Revisiting a Gryphon refit.

wastedfly wrote: SO why the bloody Hell would they not simply put MK-16G's in said Gryphon as said missile head is a Capital grade missile head equivalent to what was originally SHOT OUT OF SAID SDM GRYPHONS TUBES! At least then all they would have to do is modify the launch tubes, assuming even that would be needed. More likely is that the missile que TOOOOOOO the launch tubes would need modification and the launch tubes which are encased in armor would not need modifying at all.
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We've been told that refitting missile tubes that were designed to fire capacitor birds into tubes that can handle fusion birds is a massive undertaking. The missiles may have close to the same physical dimensions with the Mk-16 being slightly bigger, but the tubes for the fusion birds have to be much tougher and wired extremely differently to handle a light off a fusion reactor in the tube.

I don't know if your Legacy refit of Gryphons to Mk-16G capability passes either the engineering/economic test or provides enough benefits over building new NIKES.

munroburton wrote:Only the Saganami-C with MK16G might do that. The rest of the time, they're going to need pods and a defensive location, unless their ammo ship is intended to enter the system.

Heavy cruisers might be able to beat down on SDs, but this isn't going to be true forever. Eventually SDs will stop sucking so badly and the first cruiser to try engaging them will get blown apart as much as Pierre Jr's battlecruisers.

True enough, but by the time respectable solly SDs are built, Bolthole would have spat out squadrons and squadrons of SD(P)s. Gryphon class SDs would be a waste of personnel to deploy and refitting one would be a totally useless endeavor.

Lord Skimper wrote:Finally with capacitor tech the Mk41 should be cheaper than the Mk16 and much cheaper than the Mk23. Plus it can hit harder. Modern fire control and EW should be similar or the same.

I'm not sure a Mk41 is all that much cheaper than a Mk23; it's a bigger missile with a ton of plasma capacitors. I guess it all comes down to the (unknown) cost of those capacitors vs the (also) unknown cogs of a micro fusion plant.

But even if they do cost more there are good reasons to stick with the newer Mk23s -- they're a militarily more effective weapon. For one thing they're a fair bit smaller, so ships can carry more of them. But more importantly a lot if Manticore's offensive ECM depends on the amazing energy budgets the microfusion plant allows. To make dazzlers or dragons teeth anywhere ear as long lasting and effective with only capacitors you'd have to design a new capacitor powered successor to the Mk41 that was even larger to make room for the extra capacitors needed to provide the same peak and sustained power the Mk23 birds have.


Oh, and who knows how much power the FTL comms on the Apollo control missile take - but at minimum if you wanted a capacitor powered version of one, to make an entirely non-fusion missile launch, it'd be much bigger just for the capacitors needed to power the drive.


Bottom line; there seem to be good reasons Manticore moved on to fusion for their dual and multi drive missiles. I don't see a real compelling reason to move back.

fester wrote:

wastedfly wrote: SO why the bloody Hell would they not simply put MK-16G's in said Gryphon as said missile head is a Capital grade missile head equivalent to what was originally SHOT OUT OF SAID SDM GRYPHONS TUBES! At least then all they would have to do is modify the launch tubes, assuming even that would be needed. More likely is that the missile que TOOOOOOO the launch tubes would need modification and the launch tubes which are encased in armor would not need modifying at all.
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We've been told that refitting missile tubes that were designed to fire capacitor birds into tubes that can handle fusion birds is a massive undertaking. The missiles may have close to the same physical dimensions with the Mk-16 being slightly bigger, but the tubes for the fusion birds have to be much tougher and wired extremely differently to handle a light off a fusion reactor in the tube.

I don't know if your Legacy refit of Gryphons to Mk-16G capability passes either the engineering/economic test or provides enough benefits over building new NIKES.

I stated such a refit works as the MK-16G is SMALLER than old SDM Capital missiles that we KNOW weighed in at 130 tons.

94 << 130

As for the fusion bomb problem, in tube, well it is an imperfect universe. They cannot build a worthwhile ship(BCL/SDP) for 5 years minimum. They need thousands of ships.

Remember, MK-16G will still be its secondary offensive system. Primary will be limpeted pods.

Its a stop gap just as using ancient WWI ships was a stop gap. You use what you have, not what you wish you had.

War isn't pretty.

In what way is this any different than using the SLN SDs? We all know how that turned out. There is absolutely no reason to do the refits.

