[Ultra Tech] Increased Firearm Power with TL

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Anthony

Frankly, we may have hit the limits of solid shelf-stable monopropellants (note that GURPS has REF 4 explosives at TL 9 and REF 6 at 10, which indicates something new, but there's no evidence of anything that dramatic actually occurring).

Are modern small arms using propellants at this limit? I know there has been talk of using high explosives as propellants, but maybe those aren't shelf-stable or are otherwise unfeasible, and we're stuck with modern smokeless. Or maybe there could be a dramatic breakthrough of some flavor.

Originally Posted by Ulzgoroth

This is a kind of odd framing, since adding more propellant, absent carefully changing the nature of that propellant, will extremely directly translate into increased chamber pressure. What you're calling 'more propellant' here seems to be a prolonged burning curve...which does require more propellant, yes, but it doesn't stop there!

My apologies, I skipped a step - it was meant to be read as something like "more propellant gets you better performance but requires a longer barrel if you maintain the same peak pressure" (because your weapon can't handle higher).