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Product: Weapon: Countermeasure
Ballistic Gel Sniper Locator   (+3)  [vote for, against]

Worried about sniper fire?

1) Stick out a head made out of ballistic gel.

2) After it gets shot, trace back the path of the bullet to the exact position of the shooter.

3) Call in an airstrike.

Premium version contains a calibrated gyroscope that tracks the exact position of the fake head the moment it was struck. Those parameters are communicated via bluetooth to a smart phone which will calculate precise line of fire based on hand entered parameters regarding head entry coordinates + angle.

Value version is just a paper mache ball painted to look like a head of a soldier. Stick it out, keep track of the heads orientation and after it's shot simply align the entry and exit holes to find the line of fire.
-- ixnaum, Nov 23 2015

Counter-battery radar https://en.wikipedi...unter-battery_radar
For artillery, not bullets. Needs down-sized. [Voice, Nov 23 2015]

I think you need at least two well-separated gel heads, so you can triangulate.

Or you could set up a stall (perhaps camoflaged as an APC) with lots of gel heads poking out of holes and ducking back in. Every 5 minutes all the heads go in for 10 seconds, and a score is displayed. Whack-a-mole for snipers. Then they'd spend their time playing that and use up all their ammo.
-- Loris, Nov 23 2015


Or...

This could be done electronically. For simplicity, make the dummy head with a flat face, and a flat back-of-the-head.

Across the face, a grid of fine wires is run, with each wire being insulated. Across the back of the head, likewise.

The grids of wires are connected to a box of electronics, which can test each wire for continuity.

After being shot at, the electronics determine which wires of the grid were broken, on both the face and rear sides. From this, the trajectory can be determined.
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Nov 23 2015


1b) call the shooter up and inquire as to powder-load and barrel length.
-- FlyingToaster, Nov 23 2015


Experienced snipers will be able to differentiate between real heads and those made of ballistic gel. Therefore, you will only be able to locate and eliminate the inexperienced enemy snipers with this method. As a consequence, you will select for the experienced enemy snipers and your enemy sniper population will have evolved resistance to this device in the next generation.
-- Cuit_au_Four, Nov 23 2015


I was wondering about that. How does an experienced sniper make out the difference? I would imagine that in the sniper's scope the head will be too small to see details. Can snipers see soldiers faces and expressions?
-- ixnaum, Nov 25 2015



random, halfbakery