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Why am I a heretic? Because I've noticed a big hole in the theory accepted here regarding turbolasers. I realize I'm opening myself up for flames, but I'll present it anyway:

Recoil.

Even if we assume the part carrying the devastating blasts is energy, it will still carry signifigant recoil. However, when I watched ANH the other day, I noticed something: The recoil only sync's up with the visible portion of the beam. There is no second peice of recoil a little while after when the invisible, lightspeed bolt leaves the barrel. Indeed, the fact there is no delayed recoil means that the invisible portion is fired concurrently with the visible blast. This rather destroys the idea they move at lightspeed.

Alright, flame on.

Uh, if both parts are fired at the same time, and one moves at light speed and one moves slower, then won't the one at light speed hit first, followed by the visible part. In other words, they leave at the same time, one just gets there first. Isn't that what we see already?

neoolong wrote:Uh, if both parts are fired at the same time, and one moves at light speed and one moves slower, then won't the one at light speed hit first, followed by the visible part. In other words, they leave at the same time, one just gets there first. Isn't that what we see already?

Not the majority of the time. I suggest you work out just how fast a lightspeed blast will travel between ship and target, compared to the beam we see fired...(For any of the distances seen in the movies, lightspeed beams would hit inside of a second, where the visible blasts are trackable with the naked eye)

I would assume that they just fire at the same time, making the recoil from both blasts appear to be the same.

SirNitram wrote:

neoolong wrote:Uh, if both parts are fired at the same time, and one moves at light speed and one moves slower, then won't the one at light speed hit first, followed by the visible part. In other words, they leave at the same time, one just gets there first. Isn't that what we see already?

Not the majority of the time. I suggest you work out just how fast a lightspeed blast will travel between ship and target, compared to the beam we see fired...(For any of the distances seen in the movies, lightspeed beams would hit inside of a second, where the visible blasts are trackable with the naked eye)

Perhaps not at light speed, but if the invisible part hits first, doesn't that mean it still moves faster than the visible portion?

neoolong wrote:

SirNitram wrote:

neoolong wrote:Uh, if both parts are fired at the same time, and one moves at light speed and one moves slower, then won't the one at light speed hit first, followed by the visible part. In other words, they leave at the same time, one just gets there first. Isn't that what we see already?

Not the majority of the time. I suggest you work out just how fast a lightspeed blast will travel between ship and target, compared to the beam we see fired...(For any of the distances seen in the movies, lightspeed beams would hit inside of a second, where the visible blasts are trackable with the naked eye)

Perhaps not at light speed, but if the invisible part hits first, doesn't that mean it still moves faster than the visible portion?

Yes, it does. However, the fact it does not always hit first indicates that it isn't always faster. In addition, the invisible section must now be some kind of matter, in order to move at sublight speeds. This is more or less my point. That, and I get to poke at the establishment.

My theory was basically that the gunnery crew has a way of dividing up the beam's firepower between the visible portion and invisible portion of the beam. Certain ratios are better for certain situations. In a starfighter-rich environment, you want the majority of power to be in the invisible portion so that your pilots can see your beams and avoid them.

SirNitram wrote:Why am I a heretic? Because I've noticed a big hole in the theory accepted here regarding turbolasers. I realize I'm opening myself up for flames, but I'll present it anyway:

Recoil.

Even if we assume the part carrying the devastating blasts is energy, it will still carry signifigant recoil. However, when I watched ANH the other day, I noticed something: The recoil only sync's up with the visible portion of the beam. There is no second peice of recoil a little while after when the invisible, lightspeed bolt leaves the barrel. Indeed, the fact there is no delayed recoil means that the invisible portion is fired concurrently with the visible blast. This rather destroys the idea they move at lightspeed.

Alright, flame on.

The recoil I thought was mostly a consequence of massive amounts of excess tibanna gas being vented through the barrel, accounting for the blast flare around the gun tip.

Besides this is no alternate theory and plasma and all others are essentially incredibly stupid.

Illuminatus Primus wrote:

SirNitram wrote:Why am I a heretic? Because I've noticed a big hole in the theory accepted here regarding turbolasers. I realize I'm opening myself up for flames, but I'll present it anyway:

Recoil.

Even if we assume the part carrying the devastating blasts is energy, it will still carry signifigant recoil. However, when I watched ANH the other day, I noticed something: The recoil only sync's up with the visible portion of the beam. There is no second peice of recoil a little while after when the invisible, lightspeed bolt leaves the barrel. Indeed, the fact there is no delayed recoil means that the invisible portion is fired concurrently with the visible blast. This rather destroys the idea they move at lightspeed.

