A industrial society that lags in military tech (RAR!)

[madd0ct0r]

lessee..

I think we can assume the development of fire engines. These lead to the development of water cannon on fireboats, within the time frame and could certainly lead to fire engine's being press-ganged into riot control (since riots do tend involve fire anyway) before being adopted permanently.

Extinguishing fires on boats and buildings near the water was much more difficult and dangerous before fireboats were invented. The first fireboat deployed in Los Angeles was commissioned on 1 August 1919. The first fireboat in New York City was Marine 1, deployed 1 February 1891. There may have been other fireboats elsewhere even earlier.

for pacification, mounted police are STILL very popular in the UK, so I'm guessing the old miltary will be holding onto it's calvary for more than just nostalgia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mounted_police
Insurrectionist counter - petrol bombs used to make a defensive line, wires strung across streets, pikes (ironically), cheap nail caltrops, maybe flashbang fireworks/ proto grenades.

Shields, body armor and billy clubs go back thousands of years, so again are likely to come back for mob line control. Shields especially for thrown projectiles.
Riveted plate troops dropping out of an armoured car would be effective snatch squads and better at house clearing than rifles, although I'm willing to bet the insurrection will resort to flamethrowers against them pretty quickly.
An example use might be driving the car up to a barricade, the plate troops attaching big hooks on the front and the car backing down the street, dragging the barricade to pieces while a squad of muskets fire into the mess.

Slings and lobbas (scrap iron on a rope, spun up and thrown high as a shrapnel mortar) will also appear as insurrection weapons needing answers to. Crossbows are much more difficult, although if something like bamboo is available pretty nasty crude stuff can be made for one battle.
Fire arrows are always fun
Looking to the vietcong - mantraps, spike traps and other nastiness might well come into play.

IEDs and road mines might come in reasonably quickly, especially in areas with heavy mining industries.
Fireworks seem to be universally popular in this world, so again, flashbangs and flares could enter service quite quickly after the first use.



@simonjester - just assume all the big predators are dead or nearly extinct. its a big settled empire with grumpy farmers. look at europe or china, not USA

[LaCroix]

People seem to overlook a simple reason that there are no modern firearms - mercury fulminate, or the lack thereof (and no substitute, neither).
Without it, there would never have been the transition from flintlock to percussion. Without the step to percussion caps, there will be no metallic cartridge, and no repeating rifle.

There might be already modern ideas like falling block breechloaders and everything, but they aren't adopted because they "make soldiers shoot with haste and no care for ammunition preservation."

Also, using a quick-loading breech loader blackpowder gun will be devastating for the user due to foulding - the ideas were never used in battle for that reason - after ten shots, a barrel might be clogged up enough to be blocked, but loading might still be possible. People knew to discard their gun if they weren't able to ram a ball home, but a breech loader would accept ball and charge, only to blow up in their face! (Fergussons had huge problem with fouling.)
If that happened often enough, they might have scrapped the idea as promising, but not worth the time. (Like the fergusson)

[Titan Uranus]

People seem to overlook a simple reason that there are no modern firearms - mercury fulminate, or the lack thereof (and no substitute, neither).
Without it, there would never have been the transition from flintlock to percussion. Without the step to percussion caps, there will be no metallic cartridge, and no repeating rifle.

There might be already modern ideas like falling block breechloaders and everything, but they aren't adopted because they "make soldiers shoot with haste and no care for ammunition preservation."

Also, using a quick-loading breech loader blackpowder gun will be devastating for the user due to foulding - the ideas were never used in battle for that reason - after ten shots, a barrel might be clogged up enough to be blocked, but loading might still be possible. People knew to discard their gun if they weren't able to ram a ball home, but a breech loader would accept ball and charge, only to blow up in their face! (Fergussons had huge problem with fouling.)
If that happened often enough, they might have scrapped the idea as promising, but not worth the time. (Like the fergusson)

With 1910 technology I am not certain that a chemical reaction based weapon would be required, what if they used an airifle with easily removable canisters of compressed air as propellent and a rather standard magazine full of bullets.

