Has anyone else decided to root against Manticore?

You don't think we'd have gotten better at making things in a few thousand years? A lot of the difficulties in setting up new manufacturing lines can go away when you can manipulate material on a molecular scale.

noblehunter wrote:You don't think we'd have gotten better at making things in a few thousand years? A lot of the difficulties in setting up new manufacturing lines can go away when you can manipulate material on a molecular scale.

Except that David had explicitly said otherwise in one of the "woe is us" thoughts from Haven's PoV.

Haven, which is noted at every opportunity for having a significantly worse tech base than Manticore or the League. Isn't that like using complaints from China when judging the feasibility of moving a factory from Europe to the US?

The future is always unevenly distributed.

GloriousRuse wrote:
Beowulf? "Don't worry brah, we've seen missiles. No way a relativistic speed travelling pile of fusion reactors, electronics, and nuclear warheads can be TOO hard to make. We cna start TODAY!"

Unless I've missed something that states SL Core Worlds were forced to get all their system-defense tech from the Sol System, Beowulf already had missile assembly lines running for their own forces. Yes, they would have to adjust the lines for Alliance tech, but they already knew how to build "a relativistic speed travelling pile of fusion reactors, electronics, and nuclear warheads". We're not talking about Scotty dropping the formula for transparent aluminum on a 20th century plant manager.

And IIRC, the Beowulf military had known for some time that 1) the Solarian Navy had their heads up their butts and 2) just how good Manticoran tech was compared to Solarian. It wouldn't surprise me if a few trusted Beowulf armament companies had a package in their most secure safe, to be kept sealed unless their military contacts reported that things had hit the fan.

GloriousRuse wrote:Observe the following:

Ford Re-tooling a F150 plant...from steel frame to aluminum.

In 2013 Ford decided to re-tool an existing F150 plant to build the same venerable platform, just with an aluminium frame. After a year of planning, with the plant, workforce, supply chains staying stable (the aluminium supply chain was pre-established to avoid down time), and all of the materials, tools, and so forth pre-emplaced, they began work in 2014. The plant was only down for two months. This was considered an achievement worth covering in Popular Mechanics.

Manty plans arrive at Beowulf? "No worries bro, we just hit this "Make Missiles" button on the assembly line. It's coo."


Licensed Production of the F16. Japan and South Korea, two very "advanced economies" decided to buy licensing rights to produce local F16 variants. This started in the late 80's. Both of them managed to start production by the mid 90's.

The Japanese F-2 (Mitsuibishi made F16 variant) entered service in 2000. The plant had started production in 1996.

The first KF16 rolled out of a Samsung plant in 1997, six years after the government decided to produce them and not an F-18 variant.

Beowulf? "Don't worry brah, we've seen missiles. No way a relativistic speed travelling pile of fusion reactors, electronics, and nuclear warheads can be TOO hard to make. We cna start TODAY!"

I prefer the story of FOGBANK

FOGBANK is the code name of a material that is used inside US nuclear weapons. It is generally believed to be an aerogel with properties that interact with the radiation front during detonation.

FOHBANK had been made in a large production line in the 80s, but the US Government, in it's infinite wisdom, decided to shutdown and scrap the plant that made it in the early 90s without a replacement. In 2000 someone realized they needed FOGBANK to refurbish W76 warheads and the NNSA decided that they could have a new plant running by 2005 based on the records and the existing pilot plant. Most of the people who had manufactured it were dead or retired, so they couldn't be asked. (Hmm - reminds me of some issue in the Honorverse...)

2005 came and went without a working plant (or a working production process) and in 2007 they finally claimed they had determined how to manufacture some. But it didn't work. $43 million later, after it became the highest priority project at the NNSA, in 2008 they said they had figured out how to manufacture it. It's actually unclear if they did at that point, as it's believed they salvaged FOGBANK and reused it for the first weapons that were refurbished.

Eventually they did, and it turned out that one of hte major issues was that what was believed to be an impurity in the feedstock for the process was actually a critical element of the reaction that produced the final product. And the new feedstock that was being provided for the process was higher purity than the one that was used in the past and didn't have enough of that chemical in it.

Julia Minor wrote:

GloriousRuse wrote:
Beowulf? "Don't worry brah, we've seen missiles. No way a relativistic speed travelling pile of fusion reactors, electronics, and nuclear warheads can be TOO hard to make. We cna start TODAY!"

Unless I've missed something that states SL Core Worlds were forced to get all their system-defense tech from the Sol System, Beowulf already had missile assembly lines running for their own forces. Yes, they would have to adjust the lines for Alliance tech, but they already knew how to build "a relativistic speed travelling pile of fusion reactors, electronics, and nuclear warheads".

Actually no, they didn't.

Beowulf didn't have missiles with reactors in them.

Beowulf didn't have multistage missiles, with is what you need to reach relativistic velocities.