Alright, flame on.

The recoil I thought was mostly a consequence of massive amounts of excess tibanna gas being vented through the barrel, accounting for the blast flare around the gun tip.

Besides this is no alternate theory and plasma and all others are essentially incredibly stupid.

Sadly, this does not make your theory right.

And, I suggest you go back to physics class. Even massless energy containing kilotons or megatons of energy will carry signifigant recoil. U/c.

SirNitram wrote:And, I suggest you go back to physics class. Even massless energy containing kilotons or megatons of energy will carry signifigant recoil. U/c.

I know how to derive momentum from massless particles, asshole.

I was just pointing out that I was under the impression a significant degree of recoil was from the wasting of vent gases.

And since when did it become my theory? I just pointed out plasma and other theories (which you've supported before) are complete stupidity.

Escaping gas of some sort seems to be the reason for recoil. Look at the screenshots of TLs firing in ANH (you can see the specific one under the "Technology" page, under beam weapons). Those large green clouds could very well be escaping Tibanna Gas.

As for the sync, I was under the impression that the visble and invisibel beams were released at the same time, but the actual bolt is faster so it outpaces its counterpart quickly enough to give us the "asteroid explodes before beam hits" effect.

Illuminatus Primus wrote:

SirNitram wrote:And, I suggest you go back to physics class. Even massless energy containing kilotons or megatons of energy will carry signifigant recoil. U/c.

I know how to derive momentum from massless particles, asshole.

Then why do you think some gas will cause more than a few kilotons of energy?

I was just pointing out that I was under the impression a significant degree of recoil was from the wasting of vent gases.

And no recoil from the energy released?

And since when did it become my theory? I just pointed out plasma and other theories (which you've supported before) are complete stupidity.

They're closer to canon facts than anything you throw out.

Darth Garden Gnome wrote:Escaping gas of some sort seems to be the reason for recoil. Look at the screenshots of TLs firing in ANH (you can see the specific one under the "Technology" page, under beam weapons). Those large green clouds could very well be escaping Tibanna Gas.

As for the sync, I was under the impression that the visble and invisibel beams were released at the same time, but the actual bolt is faster so it outpaces its counterpart quickly enough to give us the "asteroid explodes before beam hits" effect.

That seems most likely, however, you will not get more recoil from gas being released than by MT or GT of energy!

As for the invisible beam, I've never disputed that part of it is faster than the other, or that part is invisible. I'm just pointing out it cannot be moving at lightspeed. I do, however, enjoy seeing Illuminous backpedal from supporting it while attacking me.

SirNitram wrote:As for the invisible beam, I've never disputed that part of it is faster than the other, or that part is invisible. I'm just pointing out it cannot be moving at lightspeed. I do, however, enjoy seeing Illuminous backpedal from supporting it while attacking me.

Ah so you're still a little asshole who makes quaint little one-upping remarks.

HDS pointed out with his original debunking of the plasma bullshit that TLs often travel below lightspeed. This is nothing new and just an assault on that theory which was already noted.

SirNitram wrote:

And since when did it become my theory? I just pointed out plasma and other theories (which you've supported before) are complete stupidity.

They're closer to canon facts than anything you throw out.

Really, despite the fact they're fucking green, don't dissipate rapidly, and don't curve? I wonder.

Saxtons stuff on the nature of turbolasers doesn't work to me. He says the visible portion travels slower then the damage component. But also that its glow reduces the power and range of the damage section. I don't see how that can be. I also don't buy them traveling at C, as we never see anything like that kind of speed even in a vacuume.

What seems to fit is that when you build larger blaster weapons the energy of the bolt begins to expand beyond then length of the visible glow to a varying distance.

Sea Skimmer wrote:Saxtons stuff on the nature of turbolasers doesn't work to me. He says the visible portion travels slower then the damage component. But also that its glow reduces the power and range of the damage section. I don't see how that can be. I also don't buy them traveling at C, as we never see anything like that kind of speed even in a vacuume.

What seems to fit is that when you build larger blaster weapons the energy of the bolt begins to expand beyond then length of the visible glow to a varying distance.

We have seen C bolts before. Generally as a rule of thumb, the bolt always takes the same time to cross the screen.

EDIT: Thank you DW. I suspected the Death Star superlaser but I wanted to do calcs rather than risk making an unjustified claim.

Illuminatus Primus wrote:

Sea Skimmer wrote:Saxtons stuff on the nature of turbolasers doesn't work to me. He says the visible portion travels slower then the damage component. But also that its glow reduces the power and range of the damage section. I don't see how that can be. I also don't buy them traveling at C, as we never see anything like that kind of speed even in a vacuume.

