What if D Vincis ideas had been coopted?

What if there were a idealistic and intuitive king who could see Da Vinci for what he was as a visionary who could change modern warfare and gave him a distinguished place in their military council? Would techonology at the time have been able to invent a facsimile of his inventions of the tank, the submarine, weather balloons, the machine gun or the giant crossbow?
 

Artaxerxes

Banned
Da Vinci's military inventions are not as awesome as people like to make out.


Now if we can somehow get his anatomical books actually written and published then we're golden, also someone really needs to give the guy some ADD pills so he'd actually focus on something to completion.
 
Would techonology at the time have been able to invent a facsimile of his inventions of the tank, the submarine, weather balloons, the machine gun or the giant crossbow?

The giant crossbow yes, the rest probably no. Material science wasn't nearly up to the task and limited to horse or human power most of the inventions you're referring to are useless and likely to be more deadly to the operator than anyone else. And giant crossbows had already been made obsolete by gunpowder.

Many of his inventions were used though. Miter locks for example, cranes, flywheels, various military equipment, etc.
 
The problem is that he's almost literally ahead of his time. Most of his ideas really wouldn't work with the technology he had available to him, and I don't really think you could develop all of that. I'll second the idea of him revolutionizing medical science though.
 
The problem is that he's almost literally ahead of his time. Most of his ideas really wouldn't work with the technology he had available to him, and I don't really think you could develop all of that. I'll second the idea of him revolutionizing medical science though.

That definitely seems like the most likely result.
 
I remember Da Vinci had the idea of loading several muskets into a rotating cylinder device in an early version of a rotating machine gun that given the tech ology at the time might have been feasible.
 
I remember Da Vinci had the idea of loading several muskets into a rotating cylinder device in an early version of a rotating machine gun that given the tech ology at the time might have been feasible.

More like an early Puckle gun, no? Did he have any way to reload them? A 5 shot (or however many muskets there were) weapon is hardly a 'machine gun'.
 
Better than anything else at the time right?

About the same as 5 pre-loaded muskets, but less effective than a small cannon filled with grapeshot, really. He was brilliant as a party arranger. He really catered for his patron.
 
About the same as 5 pre-loaded muskets, but less effective than a small cannon filled with grapeshot, really. He was brilliant as a party arranger. He really catered for his patron.

And not nearly as flexible as 5 individual muskets. 5 muskets, you can place at 5 places in your defences. You can load each individually as they fire, so you can keep up constant fire.

So, no, it would have very limited use, I'd think. Less useful, in general, than 5 individual guns.
 
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