Universal Century Technology

Listed here are several of the specific techniologies of the Universal Century Campaign-Setting. They have brief explanations but will offer you a slightly more in-depth view of the world of UC3K.

Battle Mech Technology

These technologies are the basic reasoning for the Universal Century having battle mechs as the main battle unit replacing space fighters.

AMBAC
Active Mass Balance Auto-Control (AMBAC) is a fundamental technology that allows for thrusterless maneuvering in the zero-G environment of space by battle mechs by means of precise movement control of their limbs. The AMBAC technology in conjunction with the fictional fusion reactor developed by the character Dr. Y.T. Minovsky made battle mechs feasible.

AMBAC works by leveraging Isaac Newton's Third Law of Motion (When there's an action there is an equal and opposite reaction) with regard to inertia to effect changes in direction. For example, if we place a person in a micro-gravity environment where friction is negligible (i.e. space), and ask him to place his left arm to his chest then swing it out to the side, the resulting inertia of the arm movement would result in the rest of his body turning the other direction in order to conserve angular momentum. Then when the motion of the arm stopped, the rotation of the body would also stop. The AMBAC system coordinates movements and micro-movements precisely, allowing a continuous balance and stability without expending reaction mass. For the most part, AMBAC is invisible to the naked eye, as the shifts are slight. However, the system can be used to dodge incoming projectiles or small objects as the arms and legs of a battle mech account for a significant portion of its total mass. The AMBAC system also allows the center of mass to shift outside of the body. AMBAC is by its nature limited to re-orienting the unit about its center of mass, and is not a substitute for propulsion. It is often used in conjunction with the propulsion system to quickly turn the unit and shorten aiming speed as well as directing the main thrusters. The system is similar in principle to the momentum wheel system used in present day satellites, though obviously more complex. Battle mechs performing AMBAC motions would presumably move similarly to present-day astronauts performing extra-vehicular activity: both typically having roughly similar body structure, their use of that mass to control their rotation would presumably be similar, even if calculated by different means.

Tail Binder and Wing Binder
Binders are technological instruments that provide extra control for the AMBAC systems. The idea is simple: "If four limbs can maneuver the unit better than none, why not equip them with 5 or more?" The resulting advancement is the tail binder. The tail binder was originally used as part of the interface for the testing of the concept of transformable mobile units. The tail binder ultimately served as the fifth limb and demonstrated the usefulness of the concept. The unit performed well against more conventional battle mechs and showed superiority in maneuverability.

A cousin to the tail binder is the wing binder, equipped on most transformable battle mechs with waverider mode as wings. The system made use of the wings' mobility for the transformation during battle mech mode as AMBAC limbs and further increasing the number of limbs for the AMBAC system..

Balancer

A standard piece of battle mech technology, the balancer, sometimes called balance controller or auto-balancer by different authors, is the device responsible for keeping a battle mech upright. This device automatically adjusts to the terrain the battle mech is walking along in. It is the device that enables the machine the ability to walk like a human being. The balancers are placed all across the body of the battle mech's frame, with primary systems being located in the limbs.

Ballute

A technology that allows battle mechs to use balloon like devices called “ballutes” to slow their decent down and prevent burning up when entering the atmosphere of the Earth. However, they are vulnerable to weapon fire, and may burst, causing the Mech to plunge into the atmosphere.

Movable Frame

The movable frame design is a new concept in battle mech construction introduced after the One Year War in anticipation of the increasingly widespread utilization of beam weapons. Before the invention of the concept by engineer Franklin Bidan, all battle mechs' structure were based on a rudimentary internal frame, enclosed within an outer layer of sturdy armor (called the monocoque design). Because a well-placed shot from a beam weapon could easily pierce a battle mech's armor regardless of how thick it is, battle mech designers started to reduce the amount of armor mounted on the battle mechs. This new concept, rather than placing the armor on top of the battle mech's internal mechanism, grafts the armor directly to the frame, thus giving the battle mech the range of joint movement more like that of a human being, at the same time reducing the overall weight. It incorporates all the battle mech's vital mechanisms, thus increasing responsiveness, reliability, and energy efficiency as well as making it far more agile. The first suit to use this system will be the now experimental the RX-178 Nalfeshnee Mk-II and afterwards it is to become the standard in battle mech construction.

