I wonder what is the technology behind this? Does the bullet have a small GPS module along with small motors that change the form of the bullet so that it can be guided by the rifle over radio frequency? What about the radio waves being interrupted or jammed etc.
Or is it something more ground-breakingly advanced?
It says "optical guidance system" in the article. I suspect that the sniper needs to light up the target with a laser sight, and there's a small computer and microchip that adjusts the form of the bullet (per other commenter's description here) so that the laser dot is always directly ahead.
The article also says it's designed to compensate for "weather, wind, or target movement", so my assumption is that the sniper has to keep the target in their sight at all times, but it can compensate for the bullet ending up off-course after it has left the barrel.
"It says "optical guidance system" in the article."
It doesn't make much sense that if you were developing an advanced weapons system that, other than to get out disinformation, it would be a good thing to tell exactly what you are doing in any detail at all.
What is the advantage of releasing any information at all other than:
1) To insure support and funding for projects
2) To scare the enemy.
3) To get the enemy to spend resources on the wrong thing
This article sounds like a PR piece designed to get out in front of news and control the messaging. Likely they have reason to believe the project will leak shortly, and rather than having the media spin it as "Secret military lab designing killer guided sniper bullets! Police state imminent!", they want it out in public as "Your tax dollars are going toward some very advanced technology to ensure American military supremacy."
Just a hunch, having worked with some PR people before.
Good point. I agree that's a possibility that instead of being a fresh "discovery" it becomes old news (if not reported right away). [1] But I'm wondering whether if that were the strategy it wouldn't make more sense to provide easier to understand (for layman) information? It was hard for me to follow from the visual I can't see any reporter simply writing about it or getting interested from what appears there. In other words it doesn't look very "sexy" visually. And presents as if it's in a very basic form (but then maybe that is exactly your point..)
[1] Obama did this with revelations of cocaine usage. Once it was out there it wasn't a big juicy story to present. Media likes scoops, exclusives not just digging up old info (ala some HN posts) of things that perhaps people missed (unless there is an angle that they can work).
I guess here is the thing about old news. People must assume that if something were said in 2012 and nobody made a fuss about it then it's because it's not a big deal.
It doesn't need to be any more than what it (apparently) says on the tin. .50 BMG is very ballistically efficient as it is, so at shorter ranges, windage really isn't much of a concern. But at a couple of kilometres or more, drift can be significant. Keep in mind that these bullets will be used for individual kills of high-value human targets (no point putting it any differently; there's no advantage over tracers when used for automatic fire for antimateriel purposes where single shots would be ridiculous to contemplate, and there's no "shoot to wound" in the military, both by the rules of war and for more practical "he can still shoot back" reasons), and that recent operations (particularly in Afghanistan) have been in conditions where trying to get closer than a couple of clicks is suicidal due to lack of cover.
Between 880-930meters/sec. I would think that a gps would have a hard time fitting inside a typical 50bmg bullet anyway. They only weigh about 45grams.
there is a lot of wasted space in a 50 BMG cartridge - you could easily make the bullet much longer without using up needed powder capacity. As long as you make it the same mass, you should be OK to fire it in guns currently chambered in 50 BMG. If you need to trivially prove this, pick up a loaded round and shake it. You can hear the powder jostling around in there.
Why is there wasted space? As powders become more efficient, you need less powder to get the same result. Consider the age of the round - there's been a lot of development in powders in the interim.
Looks like something around 40-60gr worth of powder space depending on bullet and desired COAL. (I don't have any of my reloading manuals near by so that's based off wikipedia/handloads.com info)
you don't get many rounds out of a keg of powder, that's for sure. If you're not magazine feeding them, of course, you can get a longer COAL. I don't know of anyone doing compressed loads (why would you?) but I assume it's possible. If we assume a 50BMG-shaped round that isn't actually to standard, you could load it with titegroup or something exciting, but I think making something like that which would chamber in a 50 BMG would be borderline criminal.
Or is it something more ground-breakingly advanced?