What seems to fit is that when you build larger blaster weapons the energy of the bolt begins to expand beyond then length of the visible glow to a varying distance.

We have seen C bolts before. Generally as a rule of thumb, the bolt always takes the same time to cross the screen.

When have we seen C bolts? Unless the speed of the tracer is extramly devoriced from that of the damage component, which isn't really possibul since the gap betwen various explosions and the visabul bolt has alway been a matter of meters, that doesnt seem possibul.

Illuminatus Primus wrote:

Sea Skimmer wrote:Saxtons stuff on the nature of turbolasers doesn't work to me. He says the visible portion travels slower then the damage component. But also that its glow reduces the power and range of the damage section. I don't see how that can be. I also don't buy them traveling at C, as we never see anything like that kind of speed even in a vacuume.

What seems to fit is that when you build larger blaster weapons the energy of the bolt begins to expand beyond then length of the visible glow to a varying distance.

We have seen C bolts before. Generally as a rule of thumb, the bolt always takes the same time to cross the screen.

I would love to hear you cite one instance where the bolt covered 300,000 Km in one second onscreen(Or otherwise was observed to move at that speed).

SirNitram wrote:That seems most likely, however, you will not get more recoil from gas being released than by MT or GT of energy!

Is everyone allergic to numbers? Let's take a 6 megaton blast, assuming those big turrets weren't firing max-power blasts at the fighters. It would have 8.4E7 kg*m/s of momentum, hence an equal and opposite reaction.

Let's say the TL dumps out 100 kg of gas when it fires a blast like this. If the gas is ejected at an average velocity of 840 km/s, it would equal the recoil of the energy in the bolt. This is a pretty high velocity and we don't really see it, but then again, we could be looking at a particle stream which is not visible to the naked eye.

As for the invisible beam, I've never disputed that part of it is faster than the other, or that part is invisible. I'm just pointing out it cannot be moving at lightspeed. I do, however, enjoy seeing Illuminous backpedal from supporting it while attacking me.

The Death Star superlaser moves at lightspeed, or very close to it.

However, AOTC nullifies your claim. The SPHA-T barrel experiences an initial recoil upon firing and then returns to its original firing position WHILE THE CONTINUOUS BEAM IS STILL BEING EMITTED. So there's no reason to dismiss the idea that the visible bolt is a carrier on a short-duration beam with a brief power ramp-up curve, since the recoil you mention looks the same as the recoil on a known continuous-beam design.

SirNitram wrote:They're closer to canon facts than anything you throw out.

Thank you for being a bitch as usual.

SirNitram wrote:I would love to hear you cite one instance where the bolt covered 300,000 Km in one second onscreen(Or otherwise was observed to move at that speed).

Watch the ground battle scene in AoTC again. Observe how the bolts from hand blasters travel relatively slowly across the battlefield (there are some overhead shots showing this) with no measurable drop due to gravity whatsoever. If these things had any sort of mass, they'd act like bullets and would most certainly drop noticeably as they fly across large distances. This is simple Newtonian mechanics.

I would pay good money to see one of you guys ask these types of questions to the creators of Star Wars at a convention!!

On the other hand if the two parts would move at different speed, the two part would impact on a different area on a moving target especially at high distances or if the target moving at high speed...

I believe the beam has a power variance that travels somewhat ahead of the visible part(think of the visible part as an exhaust trail) and the speed of the variance, in which most of the energy is, depends on the total lenght of the beam, as we all know the delay between a shot being fired and hitting it's target is nearly constant regardless of range.

Looking at the DS beam, it would seem TL bolts "pan out" at C at around 75.000km.

Anyway, I'm sure there is someone that can explain it better, but canon evidence has allowed me to gauge bolt speeds at various velocities, and 75tkm seems to be where they reach their top velocity.

Durandal wrote:

SirNitram wrote:I would love to hear you cite one instance where the bolt covered 300,000 Km in one second onscreen(Or otherwise was observed to move at that speed).

Watch the ground battle scene in AoTC again. Observe how the bolts from hand blasters travel relatively slowly across the battlefield (there are some overhead shots showing this) with no measurable drop due to gravity whatsoever. If these things had any sort of mass, they'd act like bullets and would most certainly drop noticeably as they fly across large distances. This is simple Newtonian mechanics.

Any mass-energy should be affected by a gravitational field. With, say, light rays, the velocities involved are so great that the deflection is tiny, but at those bolt speeds I don't see that working. Either they don't feel the gravitational force, or they are a by-product from something else that is continuous and is travelling rapidly.