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Originally Posted by Legbreaker
Accuracy might increase as you're unlikely to need a great big bolt, etc as you do in the M60 banging back and forth inside. I'd imagine the only working parts would be those moving the new round into position for firing. The whole weapon could probably be lighter than conventional weapons that need to account for the rapidly expanding gases and extremely high internal pressures, and this could actually have a detrimental effect on recoil - less mass to soak up the recoil.
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I wouldn't be surprised if one of the largest, if not the largest, part of such a weapon's mass would be its power pack. The designers of such a weapon would no doubt place the power pack in such a location on the weapon as to maximise the use of the power pack's mass to negate recoil as much as possible and balance the weapon. The power pack wouldn't get lighter as it is depleted, unlike a magazine or belt, and the projectile magazine would weigh very little compared to a magazine holding conventional bullets. So the weapon should stay balanced even as its power and ammunition is depleted.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Legbreaker
The time it would take for a single projectile to move from the "breach" to the muzzle isn't likely to be all that much longer than a conventional round - a small fraction of a second. However, it probably would be slow enough than the felt recoil would be more like a swift push than a sudden thump.
Firing cyclicly, I would imagine it would be a little like holding a hose and after the initial half second, be much easier to keep on target. It does depend a lot on the RPM of the weapon though - slow RPM would certainly result in "pulsing" while faster RPM would be much smoother (but chew through ammo and power).
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Most concept gauss rifle plans I have seen use very small, very high velocity flechettes. Each round weighs much less than most RL bullets. The rate of fire for a gauss rifle could theoretically be incredibly high, especially as the very small diameter and mass of each round naturally lends itsself to a high ROF.