How Hard is to Hard hitting guns?

Ok I woul dlike to get some out side in put on this. I will attempt to explain a fe wdetails first ,the would like your=input.

1 I have a South Dakota hull thayt was built out of Fiberglass by Battlers Connection.It was the famous V built in and is pertty much a standard hull. I use bc guns have single side mounts in the front and triple sterns that work well ocasionaly and over all happy with the ship. The superstructure is made out of pine block that is screw together as as to be able to be taken apart and fixed when needed.

2 we have a young man in our group that bought from battlers the very first yamato that has the twin fireing side mount and alot of fiberglass superstructure . Now his guns are not the normal ones you get when you order they were special made for this ship. They have good sized dump tanks on each gun and use selnoids to fire them. Now he has to use a wrench to tighten down the breech to get them to really crack the way he was told to and they way he like them. Over the last two years it really has not been a problem because he bought the ship ready to fight and did not understand the systems and had to learn how to take care of them when the broke down.So he was really not damageing others very badly to be a problem.

3 Last year he really had the ship up to snuff and is very aggressive and eveything worked well. WE and I was very glad for him .Now here is where the problem starts, inthe last battle where we fought together we had to balance out the fleets to make it more reasonable ok? This put my South Dakota and a North Carolina and an Anderia Doria on the same side to counter an Yamato ,a HMS Austraila, and a cruiser. In the battle we exchanged numerous shout , the North Carolina and the South Dakota went to tie up and damage the Yamto while the Anderia went to deal with the others.In this process the North Carolina is a reakitively a new ship with a some wht experinced captin and we have all been friends for while. During the battle both allied bbs took heavy damge and the North carolina eventually sank and the south dakota had to with draw and go defenceive due to damage. thus leaving the Anderia to face the Yamato. He held is own and did not let the Yamato get good shots at him. At the end whenwe looked at damage it was worse then we thought. On the North Carolina the 5 ply 1/4 inch plywood was not only brook out in sections but in places was shot through by bbs! Most of the superstructure in the ship was badly damaged and in some places gone altogether.
Ok the Damage to the SoDak was mainly done in her V the gell coat was completly gone in places as long as 3 inches and down into the fiberglass. Other places the bbs had gone throught the gell and most of the fiberglass was also gone to where you could look right in thehull, nothing was left. Also the schedule 40 pvc pipe that was used for barbets in A turret had a chuck about 1.5 inches broke out.

Damage on the Andria was not bad but the schedule 40 pipe used for the barbet in C turret had a 2 inch pc broken out. Greg had made it to where his gun actually was mounted to another pc of pvc that fit down in to the barbet so it was protected when the first had been borken.
Now our group is looking at doing some penatrations test to help limit the amount of serious damage and we came up with soem thing very simalr to what was being used in Big GUn tests. We have put it toward the main body with tests showing that bb guns can be fired useing 125 psi instead of the allowed 150. This particulure battler is haveing a fit about this and feels we are harming the way rc combat is doen and if you want to play this is what you get. We feel that if a gun or in this case guns can do this to fiberglass and 1/4 5ply plywood what would it do to the human body , so we feel it ha sbecome a safty issue. You know it is real possiable to haveone slip up and someone get seriously hurt.
I can take fixing damage but I feel we do not need to shot through fiberglass just through 1/32 balsa, the reaction I get to this, from the battler it is the only way he knows he hits you and that he wants to make sure he puts holes in your ship.He is still yooung and needs to go to the Nats and wants to go , he is very competitive where the last couple of years we are more laid back and do it for fun and enjoy each others company and have a good time. I have tired to talk to him about it and he just blows me off.

 

Safety Test #1: Ask him if he is willing to stand in front of his own cannons and shoot himself at point blank range? If not, his guns are too powerful. THIS IS THE MOST COMMON SENSE SAFETY RULE, AND SHOULD NEVER BE IGNORED, even though no rulebooks mention it. Penetrating 1/4" plywood is a SERIOUS safety issue. I saw someone accidentally shoot himself in the hand while launching a boat, and the shot broke skin, even though his guns had passed the penetration test (his hand was about 6" from the barrels). Projectiles reflect off the pond towards captains all the time, so you must be willing to take whatever your cannons can put out.