Armor technology

Semi-Transparent Coating

Semi-transparent coating is originally used as the laser medium, mirror and partial mirror of laser weapons in the Universal Century timeline. It was also used before and early in the One Year War as an effective armour coating to defend against laser weapons. However, due to massive use of mega-particle/beam weapons and the necessity of developing an anti-beam armor, this technology is no longer a basic requirement on mecha weapons. This technology served as the basis of the beam-resistant coating and anti-beam coating although the only common factor is the multiple layers. Semi-transparent coating protect the unit by having multiple layers all reflecting a certain wavelength of light and thus effectively reduces the energy of different laser weapons. See Mekton Zeta Plus Armor section Alpha

Beam-Resistant Coating

In the latter half of the One Year War, NEO battle mechs suffered heavy damage from Earth Federation Forces' beam weaponry-equipped battle mechs. The semi-transparent coating is not useful in countering anything other than lasers, thus a new technology has to be developed. A technology similar to the later well-known anti-beam coating called beam-resistant coating was developed and became a standard. This coating can absorb some of the energy from the mega-particles and hence reduce the damage. It can also protect the unit from laser attacks by the same principle. However, it is not as effective as the later anti-beam coating, and the armor will still be damaged if the beam weapon is fired in close range or has a high enough power. This coating is often applied on battle mech shields. See Mekton Zeta Plus Armor section Beta

Anti-Beam Coating

Anti-beam coating (ABC) first came into testing in U.C. 0079.8. The technology coats multiple layers of high specific heat capacity material on top of the armor that evaporates in high temperature. It provides a type of sacrificial protection against any type of beam weapon. However, due to its nature of ablating when defending against great heat, ABC can only tolerate a few hits to the same spot. See Mekton Zeta Plus Armor section Gamma

Anti-Beam Coating Mantle

Currently in development, the anti-beam coating mantle is used to provide easily restored protection against beam weapon attacks. The idea is simple — the ABC is applied on a piece of cloth instead of the unit itself. The mantle could then be discarded once it loses all the ABC (thus the anti-beam protection). Although most units are equipped with beam shields already, the ABC mantle provides stealth compared to the brightly glowing beam shields, which renders the units a visible target.

Minovsky Physics

The Minovsky Physics Society was formed in U.C.0045 at the space colony Side 3. Their research was devoted to the development of a nuclear fusion reactor. By the year U.C.0047, development of the Minovsky-Ionesco reactor began. This reactor, although designed by Dr. T.Y. Minovsky in his earlier days when he was serving the Earth Federation, was still a piece of black box technology and rendered him a heretic in the classical physics community (where classical in the Universal Century includes the modern physics of today). This is the main reason for his termination of service in the Earth Federation and taking residence in Side 3 prior to the One Year War. However, seeing the horror of the Chrysylophax family's militaristic regime, Minovsky defected back and offered his expertise to the Federation. However, his inventions were applied very differently by the Earth Federation.

The Minovsky-Ionesco reactor was named after its fictional inventor. This reactor was "radical" due to the fact that it was the first "clean" nuclear reactor, emitting zero neutron radiation.

The reactant used a rare isotope of helium known as helium-3 (i.e., 2 protons and 1 neutron in the nucleus). A helium-3 atom is fused with a deuterium atom (heavy hydrogen) to form the stable helium-4 and a single proton. Since the proton is positively charged, it can easily be trapped within a magnetic field. The main practical problem with this reaction is that helium-3 is extremely rare; there are few deposits on Earth, mainly found in uranium mines, and these are mostly depleted. The UC3K world's fusion reactors rely on a constant supply of helium-3 imported from the outer solar system planet Jupiter, thus necessitating the beginning of the Jupiter Energy Fleet. The JEF would travel from Earth to Jupiter, which has a high level of helium-3 in its atmosphere, and then come back to Earth with the gas fuel. It should be noted that in real physics, helium-3-deuterium fusion produces neutrons due to inevitable deuterium-deuterium reactions. Also, significant quantities of helium-3 were recently discovered on the moon, although there is certainly much more on Jupiter.

