The Effects Of Firing A Tri-Barreled Shotgun With 1" Cal.

Trigger-Happy, one of my Action Girls, has a customized tri-barreled shotgun with each barrel having a caliber of one inch...breach loading. The recoil is so massive that she actually has to spin the gun to compensate for the forces involved. My question, what kind of effects would rounds from such a gun produce? She's got several round types: Frag, Armor-Piercing, Incendiary, and Solid Shot.

edited 20th Nov '10 11:08:51 PM by SandJosieph

Well, 1.0 caliber is more often known by the millimeter size, or the bore/gauge size: roughly 3 or 4 bore.

Now, for the firing... Well, for a trained gunner, it would be too much, especially so if the gun is custom-made, assuming they put in recoil-damping modifications. See this for a 4 bore double rifle, which is pretty much what your gun would be like. I'm assuming that you wouldn't fire all three barrels at once, though. That would just be silly.

I wouldn't fire them all at once...but Trigger definitely would. And would probably go out of her way to put herself into situations were she had to fire all the barrels at once.

Well, those guns are called "Elephant" guns for a reason. Firing all of them at once would knock just about anyone over, unless they were an incredibly buff midget or had extremely good bracing, like a fixed gun mount and a sandbag or something. The bullets, without armour-piercing slugs, would destroy anyone without good armour, and even people with really tough protection would very likely die from the shock of such a large bullet hitting them. That's how most large game animals are killed by bore guns, at least. And if an elephant isn't much of a challenge for such a weapon, then people wouldn't stand a chance, unless they were in large numbers or at a distance of at least 300 meters.

On a semi-sorta-kinda related note I want to ask about a way for the girl to carry the gun, as in, what kind of holster should she use? She keeps all her extra ammo in her purse and usually goes around with some 12 other guns strapped to her body is some way that never impedes her dress or movement. Don't worry, she's got special permission to carry those guns where ever she goes (in fact, the only time she wasn't allowed to take her weapons with her, it nearly got her killed).

Just a regular leather/nylon strap, maybe a tiny bit wider or thicker. For just carrying it around, not using it, it could just hang in front or to the side, with the strap on one shoulder, depending on how physically strong the character is.

Or, if you're interested and want to be classy, you could use something like this.◊ I don't think it would fit as well with three barrels, though.

One of the more famous 1" caliber guns were the "boys anti-tank rifles".

Even they, with enormous support, often broke the bones of hardened soldiers. I'd consider taking the caliber down a notch.

Unless you want people to say you fail at physics forever. Though I'd probably accept it.

edited 28th Nov '10 12:06:39 AM by GlassPistol

A "Hundred Caliber" weapon would be about 25mm. A 4 gauge weapon is about a millimetre smaller.

A three barrel arrangement probably wouldn't make sense given the weight.

Better, see the movie Dogs of War where Christopher Walken uses a 25mm 20 shot revolver grenade launcher.

Alternatively, play Ghost Recon and use the OICW which mounts a 5 or 6 shot 25mm grenade launcher. In the game you only get frags but the real thing, which apparently was being tested in Afghanistan earlier this year, can fire flechette, non-lethal, and fuel-air munitions.

It might be possible to make it into a recoilless rifle. Beyond that, maybe just hold the back to a wall when you fire.

25.4 mm, actually. That in mind, God help the shooter, becuase he/she will need some REAL support for that monster gun.

The caliber is not as much an issue as the round velocity. The M79 and M203 grenade launcher fire 40 mm rounds (over an inch and a half). But the velocity is low. Think about the comparisons of pistol and rifle ammunition. A .308 Winchester packs a hell of a whallop compared to a .38 S&W despite the latter being 20% larger in caliber.

Roughly speaking, the weight of the round will be a function of the cube of the caliber. Recoil will be weight times muzzle velocity while energy will be weight times the square of your muzzle velocity.

To fire a 25mm rifle from the shoulder, you would have to fire a sub sonic round so the recoil wouldn't knock you on your ass. Maximum effective range would be on the order of 30-50 metres. But if you hit you put big holes in it!