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[Guardian G.I.]

But did they actually work? Cuz I'd think there'd be a lot more laser-based weaponry around if the Soviets had actually made them useful.

Yes, they actually did work as intended. However, the laser weapon development program was closed after the collapse of the Soviet Union due to lack of funds, and most prototypes were scrapped. The surviving vehicles had their laser emitters removed.

Apparently I'm in in the thread title now, so here's another interesting Soviet weapon prototype: 17F19D Skif-DM, an experimental Soviet anti-satellite military spacecraft.


Skif-DM was created in response to the American SDI program. This spacecraft was designed to destroy SDI satellites with the help of a megawatt carbon-dioxide laser installed onboard. The laser emitter installed in Skif-DM was originally created for Beriev A-60 airborne laser system (it's like Boeing YAL-1, except A-60 was made 30 years before its American counterpart and is still in service).

The only prototype of this spacecraft, called Polyus, was launched on the 15th of May 1987 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome. It was mounted on a superheavy rocket Energia, which would be later used to launch the Buran space shuttle.

Spoiler: Polyus on launchpad (click to show/hide)

The ship was launched upside-down due to technical reasons. Unfortunately, during orbit circulazation manoeuvre, the ship spinned 360 degrees instead of 180 degrees because of a programming error. As a result, when the ship's engines automatically fired to circularize its orbit, Polyus was actually deorbited. It burned in the upper atmosphere.

The best friend of America Mikhail Gorbachev was very afraid that the disclosure of the Skif programme could piss off the United States and ruin the reputation of the Soviet Union, so no other spacecraft with laser systems were made. The flight data were used during further development of Energia launch vehicles. The development of Energia launch vehicles was ultimately abandoned after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Spoiler: A render of Skif-DM in orbit, firing its gun (click to show/hide)

Spoiler: A render of Skif-DM in orbit, being resupplied by the Buran space shuttle (click to show/hide)

Also:

Well, as has been posted before, the US is deploying one on a ship this year. Even if they're over-hyping the thing, it's apparently something that they're wanting to continue to improve.

Dunno if any of its functioning specifics have been posted anywhere, though. Probably not.

I've heard very, very sketchy reports once that Soviet engineers tried installing an experimental laser gun on one of Soviet Navy destroyers in the 1970s. The operational tests were successful, but the project didn't take off for some reason.

[Aseaheru]

Nice rotation.

[Guardian G.I.]

Nice rotation.

I shamelessly stole the rotating gif from a Russian website about the Buran programme and its offshoots (that also promotes Russian liberal opposition, which is kinda funny considering that the devastating rule of Russian liberals in the 1990s indirectly caused the closure of many development programs featured there; Russian scientists had to collect scraps to survive because R&D didn't get any financing at all)

[Bouchart]

On a side note, the Soviets also developed laser pistols and revolvers. For use in space.

Well, yeah.  Anyone who's played Yuri's Revenge knows that.

[Chaoswizkid]

makes me wonder how nobody had the idea to take a ridiculously unshielded nuclear power generator, put it on top of a tank, give the tank loadsa lead armor (not to stop projectiles but to stop the crew from dying too fast) and make it shoot lasers then send all that into enemy territory

shoot tank -> tank explodes -> fallout on your own land, gg no re

not shoot tank -> tank wrecks your shit -> your shit is wrecked, gg no re

hell you could install a selfdestruct mechanism in case it got stuck in a trench ror

Because irradiating territory pisses off everyone, way more than planting minefields. Carrying around an unshielded reactor is going to fuck up everywhere that tank goes, and the whole world is going to jump whoever's ass was crazy and/or malicious enough to intentionally render enemy territory uninhabitable, to say nothing of air currents that would spread the radiation beyond the immediate location.

We don't use every weapon we have available to us due to enforced morality, at the least.

[Jopax]

Also you don't really need explosives to kill tanks. They usually explode on their own (usually ammo, there's some spectacular vids of such explosions in Syria). The kill usually happens from the round shattering inside the vehicle (thus turning any flesh into a fine mist), the armour spalling (giving much the same effect but this time it's the tank itself that mistifies you) or in case of HEAT rounds the crew gets boiled by the stream of molten metal.

So it's not so much that you explode them to death but they spectacularly explode themselves after kinda dying.
Or in case of aircraft, those usually explode them in a variety of ways, but those aren't as common I think as getting knocked out by HEAT rounds from hand-held devices.

[misko27]

*Sees discussion about soviet lasers*
Internal Monologue: Yay! My time to shine!
*continues reading*

On a side note, the Soviets also developed laser pistols and revolvers. For use in space.

Internal Monologue: Ahh nuts.

Also you don't really need explosives to kill tanks. They usually explode on their own (usually ammo, there's some spectacular vids of such explosions in Syria). The kill usually happens from the round shattering inside the vehicle (thus turning any flesh into a fine mist), the armour spalling (giving much the same effect but this time it's the tank itself that mistifies you) or in case of HEAT rounds the crew gets boiled by the stream of molten metal.

