Enough bullets can overwhelm a personal shield?

[SoulReaver]

lol you just contridicted the sentace i wrote i said mass is not required for a projectile to penetrate if it has the right amount of speed i already explained the mass issue citing the space incidents where space crew and equiptment have been damaged by things with far less mass then a bullet such as a pebble of paint or ice which can vary from an inch or larger in size plus considering the weightlessness of space mass is no longer a factor but since this piece of space debris have been catapulted countless times around the earth by our gravitional field in orbit these objects have gained high velocities allowing them to decimate larger and heavier mass objects negating the physics of mass required to penetrate but like the other guy said i dobut these aliens were that darn advanced that their suits could stop all manner of weaponry

precisely : these objects you cite (pebbles, ice, debris) tend to be relatively heavy for their size

ok see it this way : if a small round piece of chalk hits titanium plating at a tremendously high speed (say near the speed of light), what do you think is more likely : that the chalk will make a hole in the titanium armour or that it will only be pulverized upon impact ? (tbh I'm not sure what would happen either)

[Slyke]

The chalk will be pulverized. Would make the tiniest dent in the titanium.

Just like you need diamond to cut diamond.

Though if you had say a 1000 chalk bits splattering against the titanium, then over time they would compound up.

There's an old saying "The dripping of water wears away stone", in our case this can be taken literally!

[SP90]

He wasn't using Duracell batteries. Everyone knows they last the longest in your everyday personal electronic equipment, be it alarm clocks, flash lights or personal shields.

[DaRngATe]

the personal shield was awesome...it sent shivers down my spine when i first saw it...but like some advance tech...bullets work...take the replicators for example when they were first introduced bullets work well on them because of the low tech....so maybe its the same with the personal shield....

well thats what i thought of....and who knows maybe they could be like the kull warriors

[ivanw]

The chalk will be pulverized. Would make the tiniest dent in the titanium.

Ahem.. 'close' to the speed of light doesn't make much sense.. But let's assume 99% is close enough..

So ok.. Let's assume a piece of chalk, with a rest mass of say.. 1g, traveling at 99% the speed of light (relative to the "titanium" target).

According to special relativity, the energy required to accelerate that impactor to that speed, and consequently, the kinetic energy impaired to the impactor is going to be about (7.089*9E16 or 6.3E17) Joules.. (7.089 is the Lorentz factor for a velocity of 99% of the speed of light and 9E16 is c squared). For an order of magnitude, that would be the equivalent of an hypothetical 150 MT thermonuclear bomb (as a reminder, the largest ever detonated high energy weapon is the Tsar Bomba with 50 MT which produced a 5 miles fireball that was visible more than 600 miles away)

So no.. The chalk will not be pulverized.. Since most of the kinetic energy is going to be converted to heat, it will probably vaporize anything within a 10 miles radius into superheated plasma...

Don't try this at home !

--Ivan

[Ackeb]

Ahem.. 'close' to the speed of light doesn't make much sense.. But let's assume 99% is close enough..

So ok.. Let's assume a piece of chalk, with a rest mass of say.. 1g, traveling at 99% the speed of light (relative to the "titanium" target).

According to special relativity, the energy required to accelerate that impactor to that speed, and consequently, the kinetic energy impaired to the impactor is going to be about (7.089*9E16 or 6.3E17) Joules.. (7.089 is the Lorentz factor for a velocity of 99% of the speed of light and 9E16 is c squared). For an order of magnitude, that would be the equivalent of an hypothetical 150 MT thermonuclear bomb (as a reminder, the largest ever detonated high energy weapon is the Tsar Bomba with 50 MT which produced a 5 miles fireball that was visible more than 600 miles away)

So no.. The chalk will not be pulverized.. Since most of the kinetic energy is going to be converted to heat, it will probably vaporize anything within a 10 miles radius into superheated plasma...

Don't try this at home !

--Ivan

So for everyone who speaks english;
theres a big boom

[ivanw]

So for everyone who speaks english;
theres a big boom

That would be a very 'dumbed down' description of the effects.

