MDM's Improving Laserheads?

Now that end of run MDMs can approach a target at a considerable percent of the speed of light, for a laserhead that detonates in line with its trajectory, are the:

1) X-rays produced by the warhead's nuclear explosion that don't get picked up by the lasing rods

and

2) X-rays produced by the lasing rods

blue-shifted to the point (where from the target's point of view), the X-rays produced are now Gamma rays?

Missile warhead detonates at X, with the X-rays produced traveling parallel to the missile trajectory.

Ship.................Missile Trajectory...............Target
..| ------------------------------------------------> X |

Call the doppler effect 0.8c. What frequency shift is this? Simple math time. Open a physics book or look up doppler effect equations on wikipedia.

You can answer your own question on the frequency shift of 0.8c.

Vince wrote:Now that end of run MDMs can approach a target at a considerable percent of the speed of light, for a laserhead that detonates in line with its trajectory, are the:

1) X-rays produced by the warhead's nuclear explosion that don't get picked up by the lasing rods

and

2) X-rays produced by the lasing rods

blue-shifted to the point (where from the target's point of view), the X-rays produced are now Gamma rays?

Missile warhead detonates at X, with the X-rays produced traveling parallel to the missile trajectory.

Ship.................Missile Trajectory...............Target
..| ------------------------------------------------> X |

You get a factor five, which probably is not enough to get from X-ray to gamma ray, but it does increase energy by a factor of 5.
However with such considerations one should remember that special relativity is not really accounted for in the Honorverse. The missile itself has 5 orders of magnitude more energy than the warhead on the missile, but that somehow does not matter.

Vince wrote:Now that end of run MDMs can approach a target at a considerable percent of the speed of light, for a laserhead that detonates in line with its trajectory, ...

Therein lies a flaw in your assumption: Laser-heads do not fire in-line with the missiles travel, which is the primary advantage of laser-heads in the first place.

In the most extreme case, a laser-head passing the throat or kilt has only a very fraction of a second to get a shot off at up to 90 degrees (or more) from its line of travel.

There does not appear to be any tangible difference between a laser-head from a missile coming down the throat vs a laser-head passing the throat, although MWW doesn't give us any hard numbers to compare.

Weird Harold wrote:

Vince wrote:Now that end of run MDMs can approach a target at a considerable percent of the speed of light, for a laserhead that detonates in line with its trajectory, ...

Therein lies a flaw in your assumption: Laser-heads do not fire in-line with the missiles travel, which is the primary advantage of laser-heads in the first place.

In the most extreme case, a laser-head passing the throat or kilt has only a very fraction of a second to get a shot off at up to 90 degrees (or more) from its line of travel.

There does not appear to be any tangible difference between a laser-head from a missile coming down the throat vs a laser-head passing the throat, although MWW doesn't give us any hard numbers to compare.

I specifically said a laserhead that detonates in-line with its trajectory (X-rays traveling in the same direction as its trajectory), because I knew that a laserhead that detonated with at right angles to its trajectory (the X-rays traveling at right angles to its trajectory) would experience little or no doppler shift. And with angles that are not in-line with but not exceeding 90 degrees to the trajectory would experience a lower blue-shift amount. Angles exceeding 90 degrees (the missile travels some distance past the target, then detonates with the X-rays traveling back towards the target) will actually be red-shifted to some degree.

Not all missiles will attack the throat or kilt of the wedge of a target. And even the ones that do can have the detonation (X-rays) occur in the direction of the missiles trajectory. Case in point: 2nd Hancock in Echoes of Honor, where the Ghost Rider missiles fired by HMS Minotaur at PNS Mohawk came in with "a straight shot directly up the after aspect of its wedge. Two of them actually detonated inside the wedge, and the other seven all detonated at less than eight thousand kilometers. The hedgehog pattern of the X-ray lasers enveloped the stern of PNS Mohawk in a deadly weave of energy, and the battleship's after impeller room blew apart, and her wedge faltered."*

Also consider the Battle of Spindle in Mission of Honor, where Task Force 496 manged to stop 1,007 Mark 23 attack missiles--with CMs, PDLCs, (main energy mounts?)--and where presumably some of the less than 2,000 CMs in the single CM salvo the SLN was able to fire even using Aegis either missed or attacked ECM missiles. The SLN doesn't have off-bore firing capability, so in order to use Aegis they had to turn broadside on to the incoming fire. 8,209 attack missiles got through, concentrated on only 23 SLN SDs.

