Countering the Spider – Real World Inspirations

dreamrider wrote:Folks here have mentioned/implied that compensators are necessary for W. sail travel in grav waves and in wormholes. Do we really have textev for that? I couldn't find any.

We do know that somehow ships and crews ARE able to survive grav wave entry and sailing at effective accelerations that are nominally vastly greater than their compensator ratings. I assume that this is either because gravitic 'medium' of the grav wave is 'flowing' in such a way that the relative acceleration is within the limits of the available compensator, or because the compensator is somehow able to operate much more efficiently in the medium of the grav wave.

The Warshawski Sail also made it possible to "crack the wall" between hyper bands with much greater impunity. Breaking into a higher hyper band was (and is) still no bed of roses, and ships occasionally come to grief in the transition even today, but a Warshawski Sail ship inserts itself into a grav wave going in the right direction and rides it through, rather like an aircraft riding an updraft. This access to the higher bands meant the first generation Warshawski Sail could move a starship at an apparent velocity of just over 800 c, but an upper limit on velocity remained, created by the range capability of the vessel's grav wave detectors. In the higher bands, the grav waves were both more powerful and tightly-spaced due to the increasingly stressed nature of hyper-space in those regions. This meant that the five-light-second detection range of the original Warshawski offered insufficient warning time to venture much above the gamma bands, thus imposing the absolute speed limitation. In addition, the problems of acceleration remained. The Warshawski Sail could be adjusted by decreasing the strength of the field, thus allowing a greater proportion of the grav wave's power to "leak" through it, to hold acceleration down to something a human body could tolerate, but the old bugaboo of "g forces" remained a problem for the next century or so.

Then, in 1384 pd, a physicist by the name of Shigematsu Radhakrishnan added another major breakthrough in the form of the inertial compensator. The compensator turned the grav wave (natural or artificial) associated with a vessel into a sort of "inertial sump," dumping the inertial forces of acceleration into the grav wave and thus exempting the vessel's crew from the g forces associated with acceleration. Within the limits of its efficiency, it completely eliminated g force, placing an accelerating vessel in a permanent state of internal zero-gee, but its capacity to damp inertia was directly proportional to the power of the grav wave around it and inversely proportional to both the volume of the field and the mass of the vessel about which it was generated. The first factor meant that it was far more effective for starships than for sublight ships, as the former drew upon the greater energy of the naturally occurring grav waves of hyper-space, and the second meant it was more effective for smaller ships than for larger ones. The natural grav waves of hyper-space, with their incomparably greater power, offered a much "deeper" sump than the artificial stress bands of the impeller drive, which meant that a Warshawski Sail ship could deflect vastly more g force from its passengers than one under impeller drive. In general terms, the compensator permitted humans to endure acceleration rates approaching 550 g under impeller drive and 4-5,000 g under sail, which allows hyperships to make up "bleed-off" velocity very quickly after translation. These numbers are for military compensators, which tend to be more massive, more energy and maintenance intensive, and much more expensive than those used in most merchant construction. Military compensators allow higher acceleration—and warships cannot afford to be less maneuverable than their foes—but only at the cost of penalties merchant ships as a whole cannot afford.

SWM wrote:But using counter-missiles or high-speed drones to sweep out a zone just won't work. It's not like depth-charges, because depth charges have a vastly greater chance of hitting or causing damage to the target. With the system Theemile described, if the counter-missiles had a range of 1 light-minute…

Jonathan_S wrote: …(with attached response DDs) … 175 destroyer groups to respond…without distributed response forces…

dreamrider wrote:Well, we know from textev (?pearl?) that Sharks are 'about battleship' sized. We further know from various thoughts and discussions of the Detweiller clan, and MAN officers, that the Leonard Detweiller class is much larger than the Sharks. We also know that the Lenny Dets are taking an real long time to build (a measure of mass for all ship types), apparently well over 2 years and maybe as long as 4+, even with the resources of Darius essentially devoted to the task. Finally, we know that the Lenny Dets the magazines and tubes to carry and launch graser torpedoes internally, whereas Sharks are far too small for that and had to make do with carrying 1 or 2 graser trops on jury rigged external racks (18 torps in the Hepaestus attack, 15 Sharks in that task force - parcel them out as you wish).

Folks here have mentioned/implied that compensators are necessary for W. sail travel in grav waves and in wormholes. Do we really have textev for that? I couldn't find any.

More Than Honor wrote:A hyper drive is required to use them, and ships cannot maintain stability or course through a wormhole junction without Warshawski Sails.