Safety check #2: The big gun foam test says that guns should NOT be able to go through 2" of foam. This still more than enough to cause holes well below the water line with thick 1/8" armor. With thin 1/32" skin, a 2" foam test should be plenty powerful enough to poke holes.

Safety check #3: Check the pressure of the regulator. Some of the other members of the WWCC have used o-ring restrictor cannons, and have tested them at 200-300 psi, just to see what they are capable of. The results were similar to what you have reported.

 

Well heres my thought. I agree with all the guys on this issue. Definitly a safety concern and Buddy you are doing the right thing to talk to him. Maybe put it this way. Ask him if would be willing to test the power of his guns on his superstructure. I assume it is removable. Then he can see what effect he is actually having. 2. I can tell you from experience that even at 150 psi small gun there is no way it can penetrate barbettes or wood of such thickness and strength. 3. He definitly has a pressure issue here and the pressue needs to be checked. A simple pressure test will confirm he is firing above maximum allowable pressure. Advise him he is is not going to be handicapped by reducing the pressure to the same as the other ships who are within safety pressure parameters. Advise him he just needs to get a new pressure spring for his regulator, not a big deal to install and not expensive. Doesn't take long. Tell him too the idea is penetrate balsa not penetrate areas that are supposed to be impenetrable. The idea is to simulate damage not destroy the models. Tell him if he is destroying models than he will have no one to battle left on the pond and he will be all alone on the water, he will be banned from other clubs. Charlies guns fire hard but NOT THAT HARD. They can only be tweaked so far before they jam or start spurting. I have seen some chunks of thin fibreglass decks chip or crack or even the edges chip if it is just resin with no Fibreglass matt backing it but that is normal.
My guns are at 120 psi but even when they were at 150 they could not do that kind of damage this fellows Yamato is doing. Tell him if his bbs are penterating that thick balsa lets place a pair of saftey goggles in front of cannos and see the effect. Maybe he will get it.

Good luck with him.

 

One more thought, try not to antagonize the accused too much. Whatever tests you subject his boat to, should also be performed on all other ships present.

The lack of a maximum-penetration test is one objection I have always had with fast gun clubs, because if ever there is an accident, if nobody's guns are capable of piercing human skin then everybody will still be alive afterwards. 2" of pink foam is easier to shoot through than the average human skin, so if your guns don't go through foam then they won't go through skin either.

 

Thanks guys you are all thinking along the same lines as I and my fellow battlers here in ohio. And to add another peice of information this ship and its componets are all built by Charlie at BC, like I said he bought the ship basically ready to go from charlie and charlie doesnt sell these guns when you but a kit from him.Charlie made these guns specially for this Yamato!
Ok my group here is fitting together a set of rules for the penetration tests as was outlined very much the same as you have said here.We borrowed them from the big gun. And yes we are going to look at the psi in his regulator and I told him along wiht others that we all are going to go through the same tests his ship will go through. Now his arguement is we are trying to make the club to speciall where his ship will not be able to fight in the IRWCC. I have also talked to some members of IRWCC and have dicovered that there is a growing movement in their body that is thinking the same way. The down side is there are a few strong members in that group that have a mount of power that are fighting this idea, some thing tells me he is talking to them and they are telling him that as long as there is no rules about it then nobody can say anything about it . Talking with Mike Deskin he has informed me,That some who compained about hard hitting guns were brow beat by these guys in to shutting up.

 

Pressure is not the only component to a hard hitting gun. I think weaps on all clubs should be subject to the foam test. No reason not to.