While many of the Mark 23s undoubtedly fired down the SDs throat, fewer probably fired up the kilt, simply because the wedge geometry gives a smaller volume of space that can be utilized for attack missiles to occupy. Most missiles probably attacked the broadsides through the sidewalls.

Mission of Honor, Chapter 22 wrote:Jacomina van Heutz clung to the arms of her command chair as her shock frame hammered her. The fleeting instant in which the Manticoran missiles could bring their lasers to bear against her ship's sidewalls as they penetrated the Solarian formation with a closing velocity which had climbed to seventy-three percent of light-speed was far too brief for any of Joseph Buckley's damage register on merely human senses as individuals hits. It was all delivered in one stroboscopic lightning bolt of devastation, too sudden and intense for even the ship's computers to register or sort out.

Italics are the author's, boldface is my emphasis.

I find it hard to believe that even Crandall would not turn the kilts** of her forces away from that incredible missile salvo after she recognized and then explained to her chief of staff that it was both real and under full control. And if she did turn her ships kilts away to point their sidewalls at the incoming salvo to maximize the number of CMs, PDLCs (and main energy weapons?) that could engage that salvo***, the Mark 23s that attacked her sidewalls would detonate so their X-rays would have an angle of attack from the point of detonation that would be as close to zero in respect to the missiles trajectory as possible, although not all of them would be able to achieve that angle. Still, some would be able to.

*Quote from Echos of Honor, Chapter 34. Italics are the authors, boldface is my emphasis.

**Remember, she was decelerating towards Spindle when Commodore Terekhov's forces fired the salvo at her.

***She could have also rolled her forces wedges so only the roof or floor faced the incoming salvo, but the numbers or attack missiles killed--1,007--argue against that as her anti-missile defenses on the 23 SDs that were attacked would have been insufficient to kill that many attack missiles as she would be restricted to her bow and stern mounted weapons.

The same lack of anti-ship weapons that could bear on the threat axis is even more true if she was dumb enough not to turn the kilts of her forces away from the incoming salvo, as she would be restricted to only the stern mounted weapons.

Vince wrote:

Weird Harold wrote:Vince wrote: Now that end of run MDMs can approach a target at a considerable percent of the speed of light, for a laserhead that detonates in line with its trajectory, ...

...

There does not appear to be any tangible difference between a laser-head from a missile coming down the throat vs a laser-head passing the throat, although MWW doesn't give us any hard numbers to compare.

I specifically said a laserhead that detonates in-line with its trajectory (X-rays traveling in the same direction as its trajectory), because I knew that a laserhead that detonated with at right angles to its trajectory (the X-rays traveling at right angles to its trajectory) would experience little or no doppler shift.

I know that is what you specified -- I did highlight that in bold. The point was that most missiles do NOT fit that criterion.

The other point I made is that as far as descriptions and textev go, there is no distinction made in the damage, energy or "color" of incoming laser-heads. Thus there is no way to quantify any difference Doppler shift might make in laser-head -- OR energy weapon -- energy or effectiveness.

Vince wrote:Now that end of run MDMs can approach a target at a considerable percent of the speed of light, for a laserhead that detonates in line with its trajectory, are the:

1) X-rays produced by the warhead's nuclear explosion that don't get picked up by the lasing rods

and

2) X-rays produced by the lasing rods

blue-shifted to the point (where from the target's point of view), the X-rays produced are now Gamma rays?

Missile warhead detonates at X, with the X-rays produced traveling parallel to the missile trajectory.

Ship.................Missile Trajectory...............Target
..| ------------------------------------------------> X |

The key point of relativity is that the speed of light is always c in any frame of reference. Relativistic effects only occur when you're looking at something moving relative to you. So as far as the missile is concerned, it makes no difference how fast it is going relative to its target or relative to the system primary (the local star), the operation of the nuclear warhead or the laser will be exactly the same.

