?

Robert_A_Woodward wrote:You are forgetting about the time the "Fearless" (a 90K light cruiser) did a close flyby of a PN courier (45K?) in _On Basilisk Station_. True the courier's nodes were not yet on line, but the interaction destroyed the courier's nodes, but the "Fearless" suffered no damage.

No, I didn't forget about that. It's not an example of what happens when two wedges collide.

A similar instance occurred between two equal-tonnage ships of White Haven's fleet when he did the double transit from San Martin to Basilisk in EOH. That was between one destroyer with its wedge just coming on and one just a bit slower in the transition from sails. In that case the ship with its wedge coming up got away with no real damage and the one with its wedge just starting to build had two thirds of its aft impeller room vaporized.

In the one instance we actually have of wedge fratricide, the impeller rooms of BOTH ships exploded so violently the shock wave caused the fusion reactors to blow.

kzt wrote:

ThinksMarkedly wrote:
I would like to think that whatever OpSec failure led to the loss of the Mycrofts wouldn't extend to finding the parked fleets, with wedges on stand-by.

They were not on standby. They were down. It took hours to mobilize them, other than the alert squadron iirc.

Wasn't it part of the tactic to lure the SLN task force in? Like Honor did at Second Manticore.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:
Wasn't it part of the tactic to lure the SLN task force in? Like Honor did at Second Manticore.

I'm sure it was another example of the flawless RMN planning...

ThinksMarkedly wrote:

kzt wrote:Your assumptions about the effectiveness of RMN sensors seems based on very little data. Particularly given that the developers can only detect it at about a light second.

40,000 km is just over a tenth of a light-second. We don't know for sure, but my money is that you can detect a graser torpedo at that range.

Let's say the LACs form a shell 50,000 km in radius around the wall. That's 314,159 km in circumference in any great circle. With 10 LACs in the equator, they're each spaced 30,900 km from each other (side of a decagon inscribed in a circle of radius 00,000), or 36°. Each additional great circle spaced 36° adds 8 LACs (you don't need two more at the poles) and you need only 5 more great circles to complete coverage. So you can form a shell with merely 50 LACs and be almost sure you can catch the torpedoes before they can come into attack range.

The relief force is going to come with hundreds of LACs, so they'll do concentric shells, further and further out.

And they're also slow-moving, so need a time measured in seconds to reach that range. Plenty of time for a CM or another LAC further back to hit it, once painted. Not that the RMN knows this, though.

Detection range of graser torps probably changes significantly if someone is actually looking for them, opposed to sitting fat, dumb, and blind as a bat with wedge down. It'll probably also depend on exactly who's sitting at tactical.

Shannon will spot 'em at a light minute out. "Something's awfully fishy here." LOL

From the guy who just woke up in the back of the class. Do forgive him . . .

WIKI:

Missile drives were frequently adjustable, allowing the acceleration to be "stepped down" in order to increase the powered lifetime, although at a cost of giving the opposing force more time to throw up defenses.

Because the Lenny Dets can get so close to targets, distances never before envisioned, is it possible to design a missile with outrageous acceleration? A missile that shoots it's wad quickly? The MA are notorious for turning concepts on its ear, to fit their technology and doctrine.

At one point, curved tubes and drivers were considered for the "top" and "bottom" of a warship, in order to pack more launchers into a ship, allowing for a larger broadside. But this was deemed impractical, as the tonnage required was enormous. The idea was made obsolete by the re-introduction of the missile pod.

How enormous a tonnage is required for that? The Lennys are enormous.

Probably.

Or you could design a missile without a compensator, just fully hardening everything. Then it's a fully adjustable drive, from 0 to absurd accelleration. You don't need stages, it's just a single miniaturized impeller drive so you can just stop accelerating at any time.

cthia wrote:Because the Lenny Dets can get so close to targets, distances never before envisioned, is it possible to design a missile with outrageous acceleration? A missile that shoots it's wad quickly? The MA are notorious for turning concepts on its ear, to fit their technology and doctrine.

Who says they can get that close? I maintain that a properly forewarned force will be able to detect an LD at 600,000 km or a million. Granted, that's close by even pre-war standards (it's energy weapons range), but not "never before envisioned". Even a non-forewarned enemy should be able to detect it at less than a light-second (300,000 km), if they have active sensors up.

At 300,000 km, a missile pulling 150,000 G (more than the Cataphracts) needs to cross the range and will reach only 30,000 km/s (0.1c). 20 seconds is not enough time for a ship at Condition 4 to go to general quarters or battle stations, but it is enough for PDLCs to fire. And those missiles would be moving very slowly. The engagement range of CMs and PDLCs is 200,000 km, which the missiles need nearly 9 seconds to cross, starting at 17152 km/s.

If double that acceleration to 300,000 G, the missiles enter the engagement range at 24257 km/s 8.2 seconds after launch and need 6 seconds to cross it. I think someone said in some other thread that RMN PDLCs can take 16 shots every 2 seconds, so that's 48 shots per PDLC at the incoming missiles.

