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I remember reading about a model boating society that, instead of wargaming, would create scale models of famous warships and fight them - the hulls would be th
by waste_monk 7y ago
I remember reading about a model boating society that, instead of wargaming, would create scale models of famous warships and fight them - the hulls would be thin wood, and the turrets had motorised mounts and compressed air guns capable of firing a metal pellet through the wooden hulls. The ships would have less internal bulkheads (to account for the damage explosive shells would cause) but would otherwise try to be as true to life as was possible given the limits of technology (I don't think anyone was building gyro-stabilised gun platforms, for example, as it was too hard to minituarize).
There was even a proposal to build larger scale ships that used small-calibre handgun ammunition and sheetmetal hulls, but it was shot down (if you'll forgive my pun) for being wildly unsafe and probably illegal (as I understand civilians are generally discouraged from owning remote-controllable firing mechanisms).
- sandworm101 7y agoFun to watch, but it could never be a reasonable simulation. Unless the model ships were hundreds of meters appart, the trajectories would be far too flat. To be close enough to score a hit you wouldnt be able to hole the other ship near the waterline. You would just blast at superstructures without ever sinking. And there was an easy(ish) way to stabilize the guns. Mercury switches were used to ensure they only fired when the hull was reasonably level.
- Something1234 7y agoIf anybody has a link or video to this, I would be extremely interested in it.
- nkurz 7y agoModel Warship Combat seems to be a good search term: https://www.google.com/search?q=Model+Warship+Combat https://www.google.com/search?q=Model+Warship+Combat
- MrMember 7y agoI could have sworn it was outright illegal to build a remote firing mechanism but apparently that likely isn't the case. https://hackaday.com/2015/07/22/no-mounting-a-gun-to-a-quadcopter-probably-isnt-illegal/ https://hackaday.com/2015/07/22/no-mounting-a-gun-to-a-quadc... Still stupid as hell, but probably not illegal.