They certainly didn't have FTL transmitters that fit on missiles.

kzt wrote:
Eventually they did, and it turned out that one of hte major issues was that what was believed to be an impurity in the feedstock for the process was actually a critical element of the reaction that produced the final product. And the new feedstock that was being provided for the process was higher purity than the one that was used in the past and didn't have enough of that chemical in it.

I read a story a generation or two ago, that when Rolls Royce was looking at building or buying an automatic transmission, they brought a General Motors slush-a-matic, and disassembled to see what made it work. They noticed that one part seemed to be especially poorly finished, not up to Rolls Royce standards, old boy. So they ran it back to the machine shop, and polished it smooth. Reassembled the transmission, and ran a function check on it.

Didn't work. Seems the rough finish wasn't a production defect, but an essential part of the design of the transmission.

kzt wrote:Actually no, they didn't.

Beowulf didn't have missiles with reactors in them.

Beowulf didn't have multistage missiles, with is what you need to reach relativistic velocities.

They certainly didn't have FTL transmitters that fit on missiles.

Right, Since Beowulf coordinated their military so closely with Manticore many of us thought modern Beowulf ship designs had Manty parts or had a hidden "Manty mode" on their ships. David said no - Beowulf intentionally did not purchase Manty parts to hid the Manty capabilities from the SLN. Their ships are close to stock SLN in capabilities, if not design.

Theemile wrote:

kzt wrote:Actually no, they didn't.

Beowulf didn't have missiles with reactors in them.

Beowulf didn't have multistage missiles, with is what you need to reach relativistic velocities.

They certainly didn't have FTL transmitters that fit on missiles.

Right, Since Beowulf coordinated their military so closely with Manticore many of us thought modern Beowulf ship designs had Manty parts or had a hidden "Manty mode" on their ships. David said no - Beowulf intentionally did not purchase Manty parts to hid the Manty capabilities from the SLN. Their ships are close to stock SLN in capabilities, if not design.

And that made perfect sense. Yes, they would have problems fighting Manticore but they had no reason to want to fight Manticore.

And in the old days Haven wouldn't have started with them because that would have begun a war with the Solarian League.

Of course, once a war began against the League, they could switch to new designs and might even take over some of the older ships that Manticore was replacing that were still better than what the League had.

kzt wrote:

GloriousRuse wrote:Observe the following:

Ford Re-tooling a F150 plant...from steel frame to aluminum.

In 2013 Ford decided to re-tool an existing F150 plant to build the same venerable platform, just with an aluminium frame. After a year of planning, with the plant, workforce, supply chains staying stable (the aluminium supply chain was pre-established to avoid down time), and all of the materials, tools, and so forth pre-emplaced, they began work in 2014. The plant was only down for two months. This was considered an achievement worth covering in Popular Mechanics.

Manty plans arrive at Beowulf? "No worries bro, we just hit this "Make Missiles" button on the assembly line. It's coo."


Licensed Production of the F16. Japan and South Korea, two very "advanced economies" decided to buy licensing rights to produce local F16 variants. This started in the late 80's. Both of them managed to start production by the mid 90's.

The Japanese F-2 (Mitsuibishi made F16 variant) entered service in 2000. The plant had started production in 1996.

The first KF16 rolled out of a Samsung plant in 1997, six years after the government decided to produce them and not an F-18 variant.

Beowulf? "Don't worry brah, we've seen missiles. No way a relativistic speed travelling pile of fusion reactors, electronics, and nuclear warheads can be TOO hard to make. We cna start TODAY!"

I prefer the story of FOGBANK

FOGBANK is the code name of a material that is used inside US nuclear weapons. It is generally believed to be an aerogel with properties that interact with the radiation front during detonation.

FOHBANK had been made in a large production line in the 80s, but the US Government, in it's infinite wisdom, decided to shutdown and scrap the plant that made it in the early 90s without a replacement. In 2000 someone realized they needed FOGBANK to refurbish W76 warheads and the NNSA decided that they could have a new plant running by 2005 based on the records and the existing pilot plant. Most of the people who had manufactured it were dead or retired, so they couldn't be asked. (Hmm - reminds me of some issue in the Honorverse...)

2005 came and went without a working plant (or a working production process) and in 2007 they finally claimed they had determined how to manufacture some. But it didn't work. $43 million later, after it became the highest priority project at the NNSA, in 2008 they said they had figured out how to manufacture it. It's actually unclear if they did at that point, as it's believed they salvaged FOGBANK and reused it for the first weapons that were refurbished.

Eventually they did, and it turned out that one of hte major issues was that what was believed to be an impurity in the feedstock for the process was actually a critical element of the reaction that produced the final product. And the new feedstock that was being provided for the process was higher purity than the one that was used in the past and didn't have enough of that chemical in it.

I recall kzt mentioning FOGBANK before and found it quite interesting. I certainly had never heard about it. I intended to research it but memory slips. At any rate . . .

FOGBANK.

FOGBANK, Wikipedia.