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Self-Guided Bullet Can Hit Targets a Mile Away
New submitter jpwilliams writes "Gizmag reports that researchers at Sandia National Laboratories have tested a 10-centimeter bullet that can be fired from a smooth-bore rifle to hit a laser-marked target one mile away. The bullet 'includes an optical sensor in the nose to detect a laser beam on a target. The sensor sends information to guidance and control electronics that use an algorithm in an eight-bit central processing unit to command electromagnetic actuators. These actuators steer tiny fins that guide the bullet to the target.' Interestingly, accuracy improves with targets that are further away, because 'the bullet's motions settle the longer it is in flight.'"
If everything went metric we wouldn't have these problems. The bullet is 10cm not 10in.
accuracy improves with targets that are further away,
Farther. Actual distance is farther. Metaphorical distance is further, like furthering one's goals. Thanks, I feel better now.
Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
smooth-bore rifle
"Smooth-bore" and "rifle" are mutually-exclusive terms. Pick one.
I don't normally do this, but woosh
SJW n. One who posts facts.
No, laser guided implies that there are lasers on the bullet that are helping to measure its location wrt it's surroundings. Instead, the laser just paints a target; it guides itself to the target. Hence, self guided.
Laser Guidance
A) there doesn't need to be a human at the laser's position, it could be pointed by robot.
B) the laser doesn't need to be continuous. You could PWM it with a small duty cycle and a decreasing aperiodic frequency, at the sacrifice of accuracy.
Actually, it states 2,475m = 2.475 km = 1.5 miles. I know, we Americans tend to assume everything is measured in miles, but the rest of the world tends to disagree.
If you're covered in flat mirrors, you only get specular reflection, where the light travels in one singular path. If the seeker head is not directly in that path, it will not be able to see you, and will not track. Laser guidance required diffuse reflection, where the laser light is scattered in all directions, and the seeker head can see it from any location.
"I'm not claiming this is a target-guided bullet, I'm saying it's laser-guided bullet."
So, you're claiming that the laser spot isn't the target for the bullet? Now you're being silly, or trolling.
Of course the laser spot isn't the target for the bullet, who's trying to destroy a laser dot?! If you want to shoot someone standing in front of a wall and target them with a laser but they move out of the way before the bullet gets there the laser dot is going to be on the wall behind them, and you'll still hit the laser dot - because it is guiding the bullet - but did you hit the target? No, because the laser dot isn't the target, it's the guide!
This really isn't that difficult a concept to grasp, I can't see why you're having so much trouble with it so let me try this a different way:
If you are hiking with a guide what is that guide doing? He/she is 'guiding' you, and doing so not by moving you or positioning you, but by indicating where you need to go. Likewise the laser is indicating to the bullet where it needs to go, by definition it is guiding the bullet, if the laser weren't there the bullet would not know where to go because it has no guide, the bullet will go wherever the laser is pointing because the laser is the bullet's guide, if it were self-guided it wouldn't need a laser. Really it's not that hard.
If you still don't get it then explain to me what you think the purpose of the laser is.
Putting the crosshairs off the target is called "kentuckying" or "kentucky windage"; it's for amateur hour. Snipers use scopes that let you dial in the range and windage so that the cross hairs keep the point of aim and point of impact the same. Some scopes for short range sniping use "mil-dots," which is an indexed system of little aimpoints up the vertical axis and along the horizontal axis. Those are typically used in telescopic sights of low magnification. (My hobby used to be long-distance target shooting; now I have a wife and kids; my hobby is dodging responsibility.)