a squad machine gun sized version would be fun

How many years till this technology has real world military application?

*related=http://videosift.com/video/A-DIY-Rail-Gun-1-25kJ-Homemade-Magnetic-Coilgun
*related=http://videosift.com/video/US-Navy-Elecromagnetic-Rail-gun

A DIY Rail Gun! 1.25kJ Homemade Magnetic Coilgun has been added as a related post - related requested by oritteropo.

US Navy Elecromagnetic Rail gun has been added as a related post - related requested by oritteropo.

Man that is really gonna fuck up the hordes of soda cans, glass bottles and laptops coming for us in the future!

http://books.google.com/books?id=UOIDAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA819&dq=Junkers+stratosphere&hl=en&ei=4KgNTb33B8S4ngeYq9WjDg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=7&

☚☚(from a 1930's Popular Mechanics article, a gauss gun)
Chances are good, that if there was a practical application for the military as a personal combat weapon, it would already be here. Wait for tinier more powerful batteries maybe? But by that time, a walking DarpaBot with a minigun and grenade launcher will have replaced puny human infantry fleshbots..

I wonder how much of these efforts were fueled by the need to violently murder that Dell laptop.

I've used one at work for three years, I know the feeling.

This looks like it could be integrated into keyboards for haptic feedback during games like Battlefield.

Engineering aside, exploding glass objects in your carpeted living room is pretty stupid if you ask me.

What's that meme? Oh yeah, SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY!!!

I wonder if you can make that thing put a spin on those slugs so that they fly better.

Fitting response?

The question with all these things is what advantage would it have over current military technology (i.e. firearms)?

While that was cool, it wasn't very powerful. Most of the slugs didn't even penetrate the laptop screen. Pretty sure even the "weakest" handgun would manage that.

Ideally, a railgun would eliminate recoil, muzzle flash and noise, making it more effective for sniping.

The problem is that getting the railgun to fire bullets faster than combustion-based weapons requires a lot of electricity.

I wonder if he would get better holes if the slugs had fins.