The Minovsky Particle

The Minovsky Physics Society, while working on the reactor, encountered a strange electromagnetic wave effect in U.C.0065 within the Minovsky-Ionesco reactor that could not be explained by conventional physics. Within the next few years, they identified the cause: a new elementary particle generated by the helium-3 reaction on the inner wall of the reactor, which was named the Minovsky particle or "M" particle. The Minovsky particle has near-zero rest mass - though, like any particle, its mass increases to reflect its potential or kinetic energy - and can carry either a positive or negative electrical charge. When scattered in open space or in the air, the repulsive forces between charged Minovsky particles cause them to spontaneously align into a regular cubic lattice structure called an I-field. An I-field lattice will slowly expand and scatter into space, however, after dense interference it will take approximately 29 days before the region can support normal electromagnetic communication again.

The main use of the Minovsky particle was in combat and communication. When the Minovsky particle is spread in large numbers in the open air or in open space, the particles disrupt low-frequency electromagnetic radiation, such as microwaves and radio waves. The Minovsky particle also interferes with the operations of electronic circuitry and destroys unprotected circuits due to the particles' high electrical charge which act like a continuous electromagnetic pulse on metal objects. Because of the way Minovsky particles react with other types of radiation, radar systems and long-range wireless communication systems become useless, infra-red signals are diffracted and their accuracy decreases, and visible light is fogged. This became known as the "Minovsky Effect".

The disruption of electromagnetic radiation is due to the small lattice of the I-field creating fringes that long wavelengths cannot penetrate, and that diffract wavelengths that have similar distance with the fringes. This diffraction and polarization process disrupts the electromagnetic waves. Notice in real life there is a similar experimental particle that could do the same thing in few thousandth of a second, which is still not practical but proves the theory to be correct. A second use of the I-field (and Minovsky particles in general) was the repulsion of charged plasma and chargeless mega-particles from an I-field surface, which was of use both in power generation and armament technology. If controlled, the particles can form fringes of different widths and further interfere with electromagnetic waves of shorter wavelengths. This provides the basis for the miniaturizing of fusion reactors installed in battle mechs since a controlled I-field can block the infra-red waves. This reduces the heat from the thermonuclear reaction and reduces the need for coolant and shielding for the fusion reactors. Without such a field, a pilot would be boiled alive in a few nanoseconds and the suit would burst into superheated gasses, thus explaining many of the series' casualties when the reactor of a battle mech is pierced with a beam weapon powerful enough to disperse this I-field.

The only counter measure to the "M" particle in the series was to install bulky and expensive shielding on all electronic equipment, but only to counteract the effect it had on electronic circuitry. While this could be done for space ships and naval ships, this ruled out the use of precision guided weapons, such as guided missiles. Due to this, the military use of Minovsky particles ushered in a new era of close-range combat. This is the primary reason for the birth of the NEO close-combat weapon: the battle mech.

Minovsky Ultracompact Fusion Reactor

In UC 0071, NEO researchers created the Minovsky ultracompact fusion reactor. Instead of the conventional magnetic field, this improved version of the Minovsky-Ionesco reactor used an I-field to confine and compress the reactor fuel, triggering a fusion reaction. The Minovsky particles produced as a byproduct of the helium-3 fusion reaction were recycled to keep that reaction going. The Minovsky particles that form the I-field lattice also helped catalyze the fusion reaction, in a process similar to the muon-catalyzed fusion investigated by real-world scientists during the 1950s. This super-efficient design was only a fifth as large as an equivalently powerful Minovsky-Ionesco reactor, for this reason it was adopted for use on battle mechs as the standard power plant.

Minovsky Craft System

Since it is made up of charged particles, the I-field is unable to penetrate metal, water, the Earth's surface, or other electrically conductive materials and can be shaped simply by trapping it in an electromagnetic field. Thus, at low altitudes it is possible to generate an I-field cushion between the underside of a vessel and the ground, yielding a gravity-countering buoyancy. This principle is used in the creation of the Minovsky craft system, which allowed a spaceship or heavy ground vehicle to "fly"/hover on Earth. The Principality of NEO was slow to make use of this principle however, the Earth Federation was quick to adopt the system on its Pegasus-class assault carriers. This allowed the Pegasus-class to enter and exit earth's atmosphere and to fly while inside the atmosphere.