 

Well the only other thing I could think of to cause a bb to hit harder is the tighter tolerance of the barrel. Is this guy using stainless steel barrels from BC? If so they will fire harder but we have many ships here and myself included and at 150 psi they don't have the kind of hitting power this fellow has on his. Pressure is most likely the culprit here. A tighter tolerance barrel is more efficeint but does jam up causing the barrel to eject from the breech. We had a Musashi that had that probem.So there is a limitation here regarding barrell tolerances for internal diameter. When you do test this guy could you post the testing results.Am curious to find out exactly what the cause is here.

 

Hey guys I will gladly post what happens when we get him to check his ship. I hope we can get him to come to the next build session here in Feb 24.

 

I have never heard of bb's doing that kind of damage before. That is incredible. It's hard to say how to proceed, especially with someone who is young and really trying to feel out his place in the hobby. There are issues here and safety is the main factor. Suggestions to have him to volunteer his superstructure or a pair of goggles are good. I would start by asking him to step back from everything for a moment. Look at the big picture. It's great his model works and is a force to be dealt with, but, in the end, as Curt stated earlier, if you decimate your adversaries to this degree, where there is extra work repairing over normal damage, expense and safety issues... you simply will have no one to play against. No other person would want to go toe-to-toe with a ship like this. I would if I had a Yamato from Big Gun, with it's guns on overkill!

In the end, he has a choice, abide by the nature of the game against those willing combatants, or he has to find some others to play with. Hard-hitting guns are one thing, but, not being able to come to a compromise will ultimately keep him out of most battles than in. Let him know his guns are acceptable, 100%. It comes down to who he is playing against and safety concerns most than all, does he want to be responsible should something happen?

Two things, in the end. Firstly and most importantly, there have been injury and death from projectiles of any kind. Most recently and close to me, my brother and his friend were messing with a daisy rifle and it went off accidently approx. twenty feet from my brother's friend's face, catching him in the left eye, he has, because of this, lost 70%+ of his vision in that eye, and his friend's parents have taken measures to not allow them to spend time together. Secondly, just because someone tells you to do something one way, does not make it the status quo. Hard firing guns are great, however, if they are too much, then it falls to those around whether they want to compete with you or not. Have a meeting of those in yoru group with him present. You and he should each state your case supporting and apposing and make a ruling then and there. Hopefully, it will be something you all can agree to. This also gives him a chance to have his opinions heard and that his voice matters.

Good Luck, Buddy. I'm either talking out my *** or if you can spin this to make it work, all the power to you. Just trying to put myself in your shoes and resolve the issue without letting it get out of hand.

 

I did some calculation of this last year for BBs.

There are a couple of models that you can use for predicting skin penetration of a projectile. I used both the Kokinakis Skin Penetration Model and the one from the Eleventh Annual Report of the Firearms Consultative Committee. According to the Kokanakis model (Vmin=125(Area/Mass)+22 and used by White Sands for risk management of fragments), an average BB (.173 diameter, .343434223g) needs to be traveling at least 253fps to have any chance of penetrating skin. The international standard however is based off the report from the Firearms Consultative Committee which was commissioned by the US Army and states that an object requires between 2 and 3 Joules of energy in order to penetrate skin. That same standard BB needs to get up to 355 fps in order to reach 2 Joules (1/2*mass*velocity^2). You can see this reflected in the Labeling of Daisy air rifles. The Red Ryder shoots at an average velocity of 280 fps and does not carry the warning stickers. However. the Daisy Model 880 at 750 fps does carry warning labels.

255 fps is pretty tough to reach for the average battler when limited to a 5" barrel and 150 psi using standard 1/16" hose to connect the cannon to the firing valve.

That said, I _have_ broken through an old swampworks hull with the doubles (BC standard cannons) on my Iowa @ 140 psi at almost point blank range. Though that was more reflective of the state of that particular fiberglass hull than of the power of the guns. The cannons on my other battleships are much more powerful (using the breech bypass design) and I still struggle to get them up into the 230fps range at a legal pressure.

