Project Crossbow: The Short History of Zokesia's MAC Cannon Program [WITH PICTURES]

[zekes]

Project Crossbow: The Short History of Zokesia's MAC Cannon Program

Mass Accelerator Cannons (MACs) are a type of weapon which accelerate a projectile to high speed, not unlike a gun, and shoot it out. In KSP terms, this is acheived by pushing something into the line of an engine's exhaust.

For almost a year, there had been several designs of MAC Cannon in the RB thread, with Probe-Tek and DAEcorp leading the way. Zokesia, like most companies, preferred to stick with the known: heavy, complex guided missiles. The overall thought on MACs was that they were fuel-guzzling and couldn't penetrate armor.

However, no one in Zokesia Skunkworks had ever really put the theory to the test. In late December, with the recent design of the Victory class Cruiser, a team of engineers saw the strong body and wondered if they could put a MAC cannon on it.

The leader of the project, Koodman Kerman, wrestled with the administrators and budget hawks for weeks, before he was given a big break - the structural fatigue test hull of the Victory. Koodman and his engineers got to work right away. The barrel mounts were taken off, and two LVT-30s as the MAC weapons. They stripped off two of the propulsion engines and replaced them LVT-30s as the kickpack dampening engines. Then they grabbed a huge tin box and threw it around the engine, and began strapping MAC rounds to it. The first test of the craft was launched on a Cira IV, into Low Munar Orbit to test the craft.

Right away, there were problems. The rounds were packed in in such a way that, even though 16 were carried, 8 of them clipped with each other, and so half of the shots were completely off track. But the MAC itself worked, and a repair shuttle was sent up to rearm the gun and refuel the ship. The second round of tests proved it worked; the rounds left the barrel at 200 m/s and consistiently in the same direction. The unnamed Victory MAC was left in orbit to be resupplied for further tests, but for now her purpose was completed. Now, they could move on to a more powerful version.

The Victory was built as a replacement for the aging Drek XXVII in the Cruiser role, but Koodman saw life in it yet as a MAC destroyer. He also needed it to keep his project alive; he still needed to prove to High Command the concept was effective against armor.

The new ship was similar to the Victory in general design. Major differences were the increase in shots to 32 and a large Mainsail engine on either end. In the front they added a gun guard of 8 landing legs, in order to cover the gun when it wasn't firing. When the gear was open, the ship looked like a big crossbow, and the previously unnamed group dubbed themselves "Project Crossbow."

Initial tests proved disappointing - half of the projectiles would launch at 200 m/s, and the MAC ran out of fuel way too fast. They went back and took off the first 16 projectiles, and they found the ones closer to the engine would launch at 400 m/s, so they left them and shortened the barrel.

But now, they had to prove their design; they were almost out of money. Koodman set up a meeting with one of High Command's admirals to observe a life fire test against a captured MX-3 Ingressor.

The modefied XXVII, now called the ZNS Crossbow, was launched and soon moved into firing position.

Target was in sight - the admiral was watching now.

They opened up at 200m.

....But it was a dismal failure. After 6 rounds, the MAC had used 25% of its fuel. 2 projectiles had missed outright; of the 4 that hit, only minor damage to the wing armor over the missiles was actually knocked off. The admiral was not impressed; no more funding went to Project Crossbow. A week later, the building the handful of engineers had used was closed, and they went their seperate ways. In an excerpt from a critic's final report in the Project, their failure was explained:

....MAC Cannons have always been an interesting pipe dream, but these tests only proved their uselessness. The craft were too big to aim them correctly; the projectiles themselves were lopsided, causing shots to be wildly inaccurate; the MACs Guzzled so much fuel they would surely strand their own ship with a single volley, and on top of it all, they do not penetrate thick armor like conventional missiles do. They are like fighting a tank with ceremonial swords.

ZNS Crossbow was scrapped, and the unnamed Victoria class was abandoned in munar orbit. The project seemed to prove all the old wisdom - that MACs weren't going to cut it.

[andrew123]

Hehe. My old UNSC Destroyer had a MAC velocity of over 400 m/s. Even that couldn't penetrate light armor.

MAC cannons are just for show. They're more like the superconductors of the KSP universe. Obtainable, but currently bulky and inefficient.

Edited December 31, 2014 by andrew123

[Spartwo]

Why did you use lopsided rounds"

[zekes]

Why did you use lopsided rounds"

by lopsided, i mean the fact that 1x1 panels are oddly shaped, so they don't exactly fire uniformly. More often than not they bounced around inside and got wonky.

[Zamovinar]

I have been testing a variant of this but missiles are still part of the whole set up. It was supposed to be a Secret Weapon of a Dreadnought only to be fired "ONCE".

It was some sort of "MAC and Missile Hybrid". A SHIP KILLER (I think I saw one on the Duna Battle on the Naval Battle Club but it was small only using I-beams as projectiles but it was compact)

It goes something like this:

1. A MAC (Mass Accelerator Cannon) is behind a "ONE TIME" Supercharged Missile.

2. The MAC cannon is activated same time as the Liquid Fueled Missile is launched. (I even tried firing the MAC first before releasing the missile but I ran into some problems such as exploding parts due to overheating so I fired them at the same time, I even used heat shields to preserve my armament during fire)

3. That missile also has it's own set of sepatrons built in when launched plus it's own engine running at full throttle.

(I'm not taking about those puny I-beam missiles, more like a fuel tank with a warhed and an engine like a torpedo)

4. I even used an SRB/SRM (Solid Rocket Booster/Solid Rocket Missile) but it was inaccurate at a certain distance.

5. It was tested on the ground pointing up. I took note of the speed of the Liquid Fueled Missile/SRB-SRM going up without the aid of the MAC (it was fast of course)

6. Then I fired the missile with the aid of the MAC. The speed definitely improved but not that fast more like 15%-20% increase (I expected more but maybe I was pointing the engine at a wrong angle)

7. A few problems surfaced, such as accuracy. I observed that it was better if I fired the missile alone that without the help of the MAC.

8. Another thing I noticed is that the whole setup takes too many parts, it was better to invest those parts to other armament such as more missiles. (You are better off with a Mainsail Missile, LOL)

9. This was all tested on the ground I haven't even tested it on space (Guess I'll need to research this more, or should I?)