Questions about bolters

We all know that GW cannot into numbers.

But then the real life gyrojet guns had effective range of about 50-100m.

No, in dark herey, Only war, etc if you shoot outisde of the range then you get less chance to hit. And bullets don't just dissapear, there are rules (or alteast narritive) for what happends when a bullet misses it's target

"Normal" 200lbs bodybuilders catachan can easily lift and aim a Heavy Bolter

how big the blast from a bolt?

how tough is a bolter? does it jam? what breaks a bolter?

why is there no stock or longer barrel on bolters?

what is a bolt/ bolter made out of? how do they make it

Bolt pistols are favoured weapons amongst the imperium's elite, and we've got the adeptus sororitas using normal and heavy bolters all the time (they're affectionally called the bolter bitches after all).

Then again, there's a clear difference between a bolter made to be used by space marines and those made to be used by regular humans.
I can't find my Deathwatch rulebook or I'd be able to compare the stats to the DH one.

It jams if you don't take proper care of the machine spirits.

Autism, that is the answer

i though machine spirits were just for electronics?

Sanctified adamantium and three times blessed pressed plasteel.
With a lot of love and care.

...

Reeee, get out here you unaugmented normie.

>-Are they caseless, do shells come out when shot?

Spent ammunition comes out. They have ejection ports and GW themselves have little accessories you can glue to the base for piles of spent brass.

>How fast is a bolt? is it faster than a bullet?

It's jet propelled, so slower than a bullet.

>-What kind of damage do bolts do?

Explosive damage.

>-What kind of recoil do bolters have?

It shouldn't have any, but it does have kick. Normal humans can't handle the heaviest bolter weapons such as vehicle and astartes sized heavy bolters.

>-what kind of penetration to bolts have?

They can penetrate infantry armor and the 40k equivalent of concrete.

>-how many shots per magazine?

Average 30.

>-how much does a bolter/bolt cost to be made by the AdMec?

A lot. That's why only marines get them standard. The church also funds their private army with them. Everyone else with a bolter is either very wealthy or very important, such as a general or an inquisitor.

>-What is a bolters rate of fire?

It should be fairly slow.

>-What is a bolters range?

Small arms range.

so do all nonelectric things have machine spirits? Ork Choppa? imperial guard canteen?

Ork choppa no, you idiot, it is xeno tech.
Canteen maybe.

Because marines don't need to cheek weld to shoot accurately due to their superhuman senses, superhuman training, and aiming systems, and longer barreled bolters do exist. Try using google instead of bombarding Veeky Forums with retarded questions.

>-Are they caseless, do shells come out when shot?

Officially, they're caseless. Some writers fuck up with this though

>-How fast is a bolt? is it faster than a bullet?

As fast as a bullet especially when the rocket-assist kicks in

>-What kind of damage do bolts do?

Catastrophic to single shot death to normal people, takes a few direct hits to bring down a space marine or someone in power armor

>-What kind of recoil do bolters have?

significant

>-what kind of penetration to bolts have?

High, but still can't penetrate ceramite at long range unless it hits a weak point or hits successively

-how many shots per magazine?

There are different magazine sizes to justify the fluff inconsistency here. I've seen 30 as the most commonly circulated number though

>-how much does a bolter/bolt cost to be made by the AdMec?

High for a firearm. They're finely hand-crafted

>-What is a bolters rate of fire?

This is the biggest fluff inconsistency. Sometimes they're said to be near semi-automatic rate in its fire while the DoW game have them spraying like MG42's

>-What is a bolters range?

Same as a modern assault rifle

Ask yourself one question:
Is it a machine?

If the answer is yes, then it does, infact, have machine spirits.

I meant almost as fast as a bullet***

The speed of a Mk.19 grenade probably.

>writers

BLfag pls

Go look at a model

At least some Bolters have electric components to them. There's fluff bits of Bolters having gene-code devices on them that don't let them be fired by unauthorized users

The Mechanicum think machine spirits exist in any machine in any regard.

>At least some Bolters
Every SM bolter has electrical components because it has a video feed linked to their helmets. Its why they can fire perfectly accurate from the hip.

this doesn't help, a necron is a bloody machine, so is a ork Truk

They are xeno machi-scum, not real, venerable and noble machines.

sorry commissar

youtube.com/watch?v=4VXUDlcr0qI

This is really a very good thematic representation of 40k and the weapons in it. Some don't work exactly as described in fluff, but close enough.

The orks are way too accurate though.