Minovsky Theory-applied Weapon System

The new weapons derived from Minovsky physics are referred to by the generic term "beam weapons". There are two distinct varieties of beam weapon - one that uses regular Minovsky particles, and another that employs the mega-particles formed by fusing positive and negative Minovsky particles.

The Mega-Particle

Due to the repulsive forces between positive and negative Minovsky particles, large amounts of energy are required to compress an I-field lattice. If enough energy is applied, and the I-field is sufficiently compressed, the Minovsky particles ultimately fuse into massive electrically neutral mega-particles. The energy used to create the mega-particles is expressed as both mass and velocity. No longer subject to the electrical forces that maintain the I-field lattice, the particles burst out of the electromagnetic field used to compress them. The weapon requires a second I-field forming a barrel shape to prevent the mega-particles from destroying the weapon that fired them. This stream of heavy fast-moving particles, unlike a conventional charged-particle beam, cannot be deflected with magnetic fields. In U.C.0070, NEO researchers exploit this phenomenon to create the fearsome mega-particle cannon.

Mega-Particle Cannon

The ubiquitous mega-particle cannon - variously referred to as the beam cannon, mega-beam gun, mega-beam cannon or simply mega-cannon - is the standard armament of the BattleMech world's warships and Heavy Mechs. This weapon fires a focused beam of massive, high-velocity mega-particles, which cannot be deflected by magnetic fields and tears through any conventional armor material. The output power of the mega-particle cannon is 4 times greater than conventional laser weapons at the time and is considered to be more efficient due to most units having semi-transparent coatings on top of their armor which renders Laser weapons virtually useless unless having a laser device at least as big as a battle mech, excluding the generator.

To create the mega-particles, a cannon-toting vehicle must first gather Minovsky particles from the vehicle's fusion reactor. The Minovsky particles are collected in a device called an energy condenser, where they are compressed in a high-density I-field until they fuse into mega-particles. The performance of the mega-particle cannon is thus limited by the reactor's ability to produce Minovsky particles.

Though it quickly became the standard armament of space warships, the mega-particle cannon's high energy requirements and the sheer bulk of the energy condenser at first precluded its use in battle mechs. Consequently, the Principality of NEO's MS-05 Aasimon I and MS-06 Aasimon II were armed with conventional projectile weapons, rather than beam weapons. As a reference, a Musai-class light cruiser's on-board generator requires a few minutes to compress each shot of mega-particle cannon, the Zanzibar class new improved generator still takes 150 seconds to charge up. This was not practical for the battle mechs' smaller reactors to compress mega-particles by themselves in combat, since it would take an unreasonable amount of time to do so and would significantly reducing the firing rate. Attempts to create a portable mega-particle cannon for use by battle mechs was always a challenge, and during the One Year War, various battle mech have been equipped with a large generator unit in order to power the cannon. However, it is still impossible for a mega-particle cannon to be fully utilized on a battle mech. For example, the RX-78-7 Nalfeshnee will have to carry a large add-on unit as big as the battle mech itself (the FHA-78-3 add-on) in order to fire just one shot of mega-particle beam and have to detach the unit in order to retrieve mobility, since the add-on still needs a few minutes to charge the second shot, rendering the less mobile enlarged battle mech a big target for the enemies for target practice if not detached.

Amphibious battle mechs have an advantage on equipping the mega-particle cannon as they can use water as a coolant and greatly reducing the size of the cannon, and thus most NEO amphibious battle mechs are equipped with one or more such cannons. The shortcoming of this is that the mega-particle cannon is basically useless under water or if the unit is far away from the water and the cannon cannot effectively cool down. The cannon became deadweight of the unit in these cases.

M-Warhead

Due to the effect of the Minovsky particles of interfering with low-frequency electromagnetic waves, it is used in combat as a form of warhead on missiles. The M-warhead will spread Minovsky particles in the battle field and prevent all known wireless communication and enemy detection methods except visible light.

The M-warhead technology was used extensively in the One Year War, but after the war, a treaty (The Granada peace treaty and later treaties include this as well) was signed to stop the mass dispersal of the Minovsky particle because the dense Minovsky particle areas became a major disaster for civilian communications and the economy. The M-warhead became like the nuclear warhead and was banned from the battlefield. However, most warships were still equipped with M-warheads and the captains can use the warheads whenever they get the authorization from higher-ranked officers, and Minovsky particle-scattering battle mechs were still widely used.

