The 200 year old weapon rant

[Skree000]

2 things

 

1. A nuclear holocaust happening to a weapon is slightly different than 'passing a weapon down through generations of family members' Thus more dmg :)

 

2. Can you send me those weapons IRL so i can just ummm double check and verify your claims? *schemingly rubs hands together* hehe

 

8-)

[einherjrar]

All this talk of things having to be rusty, chipped and the whole "after 200 years old you get, look good you will not" I have a bayonet that went belonging to my Great, Great Grandfather that was used in Two World Wars and apart from one tiny chip in the blade is in mint condition. I also have a pair of flintlock pistols with spring mounted bayonet from 1753 and a horse pistol from 1801, again all in mint condition and all shiny, nothing wrong with the springs, the wooden furnishings or anything. If a weapon is cared for it will survive centuries with only the most minor of cosmetic wear and tear, so please can we stop all the argueing over texture being "too clean"

 

well, that was cathartic :biggrin: had to get it out of my ssystem

 

Having collected, operated, maintained and constructed various types of firearms, I too have an opinion about firearms which have remained intact for two centuries.

 

On the one hand you have the historical pieces you and your family have mentioned in mint condition,

 

On the other hand, I own a pondevaux et lissy (jussy) side by side shotgun from the late 1800's that was recovered from a storage locker. It had been stored in it's leather container for years in a dry environment. Aside from missing a hammer and having it's stock crushed (broken at the bow), all metallic surfaces were heavily oxidized (including the inside of the barrel, and fire control group). Excluding the physical abuse of the broken stock, the important part of the gun was completely intact.. and utterly unusable. Too much corrosion, imminent risk of barrel breach if I ever fired it with a full load.

 

With proper maintenance and minimal care, a well made tool can outlast consecutive owners. But abuse isn't necessarily to destroy a tool, enough time and neglect is all it takes.

 

If anyone had applied a miniscule amount of oil or lubricant every few years, it would have helped prevent the deep corrosion, but it was in a storage locker and never saw the light of day.

 

I guess this is really my thoughts about all the firearms that were locked away in depots. They certainly wouldn't likely be pretty by any means.

 

.02 USD

[Moraelin]

1. _But_ here's the important part: regardless of how you found it, if you decided to entrust your life to that gun, you'd first clean and oil it. Running around with a Mauser with a rusty slide like in the game is IMHO pretty freaking stupid. That thing will jam in your darkest hour of need.

 

2. There is also stuff like the sword of Goujian which has been found in nearly mint condition, after being over 2400 years under water. Apparently it had a water-tight scabbard. Still, you know, nearly 25 centuries. In water. Roll that around in your head.

 

Somehow finding a clean weapon after 200 years doesn't seem all that impossible.

[Khet]

Stop me if some of this has been mentioned already. Actually, don't bother cause I'm gonna post anyway! *cackles*

 

First off, I don't own a gun. The closest thing to a weapon that I 'own' is a replica hand-and-a-half sword, fully sharpened and hasn't been taken out of it's sheath in about five years. I mention this because my statements might be a little inaccurate or completely wrong (please correct me on any points)

 

With that out of the way, I really don't see how a gun, even one that has been passed down from generation to generation can stay minty fresh for 200 bloody years, especially since it's being used. Sure, there are ways to clean and care for a weapon but with my limited knowledge I'm pretty sure that even with proper care and handling a gun will eventually 'age' and it'll show. Namely, I think we're forgetting the 200 YEARS part. Yeah, sure we can keep guns squeaky clean right now but how much is that due to synthetic chemicals/cleaners/oils? If any of those existed in the Fallout universe I think it's safe to assume that they've all been used up. Then again... we still find hospitals with stimpaks and other medical goodies so I guess it's possible...

 

Where was I? Ah... yes. Let's say those chemicals/cleaners/oils have indeed been used up (due to the fact that we don't find any!) It's safe to assume that despite the bestest of care your weapon WILL age. Like I said I don't know much about guns (last time I fired one was a good ten years ago) but from my understanding they require oiling of the mechanical parts, polishing of the barrel, blah blah blah. Now, take Post-Apocolyptia for example. Dust. Sand. Dirt. That stuff will begin to wear out the finish on the gun over time, no matter how much you polish it. Since we can assume there's no oil for the mechanical parts they too can begin to wear and tear, thus requiring you to rip apart another gun, rip apart you own and replace some of the parts with (hopefully) better condition pieces.

 

That, and I'm sure many guns have been made AFTER the bombs were dropped with spare parts. Heck, look at Afghanistan (I think?) they make their own AKs and such. None of the look as snazzy as the factory made ones (I think? :D But I assume they wouldn't). Now, look at the Chinese Pistol. Seriously that thing looks like it's been slapped together with a few sheets of metal, cheese wire and bubblegum. (McGuyver could do it!)

 

Now, for the most important part of my post. Correct anything I made a mistake on with my limited gun-knowledge. I promise I won't hurt you too bad.

[Moraelin]

Scratches on the finish are fine. I'm not going to argue with you about that.

 

What does mildly annoy me is when people come and ask for every-bloody-thing to be _rusty_ "like in fallout 3". And "because it's 200 years old."

 

As if rust were a permanent un-removable addition to iron. If it were that hard and impossible to remove, we'd _anodize_ iron pieces to get them nicely covered in a layer of oxide, like we do for aluminium and titanium. Because the oxide of both is harder than the underlying titanium or aluminium, and stays bonded to the surface, we pre-oxidize them. The hard layer of oxide actually makes them better.