To get a 'boom', this needs to happen in some gas (such as air), which the piece of chalk would obviously not get a chance to pass through at these energy levels. So this has to happen in some fairly good vacuum - where, there won't be a 'boom' (which is the sound effect of a shock wave produced by super/hyper sonic matter - including air itself - moving in a gaseous environment).

In the absence of air, there also won't be any fireball. At impact time, most of the energy will probably be converted to high frequency electromagnetic radiation (probably X or even Gamma rays).

If this happens in say, a planet's low orbit, some of this electromagnetic radiation will eventually decay to various lower frequencies upon entering the atmosphere, eventually leading to a large amount of radio waves capable of disrupting electric & electronic equipment in the vicinity (the 'EMP' effect). This may also lead to the formation of some aurora in the highest layers of the atmosphere because some of the gas will get ionized due to some of the molecules electrons being kicked out of their energy levels by the incident radiation.

Any ship, satellite, or anything else close enough to the phenomenon may itself get vaporized, damaged or somewhat impaired.. Especially those behind the titanium target since the radiation may be somewhat colimated in that direction.

As I previously said, do not attempt to do this without adult supervision, as this might have non-trivial side effects (besides destroying the titanium target).

....

Ok.. It goes "boom" !

[FallenAngelII]

Stuff.

Too bad the chalk will be vaporized by the heat produced by traveling at such a high velocity, no?

[ivanw]

Too bad the chalk will be vaporized by the heat produced by traveling at such a high velocity, no?

As long as you're in a vacuum, that should be fine.

But then again.. true 'vacuum' doesn't really exist. Inside a volume of apparent nothingness - devoid of matter & as cold as possible, (aka 'Free space' or 'Quantum Vacuum'), you're going to get virtual particle pairs that will appear & disappear (how do you think a ZPM works uh ?), Dark Energy.. Well.. lots of things that can affect matter traveling at relativistic velocities.

--Ivan

[Ackeb]

That would be a very 'dumbed down' description of the effects.

To get a 'boom', this needs to happen in some gas (such as air), which the piece of chalk would obviously not get a chance to pass through at these energy levels. So this has to happen in some fairly good vacuum - where, there won't be a 'boom' (which is the sound effect of a shock wave produced by super/hyper sonic matter - including air itself - moving in a gaseous environment).

In the absence of air, there also won't be any fireball. At impact time, most of the energy will probably be converted to high frequency electromagnetic radiation (probably X or even Gamma rays).

If this happens in say, a planet's low orbit, some of this electromagnetic radiation will eventually decay to various lower frequencies upon entering the atmosphere, eventually leading to a large amount of radio waves capable of disrupting electric & electronic equipment in the vicinity (the 'EMP' effect). This may also lead to the formation of some aurora in the highest layers of the atmosphere because some of the gas will get ionized due to some of the molecules electrons being kicked out of their energy levels by the incident radiation.

Any ship, satellite, or anything else close enough to the phenomenon may itself get vaporized, damaged or somewhat impaired.. Especially those behind the titanium target since the radiation may be somewhat colimated in that direction.

As I previously said, do not attempt to do this without adult supervision, as this might have non-trivial side effects (besides destroying the titanium target).

....

Ok.. It goes "boom" !

Lol I prefer the "dumbed" down version. Lol being the history, philosophy major that I am the dumbed down science suits me just fine.

[YutheGreat]

Oh Alright.

He had a heart attack!
yes sir!

[JSPuddlejumper]

Gaould personal shields have never come remotely close to the kind of sustained firepower that was used against the Asgard one.

Best personal shield is the Ancient one, and they both failed after a lot of attack: The one McKay was wearing, the on Shephard was wearing.

[Jeffala]

Yeah, but McKay's failed because it was overwhelmed by the energy-sucking creature.

[JSPuddlejumper]

^Yeah, but John's eventually failed because it was hit by pea shooters from wtf are those hermit like primitive tards.

[tombombadil]

i thought he just deactivated the shield when he saw that the mission was successful. we all know that the

Spoiler:

asgard

have no problem with self sacrifice.