So it's not so much that you explode them to death but they spectacularly explode themselves after kinda dying.
Or in case of aircraft, those usually explode them in a variety of ways, but those aren't as common I think as getting knocked out by HEAT rounds from hand-held devices.

So to sum up: You are in a metal death machine dealing metal death to other metal death machines and having metal death dealt to your metal death machine. This can involve painful, metallic death.

[10ebbor10]

Also, really, why would you want to put it on a tank?  Nuclear ramjets are where it's at.  Load it up with nukes, set it up so you can open the shielding if you want to make the exhaust itself radioactive (or don't; it'd be complex, prone to failure, and just ramming it into the ground at supersonic speeds should scatter radioactive material across enough terrain), and watch the fireworks.  And, without people on board, you never need to land the thing to take on food or water, so it can just sit in the stratosphere for years, watching and waiting. ^_^

The basic design for the Nuclear ramjet doesn't include shielding. It's too heavy, and hampers the engine. (Airflow directly over the reactor is required for thrust and cooling). And sadly, reactors are heavy. It won't fly for years. It will fly for months however, but much longer and the engine rapidly looses thrust.

makes me wonder how nobody had the idea to take a ridiculously unshielded nuclear power generator, put it on top of a tank, give the tank loadsa lead armor (not to stop projectiles but to stop the crew from dying too fast) and make it shoot lasers then send all that into enemy territory

shoot tank -> tank explodes -> fallout on your own land, gg no re

not shoot tank -> tank wrecks your shit -> your shit is wrecked, gg no re

hell you could install a selfdestruct mechanism in case it got stuck in a trench ror

Because irradiating territory pisses off everyone, way more than planting minefields. Carrying around an unshielded reactor is going to fuck up everywhere that tank goes, and the whole world is going to jump whoever's ass was crazy and/or malicious enough to intentionally render enemy territory uninhabitable, to say nothing of air currents that would spread the radiation beyond the immediate location.

We don't use every weapon we have available to us due to enforced morality, at the least.

Yup, this might fall under the ENMOD treaty, which bans weaponization of geo-engineering.

[scrdest]

makes me wonder how nobody had the idea to take a ridiculously unshielded nuclear power generator, put it on top of a tank, give the tank loadsa lead armor (not to stop projectiles but to stop the crew from dying too fast) and make it shoot lasers then send all that into enemy territory

shoot tank -> tank explodes -> fallout on your own land, gg no re

not shoot tank -> tank wrecks your shit -> your shit is wrecked, gg no re

hell you could install a selfdestruct mechanism in case it got stuck in a trench ror

Contrary to what Hollywood would have you believe, shooting a nuclear reactor doesn;t make it explode.

Nuclear forces aren't directly affected by physical forces. Compressing a reactor might send it into meltdown because all the uranium is compressed together, but not directly because of the compression.

Explode, not really, but uranium is pretty flammable. The main problem with early reactors was that they liked to catch fire very, very much. And once they did, Uranium Smoke!

[Funk]

Let me rephrase that: did they ever get used in action, or anywhere other than testing sites? Did they ever combat optical sensors like Guardian said they were designed to do? Were they even slightly practical?

The Royal Navy had working laser dazzlers by 82 we just didn't use them.
link

[jimboo]

Explode, not really, but uranium is pretty flammable. The main problem with early reactors was that they liked to catch fire very, very much. And once they did, Uranium Smoke!

Not the uranium so much as the surrounding materials:
http://www.phyast.pitt.edu/~blc/book/chapter7.html

Chernobyl-style reactors use graphite as a neutron moderator.  That’s one of those things where “it works well, until it doesn’t.”  That Soviet-style reactor also produces plutonium as a by-product along with electricity, unlike other designs.

[Owlbread]

The USSR really was the greatest, wisest Union. Rather than just laughing at Reagan and spending more money on improving public services in Central Asia/Far East/Caucasus, or even just making some more tights/stockings/cigarettes/whatever people wanted in the managed economy, they decide to spend god knows how much on a laser pistol to allow cosmonauts to shoot pesky American agents in space.

[Lagslayer]

Are you saying laser pistols aren't worth exorbitant amounts of cash? Laser revolvers?

[Owlbread]

I really want to find out more about what kind of successes the Soviets had with that gun. Maybe an independent Scotland's military should take it upon itself to carry off where the Soviets left off. When we sell our oil supplies to North Korea for a lump sum of cash, allowing us to start our own space program, we can conquer the moon and nobody shall be able to stop us.

I know it sounds like a 2000AD comic from the early '80s, maybe an obscure issue of "Cal-Hab Justice", but by jove we'll do it.

[LordSlowpoke]

scotland for president

the whole country

for president

now