Also there are plenty of chemicals that can serve the role of Mercury Fulminate, which they should have access to assuming a vibrant chemical industry at ~1910 levels.
And again, with a vibrant chemical and mining industry there is no reason to assume that they cannot improve on black powder especially since (correct me if I am wrong on this) certain mining tasks utilize
low explosives, the kind without a rock-shattering shock wave.



Now if somehow there have been no rebellions in the past 500 years I would imagine that discontent would be at a fever pitch, and any modernization of the army would be pointless against roughly the entire lower and middle classes up in arms.

[Forgothrax]

At what point did Zor state that mercury fulminate or similar primers are not available in this scenario?

[Formless]

He didn't. LaCroix is trying to salvage the thread from certain posters trying to drag the RAR off its rails for seemingly no reason. Its a dang RAR, guys. Its for fun, not an alternate history we're supposed to take seriously. There is no reason to nitpick the original parameters. Detailing weapons they've likely invented or developed in the 500 years prior to the scenario that are consistent with their technology, okay I get that, but taking issue with the sophistication of their guns is missing the point.

Could you point me to more information about this? I was under the impression that Indian armies typically used well defined musket-form guns, and ordinary swords, spears, and such, and had never before heard of this idea of whole armies armed with guns that have swords in them or vice versa

Not whole armies, but not one-off weapons either. At the 5:28 mark of this video Nidar Singh brings out a sword which he mentions frequently had a musket inside, and I trust the man for two reasons: from everything I've seen from him he's demonstrated practically encyclopedic knowledge of India's military and martial history, and I have seen several antiques to back up what he says.

Yeah, being the fantasy nerd I am I have an entire folder on my computer with nothing but pictures of blades and a subfolder for swords. Unfortunately I haven't been very diligent in documenting links to where I got most of them, especially the section of true antiques .

Riveted plate troops dropping out of an armoured car would be effective snatch squads and better at house clearing than rifles, although I'm willing to bet the insurrection will resort to flamethrowers against them pretty quickly.

Not inside their own residences and workplaces, I bet! Flamethrowers tend to be better used as an offensive weapon to flush defenders out.

Fireworks seem to be universally popular in this world, so again, flashbangs and flares could enter service quite quickly after the first use.

Yeah, I was just thinking that they might develop some kind of rocket launchers like those in China and Korea. Probably explosive too. For aerial combat like I was speculating earlier rockets might be the weapon of choice in lieu of guns. They could at least set blimps, balloons and zeppelins on fire, I think.

Also pikes are not such a great nightmare to attack in dense cities.
I would not expect a army that has not fought a real war in 500 years to hold their ground if their formation is broken by rebel mobs, militia, or regulars. And when they do run they will either drop their weapons (pikes at least) and bolt or die while running. Pike blocks in dense cities (I would assume most big rebellions would occur there or at the mines) would be simple to break with petro bombs thrown from the upper stories and as soon as part of the army breaks the entire army will likely break because there are no real veteran units or officers or ncos around which the army can rally. This will give the rebels time to organize a better defense.

Although like I said earlier, riots don't just happen in dense cities. And even in dense cities they are known to happen in parks, landmarks, fields, plazas, and other open places where people might congregate to protest. But yes, in smaller streets and inside buildings blades and truncheons are the way to go. Different weapons for different environments.

With 1910 technology I am not certain that a chemical reaction based weapon would be required, what if they used an airifle with easily removable canisters of compressed air as propellent and a rather standard magazine full of bullets.

That's a good question. The Lewis and Clark expedition brought one or two air rifles to impress the native tribes with the rapidity and quietness of their guns. However, air rifles have a couple limitations. They are limited in power by the maximum pressure of the air bottle (meaning: fill it too high and it will blow up because the materials can't take it), and they steadily lose power as the bottle loses pressure. So we can probably assume they have them, but I think their inherent limitations are why they weren't the game changer in real life that metallic cartridges and self loading rifles were.

Now if somehow there have been no rebellions in the past 500 years I would imagine that discontent would be at a fever pitch, and any modernization of the army would be pointless against roughly the entire lower and middle classes up in arms.

