A New Mission For The U.S. Navy's Railgun?

Patrick Tucker, Fiscal One/Defense One: Is the Navy Abandoning the Railgun?

The Navy’s futuristic electric cannon, or railgun, received yet more hype this week for its ability to fire a shell at up to 5,600 miles per hour, and do it far more cheaply than a missile. But there’s a daunting reality behind the hype: the Pentagon is already looking past the railgun to a less power-intensive, more easily deployable alternative. The railgun rounds can be fired from more conventional cannons, giving the same capability sooner and cheaper.

Here’s how the railgun works: a sabot — a shell of tungsten inside a metal casing — is loaded into the gun. Instead of an explosive charge, the gun’s capacitors shoot an enormous amount of power, some 32 megajoules, into the shell and two long rails (instead of a barrel), creating an electromagnetic field that propels the shell down the rails at incredible speed

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Update #1: The Future of the Navy's Electromagnetic Railgun Could Be a Big Step Backwards (Popular Mechanics)
Update #2: Pentagon Dumps Railguns: Electric Cannon Too Inexpensive for War Profiteers (Sputnik)

WNU Editor: I am not surprised .... the U.S. Navy is looking at how this tech can now be applied to current platforms. In short .... they now want a return on their investment.