Beam Rifle

In order to work around the mega-particle cannon's high energy demands (which hinders the use of beam weapons by battle mechs), the Earth Federation Forces (with the help of Dr. Minovsky, who had fled NEO and joined the EF in the early U.C.0070s) developed the E-cap (a contraction of "energy capacitor"). This device stores Minovsky particles in a high-energy pre-compressed state, so that only a small amount of additional energy is required to trigger their fusion into mega-particles. The E-cap is charged by energy condensers at the battle mech's home base or carrier ship, and then functions like a battery until its supply of particles is exhausted, at which point the weapon becomes useless. During the One Year War the Federation Forces perfected the E-cap and used it to create a miniaturized mega-particle cannon called a beam rifle, with which their first prototype battle mechs (the RX-78 and RX-77) are equipped.

The limited capacity of the E-cap proved to be a significant shortcoming. The RX-78 Nalfeshnee, for example, can only fire 16 shots from its beam rifle before exhausting the E-cap. Shortly after the end of the war, the beam rifle was further refined to use a removable E-cap module called an E-pac (short for "energy pack"). A battle mech equipped with spare E-pacs could then swap them during a battle to replenish its beam rifle's particle supply, similar to the use of magazines to reload conventional rifles.

The Principality of NEO's beam weaponry research suffered great difficulties after Dr. Minovsky's defection, and was only able to use large Heavy Mechs to carry the mega-particle cannon. Though the MSM-03, MSM-04, MSM-07 and MSM-10 had mega-particle cannons installed, it was not until the development of the MS-14 Nephilim could use a beam weapon that is small and efficient enough to be installed on any NEO battle mech. As a result, the Earth Federation seized the opportunity to establish a strategic advantage with their beam weapon-equipped battle mechs.

Some of the later battle mech models employed powered-up variants of the beam rifle, such as beam bazooka and beam launcher.

Beam Spray Gun

The tuned-down version of the beam rifle, the beam spray gun was developed specifically for the Earth Federation's mass-produced GM battle mechs. Since the beam rifle was a relatively expensive weapon to produce owing to the need for a long converging I-field to direct the mega particles, a shorter-ranged version, was created. The name came from the more divergent beam resulting from the shorter barrel, where the expensive focusing coil was simplified. Although the beam spray gun has an effective range less than the beam rifle, it is still capable of penetrating the armor of a NEO Seraphim - said to be the most heavily armoured unit throughout the One Year War. At short ranges the GM's beam spray gun was said to be more powerful than even the Nalfeshnee's beam rifle. This may be due to the wider focus of the beam causing more widespread damage, rather than the narrower, more penetrative beam of the Nalfeshnee's rifle, already more than powerful enough to penetrate armor.

NEO's MS-09 Seraphim and MSM-03 also have scattering beam guns mounted on the torso. However, these spray guns were not used as primary offensive armament like those of the Federation GMs, but only for temporarily stunning the enemy unit.

Beam Smart Gun

The beam smart gun is designed to be the most powerful battle mech beam weapon; at 56MW output it is only beaten by the 79.8MW Hyper-Mega-Cannon of the FAZZ. However, its strength comes from accuracy and rapid fire and not just the high power output. The Beam Smart gun has another advantage over the Hyper Mega Cannon. The particle deflecting system at the muzzle can bend the output beam by up to 20 degrees. Since the velocity of Mega particles is said to be close to the speed of light it is near impossible to dodge a beam weapon output once it is fired. The Beam smart gun is able to rapid fire at high power briefly. The Beam Smart Gun has two energy intakes that can be linked to the movable frame hard point of the Battle mech. A single connection can power the gun at 12MW+ , two connections are needed to give the 56MW output power, but at the cost of less maneuverability.

Optional Parts

Although not specifically mentioned in the story, the beam smart gun is designed to take various optional parts. The base design consist of only the gun itself, with one main grip and one sub grip (with folded cover on the left of the gun).

