ray gun

This article is about fictional devices. See Directed-energy weapon for various real weapons which are similar to rayguns.

Rayguns are a type of directed-energy weapon. They are a classic and widespread feature of science fiction. Types of raygun have various names: ray gun, death ray, beam gun, blaster, laser gun, etc. They supply the general role of guns in the scenarios of many stories.

History

A very early example is the Heat-Ray featured in H. G. Wells' The War of the Worlds, which was published in 1898. Science fiction as far back as the 1920s emphasized death rays as the weapons of choice. Early science fiction often showed raygun beams making bright light and loud noise like lightning or large electric arcs. When the laser, invented in 1960, became an industrial reality the generic fictional death rays were often renamed "lasers" (see Science fiction weapon). By the late 1960s and 1970s however, the laser's limits as a weapon were evident, and less specific terms such as "phaser" (see Star Trek) or "blaster" (see Star Wars) were used.

Types

The ray fired is usually stated to be one of:

• Laser
• Particle beam:
  • A real type of particle, e.g. protons and/or neutrons from the Ghostbusters' proton packs
  • A fictional type of particle, e.g. a type of "Minovsky particles" in the Gundam scenario, where Minovsky Physics always operate.
  • Unspecified
• plasma: see also plasma rifle
• Defined by a word not known in real-world science, e.g. "disruptor".
• Undefined.

The well-known Star Trek phaser fires a particle beam of a fictional subatomic particle called nadions.

See Blaster (Star Wars)#Technology for an unreal technology attempt at describing how a type of raygun works.

Sometimes in science fiction stories, rayguns are used for metal cutting like blowtorches.

In some science fiction, some rayguns have a firing mode that can stun its target instead of killing.

Rayguns under their various names come in various sizes and forms: pistol; two-handed (often called a rifle); mounted on a vehicle; artillery-sized mounted on a spaceship or space base or asteroid or planet. The pistol form is seen most often.

A "beam gun" in anime is an energy weapon which fires a colored beam of light.

"FX-Ray laser" in American science fiction and animation is a humorous name for a raygun that fires a visible beam: FX is the show biz acronym for special effects.

The shapes of some rayguns are influenced by an opinion that they look most effective and weapon-like if they look somewhat like real guns; others, such as this, are not.

Rayguns are a great variety of shapes and sizes, according to the imagination of the story writers and movie prop makers. Most pistol rayguns have a conventional pistol grip and trigger, but some (e.g. Star Trek phasers) do not.

Many rayguns do not behave like classical lasers:

• Often the beam travels at much less than the speed of light. The phasers of the Star Trek television series can be seen to be traveling much slower than a conventional bullet.
• The beam can be seen from off its axis, which would not happen in space where there is nothing to be illuminated by the beam.
• Sometimes, visible barrel recoil. This would only happen if the momentum of the beam is comparable to that of a bullet fired from a gun.
• Sometimes, the power of the beam completely evaporates a man (equipment and all) who is hit by the beam.

However, some of the above properties are consistent with particle beam weapons.

Why rayguns are fictional, as far as is generally known

• In many science fiction scenarios, the laws of physics and nature of matter and energy are different from in the real world (i.e.: the fictional Minovsky Physics, which operate in the Gundam universe.)
• With current technology, the amount of power that they would need is beyond the capacity of any handheld device^{[citation needed]}. Actual energy weapons are large and cumbersome and portable versions are barely powerful enough to be considered weapons.
• Many of them need non-existent materials.
• For laser guns, see directed-energy weapon.
• Many fictional ray guns fire a beam which (unlike lasers) is visible in vacuum and sometimes also travels much slower than light.
• For plasma rifles and similar, see the possibility of plasma rifles existing in the real world

See also

• Weapons of Star Wars
• Weapons of Star Trek
• The film The Librarian: Quest for The Spear (2004) refers to Tesla's "Legendary Death Ray", whose prototype in the film is housed in the massive library of artifacts and books, which also includes such artifacts (fabled, or otherwise) as The Ark of the Covenant and Excalibur.
• Shrink Ray
• Category:Rayguns

Images of rayguns

A typical imaginary raygun

Imaginary raygun, 2 views, with parts labelled

Small artillery sized version of same, in use

External links

• Atomic Rocket: descriptions and technology and many images of handguns and rifle-sized guns used in space including rayguns.

Other uses of the word

• Motorcycle enthusiasts sometimes use the term raygun for the old shape of motorcycle exhaust silencer/muffler with a long straight cylindrical barrel that merged roundedly at each end into the pipe, as in this image and this image.
• A nickname for former U.S. president Ronald Reagan.
• In music:
  • Ray Gun was a music magazine published during the 1990s.
  • Plastic Raygun is a successful independent record label in the UK.
  • Raygun was the name of a 1996 album by the Matthew Good Band.
  • Ray Gun Suitcase is the name of an album by Pere Ubu (band).

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