Destiny's main weapon

[SGSargon]

A stream of liquid heavy metal fired out of a railgun at c fractional velocities could actually wreck things pretty badly though. Since it's not going to expand by any meaningful amount at SG ranges but it is going to smash its full mass into a much smaller cross sectional impact area than anything short of a ridiculously long solid rod massing the same could manage.

Don't liquids tend to vaporize (and therefor cool) in the vacuum of outer space due to lack of pressure?
http://www.damninteresting.com/outer-space-exposure/
http://www.newton.dep.anl.gov/askasc.../chem07192.htm

[Ouroboros]

Don't liquids tend to vaporize (and therefor cool) in the vacuum of outer space due to lack of pressure?
http://www.damninteresting.com/outer-space-exposure/
http://www.newton.dep.anl.gov/askasc.../chem07192.htm

That's actually an interesting point. The links talk mainly about water but I wonder if something like that would happen with liquified metals. I'm not inclined to think it would, or at least not nearly as quickly. The atoms that make up heavy metals are themselves heavier and would therefore seem like they'd be less likely to rapidly evaporate than water when heated to a liquid state.

Like any beam weapon it would eventually bloom out into a cone of droplets though. Which would resolidify. But this would happen at ranges much further than anything relevant to SG verse combat.

You only really need this thing to propagate usefully a few hundred, or even a few dozen, kilometers and you've got the pressure cutter from hell.

[SGSargon]

The atoms that make up heavy metals are themselves heavier and would therefore seem like they'd be less likely to rapidly evaporate than water when heated to a liquid state.

Probably, but mercury is a heavy metal with big atoms, yet it's still pretty volatile.
The behaviour of matter has more to do with the point of view from our ambiant temperature (room temperature) rather then whether is a metal or water.
One of the things I learned in physics class is all temperatures begin from 0 Kelvin, forward and "hot" and "cold" are just points of view from our ambiant temperature.
Tungsten for example has the higest melting point of all known metals. At room temperature is very solid, very hard and very non volatile. This is because the melting point of the metal is almost 3200 degrees Celsius higher than our ambiant temperature.
If you want to measure the amount of tungsten vapors at room temperature, you'd find none.
If we look at other substances with the melting point under, at or a few hundred degrees above the room temperature, such as mercury, gallium, caesium, sodium, cadmium, lead etc. they have vapors at this temperature interval. But if you lower the temperature at nearly 0 Kelvin, their vapours are no longer present.
If the temperature is low enough, there are no vapours (tungsten), but if the temperature is close enough to the melting point or above the melting point (mercury) you'll have vapours.

[morrismike]

Plasma is utterly devastating to anything it touches. I have seen it first hand in a laboratory setting. Getting it to behave like a beam is a completely different matter and practically impossible.

magneto hydro dynamics

Think an "air arc" or plasma cutting torch. Plasma makes a fine beam.

[Dr.MacKay13]

Destiny's main weapon is bad ass. IMO.

[AlexanderD]

As far as we know, Destiny was not constructed as a front line warship. Instead, Destiny is meant to fulfill the purpose of an extended scientific research vessel. With that in mind, her weapons suite is meant not to dominate but instead combat threats to her mission and continued existence. Sure, the main weapon may not be as powerful as Ancient drone weapons, but it is still an incredibly powerful energy weapon.

[psl1]

A defensive weapon should be much more 'steerable', than the 'main weapon' is on Destiny. Having to vector the entire ship in order to act as primary aiming,mechanism is clumsy at best.

[AlexanderD]

A defensive weapon should be much more 'steerable', than the 'main weapon' is on Destiny. Having to vector the entire ship in order to act as primary aiming,mechanism is clumsy at best.

The lack of understanding of systems aboard Destiny could explain the lack if steering of the main battery. Damage is another potential explanation.

[morrismike]

As far as we know, Destiny was not constructed as a front line warship. Instead, Destiny is meant to fulfill the purpose of an extended scientific research vessel. With that in mind, her weapons suite is meant not to dominate but instead combat threats to her mission and continued existence. Sure, the main weapon may not be as powerful as Ancient drone weapons, but it is still an incredibly powerful energy weapon.

No. Destiny was intended to transit the universe and survive encounters with whatever it came across. Over 10 million years it is possible that she has survived 10s of thousands of engagements. To accomplish this she'd need a superior CIWS system and be able to one-shot capital ships.

[psl1]

I thought Rush said at the begining of the series that destine was possibly 100,000 years old?

[AlexanderD]

No. Destiny was intended to transit the universe and survive encounters with whatever it came across. Over 10 million years it is possible that she has survived 10s of thousands of engagements. To accomplish this she'd need a superior CIWS system and be able to one-shot capital ships.

If Destiny were outfitted with the ability to destroy opposition capital ships in one shot, that would make her a warship. Instead, Destiny seems to be better outfitted for long term exploration. Yes, the energy turret CIWS system aboard does offer a formidable anti fighter capability. The main weapon and shields seem to me to be present more for contingency support towards the overall scientific mission. Being that the vessel is designed for brief stops, her best defense is the fact that she is constantly moving and somewhat difficult to track until ancillary events are viewed in large scale.