Well, that goes without saying. Difficulty here is getting an entire continent to go full French Revolution mode when talk radio has just been invented.

[SMJB]

He didn't, but weapons technology hasn't exactly been a top priority during the last five centuries..

EDIT: ninja'd.

<snip>

My God, you're right! I feel stupid for having missed that.

Not that the poster below you doesn't have some good points, as well.

[Jub]

Based on what I've found here aerial rockets will be utterly dismal for use anywhere that you can't afford to miss.

"The average hit rate of MS-82 in the tank pickup point when shooting from a distance of 400-500 meters, as shown in the materials of the report, was 1.1%, and in a column of tanks - 3.7%, with 186 of the issued ammunition was received only 7 direct hits. The height of the approach to the goal of -100 and 400 meters, the angles of planning - 5-10 and 30, respectively, Targeting Range - 800 meters. Shots were fired shells and single volley of 2, 4 and 8 rounds."

Now considering that these are late 1930's technology from a nation that was known to heavily use rockets on the battlefield I can only imagine how few rockets would go anywhere near the spot they've been aimed at. Plus 1910 era planes might be able to carry a handful of the things on a dedicated bomber platform and smaller rockets that they could carry more of would have next to no charge and likely have even worse accuracy unless they really started to play with spin stabilization and fin sizes and angles.

[Formless]

Oh, well... that's disappointing. What about rockets fired from the ground? Sill not accurate enough to hit a blimp, or would saturation be enough to make balloons ineffective for air based attacks?

[Jub]

It depends on how many rockets you want to fire, and what the range you can get from early 1900's rocket engines. My guess is that you simply won't have the quality needed to get them to the blimp with a reasonably sized rocket. The Le Pieur rocket was only accurate with 115m and thus a plane would need to get right up on a blimp or balloon to score a hit. Of course misses, and some hits, will go right through and land somewhere, maybe a field or wilderness or maybe in a building, maybe a school. You don't use rockets if you care about where they go afterwards.

You might want to look into Congreve rockets, Hale rockets, and Boxer rockets to get an idea of how far rockets needed to go before they could be used to any real effect without firing hundreds of them at once. Even with better rockets air-to-ground attacks (far easier than attempting the reverse) had dismal accuracy. Even ground-to-ground rockets were mainly used for the terror value and weren't actually an artillery replacement.

IMHO you'd be way better of trying to find a way to get a cannon light enough or a plane big enough and use something like grapeshot against a blimp. That way you can tear as much material as possible with shot with low enough mass that it might not fly everywhere and if if does it may not have the energy to do much real damage. So something the weight of a quarter but fired in large numbers at the same range as a rocket might work.

[LaCroix]

Also there are plenty of chemicals that can serve the role of Mercury Fulminate, which they should have access to assuming a vibrant chemical industry at ~1910 levels.
And again, with a vibrant chemical and mining industry there is no reason to assume that they cannot improve on black powder especially since (correct me if I am wrong on this) certain mining tasks utilize low explosives, the kind without a rock-shattering shock wave.

You are missing the history of the firearm.

Firearms were invented around the turn of the millenium, and in widespread use since the 12th century. Still, they remained basically the same mid - 19th century, variation of flintlocks. With a flint lock mechanism, there is no way to create a multy-shot weapon other than by using multiple barrels, and it is prone to misfire and will not work well in damp or wet conditions. That's why they almost always used guns in combination with other weapons. In these 700 years, they did all they could to come up with better guns, to a point they got somehow relyable, but they couldn't take it one step further.

The single thing that enabled out modern warfare - multi-shot guns, machineguns, modern artillery, bombs and grenades (due to impact fuses) - is not the metallic cartridge.
It's the mercury fulminate.

That single thing, which was invented in 1800, revolutionized guns.
By 1820 - almost everyone used percussion caps - guns were now almost weatherproof, and reliabilty skyrocketed.

But what is more important, is that people immediately began having ideas of adding the cap to the already common paper cartriges, and getting a way to fire the whole cartridge.
In 1808, only 8 years after the invention of MF, we had the first true self-contained paper cartridge and breech-loading gun using it, the Dreyser gun.

