So I have been pondering ammunition for quite a while, and for a long time I have wanted to fire off depleted uranium rounds.... only thing is there are no stats for something like this. I was waiting for Arsenal to have DU rounds, but to my sadness there is nothing like it of the sort. Part of me wonders why, since America uses and has used it willy nilly (especially in Desert Storm) so why not? Is it because of that weird thing where radiation does not quite have the same effect in the awakened world? Why has there been nothing published on this, or was this just on oversight? Cuz' if there is any type of ammo you would want to cut someone down with while flying a helicopter I would think DU would be your bestist best friend.

I would just like an explanation, because if it is in such a common usage today how did it all of the sudden drop of the face of the globe?

probably the stuff anti vehicluar ammo was made out of in SR3 . .

Well I play in SR4, and there are actually armor piercing rounds and anti-vehicular rounds IRL so I wants me some depleted uranium rounds. RRRRRRAAAAAARRRR! *throws tantrum*

I'm no gun nut, but it is my understanding DU rounds are only made for large caliber weapons (i.e. tank guns) and that DU rounds are simply a type of armor-penetrating/anti-vehicular round, therefore are in fact abstracted as those exact types of rounds in SR4. So pointedly, they ARE in the book. Them being DU would simply be fluff description.

Besides, I imagine DU rounds, being +70 year old, are probably replaced by a better technology.

didn't want to point that out so harshly *g*

A -6 to armor penetration? DU rounds shred tanks. I personally think they are not there for game balance reasons, but I would like to see them exist. I feel that DU rounds would be more effective then the AP given, but at the same time be kind of a white elephant. You shot them and you rock it, and everyone can follow the yellow brick road of DU rounds being used in any given situation (that is if it gets investigated.)

There are always people who have trouble with abstractions and crave for more simulation. All one can do is explain how the System already kind of has what they want, just does not call it that way. It's a taxing and not very rewarding task.

Also, some have really weird perceptions of say, DU rounds, thinking they are some awesom-o-explodo ammunition. A hole in the front and back of a tank is not what I'd call "shredded".

Correction: DU rounds from large, vehicle mounted cannons shred tanks. The AV rounds are a pretty good fit for DU ammunition actually, with the exception of DU's tendency to burn when traveling through dense materials (like tank armor) which is sadly absent. The designation for the A-10's 30mm DU rounds is 'Armor Piercing Incendiary' for a reason.


The smallest DU round I know of is .50BMG which would correspond to an HMG or heavy sniper rifle in SR. I tend to agree about labeling them DU as simply fluff, as SR4 isn't really set up for the kind of granularity required to make them really special. The AV rounds will suffice.

DU is a material to make the bullet from, not the design it's self. The stuff is basically perfect for armor piercing rounds, so with improvements in engineering and design, I wouldn't be surprised in the least if they were still using them in 60 years.

they're right here:



Arsenal, pg.34

Contrary to popular belief enviromento-nut hysteria, depleted Uranium isn't particularly radioactive, not much more than anything else and not dangerously so. That's wh it is called depleted. Depleted uranium is toxic because it is a toxic heavy metal (which is exactly the same reason why lead is toxic).

Depleted uranium bullets aren't anything special. The metal is used because because it is denser than lead and thus make a heavier projectile. It is little different from tungsten, brass, or steel bullets in principal. It can be used in pistol or rifle bullets. The extra density would provide slightly better penetration of hard objects such as car doors, but the use of depleted uranium does not automatically make a bullet "anti-vehicle" by any means. The extra density also alters teh balistics of the weapon and reduces both accuracy and maximum effective range. The use of depleted uranium tends toward 30mm guns on aircraft and armored vehicles. 30mm depleted uranium is very effective against light armor. It is also used in anti-tank kinetic energy penetrators, usually alloyed with other metals to help it resist abrasion. In a high-velocity kenetic energy penetrator it has some interesting properties. Penetrating a tank's armor both shaves off small pieces of it at the tip, making the tip more pointed as it penetrates, and produces enough heat to ignite these shavings, potentially starting fires in the target vehicle.

The dragons cast a ritual that makes deplete uranium rounds ineffective.

Hah, no, seriously, there was once speculation that criminals could reclaim depleted uranium for its pyrophoric properties, using it to burn through safes and the like.

...
I don't know where these people come from. I really don't.

Dude, what the fuck is "wolfram"? That sounds like the most awesome metal ever. My google-fu did not uncover sufficient explanations.

Wolfram = Tungsten

ha, so i was right! seldom enough *g*
Wolfram=Tungsten in German ^^

By the very nature of it's name is wolfram teh Awesome!

I thought DU was called as such because its no longer fissionable, not because it wasn't as radioactive. It is low enough that short-term exposure isn't going to hurt you, but long-term is less clear.


Er... standard copper-jacketed 9x19mm rounds go through a car door with no trouble. Even .45ACP hollowpoints can sort of do it.

