Storage capacity of Blaster power packs

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Lucky
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Storage capacity of Blaster power packs

Post by Lucky » Wed Oct 10, 2012 5:00 am

Star Wars The New Essential Guide To Weapons & Technology ISBN: 978-0-345-44903-0 Page: 6 wrote: The DH-17 which was used extensively by the Rebel Alliance infantry forces during the Galactic Civil War, is typical of most blaster pistols. The DH-17 is meant for shipboard combat: its bolts are capable of penetrating stormtrooper armor, but it can't breach the hull of a starship. It can also be modified to fire in short bursts (which drain the power pack in about twenty seconds), and the weapons sturdy construction enables its use on hostile worlds such as the ice planet Hoth.
It seems like someone could figure out the storage capacity of a DH-17's power pack if you figure out the rate of fire and the yield.
20 seconds of fire will empty the power pack.
Star Wars The New Essential Guide To Weapons & Technology ISBN: 978-0-345-44903-0 Page: 6 wrote: The most common blaster variants are the heavy blaster, the sporting blaster, and the hold-out blaster. The heavy blaster is designed for extreme close-quarters combat. The bolts are accurate only at ranges of less than twenty-five meters, but they cause incredible damage compared to most blaster rifles, and can easily penetrate personal deflector shields and armor. Heavy blasters require much more energy to fuel their more powerful bolts; often their power pack may contain enough energy for only twenty-five shots. Han Solo's DL-44 is a heavily modified weapon: the blaster includes a motion sensor scope and efficient galven circuitry the allows the pistol to deal more damage without draining additional energy.
25 shots per power pack when used with a Heavy Blaster pistol like the DL-44 like Han Solo uses.

Given the performance of Han Solo's DL-44 on Tatooine I feel the bolts caused damage that can be argued to be comparable to a stick of TNT to the packed dirt and stucco like surface, and I am feeling lazy.

Looking at this site:http://www.projectrho.com/public_html/r ... Boom_Table a stick of TNT releases 840,000 joules.

840000*25=21000000 or 21 Megajoules per DL-44 power pack

Most blasters would get more shots out of the same power pack do to having lower yields.
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Did I do the math correctly?

Did I make any unreasonable assumptions?

Are there any intelligent criticisms of the calculation that you wish to make?

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Praeothmin
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Re: Storage capacity of Blaster power packs

Post by Praeothmin » Wed Oct 10, 2012 2:02 pm

So, at 4.7 MJoules, or 10 MJoules for Phase Pistols, Federation weapons are more powerful than even a DL-44?

Lucky
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Re: Storage capacity of Blaster power packs

Post by Lucky » Thu Oct 11, 2012 9:05 am

Praeothmin wrote:So, at 4.7 MJoules, or 10 MJoules for Phase Pistols, Federation weapons are more powerful than even a DL-44?
Well I never really thought about that honestly. I was doing this as practice for doing something similar for the Rifts thread I've been working on.

What I did was:
1) notice the yield listed at Atomic Rockets for a stick of TNT.

2) went to Youtube, and found a number of videos of people blowing stuff up with a stick, half stick, and quarter stick of TNT.

3) Decided a stick was would get the results we see in the movie for certain.

I didn't do any detailed scalings of the craters.

There are a number of unknowns mostly do to the exotic nature of blaster bolts. I honestly don't think we normally see the energy release comparable to a stick of TNT, but I felt it better to err on the side of caution, and go with the larger yield in this case.

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