And by 1860, we had the metallic cartridge. It was the logical result of MF.

So if these people had anything like MF, they would have invented modern weaponry within a few years. It's inevitable. The fact that they haven't means they don't have that stuff.

Without it, people would still be stuck in what is basic napoleonic warfare, with some extra tech.

And the army couldn't use most of their superior weaponry in rainy weather - guns&cars getting stuck in mud, airplanes can't fly, and you can't reloead a flintlock without getting it wet - which would make fall the perfect time to start insurrections. It would probably become a proverb that rain brings revolution.

[Simon_Jester]

That's great story material, I love it.

If we want to be very literal, well, a society with 1900-level chemistry will have found out about mercury fulminate a long time ago almost by default, but if we're writing a semi-fantastic story it works well.

[LaCroix]

That's great story material, I love it.

If we want to be very literal, well, a society with 1900-level chemistry will have found out about mercury fulminate a long time ago almost by default, but if we're writing a semi-fantastic story it works well.

Probably. But you must remember that mercury and all other reagents were known for like 3500 years before someone had the idea to pour nitric acid and alcohol into a jar of mercury. The fact that it will (when not done with utmost care) most probably result in a detonation and a hurt chemist inhaling poisonous mercury vapors mith had been a deterrent. Fact is, if they eveer invented something better than a flint to ignite powder, the evolution of the gun would have been a quick process, so we must work with the fact that they, for some reason, haven't.

It might be as easy as that they live on a continent with no (notable)mercury deposits.
To quote Wikipedia:

Mercury is an extremely rare element in the Earth's crust, having an average crustal abundance by mass of only 0.08 parts per million (ppm).

That could have resulted in mercury being a horrendously expensive ressource, which made the idea of burning it up in a gun laughable...

[Titan Uranus]

Also there are plenty of chemicals that can serve the role of Mercury Fulminate, which they should have access to assuming a vibrant chemical industry at ~1910 levels.
And again, with a vibrant chemical and mining industry there is no reason to assume that they cannot improve on black powder especially since (correct me if I am wrong on this) certain mining tasks utilize low explosives, the kind without a rock-shattering shock wave.

You are missing the history of the firearm.

Firearms were invented around the turn of the millenium, and in widespread use since the 12th century. Still, they remained basically the same mid - 19th century, variation of flintlocks. With a flint lock mechanism, there is no way to create a multy-shot weapon other than by using multiple barrels, and it is prone to misfire and will not work well in damp or wet conditions. That's why they almost always used guns in combination with other weapons. In these 700 years, they did all they could to come up with better guns, to a point they got somehow relyable, but they couldn't take it one step further.

The single thing that enabled out modern warfare - multi-shot guns, machineguns, modern artillery, bombs and grenades (due to impact fuses) - is not the metallic cartridge.
It's the mercury fulminate.

That single thing, which was invented in 1800, revolutionized guns.
By 1820 - almost everyone used percussion caps - guns were now almost weatherproof, and reliabilty skyrocketed.

But what is more important, is that people immediately began having ideas of adding the cap to the already common paper cartriges, and getting a way to fire the whole cartridge.
In 1808, only 8 years after the invention of MF, we had the first true self-contained paper cartridge and breech-loading gun using it, the Dreyser gun.

And by 1860, we had the metallic cartridge. It was the logical result of MF.

So if these people had anything like MF, they would have invented modern weaponry within a few years. It's inevitable. The fact that they haven't means they don't have that stuff.

Without it, people would still be stuck in what is basic napoleonic warfare, with some extra tech.

And the army couldn't use most of their superior weaponry in rainy weather - guns&cars getting stuck in mud, airplanes can't fly, and you can't reloead a flintlock without getting it wet - which would make fall the perfect time to start insurrections. It would probably become a proverb that rain brings revolution.