Sensor unit

The small sensor unit is attached on the right side of the gun. It is specified that this is not an ordinary scope and is not looked through; the visual data is transmitted electronically. This was later adopted for other Battle mech hand weapons. This unit is the basic optional part of the beam smart gun and is normally attached unless unnecessary for battle. However, no record shows it was ever detached from the gun. For identification from the Disk Radar, it is usually depicted as "Normal Sensor".

Disk Radome

The Disk Radome device is set parallel to the sensor unit and can perform a wide area scan. The main function of it is to provide specific location of multiple enemies on the field. It is said to be more useful when the BattleMech is piloted by three pilots with one being the weapon control person as in the Artillery Mechs.

Cryo-system

This system adds extra cooling devices to the barrel. This allows extended period of rapid firing of 56MW beams without over-heating the gun. It was introduced as a combination of the Plan 303E system in order to give the unit more fire power. However, also mentioned in the Sentinel line-art is, the downside of this system is the deadweight and high cost.

Beam Saber

The name "beam saber" is somewhat of a misnomer as, unlike other weapons with the word beam, the beam saber does not use mega-particles. Instead, it emits high-energy Minovsky particles to form a blade-shaped I-field (via manipulation of electromagnetic fields), and then fills this I-field shell with superheated Minovsky particle plasma to produce an effective cutting blade. The Minovsky particles are stored by E-cap in the hilt of the beam saber, which is recharged from the battle mech's reactor when the saber is returned to its socket. Once activated, beam sabers do not rely on the battle mech's reactor and can be thrown or discarded as decoys.

The termination of the I-field along a solid contact surface allows the plasma to eat away at the offending material until the I-field reestablishes itself, allowing the weapon to "cut" through almost any target. Likewise, as the beam saber's I-field enclosure repels plasma, it not only keeps the blade's plasma in but also keeps plasma from another blade out allowing one beam saber to be used to block another. Since the containing fields can be formed into a variety of simple shapes, it is trivial to create exotic variants like the beam tomahawk, beam axe, beam naginata etc.

The power output of the beam sabers used in the One Year War was power rated at 0.38 MW)

I-Field Barrier

Another application of the I-field is the I-field barrier. This generates a dense I-field in the space surrounding the barrier generator, which can deflect the beam weapons derived from Minovsky physics due to the interaction force (presumably a fifth basic force) between the mega particles and the Minovsky particles. However, this barrier has no effect against lasers or against physical attacks such as missiles until late in the Universal Century, very high-output I-field might have created a barrier using the effect like the Minovsky craft system, was seen blocking missiles, and within the barrier's radius beam weapons do not function with their usual lethality. Most I-field applications of this type were used on mobile armors developed by both the Principality of NEO and later the Earth Federation.

This technology was first utilized in the One Year War, and installed on a massive NEO Heavy Mech. The I-field technology would later be utilized in other Heavy Mechs. Despite the deflection power of the I-field, it usually overheats easily, and has no effect on conventional projectile weapons. The biggest mech could only operate its I-field for no longer than 20 minutes.

Funnels and Bits

Towards the end of the One Year War and beyond, there was much research into developing remote weapons that are designed to exploit the heightened senses of an ESPer pilot. Funnels and bits are the projects under way in that research.

Funnels

Funnels are essentially funnel-shaped drone units that are designed to be remotely controlled by a ESPer pilot. It is equipped with a small beam cannon, and an energy cell to propel the funnel when it is operating. A ESPer pilot is in theory able to control these funnels with great precision, allowing him to remotely attack an enemy from all directions, making a funnel-equipped battle mech extremely deadly. When the funnels are not in use, they are attached to the mother suit's surface hardpoints for recharging. All NEO funnel equipped units have the ability to recharge funnels but the Earth Federation Forces is very slow in adopting the technology.
See REMOTES in Mekton Zeta Plus

Cultural Influence

The new DACS(Divert & Attitude Control System) created by the Japan Self Defense Forces in December, 2006 was quoted as an attempt to create Funnel system in real life by Gizmodo Japan

Bits

Bits are fundamentally similar to funnels, except that they have their own on-board power generators, and do not require re-docking with the mother unit with for recharging, unlike their funnel counterparts. Bits are not always used as offensive weapons. The reflector bits on the still in design/development Glaabrezu Mk-II are used to reflect the beam fired by its torso mega-particle cannon towards the enemy, or deflect incoming enemy beams.

