Revisiting a Gryphon refit.

SWM wrote:And Skimper, you STILL have not answered why they should precious yard space to refit outdated ships when they could use that same space to build SD(P)s. Yes, they need every ship they can get, but why should they settle for a refitted Gryphon when they can get an Invictus for just a little more time and effort? Any new superdreadnought-sized yards they build should be building SD(P)s.

I've got Skimper blocked, but anyone in favor of taking old SDs out of mothballs or using captured SDs or building some field expedient waller-sized ship that's less capable than the best than can be built also has yet to explain where there's the slightest bit of evidence that the Grand Alliance has a shortage of wallers or is likely to any time soon. With no ships beyond what it presently has, the Grand Alliance (and associated powers) can easily defeat all other conventional navies in human space individually or in combination, even if they were all commanded and crewed by Honor Harrington. And even if that were not the case and unlikely to change soon, Haven's still got undamaged yards and hundreds of SD(P)s under construction.

drothgery wrote:

SWM wrote:And Skimper, you STILL have not answered why they should precious yard space to refit outdated ships when they could use that same space to build SD(P)s. Yes, they need every ship they can get, but why should they settle for a refitted Gryphon when they can get an Invictus for just a little more time and effort? Any new superdreadnought-sized yards they build should be building SD(P)s.

I've got Skimper blocked, but anyone in favor of taking old SDs out of mothballs or using captured SDs or building some field expedient waller-sized ship that's less capable than the best than can be built also has yet to explain where there's the slightest bit of evidence that the Grand Alliance has a shortage of wallers or is likely to any time soon. With no ships beyond what it presently has, the Grand Alliance (and associated powers) can easily defeat all other conventional navies in human space individually or in combination, even if they were all commanded and crewed by Honor Harrington. And even if that were not the case and unlikely to change soon, Haven's still got undamaged yards and hundreds of SD(P)s under construction.

Besides, the currently fielded 1922 ERA SD Gryphons and Sphinx are each the equal of 3-4 Scientist/Vegas even when they are using Cataphracts.

We do know that not all of them had been mothballed (as of BoMa) and were still part of the various defensive fleets.

Their only limitation is in tube combat - if anything, a "drop in" missile replacement should be designed to increase their relevance for the brief period they might still be used.

As everyone else has mentioned, we havn't seen a demonstrable need at this point for the Tube ships anymore. And if there is a need, it is now or in the next few months- not in 20- 24 months when Havenite construction can cover any gaps or 60 months when new RMN construction is rolling off the line.

Theemile wrote:As everyone else has mentioned, we havn't seen a demonstrable need at this point for the Tube ships anymore. And if there is a need, it is now or in the next few months- not in 20- 24 months when Havenite construction can cover any gaps or 60 months when new RMN construction is rolling off the line.

Lets see, in a "real war" that lasted for 10 years between Haven and the RMN, their building rates were such that their navies did not grow in numbers yet they were supposedly in a "real war". Then "miraculously" they seemed to have doubled or quintupled their rate in the VERY short 2nd war...

This was over the star map area of a hundred systems. We are now talking a battle space of several thousand systems and effectively the "good guys" now have half of their naval yards for building ships along with war goods.

Its about space control, not combat superiority. They need hull numbers. Their navy must increase in size by 5-10 times or so. Look at their ship totals! Neither side even has a 1000 ships in commission in 1920. In 1922, Haven nor RMN have 1000 ships as there was this big nasty battle called BOMA followed by Oyster Bay.

Now, if the Grand Alliance wish to conquer the entire SL and subjugate them, sure they have the naval forces for that. Blitzkrieg them destroy everything and leave a single Naval unit at every SL world. They are not going to do that now are they? Doesn't exactly make any friends or neutral partners. This means they must move fairly slowly. Pick their targets and then HOLD the territory, or help the neutrals HOLD their own territory. Only way you can do this is by either manning all those ships YOURSELF, or give said ships to your "friends". Last I checked, they do not have the ship numbers for manning all those ships themselves, nor to give them to their "new-found buddies".

It is called ship totals for thousands of star systems, neither of which can "radio" for help as you can here on earth. You have NO idea where the enemy is or in what numbers. Currently they do not even know WHO the enemy is.

Therefore everything that even looks like a warship will be looked at for its short and long term viability to either be used by the Good-Guys, or the neutrals. This means starting with every ship in mothballs.

wastedfly wrote:Lets see, in a "real war" that lasted for 10 years between Haven and the RMN, their building rates were such that their navies did not grow in numbers yet they were supposedly in a "real war". Then "miraculously" they seemed to have doubled or quintupled their rate in the VERY short 2nd war...

