinematic battlesuits, but it's not actually superscience.

[lexington]

Originally Posted by Kallatari

Yep. So, what would this take? How much would it cost (ballpark)?

To be a bit more optimistic than HANS I'd let it be designed with the rules in Basic Set.

Originally Posted by Kallatari

And could it still use normal ammo interchangeable?

Definitely not. The silent round would have to be much longer than the original.