Why do they call it a Railgun?

[Vorpal]

Because a Railgun is a very large cannon that was mounted on railroad tracks (used in ww1). When it fired it was pushed backwards, abled to make speedy retreats this way.
I think Big Bertha was a railgun (Big Gun idea in q2 was probably a spinoff of this).
well, just so you know what kind of cannons I'm talking about:
http://members.nbci.com/dgrev/images/railgun.jpg

[Vorpal]

Oh, by the way, I'm asking Why do they call it a Railgun in quake2/3 and now skulltag?

[Arioch]

The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000.

rail gun
SYLLABICATION: rail gun
NOUN : A weapon, consisting mainly of conducting metal rails, that uses electromagnetic force to accelerate a projectile to a much greater speed than that achieved by conventional chemical propellant weapons.

I think it's claimed that a rail gun can fire the aluminum projectile close to the speed of light. As you can imagine the energy requirements for such a weapon would be enormous.

[Guest Nuno Correia]

I believe it's because of its flawless precision.

[Vorpal]

Vorpal said:

Oh, by the way, I'm asking Why do they call it a Railgun in quake2/3 and now skulltag?

Whoa, cool. Thanks Arioch

[Lüt]

Because (in case you've never seen it in action) it shoots a rather powerful electronic rail through everything in it's path.

[Biffy]

Vorpal said:

Whoa, cool. Thanks Arioch

Here's a copy and paste from a responsible-appearing website:

A railgun consists of two parallel conductors, the "rails," bridged by a non-ferromagnetic conducting armature. The railgun is fired by creating a current loop that flows from some large power source, down one rail, across the slug, and back up the other rail. This current loop induces an enormous magnetic field which, in turn, pushes the armature down the rails with a force proportional to the magnitude of the current, the separation distance of the rails, and the magnetic field.

This web site also makes mention of a DOD-developed weapon,
probably for SDI use ("star wars"..antimissile defense) which
has a pulsed current supply of 5 MegAmps (five million amps)
and pushes a 10-lb projectile to about 4 Km per sec. Light speed is 300,000 Km per second. Aw, they say it doesn't make the pretty blue corkscrew. :)

[elbryan42]

You have to destroy the Railgun Greta in Medal of Honor for the psx. Hmmm.... shooting Nazis fun. Need new Wolfenstein.

[Rubilacxe]

Wasent the Railgun one of those weapons on Eraser, or am i just stupid? :)

[SaGa]

the rail gun shoots slugs threw a electro magnatec field on a rail making whem go like 10 times faster then bullets

[Guest Aradiel]

Do railguns (the electromagnetic ones) actually exist in real life, or are they still a thing of fiction?