07-01-2015, 09:31 AM | #11 | |
Join Date: Aug 2007
|
Re: Wheellocks and Flintlocks
Quote:
__________________
Fred Brackin |
|
07-01-2015, 12:43 PM | #12 | ||
Join Date: Nov 2011
|
Re: Wheellocks and Flintlocks
There's been a lot of discussion on wheellocks, I suppose no one can think of any factors to distinguish the different types of flintlocks besides the snaplock weakness to rain?
Why lower HP? Quote:
Quote:
|
||
07-01-2015, 01:26 PM | #13 | |
Join Date: Aug 2007
|
Re: Wheellocks and Flintlocks
Quote:
It's probably below the Gurps threshold of granularity but smaller pieces of a mechanism have fewer HP. You never gain status when your pistol malfunctions. You just look stupid. The wealthy were most of the early adopters of flintlock technology. The earliest "true" flintlock (1613) still in existence and with unquestionable provenance is from the collection of Louis XIII, King of France and patron to _those_ Musketeers.
__________________
Fred Brackin |
|
07-01-2015, 01:35 PM | #14 | |
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: Down in a holler
|
Re: Wheellocks and Flintlocks
Quote:
It was even standard issue in the USA and CSA armies. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Springfield_Model_1855 |
|
07-01-2015, 02:10 PM | #15 | |
Join Date: Jun 2006
|
Re: Wheellocks and Flintlocks
Quote:
For piezoelectric crystals, the only real requirement is an ability to facet gems. Historically of course the effect is only discovered in an era of electrical measuring instruments, and immediately leads to developments in pressure and temperature sensors, timekeeping quartz resonators and the like, but if you postulate somehow discovering it in an earlier era it probably doesn't do anything but let you make sparks. The reason it's plausible you could discover it that way is tourmaline is piezoelectric, so if you were cutting it and mounting it into a bit of metal jewelry while squeezing it.... Tourmaline's characteristic weird ability to attract ashes when heated is known from the 3rd century BC, the pyroelectric effect responsible has the same physical basis in the crystal structure, so discovering it can sometimes toss off firey sparks might not even be too surprising.
__________________
-- MA Lloyd |
|
07-01-2015, 03:43 PM | #16 |
Join Date: Jun 2013
|
Re: Wheellocks and Flintlocks
Some interesting ideas here. Let's see...
Affordable watch springs and the like probably would have simply resulted in cheaper wheellocks, rather than whole new designs. Using internal springs to generate a spark inside of the weapon would have been interesting, however. Mercury Fulminate, the material used for percussion caps, should have been possible for alchemists to produce. It requires nitric acid (aqua fortis, known by the 13th century), ethanol (aqua vitae, distilled at least by the 12th century), and mercury (known from ancient times). The first two reagents may require higher concentration/purity than alchemists could achieve, although even a mildly-cinematic campaign could waive that. For that matter, nitrocellulose - guncotton - can be made using cotton, nitric acid, and sulfuric acid (vitriol, also known by the 13th century), yielding something much more powerful (and cleaner burning) than traditional black powder. TL3-4 batteries sufficient to cause a spark would probably be rather large, so they likely wouldn't see much use outside of fortifications (where the advantages of alternative firing mechanisms are less pronounced anyway). Hypergolic mechanisms, if even remotely reliable, would be in a similar boat, requiring too much weight. Piezoelectric crystals would add some interesting flavor, although they'd ultimately function similarly to flintlocks - hammer comes down, strikes the crystal, produces a spark. Fire pistons are, in my opinion, the most interesting, but I suspect they'd be beyond TL 4 capabilities. You would need some mechanism that reliably opens a small "window" in the bottom of the piston to eject the burning material to ignite the gunpowder, which is probably a bit too complex (a fire piston needs to be a contained system to build up sufficient heat to light anything, but then whatever it lights needs to light your powder). |
07-01-2015, 04:36 PM | #17 | ||
Join Date: Nov 2011
|
Re: Wheellocks and Flintlocks
Quote:
Quote:
|
||
07-01-2015, 06:30 PM | #18 | |
Join Date: Aug 2007
|
Re: Wheellocks and Flintlocks
Quote:
More important than ho0w that technology developed is that it did develop and flintlocks replacing wheel-locks was an example of a superior technology replacing an inferior one.
__________________
Fred Brackin |
|
07-01-2015, 06:56 PM | #19 | |
Join Date: Nov 2011
|
Re: Wheellocks and Flintlocks
Quote:
That it did develop is completely unimportant. Again, not a historical setting. And the message that wheellocks have unrepresented fragility has been received. A change in how technology develops would thus obviously mean a difference in the wheellock mechanism. |
|
07-01-2015, 09:31 PM | #20 | |
Join Date: Sep 2004
Location: Here .
|
Re: Wheellocks and Flintlocks
Quote:
The Ottomans for example kept using matchlocks in large numbers well into the napoleonic era .
__________________
7 out of 10 people like me , I'm not going to change for the other 3 ! |
|
Tags |
low tech, low-tech |
|
|