...snip...

Before the in 1905 Manticore was building 18 wallers. In the wars first six months they captured 37 PRN ships of the wall and destroyed another 40. In 1906 they were building around 4-5 a month with their allies. In 1914 the RMN alone was building ~200. In 1921 they were building ~200.

Of course the RMN lost 19 capital ships in just a three month period. In the first 9 months of the war they lost 26.

All the above numbers except 1914 are in FiE Chapter 1.

Have fun,
T2M

Silesia is not Talbott. There are a lot of problems in Silesia that are not or are of lesser import in Talbott. The military ships Manticore has deployed in Talbott are there primarily for defense against both piracy and the SL plus the manipulation of the Alignment.
There have been local opposition groups (against Manticore) in Talbott but that activity is at a relativly low level now and we have next to no mention of it in the story lines. The ships deployed in Silesia are actually for more complicated reasons. Not only has piracy there been widespread and on-going for decades and decades, quite a bit of it was done in connection with local governments. There have been a lot of problems with both corrupt and ineffective governments. There has been a lot of local and internal problems with the systems there, much of traceable to the aforementioned corruption and political situations plus lack of stability. There had been a number of problems due to military involvement by the Haven side in the war.
Given that, unlike the Talbott systems who wanted to join SEM, most of the governents in Silesia had no interest in another entity mess with their individual systems and clean up the problems. As a failed Confederacy it was partitioned with the Aldermani and annexed. SEM and IAM are imposing their respective governments on the area they took control of.
It is entirely possible that putting something like a reactivated Gryphon in many of the SEM annexed systems of Silesia could be a good idea from the view of keeping a finger on many of the problems. Along with the ships deployed in anti-piracy and general commerce protection, it does send a very clear message that they systems are defended (well from a localized point of view) against local adventurism. It does carry the same heavy handed look of PRH putting battleships in subjugated systems to keep them from revolting but it provides local command and control facilities for both the systems and planets. Admiral Sarnow is the military governor of the SEM portion of Silesia. He has had his hands full with the clean-up both politicaly and militarily. Honor presented a realistic assessment of part of the problems when she recognized that the local governments really only played nice when someone was sitting in their sky with warships. Putting a Gryphon in each major system and some of the lesser but more difficult ones could help in keeping them focused on working within the SME legal system. Just a thought.

Two separate issues have been conflated in this thread. One is whether to reactivate Gryphons at all. The other is whether to refit those Gryphons with whatever modern tech can be done.

I do not have a problem with the idea of reactivating Gryphons or other Manticoran superdreadnoughts. I would not object to using those Gryphons in Manticoran rear-areas, or in protecting or occupying systems, or selling them to Verge systems. I'm not sure they would be the best for any of those uses, but I would not object. For instance, I don't think any Verge systems would be able to man, maintain, or repair a squadron of superdreadnoughts. A different ship would be better.

What I object to is proposing to use significant yard time--in any Manticoran yards, new or old--to refit those ships. Even Skimper agrees that Manticore needs ships. But they will get more ships, and faster, by building new ships and optionally pulling old ships out of mothballs--with only minimum upgrades--than by doing extensive refits. Any refit that needs more than a month or two of yard time is too much, and all the refits that have been proposed here take too much time. Manticore cannot afford to build new shipyards just to refit obsolete superdreadnoughts, when they need those shipyards to build new podnoughts. The suggested benefits of improving the Silesian economy without trusting them with the latest tech can be achieved by other means. Any other proposed benefits of refitting old Gryphons is simply not worth it when weighed against the pressing need to build new ships.

I never said to use Manty ship yards. Uh, they do not have any...

I said Andy yard. If they even need a yard. I do not see why my proposal even needs a yard at all.

My proposal was to simply dump a smaller missile into an existing larger tube and larger missile convoy bus and racking system. Of course DW has multi megaton equivalent energy of nukes being charged in the CORE of the ship. So, cool beans, that is ok since he used the word "capacitor"... Right?

Give ya a hint what the pressure on said capacitors is... Do the calc. Requires a fair amount of assumptions though. There is a reason that farad sized capacitors have fairly thick aluminum shells on them. A capacitor when charged acts as a pressure vessel. Charge it high enough and guess what? It explodes. Makes a grand mess. By the time you scale them large enough to sustain an SDM or MDM it will have the exact same properties as that of a micro fusion plant...

So, if DW is willing to have equivalent of multi megatons of LIVE nukes in his core armor, may as well fire up fusion plants in there as well. The explosion is the same if their pressure vessel is busted. Said micro fusion plants do not simply explode. See RD's. They are good for long periods of time so if the exit is blocked one can still pull said missile back down the feed que and dump it out some other exit point.

