I have thought about making something like this for decades. As an electrical engineer, the physics were within my grasp. But I always had more important things to do.
The View From North Central Idaho
Ramblings on explosives, guns, politics, and sex by a redneck Idaho farm boy who became a software engineer living near Seattle.
Very low recoil is the result of very low KE slugs (low velocity, and only modest mass). But still pretty cool.
The lack of high velocity gases also reduces the recoil.
For small, HV projectiles, that can be a significant percentage of the recoil, yes. But for something like a typical 45 ACP load with a 230 gr bullet and 5 grains of powder, not so much. Especially if there is anything like a compensator to redirect the gasses.
Agreed. The relative low pressure of the .45 ACP reduces the muzzle velocity of the powder gases.
Well, momentum is m*v, so at 230 gr bullet weight and 5 gr powder, the bullet momentum is the majority of the total unless the average propellent gas velocity is 46x that of the bullet velocity, which seems unlikely. 🙂
And the same would be my assumption for other ammo; even for light weight bullets I would think the powder weight is substantially lower still.
Muzzle brakes and compensaters work by redirecting the momentum vector of the gas.
I know it is counterintuitive, but in a given cartridge, low weight bullets use more powder than heavy bullets. Hence, muzzle breaks and compensaters work better with lightweight bullets.
Forgotten Weapons featured a coil gun some time ago.
Kurt