Incoms

Incom is a type of weapon in development by the Federation's Murasame Research Institute for normal pilots. It is similar to bit and funnel operated by psycommu system. It is a wire-controlled beam weapon platform, remotely controlled by quasi-psycommu or psycommu system. It can execute the apparent all-range attack like bits and funnels, but is inferior in attack range and complexity of maneuvers. Incom is similar to the wire-controlled mega-particle cannons on MAN-03 and MSN-02 BattleMechs during the One Year War..

There are a few variants. A reflector/refractor incom is a device for bending a mega-particle beam to different directions in order to increase the chance of hitting. For example, MSA-0011[Ext] Ex-S BattleMech is equipped with 2 reflector incoms that is used for its 56MW Beam Smart Gun and 1 incom mounted on the head that can fire normal mega-particle beam. The technology of quasi-psycommu and incoms were transferred from Murasame Research Institute to Augusta Research Institute for development as well.

Fin Funnel Field

The energy shielding technology is currently under development, sometimes called a fin-funnel field (also called a beam barrier,FFF is the contraction), was not a proper I-field barrier, but is an alternate precursor to the beam shield.

The mechanism of the device is releasing the Minovsky particles in the reactor of the fin funnels and trapping them temporarily in the electromagnetic field generated by the funnels which is used for the shaping of the I-field barrel. In principle, the device generates an ultra-thin slice of beam saber to "cut off" incoming attacks, beams and projectiles alike.

Beam Shield

The first defensive application of beam saber technology was the beam barrier projected by the fin funnels. This barrier creates a tetrahedral shell around the battle mech, with a fin funnel at each vertex and planes of energy akin to beam saber blades forming the surfaces of the shell. Unlike the classic I-field barrier, this beam barrier not only deflects beam attacks, but could also deflect (or destroy) physical attacks and missiles as well (acting as both a minovsky craft system and beam blade simultaneously). It could, however, be collapsed by a sufficiently powerful attack. This so-called fin funnel field (or FF field for short) could not be used as a weapon due to the limits on the funnels and the I-fields involved.

A beam shield is composed of a simple plane of beam barrier, radiating from a central generator unit, which can be used like a physical shield to deflect enemy attacks. Since the edges of the beam shield are as deadly as a beam saber blade (because they are simply beam sabers formed like a shield), the battle mech's computer automatically deactivates sections of the shield that would otherwise lop off the battle mech's own parts.

Though it was limited to a single direction and, like its beam barrier ancestor, could be collapsed by a powerful attack, the beam shield's lower energy requirements and effectiveness against every type of weapon made it a perfectly satisfactory alternative to the I-field barrier.

However, a relatively low-energy beam weapon is also being developed to counter this technology due to espionage leaks of research information. The VSBR (Variable Speed Beam Rifle) is being developed to make the beam rifle output power adjustable in a form capable of penetrating a beam shield.

Variable-Speed Beam Rifle

By U.C.0120, even the weakest mass-production mobile weapons were mostly equipped with a beam shield impenetrable to common MS weapons. This forced developers to either design battle mechs for close-range encounters, or to develop much more powerful ranged weapons. However, both options were very expensive, and the latter too energy-intensive to be feasible. Eventually, the VSBR was developed to be able to switch between two fire modes.
1) high-penetration mode

2) high-damage mode

The first mode emits a higher-velocity mega-particle beam with enough momentum to breach a beam shield. However, the damage dealt to the target without penetrating a beam shield is significantly reduced due to its lower energy transfer.

The second mode is like a classic beam rifle: the mega-particles have less velocity and, while less penetrating, quickly transfer their energy to the target material upon impact, reverting back to Minovsky particles and destroying the target from within.

The only method of stopping a VSBR attack is by generating a very strong I-field.

Generative Beam Rifle Device

The GBRD is a special variant of beam rifle installed IN LONG-RANGE PLANNING AND DEVELOPMENT. The weapon's concept was long-developed, and contains a separate energy generator installed just for the beam rifle. GBRD also have the "selective fire" ability seen in VSBR.

