Roger, divide your turret and barbette diameter by three. This will give you the diameter needed for seven FAs, one in the center surounded by six more. I like this number for several reasons, one I replace the center FA with my beam pointer, second when rolling for hits I just roll 1D6. You can also divide diameter by five for nineteen circles.
In Missouri archives there is an article for making gatling lasers for anti-missile defence. I see this system as a "laser Phalanx". Hope this helps.
--- In , "Roger Malmstein" <starwolf@...> wrote:
>
> I would like to get some quick and dirty rule for how many circles of a
> specified radii I can get into either another circle or within a rectangular
> area.
> This request has something to do with my previous post about updating
> "Traveller Beam Factory". I have plans to enable laser turrets, barbettes
> and bays have more than one laser array if the array diameter is less than
> the diameter or width/length of the mount. It doesn't need to be precice as
> I have seen calculations for this and it just seizes up my brain. It can
> error on the side of fewer arrays as we can handwave it with a certain
> percent of the available area will be lost for technical purposes.
>