The doppler shift perceived by the target ship depends on the relative velocity between it and the missile.

Weird Harold wrote:I know that is what you specified -- I did highlight that in bold. The point was that most missiles do NOT fit that criterion.

The other point I made is that as far as descriptions and textev go, there is no distinction made in the damage, energy or "color" of incoming laser-heads. Thus there is no way to quantify any difference Doppler shift might make in laser-head -- OR energy weapon -- energy or effectiveness.

The point you are making does not address my point. (Or, you have a valid answer, but it doesn't address my specific question.)

I specifically gave two examples, one that absolutely has occurred in text (2nd Hancock in Echoes of Honor), and one that can be inferred from the other information given in text (The Battle of Spindle in Mission of Honor).

As far as Doppler effect goes (observers point of view is the target looking at the firing point), if an X-ray laser (laserhead or shipborne energy mount) is fired at a target and the firing point is moving toward the target at a very high percentage of the speed of light, if the Doppler effect is enough to blue-shift the light from X-rays to Gamma rays (I don't know enough to figure this out, even after reading the Relativistic Doppler effect article on Wikipedia), the target would experience being hit with a Graser, not an X-ray Laser. And in the Honorverse, a graser is much more powerful (and more penetrating) than a mere X-ray laser.

SLN Case 1: With existing SLN ship technology, until the average SLN commander in the Honorverse wises up at least halfway, we will continue to see SLN units expose their broadsides toward the incoming axis in order to interpose their ships sidewall and try to use their CMs, PDLCs (and main energy weapons in anti-missile mode?) to defeat incoming missile fire. And at least some missiles will detonate with the blue-shifted X-rays traveling parallel to the missile's trajectory and then strike the target.

SLN Case 2: A SLN commander who has wised up halfway will roll ship to interpose the wedge along the incoming threat axis before the missiles arrive so the only fire he will receive is close to right angles of the missile trajectories. This is your case where the missiles attack down the throat, up the kilt, and overfly or underfly the rolled ship's sidewalls and attack through them, with little or no Doppler shift.

SLN Case 3: A SLN commander who has wised up fully will avoid action, or failing that, will strike his wedge, abandon ship and sent a lightspeed message offering surrender. This has the lowest possible Doppler shift of all.

Right now the average SLN commander in the Honorverse is Case 1.

JohnRoth wrote:

Vince wrote:Now that end of run MDMs can approach a target at a considerable percent of the speed of light, for a laserhead that detonates in line with its trajectory, are the:

1) X-rays produced by the warhead's nuclear explosion that don't get picked up by the lasing rods

and

2) X-rays produced by the lasing rods

blue-shifted to the point (where from the target's point of view), the X-rays produced are now Gamma rays?

Missile warhead detonates at X, with the X-rays produced traveling parallel to the missile trajectory.

Ship.................Missile Trajectory...............Target
..| ------------------------------------------------> X |

The key point of relativity is that the speed of light is always c in any frame of reference. Relativistic effects only occur when you're looking at something moving relative to you. So as far as the missile is concerned, it makes no difference how fast it is going relative to its target or relative to the system primary (the local star), the operation of the nuclear warhead or the laser will be exactly the same.

The doppler shift perceived by the target ship depends on the relative velocity between it and the missile.

And with a missile traveling towards the target at .8c, from the point of view of the target, are the X-rays emitted by the detonation (and the lasing rods) blue-shifted into the Gamma ray portion of the spectrum? (I don't know enough to figure this out, even after reading the Relativistic Doppler effect article on Wikipedia)

Vince wrote:And with a missile traveling towards the target at .8c, from the point of view of the target, are the X-rays emitted by the detonation (and the lasing rods) blue-shifted into the Gamma ray portion of the spectrum? (I don't know enough to figure this out, even after reading the Relativistic Doppler effect article on Wikipedia)

People have already answered the question. No, it is not enough to change the x-rays to gamma rays.