I know that Hg(CNO)2 was what spurred these inventions in real life.
My point about magazines was directed at airguns from the 16th century and I do know that neither they nor the old school breechloaders were widely produced, my point was that there were prior examples to give them the idea of magazines and breechloaders (which from my understanding date to guns made for nobles in the 1600's or so).
My point was that they should have developed contact explosives similar to Hg(CNO)2 already with a ~1910 chemical industry, as well as better propellants than black powder.

There must be another non-physical reason (there are good contact explosives that do not use Hg) for their not using this. That reason could affect the scenario. The best two reasons that I can think of are tremendous conservatism and the upper classes restricting weapons in order to keep their power. The former implies that the military will have some difficulty adapting, at least at first while the latter implies a massive rebellion because, presumably all of the economic disruptions of industrialization will have taken place without the corresponding social reforms that were used to placate the middle classes.
Another idea that I had was that there is a strong Guild-based military-industrial-political complex which prevents the army from using factories.

Also pikes are not such a great nightmare to attack in dense cities.
I would not expect a army that has not fought a real war in 500 years to hold their ground if their formation is broken by rebel mobs, militia, or regulars. And when they do run they will either drop their weapons (pikes at least) and bolt or die while running. Pike blocks in dense cities (I would assume most big rebellions would occur there or at the mines) would be simple to break with petro bombs thrown from the upper stories and as soon as part of the army breaks the entire army will likely break because there are no real veteran units or officers or ncos around which the army can rally. This will give the rebels time to organize a better defense.

Although like I said earlier, riots don't just happen in dense cities. And even in dense cities they are known to happen in parks, landmarks, fields, plazas, and other open places where people might congregate to protest. But yes, in smaller streets and inside buildings blades and truncheons are the way to go. Different weapons for different environments.

With 1910 technology I am not certain that a chemical reaction based weapon would be required, what if they used an airifle with easily removable canisters of compressed air as propellant and a rather standard magazine full of bullets.

That's a good question. The Lewis and Clark expedition brought one or two air rifles to impress the native tribes with the rapidity and quietness of their guns. However, air rifles have a couple limitations. They are limited in power by the maximum pressure of the air bottle (meaning: fill it too high and it will blow up because the materials can't take it), and they steadily lose power as the bottle loses pressure. So we can probably assume they have them, but I think their inherent limitations are why they weren't the game changer in real life that metallic cartridges and self loading rifles were.

Now if somehow there have been no rebellions in the past 500 years I would imagine that discontent would be at a fever pitch, and any modernization of the army would be pointless against roughly the entire lower and middle classes up in arms.

Well, that goes without saying. Difficulty here is getting an entire continent to go full French Revolution mode when talk radio has just been invented.

1: Yes, but even as mobile fortresses in plazas and such I would not expect them to hold their ground unprotected, in dense formation, against petrol bombs and sticks of dynamite. I would imagine that these would break the pikes rather quickly, causing a general rout and allowing both sides technicians some breathing room to allow them to come up with better weapons.

I do concede about truncheons and swords, though those would still require dense formations I expect leaving them vulnerable to petrol bombs and dynamite.

2: I would not expect airguns to be as good as their chemical counterparts, but they do have obvious ancestors even in this world (the RAR-world, that is).

The point of the detachable compressed air canister was to mitigate the problem of pressure drop-off.

3: Kidding aside, when radio was first mass-produced it allowed anyone with as relatively cheap transmitter to broadcast to a wide audience. This was before it was regulated, obviously. But in this scenario mass radio use is not that far away, and I could be used to rouse dissent (as it did in my country (the USA) during the 1930's) and to coordinate rebel mobs and militia in areas in rebellion ("The syphilitic, inbred, blue-blooded parasites are holed up in the Embassy Hotel, all good patriots are obligated to converge and slaughter them. Liberté! Egalité! Fraternité!).

[Formless]

That's great story material, I love it.

I'm half tempted to write it myself, but then I remember that I already have about four different writing projects on hold (two fanfics, a webcomic I don't have the drawing skills for, and another RAR inspired short story). Maybe if I had a partner to write it with...

If we want to be very literal, well, a society with 1900-level chemistry will have found out about mercury fulminate a long time ago almost by default, but if we're writing a semi-fantastic story it works well.