On the subject of bolters, wasn't there a /k/omrade who did some number-crunching and simulation around making custom 12-gauge "bolts"? I remember seeing some cross-linking.

Aren't meltaguns used for taking out multiple enemies in that game instead of just being precise one shot weapons?

actually you only start getting penalties beyond 180m. absolute maximum range in 360m is absolute maximum range. WH40K RPG rangerules are weird.

Well 12 gauge mini grenades already exist

>"marine bolters are .75 or .998 caliber"
>"human bolters are smaller caliber, because they're weak and can't fire those larger calibers"

lol

>-Are they caseless, do shells come out when shot?
No, bolters are not caseless. Boltguns have case ejectors and an exposed bolt.

>-How fast is a bolt? is it faster than a bullet?
Depending on the load bolters range anywhere from subsonic to hypersonic. (Mach 5)

>-What kind of damage do bolts do?
Boltguns wreak damage comparable to the autocannon of an attack chopper, despite being 19mm they're very similar to 30mm noseguns on shit like Apaches or Cobras.

>-What kind of recoil do bolters have?
Depends on the caliber and who the gun was built for. Most space marine bolters will cause your arm to pop a socket or even be break several bones, where as lighter caliber boltguns made for normal 'umies can be fired one-handed even.

>-what kind of penetration to bolts have?
They'll go straight through APC armor.

>-how many shots per magazine?
Ranges from around 10 on bolt pistols to 25-32 on the full size bolters.

>-how much does a bolter/bolt cost to be made by the AdMec?
Shitload of resources, especially the bolts themselves.

>-What is a bolters rate of fire?
Depends on the model. Some are semiautomatic and even completely lack a full auto mode, others will go full P90 on your ass.

>-What is a bolters range?
Bolters have a range of several hundred meters. It really depends on how good the shooter is though, longest shot ever made with a boltgun was a bolt pistol sniping a heretic at over 2.5 kilometers.

>It's jet propelled, so slower than a bullet.
No they aren't. Bolters range anywhere from subsonic to hypersonic depending on the ammunition used. Hypersonic rounds are particularly nasty.

>It shouldn't have any, but it does have kick. Normal humans can't handle the heaviest bolter weapons such as vehicle and astartes sized heavy bolters.
Bolts a two-stage explosive you mong. They have an initial kicker charge to send it out the gun and down a significant range, followed by the rocket.

Yeah, but gyrojet hybrids don't. Would be cool to see, since there should be some merit to their design. Besides, with fins like on your pic, you'd get rid of the tricky machined angled exhausts on a gyrojet cartridge.

Yes
Yes
Lots the all the rest.

That's the one I was referring to as the exception. The appearance, noise and effect on enemies is about the same, though. They seem to behave more like cones of heat rather than beams, so yeah. Might also have wanted it to be even more incandescently hot.

But the bolt, plasma, power weapons and the chainsword is pretty damn spot-on. Add to that the atmosphere and scale and the frankly pretty good voice-acting and you've got a nice representation of the 40k universe.

The story is a separate thing, but yeah.

I actually used them as anti Chaos Marine weapon. No one survives a double tap from it. That and laser cannon for havocs and other long range traitors.

>What kind of recoil do bolters have?
>yes

Newflash: bolter guns shot miniature rockets.

Unless GW retconned it

Something being poorly touched on here is that a bolt is a ROCKET. It's going it's slowest when it leaves the barrel of the weapon and it's propellant ignites, speeding up as it goes along. This is the opposite of a bullet. Therefor the farther away a target is, so long as it's still within the range that the bolt will still have propellant to burn, the faster it's going and therefor the more energy and penetration potential it will have.

This almost certainly gives a bolter a very odd feel when trying to aim as it should have no drop before a certain range and a speed that shifts up and then down depending on the range. This would probably require a lot of time and training to get used to, further adding to the list of reasons they're only used by specialist forces.

Did you miss all the people talking about the bolts having a casing with a charge like a bullet, firing the bolt out of the bolter with enough speed to be deadly at close ranges before the rocket kicks in and sends it on its way?

Well how otherwise would explain "If you are not a genetically enhanced super soldier that can lift a small car it will not only tear off your arm, it will also laugh all the way while flying at mach 7 backwards".

It's a 2 stage. They fire like regular bullets that also ignite and are rockets. Because their most regular users want to get up close and violent.

I knew 40k was laughably bad with numbers, but this is legitimately retarded. It's like the writers didn't do a single bit of research, especially on the range and effectiveness of Boost-After-Launch projectiles, or really how they work at all. At all.