Minovsky Drive

The latest of all Minovsky technologies, the Minovsky drive is a theoretical system for propulsion of Star Cruisers. Development in November 0078 and is projected to be complete by U.C.0152.

The device emits a vast amount of Minovsky particles as a propulsion reaction. Although it may appear that the technology violates Newton's Second Law of Motion, the physics is very similar to that of a photon drive, because Minovsky particles have near-zero rest mass.The Minovsky drive is going to be the most powerful drive unit in the U.C. timeline. It is capable of a maximum acceleration of 20G (196.2 m/s^2). It can, theoretically, accelerate up to a speed close to the speed of light. The external manifestation of the Minovsky drive will be two large Minovsky particle plasma flames, or "Wings of Light" (Hikari no tsubasa), projecting approximately 1km out from the drive. These beam wings have a similar destructive effect as a beam sabre.

Other Weapon Systems

Projectile Weapons
The earliest weaponry for battle mechs, projectile weapons are the standard armament of mobile warfare before the invention of E-cap allowed the miniaturization of beam weapons. Projectile weapons remained the most commonly used weapons during the One Year War. Some such weapons, such as the Vulcan machinegun, remained a standard fixed armament of almost all battle mechs throughout U.C. history.

Projectile weapons come in great varieties, from kinetic projectiles like machine guns (although caliber-wise, these ought to be called machine cannons), rifles and shotguns, to payload-carrying projectiles like rockets (bazookas and Panzerfausts), grenades, missiles, shells and torpedoes. These weapons are basically amplified version of real-life modern infantry weapons.

Heat Weapons
A unique class of melee weapons introduced by the Principality of NEO for its early battle mechs, heat weapons apply thermal energy to the weapon's blade, creating a superheated cutting surface that has enhanced penetration on the target. When "cold" (not thermally charged), heat weapons can be used as conventional material melee weapons. Because of their material nature, heat weapons suffer from the same physical wears and tears that plague solid material weapons.

Heat weapons made their debut during the One Year War in the form of the Aasimon's heat hawk (heat tomahawk) and the heat saber and heat sword. With the increasingly widespread application of the more efficient and versatile beam sabers, heat weapons will soon became obsolete and eventually be phased out.

Electric Weapons
The earliest electric shock weapons appeared during the One Year War as the heat rod, which in addition of being a cutting/slicing weapon, was capable of delivering a sudden electric surge to shock the enemy unit. There was also a Mech-scale heat wire, which has a longer reach and a magnetic tip for grappling.

The NEO a weapon system which also carries three experimental electric weapons called the leaders. Each leader has an explosive container which saturates the target with a highly electroconductive particle dust, before the leader weapon itself anchors into the ground over the target, thus trapping it inside a "cage", and delivering its lethal plasma electric attack; this plasma attack can reach temperatures up to 4000 degrees fahrenheit.

Another type of electric weapons was the infamous Sea Serpent. Sea Serpent is a wire-guided grappling device which delivers a high-power electric shock to destroy/disable the target. Squads sometimes used a tactic called "spider web" to trap, shock and incapacitate their enemy, before finishing it off with their beam cannons.

The NEO's are working on a Mech designated the AMX-014 that has wire-controlled detachable forearms that can grapple onto an enemy and deliver an electric surge shock.

Shot Lancer
A distinctive close combat weapon in development, the shot lancer is designed for combat in and around space colonies, where beam weapons would run the risk of triggering catastrophic reactor explosions in enemy battle mechs. Instead, the shot lancer uses electromagnetic acceleration to drive its tip through the enemy's armor, and the spearhead itself can also be launched like a missile.

A variant of the weapon called shot claw, is DESIGNED to be installed in the left arm of a battle mech. Not only can it be used in melee combat, but the entire device or its individual claws can also be launched like missiles.

Microwave Weapons

Rarely used in combat, microwave weapons are used as a non-lethal weapon to harass and demoralize the adversary. Use of such typeS of weapon have proved very effective on battlefields filled with Combat Cyborgs, where N.E.O. Earth Attack Force Mechs used the Alexandria-class cruiser Gaunland to power their microwave attack on the AEGIS troops, causing almost all of them to suffer from physical symptoms like headache, nausea and diarrhea.