Considering that it takes place on a fictional continent, fantasy is a given.

But I wonder if maybe percussion cap weapons would be known about, but so expensive to reload that only elite soldiers and rich governors can afford to use them.

1: Yes, but even as mobile fortresses in plazas and such I would not expect them to hold their ground unprotected, in dense formation, against petrol bombs and sticks of dynamite. I would imagine that these would break the pikes rather quickly, causing a general rout and allowing both sides technicians some breathing room to allow them to come up with better weapons.

Molotov cocktails require preparation ahead of time, though, and dynamite assumes a very specific type of rioter who planned from the outset to destroy as much as possible. They aren't ubiquitous, especially when a riot breaks out spontaneously. Bottles and rocks are also common weapons, that can be improvised on the spot.

2: I would not expect airguns to be as good as their chemical counterparts, but they do have obvious ancestors even in this world (the RAR-world, that is).

The point of the detachable compressed air canister was to mitigate the problem of pressure drop-off.

Except that they are definitely bulkier than a box of ammo and some spare magazines. Which you need to carry on top of the canister. A decent improvement, but still not something I can see overtaking muzzle loaders. Possibly something you would bring out if its too rainy for black powder.

3: Kidding aside, when radio was first mass-produced it allowed anyone with as relatively cheap transmitter to broadcast to a wide audience. This was before it was regulated, obviously. But in this scenario mass radio use is not that far away, and I could be used to rouse dissent (as it did in my country (the USA) during the 1930's) and to coordinate rebel mobs and militia in areas in rebellion ("The syphilitic, inbred, blue-blooded parasites are holed up in the Embassy Hotel, all good patriots are obligated to converge and slaughter them. Liberté! Egalité! Fraternité!).

Heh, yeah, sounds like something a commie revolutionary would use. But on the other hand, radio is easily intercepted unless you encrypt it (which only lasts until the other side breaks the code). And the military is already using radio and telephone for communication, so they get its benefits too.

[madd0ct0r]

2: I would not expect airguns to be as good as their chemical counterparts, but they do have obvious ancestors even in this world (the RAR-world, that is).

The point of the detachable compressed air canister was to mitigate the problem of pressure drop-off.

Except that they are definitely bulkier than a box of ammo and some spare magazines. Which you need to carry on top of the canister. A decent improvement, but still not something I can see overtaking muzzle loaders. Possibly something you would bring out if its too rainy for black powder.

mount it on a truck then. Can even have the engine running an air compressor.

[Formless]

Well, now you are talking about a crew served weapon, not an infantryman's service rifle. Still, might just be a solution for that whole airplane armament problem...

[Simon_Jester]

That's great story material, I love it.

If we want to be very literal, well, a society with 1900-level chemistry will have found out about mercury fulminate a long time ago almost by default, but if we're writing a semi-fantastic story it works well.

Probably. But you must remember that mercury and all other reagents were known for like 3500 years before someone had the idea to pour nitric acid and alcohol into a jar of mercury. The fact that it will (when not done with utmost care) most probably result in a detonation and a hurt chemist inhaling poisonous mercury vapors mith had been a deterrent. Fact is, if they eveer invented something better than a flint to ignite powder, the evolution of the gun would have been a quick process, so we must work with the fact that they, for some reason, haven't.

The catch is that there's a huge difference between pre-1800 and post-1800 chemistry. Right around the 1780 to 1810 timeframe we see the very beginning of modern chemistry, and there was a huge growth in the systematic, organized, published experimentation with chemical compounds. Someone in 19th century Europe or its equivalent would have been looking into what you can do with mercury compounds, just like people were looking into what you can do with chlorine compounds, arsenic compounds, and so on.

It might be as easy as that they live on a continent with no (notable)mercury deposits.
To quote Wikipedia:

This is at least remotely credible, though cinnabar deposits are actually rather common (as in 'more than one per continent'), and the technology of the industrial revolution means this empire should be able to trade in desired mineral ores with other continents.