Duckk wrote: There is absolutely no reason to do the refits.

Is this comment for real?

They will be pulling out all of the Haven/Andy SDM SD's as well and converting to MK-16G. As the refitting is miniscule. Fitting a smaller object into a larger space is hardly a major refit.

There are thousands of worlds that need naval vessels. They have none. Unless of course you figure that the Malign has no naval forces of equivalence or near equivalence. In which case, the upcoming books(?) will be beyond boring and as poorly written as the last few have been and hardly worth waiting for.

The Mk41 missile already exists. See the Minotaur CLAC it uses them.

The fusion missile retrofit is very time consuming and problematic.

Using capacitor missiles is not as big a problem, pun intended.

It depends on how big the pod launch is. If it is 200+ missiles why use a pod when an SD has enough tubes to do the same thing.

No need to use Apollo outside of pods. Or use Apollo only pods. One might be able to add Apollo tubes to replace the energy torpedo's. Which likely will have the energy set up to activate the Apollo missiles in place already. But realistically one doesn't need Apollo missiles with these ships.

The Mk41 B. Could use the miniaturised LERM tech to make a capacitor missile MDM that is smaller. Likewise one could always make the missile fit the launcher rather than make the launch tube fit the missile. New tech is great. Being an MDM makes it better than a DDM Mk16.

Mk16 is about 3x the size of the LERM, hence a wolfhound carries so many more than a Roland.

Gryphon refit would be to alter the feed mechanism for the new missile, and lower the crew numbers. Increase the munition store amount and pull the lasers replacing them with PD versions of the lasers. Or replace them with additional telemetry links to the upgraded LAC Keyhole 0.5 systems.

Plus put in better compensators and new bottles and upgrade the PD the CM and the electronics software etc... Redefine the life support for smaller crew sizes and make the berth sizes larger etc... Node upgrades etc... Maybe streak drives if they are ever figured out.

Why build a whole new ship when you already have 200 that can do the same job better than anyone they are going to fight.

Off bore stacked missiles that launch three times faster, change the game. No longer is it a 37 missile broadside but 276 missiles fired at three to five times the range. Plus ballistic options.

Yes the original Gryphon is outclassed. Refitted they are not.

Back to my question is a pod launch more than 276 missiles? Per ship? Why use pods when missile tubes can do the same thing.

wastedfly wrote:They will be pulling out all of the Haven/Andy SDM SD's as well and converting to MK-16G. As the refitting is miniscule. Fitting a smaller object into a larger space is hardly a major refit.

Switching from capacitor-powered missiles to fusion-powered missiles is a major refit.

I'll bite: Why? You need to add far less power to a fusion missile to get reactor startup than you need power up a multi-stage plasma capacitor missile.

Lord Skimper wrote:The Mk41 missile already exists. See the Minotaur CLAC it uses them.

The fusion missile retrofit is very time consuming and problematic.

Yes the Mk41 exists but unmodified Gryphons can't fire it from Thierry tubes. It's way bigger than the SDM capital missiles they were designed for.

The one advantage the Mk16g conversion had going was that (while you had to replace the charging hardware with reactor startup hardware) the missile was small enough it might just have been able to fit in the magazines, feed tubes, and launchers that had been designed and sized for capital SDMs.

But if you've got to gut the existing to install larger it's easier to go to Mk23s than Mk41s due to thier smaller size; and the newer missile is more effective anyway. Zero reason to rebuild any ship to use the older, larger, less capable MDM. (Now any ship that has tubes for Mk41 can be useful without a refit to Mk23s. But if you do the refit do it right.

Lord Skimper wrote: The Mk41 B. Could use the miniaturised LERM tech to make a capacitor missile MDM that is smaller. Likewise one could always make the missile fit the launcher rather than make the launch tube fit the missile. New tech is great. Being an MDM makes it better than a DDM Mk16.

It's pretty clear to me based in the range and drive burnout numbers that the MDMs already incorporate the extended life node tech from the ERMs.

But even if I'm wrong about that I guarantee that Manticore, which has been taking steps to address the impact of MDM size on magazine capacity, hasn't missed any simple steps in reducing MDM size. Yes future R&D might result in a future shrunk MDM with similar accel, range, and payload; but it won't be capacitor based and it won't be because they forgot to look at ERM node design breakthroughs.