What other use does a DU bullet have? Other materials work quite well against body armor and flesh isn't dense enough to cause it to tumble or fragment. DU rounds are meant to be used on heavily armored targets so calling them AV rounds makes sense in this context.

Wouldn't reduced range and accuracy in this case be attributed to lower muzzle velocity? If thats the case you can just use a stronger powder in the cartridge.

Those 30mm rounds are quite effective against the rear or top armor of an MBT, but yeah, front armor is pretty much a no-go.




*chuckles*
Seriously? Anyone who could make that argument with a straight face has no idea how easy it is to make thermite.

Most "Gun Control" supporters say things just like that with a straight face.

Me, I'm fully in support of Gun Control. Shooting straight and reloading quickly, that is.

Wrong, for reasons you go on to list in the exact same post:

The pyrophoric properties are interesting, but the self-sharpening characteristic is big. Instead of flattening against armor, it stays pointed and keeps on applying very high pressure. That's pretty special, and I don't believe the other candidates for high-velocity penetrators share it.

As mentioned, though, DU+small arms = small arms. There's no point.

~J

this.


people seem to forget that it's SEVENTY YEARS in the future, they have AI for cryin' out loud.


EDIT:

BTW, DU is being phased out by the US Army right now, in favor of tungsten. environmental and health issues are the main cause.

Depleted Uranium is used in radiation shielding. It is slightly radioactive but everything is slightly radioactive. Long-term exposure to it is safer than a few medical x-rays.



I'm talking about a real car door, not one of these poofy fiberglass pieces of crap that pass for car doors now days. I'm talking about steel. Steel poured and shaped by sweaty muscular Midwestern men in tank tops.

Hell, PEOPLE are radioactive in a small manner!

Unless you get some of it inside you. Then you're hosed. Forever.

The main reason why they swapped is because of the DU dust and the fact that the round still has to go somewhere when it's done killing that other tank. Ground water contamination, the radioactive DU dust from the breech of the cannon for the crew and the impact site, the fact that it's also a toxic metal...and it's not really that much better than the new Tungsten alloy rounds.

Wolfram, we've agreed it's named Wolfram now.

Would it be wrong of me to create a homunculus of solid tungsten in the shape of a male red deer and name the Ally I summon to inhabit it Wolfram Hart?

No, it would be very, very right!

If you don't, I will. In fact I think I will anyway. I'll be directing my GM back to this thread when he tries to kill me for it.

That's disingenuous. Its half-life is comparable to the age of the earth, resulting in extremely low radioactivity, but that's vastly shorter than most stable isotopes for which it hasn't even been possible to determine a half-life.

~J

And that's disingenuous, because hardly any substance and/or object is composed of just those "most stable isotopes" exclusively. Nearly everything you encounter has at least some trace amounts of those less stable isotopes, emitting tiny amounts of radiation as they decay. "Pure" substances are the stuff of Laboratories and Manufacturing Clean Rooms.

So then what the fuck is our definition of "thing"? The universe collectively is slightly radioactive, therefore everything is slightly radioactive, I take it back, you win.

If we're going to talk about heterogeneous mixtures of isotopes, we should define what mixtures we consider to be a single "thing" up front—and it doesn't help your argument any, either, because in doing so we have to stop looking at the U-238 alone and start looking at the minority ("some trace") U-235 (half-life in the high single millions) and U-234 (half-life under a quarter of a million years).

For fuck's sake, "safe enough to not be worth worrying about" and "the safest thing EVAR" do not have to be the same thing. DU is more radioactive than a bunch of stuff. That does not make it radioactive enough to worry about, but it does make it more radioactive than a bunch of stuff. Just deal with it instead of trying to bend logic into a pretzel here!

~J

You know, the runners on Jackpoint don't spend their time arguing about how safe a thing is relative to other safe things. Let's try to be more like them

I for one know that, whether DU is radioactive enough to be harmful, breathing DU dust is a bad idea. Whether that's from radiation or just the fact that it's a heavy metal, I don't know, and it's largely an academic question if it happens to you

Woopsie.... well damn I read page 35 and not page 34 and got the AV Assault Cannon Round (p.35) confused with the other AV round (p.34)..... I suck so hardcore..... I think I should get more then 2 hours of sleep the previous night before posting something like this again. I feel so lame now. See you tomorrow dumpshockers when I just suck less hardcore.... I'll still suck.... oh well.... *slinks off into the barrens*

Blasphemer! Using logic and common sense! Years of movies taught us nothing but lies. The Buick of Truth will show us the true path.

You didn't look hard enough at the bottom of the first search page for "wolfram" then, under the link "Did you mean 'wolframite'?"

Mostly just trivia there versus what has already been posted (i.e. wolfram=tungsten), but in case you have a burning desire for trivial completeness, there you go.

At least in earlier Editions, Anti-Vehicle ammo also was referred to as APDU (armour-piercing depleted uranium) ammunition.

You´ve choosen wisely if "doing what hyzmarca would have done" does not get you INTO trouble with the GM. MOST GMs will just be prompted to introduce sanity checks into SR.