[Titan Uranus]

Molotov cocktails require preparation ahead of time, though, and dynamite assumes a very specific type of rioter who planned from the outset to destroy as much as possible. They aren't ubiquitous, especially when a riot breaks out spontaneously. Bottles and rocks are also common weapons, that can be improvised on the spot.

A Molotov only really requires gasoline, cotton rags, a glass bottle, and a lighter. Honestly, with the vast and broad base of support you would expect a revolution in a society like this to have it does not seem unreasonable that they could start ad hoc mass production of Molotovs.

I was mainly thinking about miners striking when I talked about dynamite, after all they used it in real life.
Although dynamite was a major concern in the late 1800's and early 1900's and there were a hell of a lot of terrorists who used them at the time (in the US) especially in 1919.

Except that they are definitely bulkier than a box of ammo and some spare magazines. Which you need to carry on top of the canister. A decent improvement, but still not something I can see overtaking muzzle loaders. Possibly something you would bring out if its too rainy for black powder

Muzzle loaders are good for something like 4 rounds per minute, right? In addition these would not be rifled muskets, but smoothbores (although renaissance muskets were supposed to be far mor accurate than the enlightenment-era ones due to less windage, but by the same token they ought to take longer to reload).
As far as I can tell you would need a ~15 ft^3 canister at 4500 psi to refill a 500cc (why the fuck they cannot pick one system I do not know) at 3000 psi for 6-7 full power shots (730 fps with a 45 cal bullet weighing somewhere around 200-250 grains) with a big game rifle.
Strangely by my cursory glance there does not appear to be any rifles for man-sized targets or game
I think you may have a fair point for offensive or mobile defensive uses.

Heh, yeah, sounds like something a commie revolutionary would use. But on the other hand, radio is easily intercepted unless you encrypt it (which only lasts until the other side breaks the code). And the military is already using radio and telephone for communication, so they get its benefits too.

I was thinking more as rabble-rousing leading into the early stages of ad hoc militias forming, not open radio being used to organize regulars, or later militias.

[Formless]

A Molotov only really requires gasoline, cotton rags, a glass bottle, and a lighter. Honestly, with the vast and broad base of support you would expect a revolution in a society like this to have it does not seem unreasonable that they could start ad hoc mass production of Molotovs.

Yes, but they will need a lot more than molotovs to pull off a successful revolution of succession. Ditto dynamite. The powers that be already know how to suppress a "conventional" riot or demonstration, so they will need some serious strategists to arise or defect to their side. They need leaders-- their own Mao Zedong or Vo Nguyen Giap if you will.

Strangely by my cursory glance there does not appear to be any rifles for man-sized targets or game
I think you may have a fair point for offensive or mobile defensive uses.

There are real life high caliber (re: .357 to .50 cal) air rifles intended for hunting out there, mostly from south Korea due to their gun laws, that you might look into. This would be an example. Quoted muzzle velocities were between 700 and 1000 FPS, and with a 145 grain bullet the video makers were getting 300 foot pounds of muzzle energy. Comparing to data on wikipedia, that's a little better ballistics than a .38 special revolver, but not by much. Of course, it may have to do with limited demand for such air rifles in real life.

Note by the way another limitation I forgot about that was mentioned in the video: consistency of shot pressure, which that particular gun solves using modern electronics to gauge for each shot.

[SMJB]

That's great story material, I love it.

If we want to be very literal, well, a society with 1900-level chemistry will have found out about mercury fulminate a long time ago almost by default, but if we're writing a semi-fantastic story it works well.

Would they, though? These people aren't going to be researching specifically for better gun tech, so what other lines of research would lead to the invention of mercury fulminate?

I'm half tempted to write it myself, but then I remember that I already have about four different writing projects on hold (two fanfics, a webcomic I don't have the drawing skills for, and another RAR inspired short story). Maybe if I had a partner to write it with...

I could very easily fit this world into my Gotterdammerung universe. Assuming of course we get this realistically fleshed out.

[Formless]

Nah, bloating up an unrelated universe doesn't really lead anywhere good if you ask me. This would require about a half-Tolkien worth of setting preparation and worldbuilding to do right. That's kind of what is happening here, but there are all sorts of important details to fill in like the regional politics or the geography. Best to do it on its own and explore as much as you can than to revisit it and have nowhere to go.