This is understandable to a certain degree, since research was a bit more difficult than it is today, but these are the cracks and tears that just come to show how outdated and crippled the 40k setting is as a whole.

I'm not saying it's useless up close, I'm saying it's at its weakest just after leaving the barrel. It'd an odd weapon that would require you hit an enemy near the end of the range its propellant will still be burning to get the most out of the bolt. Still effective before the, but not at it's maximum.

Most of the damage of the standard bolt probably comes from the explosion filling and not the kinetic energy.

But most of the penetration would come from kenetic energy of the bolt. The faster it's going the more able it is to pierce armor. I know they usually have adamantine tips to punch through most armor but every little bit would help when you've got a 9 foot traitor marine looming down on you.

I don't think the bolt would accelerate the whole way to the target. There is a likely period between the moment before the booster fires and reaching full speed that the bolt is at its slowest. The rocket booster is likely to get the bolt to its top speed relatively fast. It's a small projectile.

You don't need advanced mathematics to fire an RPG. Sand people can do it just fine down to doing shit like fighting Soviet reactive armour by double tapping the same spot on the armour (first shot to detonate the reactive armour, second to penetrate the actual armour). RPG's work on the same sort of principle where a charge launches it out of the tube and then the rocket activates and flies it towards its target.

GW made all the ranged weapons in dark heresy have ridiculously short ranges so you could play firefights without a ten foot table.

True, I'm going off how gyrojets in our world work. I still think they would likely accelerate continuously considering the small mass of the bolt versus the likely enormous thrust of the advanced propellants the Imperium would have access to. Mostly just pointing out how subtly but hugely different it is compared to pretty much all other weapons. Perhaps it would hit a maximum velocity quickly, but this would still present a range at which the propellant ceased burning and the ballistics completely changed, hence the penalties for going over optimum range in the RPGs.

>Trying to translate anything in 40K to reality
I see you're new to the franchise. Shall I prepare the slideshow about power weapons and chainswords?

OP asked first, I'm just trying to oblige as much as possible. Just because GW doesn't know how logic works doesn't mean you can at least get a basic idea of how shit would work IRL. Didn't people basically get the relative power of a lasgun shot down to a vague range at some point?

Perhaps the guro-vore demon-womb? Maybe the genius, idiot-savant space-orangutans instead.

Don't forget to include Leman Russes being worse than modern day tanks

But to be fair you can probably build a Leman Russ on a feral world using nothing but two rocks and a sharpened branch, and it probably runs on chewing gum and good thoughts

the fun part is that they try to hype them up as some kind of heavy tank though, or at least they used to.

wouldnt that heavy bolter have an incredibly small ammo capacity?

>Leman Russes being worse than modern day tanks

Do explain.

Yeah, the ammo capacities for bolters is all sorts of fucked. That reminds me, does it ever actually state where a Marine carries extra ammo and roughly how much? We never really see them with ammo webbing or anything like that on the models or art. At least not that I've seen.

There's plenty of machine guns that use magazines.

>We never really see them with ammo webbing or anything like that on the models or art.

Because artists want to draw space knights and players don't want to put all the pouches and shit that come with Marine kits onto the models. Old metal SM models had pouches and grenades on their belts.

I do nerf wars so I have to deal with the pain of carrying 150 50cal, 7.3cm long projectiles in 8 magazines plus side arm and it's a huge pain in the ass with how bulky all the magazines are.

If I was designing power armour i would build in a bolt hopper with an auto mag fill mechanism. You take your empty mag and insert it into the auto fill and after some seconds you have a full mag ready to go.

Then in theory you only need two mags, one in the bolter and one in the refill. Although in reality you will sometimes need to ditch mags in the heat of the moment.

not giant shoulder mounted LMGs though

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/6P62

>en.wikipedia.org/wiki/6P62

Oh that's bullshit, you can't bring Russian into discussion about logical arms. This is the nation that made a silenced GRENADE LAUNCHER for fuck sake.

world.guns.ru/grenade/rus/bs-1-tishina-e.html

Leman Russ
>35kph max speed on road
>60 tons approx.
>Short barrel severely inhibits accuracy at long ranges
>Massively elevated turret reduces cover usage and increases the profile needed to get a crippling hit
>Better materials, but literally just plates of armour

M1 Abrams
>73kph max speed on road
>60-65 tons approx. depending on the model
>Long barrel allows for accurate firing of main weapon at 4km range
>Lowered frame and profile
>Worse materials, but plates and different composites laid out in specific ways to reduce damage as much as possible

That's about every comparison I can peronally say for sure, but also understand that the crew of a modern day tank is both more competent and better trained than most Guardsmen we've ever seen, as well as the M1 being properly maintained instead of having oil rubbed all over it to calm the engine down (not saying AdMech are incompetent, but their rituals really do hamper their efforts sometimes.)

