Richard--
I love that design. Very similar to earlier shuttle concepts where they
had to have both rockets AND air-breathers for the different flight
regimes.
Like I just said to Derek, I would have loved to play around with that
kind of stuff. I really wanted to play around with it in all of the
diversity of the HT tech, but it just wasn't in the top umpteen things
that were more strenuously demanded. I remember on the occasions when I
did play around with "adiaphora" like that that it just made it harder to
get back to the other stuff, because it would pour a little gas on those
who wanted to live down that gopher hole for a while, and thus harder to
disengage and move on.
> I managed to knock up a 100tn quick turn around shuttle that got 50dtns
> into orbit at TL8/9 using the FF&S rules.
>
> 25MW fission plant + batteries, contra-grav to neutralise weight and
> then turbofans for flight into the upper atmo and then the thermal
> fusion rocket for the last burn into low orbit. Reverse to get down. The
> contra-grav meant that the drives only had to provide thrust for
> movement rather than keeping the craft in the air. Even had a spare 1.8
> minutes of fusion burn for orbital operations. Snap at only MCr 54
>
> cheers
> richard
>
> On 08/03/2015 08:22, Derek Stanley [Traveller_TNE] wrote:
>> It was for a PE that had been crashed down to TL8.
>>
>> They started out as straight up assault shuttles. Get troops into
>> orbit and try to get hands on anything that the meson gun doesn't
>> destroy. After the meson gun is reactivated. Then they were quickly
>> whacked over to SDB's while the orbital defenses were stabilized and
>> the system was secured. After that they were retrofitted again with J1
>> drives to explore and defend the 2 systems they could get at.
>> Desperate times.
>>
>> Derek Stanley
>> Sent from my iPhone...
>>
>> On Mar 7, 2015, at 22:03,
>> <> [Traveller_TNE]
>> < <>>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> Oh, right, that's more of why we did and didn't mess with what we
>>> did, not
>>> only did we have the standard Traveller focus, we also knew that we
>>> were
>>> leaving hooks for 2300, which also had no use for tea kettle drives.
>>>
>>> > I built a TL9 ish ship with collapsible spun habs that was later
>>> upgraded
>>> > to incorporate TL10 grav plates. It was fun to play with but man it
>>> was
>>> > an atrocious ship when you compare it to the TL12+ crowd.
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > From:
>>> <>
>>> []
>>> > Sent: Saturday, March 07, 2015 9:50 PM
>>> > To:
>>> <>
>>> > Subject: Re: [Traveller_TNE] Cheap Spacecraft
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > On Sat, Mar 7, 2015 at 12:41 PM,
>>> <>
>>> > <> [Traveller_TNE]
>>> > <
>>> <>
>>> <> >
>>> > wrote:
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > With all of this good conversation about cheap spaceflight, did
>>> anyone
>>> > ever mess around with the "low-tech" spacecraft design stuff in Hard
>>> > Times?
>>> >
>>> > I did a little, but with the prevalence of Grav tech in the Traveller
>>> > Universe it got to be somewhat pointless.
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > --
>>> >
>>> > Evyn
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>>
>>
>
>
I love that design. Very similar to earlier shuttle concepts where they
had to have both rockets AND air-breathers for the different flight
regimes.
Like I just said to Derek, I would have loved to play around with that
kind of stuff. I really wanted to play around with it in all of the
diversity of the HT tech, but it just wasn't in the top umpteen things
that were more strenuously demanded. I remember on the occasions when I
did play around with "adiaphora" like that that it just made it harder to
get back to the other stuff, because it would pour a little gas on those
who wanted to live down that gopher hole for a while, and thus harder to
disengage and move on.
> I managed to knock up a 100tn quick turn around shuttle that got 50dtns
> into orbit at TL8/9 using the FF&S rules.
>
> 25MW fission plant + batteries, contra-grav to neutralise weight and
> then turbofans for flight into the upper atmo and then the thermal
> fusion rocket for the last burn into low orbit. Reverse to get down. The
> contra-grav meant that the drives only had to provide thrust for
> movement rather than keeping the craft in the air. Even had a spare 1.8
> minutes of fusion burn for orbital operations. Snap at only MCr 54
>
> cheers
> richard
>
> On 08/03/2015 08:22, Derek Stanley [Traveller_TNE] wrote:
>> It was for a PE that had been crashed down to TL8.
>>
>> They started out as straight up assault shuttles. Get troops into
>> orbit and try to get hands on anything that the meson gun doesn't
>> destroy. After the meson gun is reactivated. Then they were quickly
>> whacked over to SDB's while the orbital defenses were stabilized and
>> the system was secured. After that they were retrofitted again with J1
>> drives to explore and defend the 2 systems they could get at.
>> Desperate times.
>>
>> Derek Stanley
>> Sent from my iPhone...
>>
>> On Mar 7, 2015, at 22:03,
>> <> [Traveller_TNE]
>> < <>>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> Oh, right, that's more of why we did and didn't mess with what we
>>> did, not
>>> only did we have the standard Traveller focus, we also knew that we
>>> were
>>> leaving hooks for 2300, which also had no use for tea kettle drives.
>>>
>>> > I built a TL9 ish ship with collapsible spun habs that was later
>>> upgraded
>>> > to incorporate TL10 grav plates. It was fun to play with but man it
>>> was
>>> > an atrocious ship when you compare it to the TL12+ crowd.
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > From:
>>> <>
>>> []
>>> > Sent: Saturday, March 07, 2015 9:50 PM
>>> > To:
>>> <>
>>> > Subject: Re: [Traveller_TNE] Cheap Spacecraft
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > On Sat, Mar 7, 2015 at 12:41 PM,
>>> <>
>>> > <> [Traveller_TNE]
>>> > <
>>> <>
>>> <> >
>>> > wrote:
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > With all of this good conversation about cheap spaceflight, did
>>> anyone
>>> > ever mess around with the "low-tech" spacecraft design stuff in Hard
>>> > Times?
>>> >
>>> > I did a little, but with the prevalence of Grav tech in the Traveller
>>> > Universe it got to be somewhat pointless.
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > --
>>> >
>>> > Evyn
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>>
>>
>
>