 

But iron oxide is not like that. It's porous, it's brittle, and it flakes off the surface. That's why we don't like rust. Which also means that some quality time with a wire brush and a few drops of oil will get rid of it.

 

And yes, that's all it takes. You don't need any special chemicals. Somethingh abrasive like a wire brush or whetstone is all you need, and some oil will then keep it dry for some time. Mineral oil would be nice, but people have been oiling their swords for millenia before that was discovered just as well.

 

But anyway, if a blade is still usable at all (as opposed to rusted right through), you clean it before doing anything else. And doubly so for a gun. If the barrel still looks like it wouldn't explode if you shot that gun, first thing you'd take it apart and clean it. Because otherwise you're just begging for a malfunction later, in the middle of a fight. You don't want to charge in the middle of a raider nest, or run into the next Talon Company headhunting crew, and discover that your Mauser's slide doesn't slide any more, or that the hammer on your .44 Magnum remains locked, or worse that that spring you never checked was all rusted and breaks.

[scannerfish]

I don't think every single weapon in this game is a 200 year old hand me down.

 

 

I think there is a certain amount of limited mass production going on in the wasteland, and from areas around it. Rivet City, Evergreen Mills, and Megaton all have the ability to make new weaponry, or at least manufacture necessary components for upkeep.

[Wreckless1]

Stop me if some of this has been mentioned already. Actually, don't bother cause I'm gonna post anyway! *cackles*

 

Now, for the most important part of my post. Correct anything I made a mistake on with my limited gun-knowledge. I promise I won't hurt you too bad.

 

 

Please read my first post in this thread. Moraelin's additional points on the nature of finishes and the difference between damaging wear and finish wear are also very much worth noting.

 

But to add onto my first post, let me stress that my father owns an M1911 that was made in 1915 and carried and actually USED by my great grandfather in WW1 and my grandfather in WW2 & Korea. Despite that service life, it functions 100% reliably with the FMJ ammo it was designed to use and only has some moderate holster wear that would put it around the 93% condition range if being graded on the NRA condition scale.

Thus, I must stress that most modern firearms would survive just about anything if given the proper maintenance.

 

In another case, a family friend had his sailboat sink in its moorings following a large hurricane hitting the area - and the Glock 21 that was locked in the safe onboard was fully submerged in saltwater for almost two months before it was recovered. Despite that crazy-harsh environment, the bore was only mildly pitted and remained serviceable, and the operating parts in the frame as well as the slide were almost spotless thanks to their protective finishes.

Out of sheer curiousity, we decided to leave the gun in an 'as is' condition, unlubricated, and try to fire the same ammo from the same magazine that was in the weapon while it was submerged. One round failed to fire (probably because of saltwater leaking into the cartridge casing somehow) but the gun functioned flawlessly otherwise, and continued to fire with unerring reliablity when it was fed ammo that had not been submerged in saltwater.

So, ammunition reliability and age is something that'd need to be considered right along with weapon condition and wear if we really wanted to nitpick.

 

Considering all of these factors and more, I really don't think its any sort of a stretch to expect decent firearms to survive some neglect and remain quite serviceable. A well-maintained weapon, on the other hand, will stay serviceable almost indefinitely until wear parts like springs begin to fail or malfunction - and on most modern rifle designs and quite a few older ones, that wouldn't happen for many decades and/or after tens or hundreds of thousands of rounds have been fired through it.

 

On the subject of weapon maintenance items - depending on the design of the specific weapon, common axle grease or motor oil will function quite well in most repeating firearms, and are frequently used in a pinch on the battlefield when a specified lubricant isn't available.

[PrometheusV]

"Don´t let the Overseer catch you with this, it´s a BB Gun.We found it in bad shape. It tooks us month to repair it, ever tried to find a spring that small?" - Your Dad on your 10th birthday

 

Repairing ingame:

Due to a lack of parts and knowlegde you must use other weapons to repair and maintain your own.

 

"The Stratovarius is in PERFECT Shape, because it was in a protective sealed vaccuum case, so it could survive the bombs without any harm" -Agatha

 

"Here have this, its my husbands pistol. Its in perfect shape, because my husband took care of it every day. It was very important to him" - Agatha handing you Blackhawk

 

Just to throw in some more food for both sides hahahaha :whistling:

 

 

So actually the game already has "perfect condition" weapons. Its mostly the special ones. Bethesda just used the same "rusty" textures.

[dookieboy]

Heh, this kinda reminds me I think we should make a mod where we have weapons function like in Far Cry 2 , where you can buy nice, clean, guns, and where if you pick up a gun from a dead body or another person, it'll be all rusty and will jam.

[vashts1985]

everyone also seems to be assuming that there was noone around from the time that the bombs droped untill 200 years later. much ingame lore supports the fact that there were few that survived the blast, outside of the cushy vaults. some died of rads of course, some turned into ghouls, but there were people around to scavenge, directly after the bombs fell. alot of the "working" weapons would have been found, prolly not too long after the bombs, as they would have been a hot commodity at that point. some may have survived 200 years, ALOT i would imagin did not. there is no way i could see so many working weapons without some folks with the knowledge to maintain and care for weapons, if not the knowledge to build them.

 

simply put, rusted weapons are unusable, sometimes because the rust prevents the inner workings form...well working.

if they did work, you would blow off you hand more likely than not when the chamber fails to contain the pressure of the cartridge being fired from the corrosion