Even at a million gravities, the missiles enter the engagement range at 44286 km/s, 4.6 seconds after launch and need 3 more seconds after that to reach attack range. They're not exactly sitting ducks, but they are toast.

Note also we're talking about wedge-impelled missiles, not spider-driven. Spiders cannot reach anywhere near that much acceleration. And as a side-effect of launching those missiles, the position of the LD can be deduced fairly accurately for return fire. You don't need pinpoint detection: just saturate the region with missiles and they'll get a whiff of where the LD is. And it's only a light-second away, so telemetry from the mothership works really well.

No, if you can get to energy weapons range of an enemy that hasn't detected you, you should use energy weapons. Photons don't accelerate and they can't be detected prior to hitting the enemy, at that range.

How enormous a tonnage is required for that? The Lennys are enormous.

The Lennys don't have wedge floors and roofs to block ventral and dorsal aspects, so they don't need curved tubes. In addition, since they don't use wedges in the first place, they are not limited in mass to what compensators can compensate. They can be as big as they need to be.

kzt wrote:Probably.

Or you could design a missile without a compensator, just fully hardening everything. Then it's a fully adjustable drive, from 0 to absurd accelleration. You don't need stages, it's just a single miniaturized impeller drive so you can just stop accelerating at any time.

I don't think there's any material that can withstand absurd accelerations un-compensated. It's like hitting a solid wall at high speeds, every nanosecond.

Anyway, even a million gravities wouldn't be enough for firing at 300,000 km. Ten million gravities is still nearly a second from entering PD engagement range to firing range, 1.4 seconds after launch. If PDLCs can be brought from idle to firing in that time, they can probably hit the missile.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:

cthia wrote:Because the Lenny Dets can get so close to targets, distances never before envisioned, is it possible to design a missile with outrageous acceleration? A missile that shoots it's wad quickly? The MA are notorious for turning concepts on its ear, to fit their technology and doctrine.

Who says they can get that close? I maintain that a properly forewarned force will be able to detect an LD at 600,000 km or a million. Granted, that's close by even pre-war standards (it's energy weapons range), but not "never before envisioned". Even a non-forewarned enemy should be able to detect it at less than a light-second (300,000 km), if they have active sensors up.

At 300,000 km, a missile pulling 150,000 G (more than the Cataphracts) needs to cross the range and will reach only 30,000 km/s (0.1c). 20 seconds is not enough time for a ship at Condition 4 to go to general quarters or battle stations, but it is enough for PDLCs to fire. And those missiles would be moving very slowly. The engagement range of CMs and PDLCs is 200,000 km, which the missiles need nearly 9 seconds to cross, starting at 17152 km/s.

If double that acceleration to 300,000 G, the missiles enter the engagement range at 24257 km/s 8.2 seconds after launch and need 6 seconds to cross it. I think someone said in some other thread that RMN PDLCs can take 16 shots every 2 seconds, so that's 48 shots per PDLC at the incoming missiles.

Even at a million gravities, the missiles enter the engagement range at 44286 km/s, 4.6 seconds after launch and need 3 more seconds after that to reach attack range. They're not exactly sitting ducks, but they are toast.

Note also we're talking about wedge-impelled missiles, not spider-driven. Spiders cannot reach anywhere near that much acceleration. And as a side-effect of launching those missiles, the position of the LD can be deduced fairly accurately for return fire. You don't need pinpoint detection: just saturate the region with missiles and they'll get a whiff of where the LD is. And it's only a light-second away, so telemetry from the mothership works really well.

No, if you can get to energy weapons range of an enemy that hasn't detected you, you should use energy weapons. Photons don't accelerate and they can't be detected prior to hitting the enemy, at that range.

How enormous a tonnage is required for that? The Lennys are enormous.

The Lennys don't have wedge floors and roofs to block ventral and dorsal aspects, so they don't need curved tubes. In addition, since they don't use wedges in the first place, they are not limited in mass to what compensators can compensate. They can be as big as they need to be.

Notwithstanding everything else, I'm assuming the MA will also incorporate conventional missiles. There's nothing that says Lennys or Sharks can't also carry conventional missiles?

Plus, a Lenny could drop off a pod of conventional missiles like the Charles Ward. Long gone when they light off. Or, we're assuming the MA will care about certain missions being suicidal, kamikaze in fashion. If Sharks can get insanely close, though not exactly energy range, and can design a conventional missile like that, losing a Shark to take out a capital ship is worth it. Even if the Shark dies. No?

ThinksMarkedly wrote:I don't think there's any material that can withstand absurd accelerations un-compensated. It's like hitting a solid wall at high speeds, every nanosecond.

Other then say Excaliber artillery shells and M830A1 anti-helicopter gun rounds, just to name a few off the top of my head?

The acceleration is not really the problem, the big problem is the jerk (first derivative of acceleration) which is how fast it change. Going from zero to 1400m/sec in 10 meters produces a huge jerk as well as absurd acceleration.

But hey, it's been a few thousand years, maybe they forgot how to design stuff?