To be fair, though, at least the Russ isn't powered by a fucking heat spewing, gas-inhaling turbine

Oh who am I kidding, the Russ probably uses something worse.

>Short barrel
>Long barrel

You'd have to actually have examples of Russes having poor accuracy, instead of just looking at it and going "that's surely gotta have poor accuracy." It's like people who complain about lack of sloped armour when modern ceramic armour and penetrator rounds specifically make standard sloped armour pretty shit and you either get barely any slope of really extreme slope.

>literally just plates of armour
>different composites laid out in specific ways to reduce damage as much as possible

Russ armour is a composite of plasteel and ceramite. They make terminator armour out of that.

We shouldn't forget:
>pic related
>engine that runs on pretty much anything combustible you can pour into it
>service life in hundreds of years in active duty while operated by people who think technology is magic (these days you can't even service a car without a master's degree in computer science and quantum physics)
>able to battle space aliens with reality warping technology

>You'd have to actually have examples of Russes having poor accuracy, instead of just looking at it and going "that's surely gotta have poor accuracy."

I can see where you're coming from, but at the same time I find it a more reasonable practice to base things on 40k off what they should do, unless there's specific lore to say otherwise. It's obviously not a good idea in the slightest to apply proper physics to the entire universe otherwise it breaks down fast, though.

>Russ armour is a composite of plasteel and ceramite. They make terminator armour out of that.

They also make Carapace, Power and some higher-end plates of Flak out of that, though Power and Terminator also possess Adamantium. Not saying anything against the materials, but it's plates of the two.

>pic related

The auto-loader, while minimally impressive, is pretty much the only thing on there that we couldn't trivially put on an M1 Abrams today.

You think that silencer?

You do realize that rules aren't canon, right?

>Carapace
>Power armour

They use ceramite.

>Power and Terminator also possess Adamantium

I've never seen power armour having adamantium, unless it's some special snowflake artificer armour. Terminator armour has an adamantium skeleton. Those struts you see on their legs and arms, that's adamantium. The actual armour is plasteel and ceramite.

>it's plates of the two

But M1 is special because it's plates of other materials, but more advanced. Somehow.

>put on an M1 Abrams today

Still far from the "WW1 tank in space" people always claim when talking about the Russ.

Didn't Leman Russ have RHA equivalent thickness for front side and rear armour quoted in canon somewhere?

And they were like, passable
for a medium tank
if it was WW2
and made by Italians.

>M1 Abrams is more advanced than a Leman Russ
>Leman Russ can equip a 4 gigajoule cannon
>Mfw

The Russ is a simple and utilitarian design.

The actual specs of the materials, armor, and weapons can vary greatly between worlds.

That's why there are references to both steel and plasteel armor in the fluff.

Considering that's contradicted by literally every time a Leman Russ has appeared in the Black Library, the rational conclusion is that Forge World was talking out of their ass. Again.

Didn't those fuckwits once say that space marine pauldrons had micro-missiles that intercepted incoming rounds or some shit? Or that MK IV power armor was the strongest and best version?

Nope. All you'll find is the physical thickness.

>MK IV power armor was the strongest and best version?

That's true though, even in BL fluff. Maximus had the best technology and manufacturing techniques, but it was too costly and resource intensive to produce by the end of the Crusade when resources were stretched thin. Kinda like how Volkites were almost the Space Marine standard weapon before the bolter was deemed sufficient and cheaper.

>marine pauldrons had micro-missiles that intercepted incoming rounds or some shit

No, they got auto-responsive plates. As I recall, they're on servos to move out of the way as you move your arms, so that you don't get what people always complain about marine pauldrons that the couldn't lift their arms over their heads and all that. They're not just plates strapped to their shoulders, there tech under there.

>Or that MK IV power armor was the strongest and best version?

MkIII is the strongest.

>They use Ceramite

Both the 40k Wiki and Lexicanum (for lack of a direct source, it's honestly one of those things I absorbed through exposure rather than finding a direct quote) seem to agree that Power Armour uses plasteel and ceramite, I admit that Carapace itself more often uses armaplas and I merely confused the two materials.