MAD-4A wrote:

SWM wrote:But using counter-missiles or high-speed drones to sweep out a zone just won't work. It's not like depth-charges, because depth charges have a vastly greater chance of hitting or causing damage to the target. With the system Theemile described, if the counter-missiles had a range of 1 light-minute…

You don’t set them to run strait out from the center with a 1lm radius. You set them to spiral out for 1lm total arc length. You won’t get much volume but that’s why you need some contact on gravitics to tell you the area to put it in, but without enough contact for a solid lock and several spaced out in the area. DCs were never accurate, many U-boats survived depthcharge attacks all day, where the attacker ran out of DCs, was relieved by a 2nd and it left after it ran out, all this after an initial run by multiple convoy escorts. You’d see the same results with these (which is why it works with the story parallel – yes it could work if you get it into the right spot and then you can use the hit as a detection point for a missile attack, but in practice they use a bunch of them and get little results so something better is developed)

MAD-4A wrote:

Jonathan_S wrote: …(with attached response DDs) … 175 destroyer groups to respond…without distributed response forces…

Your taking the U-boat parallel too far. It’s system defense, so you don’t need DD’s, just missile LACs (even old style LACs or “borrowed” Havenite Cimeterre class LACs) with system defense pods. spaced out to cover multiple areas - the sensor platforms would have FTL FC links for the pods.

SWM wrote:Nor is it strictly necessary to have a Warshawski sail in a grav wave, though the text does make clear that sails are very useful for navigating the shear found in grav waves and the dimensional shear between bands.

The Short Victorious War, Chapter 18 wrote:Thomas Theisman's jaw clenched as the drive sources came back toward him in attack formation. He folded his hands tightly behind his back and made himself look at Commodore Reichman without expression. She'd been so sure the Manty commander would order the entire convoy, escorts and merchantmen alike, to scatter. After all, she'd pointed out, the grav wave would strip them of the long-range missile advantage, which might have given them the chance to achieve anything worthwhile. That was the whole reason for intercepting here rather than between waves, as Theisman had suggested. No commander would throw his ships away for nothing when scattering meant at least four of his ten ships would survive.
Thomas Theisman had known better, but Annette Reichman had never fought Manticorans before. And because Theisman had lost when he fought them, she'd ignored his warnings with barely veiled patronization.
"Orders, Ma'am?" he asked now, and Reichman swallowed.
"We'll take them head-on," she said after a moment. As if she had a choice, Theisman thought in disgust.
"Yes, Ma'am. Do you wish to change our formation?" He kept his tone as neutral as possible, but her nostrils flared.
"No!" she snapped.
Theisman raised his eyes over her shoulder. His cold glance sent her staff and his own bridge officers sidling out of earshot, and he leaned toward her and spoke quietly.
"Commodore, if you fight a conventional closing engagement with your chase armaments, they're going to turn to open their broadsides and give us everything they've got at optimum range."
"Nonsense! That would be suicide!" Reichman snapped. "We'll tear them apart if they come out from behind their sails!"
"Ma'am," he spoke softly, as if to a child, "we out-mass those ships seven to one, and they have to close to energy range. They know what that means as well as we do. So they'll do the only thing they can. They'll open their broadsides to bring every beam they can to bear, and they'll go for our forward alpha nodes. If they take out even one, our own foresail will go down, and this deep into a grav wave—"
He didn't have to complete the sentence. With no forward sail to balance her after sail, it was impossible for any starship to maneuver in a grav wave. They would be trapped on the same vector, at the same velocity. They couldn't even drop out of hyper, because they couldn't control their translation attitude until and unless they could make repairs, and even the tiniest patch of turbulence would tear them apart. Which meant the loss of a single sail would cost Reichman at least two ships, because any ship which lost a sail would have to be towed clear of the wave on a consort's tractors.
"But—" She stopped and swallowed again. "What do you recommend, Captain?" she asked after a moment.
"That we do the same thing. We'll get hurt, probably lose a few ships, but it'll actually reduce our sails' exposure and give us far heavier broadsides and a better chance to take them out before they gut our sails."
He met her gaze levelly, strangling the desire to scream at her that he'd told her this would happen, and her eyes fell.
"Very well, Captain Theisman," she said. "Make it so."

Vince wrote:

SWM wrote:Nor is it strictly necessary to have a Warshawski sail in a grav wave, though the text does make clear that sails are very useful for navigating the shear found in grav waves and the dimensional shear between bands.

Actually it is necessary to have both Warshawski sails in a gravity wave.

Convoy being escorted by CPT(SG) Helen Zilwicki, Senior:

The Short Victorious War, Chapter 18 wrote:Thomas Theisman's jaw clenched as the drive sources came back toward him in attack formation. He folded his hands tightly behind his back and made himself look at Commodore Reichman without expression. She'd been so sure the Manty commander would order the entire convoy, escorts and merchantmen alike, to scatter. After all, she'd pointed out, the grav wave would strip them of the long-range missile advantage, which might have given them the chance to achieve anything worthwhile. That was the whole reason for intercepting here rather than between waves, as Theisman had suggested. No commander would throw his ships away for nothing when scattering meant at least four of his ten ships would survive.
Thomas Theisman had known better, but Annette Reichman had never fought Manticorans before. And because Theisman had lost when he fought them, she'd ignored his warnings with barely veiled patronization.
"Orders, Ma'am?" he asked now, and Reichman swallowed.
"We'll take them head-on," she said after a moment. As if she had a choice, Theisman thought in disgust.
"Yes, Ma'am. Do you wish to change our formation?" He kept his tone as neutral as possible, but her nostrils flared.
"No!" she snapped.
Theisman raised his eyes over her shoulder. His cold glance sent her staff and his own bridge officers sidling out of earshot, and he leaned toward her and spoke quietly.
"Commodore, if you fight a conventional closing engagement with your chase armaments, they're going to turn to open their broadsides and give us everything they've got at optimum range."
"Nonsense! That would be suicide!" Reichman snapped. "We'll tear them apart if they come out from behind their sails!"
"Ma'am," he spoke softly, as if to a child, "we out-mass those ships seven to one, and they have to close to energy range. They know what that means as well as we do. So they'll do the only thing they can. They'll open their broadsides to bring every beam they can to bear, and they'll go for our forward alpha nodes. If they take out even one, our own foresail will go down, and this deep into a grav wave—"
He didn't have to complete the sentence. With no forward sail to balance her after sail, it was impossible for any starship to maneuver in a grav wave. They would be trapped on the same vector, at the same velocity. They couldn't even drop out of hyper, because they couldn't control their translation attitude until and unless they could make repairs, and even the tiniest patch of turbulence would tear them apart. Which meant the loss of a single sail would cost Reichman at least two ships, because any ship which lost a sail would have to be towed clear of the wave on a consort's tractors.
"But—" She stopped and swallowed again. "What do you recommend, Captain?" she asked after a moment.
"That we do the same thing. We'll get hurt, probably lose a few ships, but it'll actually reduce our sails' exposure and give us far heavier broadsides and a better chance to take them out before they gut our sails."
He met her gaze levelly, strangling the desire to scream at her that he'd told her this would happen, and her eyes fell.
"Very well, Captain Theisman," she said. "Make it so."

Italics are the author's, boldface text is my emphasis.

SWM wrote:

dreamrider wrote:Well, we know from textev (?pearl?) that Sharks are 'about battleship' sized. We further know from various thoughts and discussions of the Detweiller clan, and MAN officers, that the Leonard Detweiller class is much larger than the Sharks. We also know that the Lenny Dets are taking an real long time to build (a measure of mass for all ship types), apparently well over 2 years and maybe as long as 4+, even with the resources of Darius essentially devoted to the task. Finally, we know that the Lenny Dets the magazines and tubes to carry and launch graser torpedoes internally, whereas Sharks are far too small for that and had to make do with carrying 1 or 2 graser trops on jury rigged external racks (18 torps in the Hepaestus attack, 15 Sharks in that task force - parcel them out as you wish).

4 years is a perfectly reasonable construction time for a ship the size of a superdreadnought. It was only after Manticore had over a decade of practice mass-producing superdreadnoughts that they were able to get construction times down to 2 years. Most navies would be quite happy with 4 years to construct one, especially a ship with a radically different design. So the construction time does not really support your claim.

As you note, the only thing we know for certain about the size is that the Detweiler is "much larger" than the Shark. I would say that 10 Mt is "much larger" than 3.5 Mt. Yes, 14 Mt also qualifies as "much larger", but none of your evidence rules out 10 Mt.

Folks here have mentioned/implied that compensators are necessary for W. sail travel in grav waves and in wormholes. Do we really have textev for that? I couldn't find any.

No, people have not said that compensators are necessary for Warshawski sail travel in grav waves. What we have said is that if you have a Warshawski sail anyway (and aren't too big), it makes sense to include an inertial compensator to use with the sail, even if you can't use the compensator while under spider drive.

Nor is it strictly necessary to have a Warshawski sail in a grav wave, though the text does make clear that sails are very useful for navigating the shear found in grav waves and the dimensional shear between bands. However, it is necessary to have a Warshawski sail to get through a wormhole. In the Universe of Honor Harrington (More Than Honor) the text talks about wormholes:

More Than Honor wrote:A hyper drive is required to use them, and ships cannot maintain stability or course through a wormhole junction without Warshawski Sails.

I conclude that if spider drive ships can pass through wormholes, they must have Warshawski sails. I further conclude that if Detweilers are no more than 10 Mt, they probably have inertial compensators so that they can take full advantage of grav waves.

I acknowledge that Detweilers might be bigger than that, and if so there would be no reason for them to have inertial compensators. But as I said before, I am not convinced that they are bigger. You might be right about their size, but we just don't have enough information to decide.

Jonathan_S wrote:These sensors are detecting FTL signals from hyperspace emergence at ranges of light weeks, and get there to investigate before the potential attacker can slip too far away to be found.

That's why the Silver Cipheled (sp?) response squadron that failed to find the Oyster Bay Sharks was a destroyer squadron. So it could reach the spot of the sensor blip in less tha the weeks it would take a. LAC.

Adding a bunch if extra sensor shells to further reduce the latency is still a waste of resources. But would be truly pointless to build then to detect distant signals sooner, but then attach investigating forces that will spend orders of magnitude longer to respond than you saved by building to distant sensors.