VT: Autosprings

Presiding Author: DROA-499

A lovely little bit of technology, the Autospring is... What it sounds like. This'll be a quickie!

Autosprings use adaptive materials to manipulate their properties, essentially going from a passive spring to a solid-state actuator when subjected to electrical currents- comparable to a solenoid, but much more compact at the expense of power. While a bit of a luxury feature in many cases, the price has gone down as the industry has caught up- it's common for these parts to work their way into subtle places. Handheld weapons are a popular use-case- mag releases, dust covers, sight zeroing, bolt releases, and even stock folding and extension can all be activated without movement by the user, either automated or managed through neural interfacing, barely more expensive than normal, equally durable, and all managed by a tacked-on wiring kit. The ability to bring a gun from a storage to ready configuration just by picking it up is... Convenient, yes, and many will dismiss it for that- but convenience means it's harder to screw up, and faster.

They've also allowed for the further minimization of guided weapons by allowing for more compact folding-fins, and are a mainstay in rifle-fired guided rounds. Even full-scale vehicles may benefit from a self-opening hatch or two, especially for gun ejection ports and the stealthy barrel covers of stealth craft, to say nothing of the applications relatively heavy ones can have in missile rails. They're also great for remotely locking or unlocking doors.

Obviously, there's limits- sort of. Autosprings as we're going off of here are optimized for low loadings. They're springs that can change their parameters, not full-blown actuators- heavy armor hatches and bay doors aren't going to be able to run off these. But, there's the "sort of" part. Autosprings are descended from a long line of revolutions in solid-state actuator technology that, when rearranged, form the foundations of many cybernetic systems and the sudden rise of legged vehicles.

Lots of folks are still mad about that...

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