[BlueLightning]

I think that the main weapon looked cool but it wasn't as powerful as I hoped it would be. I mean it can't be too powerful because that would ruin a big part of the suspense of the danger part of the show but if it was able to be fired like maybe 2 or 3 times before they had to recharge in a star but it could just barrel through the alien's shields then I think that would have been better. There would have to be some limitation on it like that but I think that would have been a much better way for them to have Destiny's main weapon work than how they did.

Anyone agree? Disagree?

[AlexanderD]

I disagree, but that's just my opinion.

[whyistheskyblue]

from the top maybe the main weapon is a uber powerful death beam ray of awesome but maybe it is damages or needs the ship to be at 100% power

[Energizer_Vs_ZPM]

Destiny has no drones because drones are a relatively new invention. we saw them only in the arctic outpost, which was abandoned when Atlantis left. not on proclarush, not on vis uban, nowhere but the arctic outpost.

I suspect proclarush DID have drones however being that it was so far away when Anubis was about to destroy earth it would seem that O'Neal knew that it was just a power source he needed after investigating the interstellar map. Don't forget there was a control chair there that he used to do that so it would seem logical that it was connected to a weapons platform just like that on earth. I would guess that by using the chair O'Neal was able to make a connection to the platform on earth and learn of its drone status remotely before taking the team back there with the ZPM to power it.

[Energizer_Vs_ZPM]

If Destiny were outfitted with the ability to destroy opposition capital ships in one shot, that would make her a warship.

I think Destiny is quite clearly a warship design. Just look at it, it has been tooled up to the hilt with gun systems and shields. It has guns all over the top, guns on the side, guns at the bottom and then one big bad boy of a gun at the front.

I don't think it's a secret that the ship is a war machine being used as a research vessel. It's purpose may not have been war but lets make it clear: It is a war machine clearly capable of defending itself, taking on entire fleets of ships, weapons and differing attack tactics from all sorts of aliens and STILL surviving - for millions of years. You're not going to get that from a scientific research vessel.

I've said this in a couple of other threads previously. I believe that destiny was ONCE a war ship in daily ancient life that was used for patrols, fighting, defence etc. Then came a time to retire it / replace the fleet with newer ships. At that point, destiny (possibly renamed from a previous ship name - we do that here on earth) was launched on an automated mission to follow the seed ships and survery the universe. The ancients knew that it could look after itself for a millenia in automated mode so just released it on a mission to float around the universe until they wanted to board it.

As for the weapon itself, yes it is a bit boring but also very practical. As others have pointed out, if you had drones the supply would have been exhausted long ago.. however considering we have seed ships out there manufacturing stargates from raw materials logic would say that they would be capable of manufacturing drones and resupplying the destiny via one of the many stargates onboard too. Anyway it didn't happen and it has a big pulse weapon which is clearly more than powerful enough on reserve power to warn the enemy not to bother. Imagine it when destiny is fully charged up in the 90-100% range.

[Quizziard]

I think Destiny is quite clearly a warship design. Just look at it, it has been tooled up to the hilt with gun systems and shields. It has gones all over the top, guns on the side, guns at the bottom and then one big bad boy of a gun at the front.

Actually, I think the third sentence points clearly to the opposite conclusion for the third. For a vessel the size of Destiny, turning quickly is impossible: this isn't some fighter jet, Wraith dart etc. Which means to fire the main weapon at something will take a long, long time. That to me reads that the main weapon is more of a deflector dish type device: keeping its path clear as it flies through the universe.

[Energizer_Vs_ZPM]

Yes but don't forget that main gun is a long range multi atmospheric weapon that can shoot through planet ozone layers etc. The theory being that destiny wouldn't even need to be close to destroy a mother ship.

It's got guns all over. Some visible all the time, others hidden inside turret domes while others seem to be fixed point weapons. The ship is absolutely loaded with defences. Ok most of them are now useless (after several million years thats no big surprise). It was clearly designed to be able to fight its way out of trouble.

Just because it has one big weapon at the front doesn't change that. We clearly know it can change it's angle up or down so I think logic would say it can probably turn around too but maybe has a busted mechanism. Just the fact that this weapon is on the ship says that it was designed to fight its way out of trouble.

Don't forget, destiny doesn't hold it's proper power reserves any longer. When the ship was younger it could no doubtedly take out a mother ship at short range with its small turret guns. Imagine 20 motherships and 30 odd turret guns each capable of taking out a ship each. They wouldn't stand a chance and that is the only realistic explanation for destiny lasting so many millions of years. The main weapon would have been used at long range like a sniper rifle either as a deterrent or to fully destroy any attacking ships. The ship is now just a remnant of its former glory so its clearly not got the capabilities it once had but that doesn't mean it isn't / wasn't a warbird.

It was built by the most technologically advanced and confident race in the known universe. They had no reason to fear it getting into close combat fights using its turret guns.