Boeing's Got High Power, Solid State Laser That Burns Almost Anything
@thebigk
•
Oct 24, 2024
Oct 24, 2024
2.0K
You may know Boeing as the commercial airplane maker - but the company also manufactures a lot of defence equipments & weapons. Boeing's Directed Energy Systems Division has come up with a solid state laser system likely to be used by the United States military to destroy almost anything - from IEDs to rockets to drones. Michael Rinn, VP of the division and program director says that the team working on the project has demonstrated that they have the necessary power & beam quality along with desired efficiency to deliver the system to the actual battlefield.
Boeing's engineers demonstrated the 'thin disk laser system' - a combo of high-power industrial lasers that generate one concentrated, high energy beam with immense destructive powers. The system's output reached over 30kW, about 30% more than required. The system required about 90kW of electric energy to produce the output. The demonstration was a part of Department Of Defense's Robust Electric Laser Initiative (RELI) initiative.
Rinn said that the chemical lasers aren't very suitable for the battlefields. They need hard-to-handle chemicals and often require cumbersome operational procedures for the operators. On the other hand, the solid state laser systems are closed-loop and are all-electric. This makes these laser weapons easy to move in the battlefield and also easier to operate. The team seeks government's funding to take the the technology forward.
Via: #-Link-Snipped-#
Boeing's engineers demonstrated the 'thin disk laser system' - a combo of high-power industrial lasers that generate one concentrated, high energy beam with immense destructive powers. The system's output reached over 30kW, about 30% more than required. The system required about 90kW of electric energy to produce the output. The demonstration was a part of Department Of Defense's Robust Electric Laser Initiative (RELI) initiative.
Rinn said that the chemical lasers aren't very suitable for the battlefields. They need hard-to-handle chemicals and often require cumbersome operational procedures for the operators. On the other hand, the solid state laser systems are closed-loop and are all-electric. This makes these laser weapons easy to move in the battlefield and also easier to operate. The team seeks government's funding to take the the technology forward.
Via: #-Link-Snipped-#
