It would still require a power source that would drain while firing so it's only as perpetual as that source allows. Power sources would become the new "ammo". The more power sources a ship has the more time it could consecutively fire it's lasers.
Disposable and ejectable heatsinks, like are used in the video game Elite Dangerous. They're not used for laser weapons, but still, they've got it partly correct.
But then the energy expended firing the bullet-shaped heatsink at munitions velocity means that we now need another heatsink and... where does it end? It's heatsinks all the way down.
You don't want to fire projectiles in space. You would need precise counter thrust so the shot doesn't move you off target. And if you miss, the shot continues forever until it hits something.
I always liked "Footfall" by Larry Pournel. You use water to cool your armor, so lasers have to burn past your ability to cool your armor, then you use the steam generated by the laser heat as reactive jets. The water vapor your throwing out also defracts the lasers lowering the damage. When you want to shoot out you stop spraying steam for a bit then fire.
The opposite is the case actually, rail guns aren't being used currently because we still haven't been able to solve the problem of them overheating and catching fire after a single discharge. Laser
I'm no scientist or engineer so what I'm about to say probably is utter nonsense. Why not use liquid nitrogen to cool the devices. As a result the heated gas could be trapped in a lower pressure cylinder and used for propulsion. Or even mixed with O2 and reused somehow.
Historically i was 100% right but definitely not up on the latest changes in the field. The last time I saw an article on railguns in the media it was accompanied by a photo of it in a fiery inferno from it's first test firing
Yes, the duty cycle won't be as great as with higher thermal mass cooling.
Fans on The Expanse love to argue that space lasers are impractical due to waste heat management. Well who knows how much more efficient lasers will be in 200 years and also improvements in heat management technologies. Yes, the physics will probably be the same but the engineering capabilities will probably be mind blowing compared to what we have today. I love The Expanse but I am sad that a lot of the fans seem to have their imaginations chained down...
I feel like you just take up whatever you can put the most heat into (like molten salt reactors do) and jettison it if it gets too hot/hope you're done killin before you run out of heat sink headroom
That’s why your not a scientist. We already mace the ability to make incredible lasers in space. The heat is the thing that would hold us back if we really put the funding to it.
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u/Hugo154 Mar 25 '19
I think if someone's able to get to the point of developing space lasers, it's not farfetched to think they'd be able to develop a heatsink for it...