I'm just trying to follow the"rule" of using presented tech without reinventing something new.

Capacitor missiles are needed in these tubed ships. It's a rule.

Missiles can't be changed in the SEM but they can in the league, without making them bigger. One seems to be unable to make a LERM or DDM or MDM that will fit a gryphon tube, why? It's a rule.

Why are tube SD useless?

Why is a building slip needed for refit of the internals of a Gryphon? It's a rule.

How many missiles can an Invictus control? No comment.

Why would a tube CA be good but a tube SD be bad?

Why are pods good?

With new off bore and stacked tubes one can fire 200-300 missiles per ship. With capacitor missiles these can be fired faster.

Why can't the internals of a SD be refitted "in the field"?
Is must be a bureaucratic thing. A ship floating in space is not a car driving down a road. Changing the internals of a SD in space can be done with a refit freighter parked next / connected to it. Or even just with the parts on the inside.

That a SD can be flown across a galaxy but can't have an automation system installed while floating in space or flying across space is just hilarious.

Having actually installed a shear line with overhead crane, steel hoppers, metal rebar cutting machines, shimming leveling and hammer drilling everything into the concrete pad we laid a month previously. The feed mechanisms for the 5000 tons of steel we went through every week, when I was a steel worker. Cutting hauling loading and unloading bending etc... All computerised but moving steel is a people directed process.

I don't see why the same kind of thing couldn't be installed in a moving SD. The missiles themselves would be installed or removed through their standard loading systems. But the hardware to automate everything isn't that big of a deal. Cutting through bulkheads, no problems. Fitting internals and reshaping what is there doesn't need a yard. It has to be done properly. But it doesn't need a yard slip to do it.

As for making tubes bigger, why not make the missiles smaller? But even if the tubes need be larger, using the same nanotech should be able to grow through the armour very easily. It may take time but it could be done last, if at all.

I would love to see you put a new server room into an existing building. The Honorverse way starts by knocking down a wall. It takes as long as building a new building. Ends up with the same building and the whole inside redesigned but it has all the same offices and hallways, same lights and doors now 3 inches wider, the computer server core was built off site and brought in whole. New AC system required the floor to be dug up so that a vent can go to the server from the AC unit.

In reality, we put a raised server floor in, add the AC, and build the server in the shop / server room. No need to knock walls down.

I'd hate to see you take a roof off to move a pool table.

Skimper, we already know, from canon information in the books, that the RMN considers refitting Gryphons to firing MDMs too costly to pursue. That even when the shipyards at Manticore were operating at full capacity, and thus yard slots more easily available, the RMN decided that building more Pod SDs would be a better use of everyone's time and money.

Why do you think that, after losing all the primary ship maintenance infrastructure the RMN possessed, this has suddenly changed?

A Gryphon in the same condition (presumed undamaged) it was put into mothballs is ready for almost all that could be expected to face in Silesia except for crew, consumables and related spares. If the intent is essentially police presence and system administration, there would need to be some playing with equipment but not something that should need a yard. Software upgrades don't have to be done in a yard. They can be done near whatever parking area you have the old ships stored in. You probably would want to take a tug and move a ship out of the holding area and into less crowded space (ok in a mothball area you are still going to have multiple kilometers between ships) to start bringing it back to life and resupplying it. Bring its systems back on-line in an orderly manner and get a crew trained to first operate and then fight the ship.
You just got a whole fleet or two of SLN small craft including assault shuttles and pinnacles that could be useful in working with a planet that might not be very happy with a change of management but they add to small craft capacity. Yes, you would need to shift over some quantity of SLN spares for said small craft and manuals but many of them could be detached for on-planet or low orbital duties. An SD is going have what would otherwise be used as a Flag Deck and related spaces which the system admin could use. While you are going to take Marines, you probably are also going to want to bring along people conversant with civilian police procedures plus customs enforcement. Mostly you are going to be transporting them, not basing all of them on the SD.
A presumption in all of this is that while Silesia has had serious corruption problems and more than its share of various criminal enterprise including piracy, the general populations would be relieved if not welcoming to have consistent and even application of the rule of law. One of the serious problems and largest drains on systems within the OFS protectorates and “assisted” worlds has been the diversion of planetary taxes, fees and revenue streams to the pockets of the people in charge. The same sort of thing on a local (if planetary scale) has been going on here. Sorting out the government accounting and regularizing of things like customs is going to go a long way in addressing needs and abuses in local system governments.
You don’t need MDMs for that. Accountants and auditors backed up by reasonable force will go a long way in these situations.