>I've never seen power armour having adamantium

I honestly can't remember the source on this one and concede that it may not be true. Though considering the vast use of the material in many areas it doesn't seem particularly unreasonable for it to be found within some more advanced forms of Power Armour, including Legion-grade.

>But M1 is special because it's plates of other materials, but more advanced. Somehow.

It's a little bit more than that. The actual construction of the ceramic tiles and metal matrix, alongside a different plate and several layers of an elastic nature are classified to the civilian population, but even that is only a primary, used alongside or replaced by M1A2 depleted uranium mesh-reinforced composite armor. Generally speaking when a vehicle like this is engineered with more kinds of materials, it means the overall effectiveness is better than if fewer of the materials were used.

>Still far from the "WW1 tank in space" people always claim when talking about the Russ.

Oh yeah, and I was never contesting that. Just pointing out some ways in which the Abrams is better than the Russ on a calculable level (obviously not taking the writer's mood or needs of the narrative into account), the latter possessing a few design inefficiencies and a few hilarious flaws. Still made of incredibly tough stuff and with some really nice tech in it, though.

>Volkites were almost the Space Marine standard weapon before the bolter was deemed sufficient and cheaper.
Bolters are also more adaptable with the library of specialist shells. Volkite (Discounting the vehicle scale ones) are fairly shit against anything that isn't a tightly packed horde of lightly armored enemies. Basically, Volkite was boss against orks and sucked shit against other Astartes.

It's "conventional steel" and "plasteel". One could argue plasteel to be the conventional steel of 40k, since it's used in pretty much everything.

My point is that the Lemen Russ is so common, and the variations between different planets so great, that it's more than likely that both are true.

We don't know how the plasteel and ceramite are worked into armour, what materials are used in the making of plasteel and ceramite, etc. It's not very fair to just assume they're overlapping plates riveted together with no design effort put into it what so ever.

Do remember, Russes date back to the Great Crusade and Horus Heresy, when Admech knew some shit and designed new stuff from the ground up left and right.

Apparently amorphous steel is probably a good idea of what plasteel is. Amorphous steel being basically a glass made of steel instead of silicon oxide.

200mm of amorphous steel armour would be about 1000mm of RHA. That's a lot of armour but may still be able to be penetrated by the best SABOT rounds today at close range. The US M829A3 DU penetrator coming out of a Rheinmetall 120mm can punch through 765mm RHA at 2km range.

No. The best power armor is MK VIII, followed by MK VII. MK IV just has better sensors but was logistically unfeasible. MK III is specialist gear meant for boarding and tunnel fighting.

Ok, going by the old WD SM armour article, what I remember from HH and shit like that:
>MkI was just basic powered armour with only the upper body having enhanced mobility and serving as the suit the Emperor's forces used to unit Earth and the system. It wasn't named the MkI until the MkII came along.
>MkII was purpose designed for the Great Crusade with all the contingencies they could think of in mind. And some Marines still consider it the best.
>MkIII was a MkII with updated hardware for stuff like void operations and heavy armour plating on the front. Best protected of them all, but cumbersome for the user.
>MkIV used whole slew of new technologies and materials to improve on lessons learned from the previous marks. It replaced the segmented armour with solid plates, which reduced mobility but made it much easier to manufacture and maintain. Cabling was reduced under the plating, new sensory systems, etc. Horus even aimed to equip all legions loyal to him with MkIVs before the Heresy.
>MkV quickly designed suit to fill in the ranks. Basic principle is MkIV style solid plate armour that aims to use as much of the more common MkII and III components and technologies as possible to ensure any shop can make them. Lack of materials leads to inferior armour that has to be boosted with extra plating bolted on, putting a strain on the servos and power supply. MkIV parts were used when possible, such as cabling and helmets.
>MkVI was in prototype phase before the Heresy. It took the advanced sensory of the MkIV to a new level and was a test bed for a whole new idea of a modular and easy to maintain and manufacture power armour. It could use replace its parts with simpler ones in a pinch. It lacked in protection and some legions wanted it to fail. It used MkV style studded plating in some parts, but after the Heresy, one more advanced materials were more available, it got new armour.

>MkVII completed the concept the MkVI started, but the VI continued to serve since it wasn't a terrible suit either.
>MkVIII fixed the few problems the MkVII had, but the extra resources to make these fixes was not considered worth it over the benefits and MkVIII serves in low numbers.

Quick fluff correction, the Mk V and VI Dalek studs were apparently "Molecular bonding studs" that themselves function as cheap but somewhat heavy ablative armor. They're not just connectors to bolt on more armor.