[Jub]

Well, now you are talking about a crew served weapon, not an infantryman's service rifle. Still, might just be a solution for that whole airplane armament problem...

Or as a sort of trench gun or other vehicle mounted weapon.

Would they, though? These people aren't going to be researching specifically for better gun tech, so what other lines of research would lead to the invention of mercury fulminate?

Did we specifically go looking for mercury fulminate because of what it could do for guns in the OTL? No, instead we found it and then figured out what it could be used for. Not to mention the fact that a good primer makes for safer mining and in an industrial society you're going to need blasting to get at the ore you need to keep building.

That leads me to ask some questions:

What do they have in terms of explosives for things like mining and clearing mountains to build roads along mountain passes?

How industrialized is the production of gunpowder and ammunition and has anybody hit on the idea of making prepacked cartridges yet?

Has the quality of gunpowder advanced from black powder to something cleaner like smokeless powder thanks to industrialized chemistry?

Has the precision of industrial manufacturing caused changes to the fit between musket barrel and ball, and if so how have people not seen fit to make groves to allow the bullet to move more smoothly down the barrel?

How many rounds per year does the average soldier fire and how much time is spent with a rifle in hand versus other types of weapon?

How have gunsmiths or even soldiers working for government armories not improved weapons technology by accident given the rate of change elsewhere?

Basically, the scenario given would not cause the level of military stagnation that you have laid out so we need a better root cause for this lack of inovation.

[Zor]

That leads me to ask some questions:

What do they have in terms of explosives for things like mining and clearing mountains to build roads along mountain passes?

TNT has been developed.

How industrialized is the production of gunpowder and ammunition and has anybody hit on the idea of making prepacked cartridges yet?

Yes, though cartridges are not disposable. Rather they are small metal or ceramic containers with a measured amount of powder and a ball.

Has the quality of gunpowder advanced from black powder to something cleaner like smokeless powder thanks to industrialized chemistry?

Yes.

Has the precision of industrial manufacturing caused changes to the fit between musket barrel and ball, and if so how have people not seen fit to make groves to allow the bullet to move more smoothly down the barrel?

Yes. Rifling is known, but rifles are listed in tactical manuals as being skirmisher weapons. Useful for skirmishers that raid enemy camps picking off enemy soldiers at a distance at night, but not useful for general infantry service.

How many rounds per year does the average soldier fire and how much time is spent with a rifle in hand versus other types of weapon?

The average arquebusier in the Imperial Army fires off a dozen or so shots every couple days at firing practice.

How have gunsmiths or even soldiers working for government armories not improved weapons technology by accident given the rate of change elsewhere?

There have been some modifications, but mostly they have to do with manufacturing. Production of guns involves interchangeable parts made with machine tools to keep costs down.

Zor

[Jub]

Thanks for clearing that up Zor, I do have one last question though. What kind of primers, if any, do they have to set off the TNT?

If they have anything reasonable as primer they don't seem to be too far away from getting a modern set of infantry weapons. It didn't take long for cap and ball rifles and pistols to come into being after reliable primer was invented and given the scale of industrialization and the fact that they have radio new ideas will start to spread like wildfire. Once ideas are had and spread they will be built and improved upon rapidly.

[Formless]

You could look up centerfire primers on wikipedia. That gives you a pretty complete list of no-go chemicals they don't use this way:

Mucury Fulminate (*)
potassium chloride (corrosive)
potassium perchlorate (not one of the more common ones, from what I can tell)
lead styphnate ( * note that both lead and mercury are poisonous)
lead azide
diazodinitrophenol [DDNP]

That leaves a few priming chemicals, including gunpowder itself (meaning pyrotechnic fuze caps), and Pentaerythritol tetranitrate (PENT), which is notably used in detonating cord. Unfortunately the latter is itself a high explosive related to nitroglycerin, but if they have TNT already it doesn't really matter.

Pays to do some research for yourself.