 

renner,

Can you make a post in the tips & tricks section regarding skin penetration? I think this information should be recorded.

 

I think the question you really have to ask yourself is: "How hard do guns need to shoot to penetrate 1/32 inch balsa?" People don't need to be shooting out ribs, and blowing out chunks of super structure. I've got some plastic through material in my HMS Courageous that has had holes blown completely through it as well. I've also got a pretty good idea exactly which ship and captain blew them out too.

I think over the years, some of the fast gun captains have lost sight of the fact that guns are more reliable now then they were in the old days, but the rules haven't really changed at all to reflect that reliability. This is part of the reason the Washington Treaty folks have begun what they are trying to do. Hard hitting guns are one of the very problems they are trying to eliminate.

Seriously, who has ever stated "replacing shot out ribs" as one of their favorite aspects of the hobby? I'm on board with limiting firepower, because frankly I think some guns are just unsafe for what we are trying to do. We always preach safety, its time some of the more "competitive" captains get on board with THAT program.

Mike D

 

Well, you have to define 'safe'

If you are meaning that the guns will absolutly not cause injury then you might want to find another hobby as lowering velocities to where chipped teeth or eye injuries are not possible pretty much negates the shooting through 1/32" balsa. Steel vs enamel or steel vs soft eye tissue, the steel normally wins.

If you mean safe as in a reasonable expectation that permanent injuries will not result so long as basic precautions are taken (ex: all partied present are wearing saftey glasses, have mouths closed, etc.), then I'd have to say that keeping under 240fps is fairly safe. Getting velocities past 253fps is where you get into the 'might penetrate skin' and past 350fps into 'will penetrate'. I don't think anyone is advocating gun velocities past either of those marks.

Personally I'm comfortable in the 220 range. I know that a shot will penetrate 1" below even allowing for the effects of a shallow angle and a patched hull. Anything more is purely dramatics to scare your opponent (that cracking guns factor).

(and yes I have shot myself with my own guns at point blank range, albeit unintentionally. It wasn't pleasant and if I were to hit more sensitive areas, it bruises and really hurts but no penetrations).

If ships are shooting through fiberglass, #1 is to check that ship's regulator asap. #2 is to examine the quality of the fiberglass that was shot through. (Gel Coat being chipped is normal as it is purely a cosmetic coating and has no inherent strength). Good thick fiberglass shouldn't be shot through, nor should 5ply birch (in good condition & well sealed). I've got a swampy kongo hull that is on the thin side that I wouldn't put on the water unless each and every rib were backed with plywood. I've also got a BC Nagato that needs absolutly no re-inforcement to stand up to the strongest guns. (The gel gets chipped, but the glass remains intact). You also have to expect that that FG unlike wood isn't all that resiliant and all these blows will eventually have bad effects upon it. 1/4 5 ply birch is probably the best stuff I know of for building hulls. Most I've had to do with it the past couple of years (or with maple stringers...seen too many basswood stringers shot through) is sand off some starred west systems and reseal.

1/8" lite ply on the otherhand.... or 1/16" birch ply vs good triples...... no joy there.

There is a reason my lower level superstructures are made from 1/8" birch ply, lexan or other similarly durable material. (at least on my BBs....the cruisers get lighter materials since if they get blasted, I've done something that deserves the damage)

 

Yeah, good birch ply is awesome stuff. I've seen a few people use the cheapest 1/8 in. door-skin wood they can get for superstructure and such, and it falls apart in combat. On the other hand, 1/8 in 5-ply birch with a thin sheet of rubber or lexan is nearly indestructible, virtually dentproof, and has a nice finish.

One thing I've noticed is that some people have thinner skin than others. If I get hit by a 1/4" round travelling at legal velocities, it will leave a small red mark. On some other people, it will leave a colorful nickel-sized bruise. Occasionally, I've seen shots that draw blood, but again this is only some people, and the incident rate has dropped since the club started enforcing gun-testing regulations.