Nasty relativistic idea

Dilandu wrote:So. What if somebody take an old superdreadnought about 6.8 millions tonns in mass, get it out of hyperspace far enough of solar system to avoid detection and large concentration of space dust (some light-days should do the trick), accelerate it toward the system up to the 0,9 speed of light, then turn it impeller-forward and just dump it into the star?

I don't believe that the impeller would protect the ship as well as you think. I think impact with sufficient mass at that velocity would destroy the impeller wedge. The ship will not penetrate very deep into the star before the wedge gives way.

I think I'd be somewhat more worried about somebody aiming at a planet, rather than a star.

The wedge, while effectively impenetrable, is not actually inviolate. Remember the events of Oyster Bay/Yawata Strike - one of the tugs interposed its wedge, and large chunks of debris hitting the wedge was enough to generate feedback vibrations in the tug.
Ramming a star at relativistic velocities would, I suspect exceed the protection a wedge can provide fairly quickly.

Besides ... the wedge would be up, and the course clearly visible to everyone in the system. For some reason, I doubt that anyone would simply ignore somebody streaking in at relativistic velocities.


This tactic would only be effective against systems with minimal defenses. And those systems can probably be handled in a more efficient manner.

And that is pretty clearly an Eridani Edict violation, given the liekly effects it will have on planets and that stars (!) are absolutely not themselves military targets. So it's going to offend every state and navy in the Honorverse, in the hunt-you-down-and-end-you way.

Well, yes, if we actually use it. But at least it's the VERY EFFECTIVE Eridani Edict violation - effective on the level of Earth-based nuclear weapon as a deterrence measure. So, if we need to deter the enemy from attacking us - it seems like plausible scenario.

Detonate some uninhabitat star system near your border, then call the enemy ambassador and assure him/her, that you "definitely not going to use this toy in case of war. Definitely. How could you even think about otherwise? We definitely would not use this against you... especially if you attacked us, we would not use it. Especially if we would be on the brink of defeat. Definitely not. Do we understood each other, mister/miss ambassador?"

I.e. the very existence of something like THIS would make any potential enemy VERY cautious and much less-willing to do something agressive near you.

JeffEngel wrote:Particle screens will pack it in over .8c. But I doubt that makes much difference in the end.

Ok, I mostly have a problem with the particle screens 0.8 C because it makes assumptions about a universal reference, when that's pointless.

Otoh long ago I made my self ok with it if it was 0.8 Relative to the system primary and accounting for Solar Wind. Especially nasty for such a device like this is solar wind and the particle density will be much nastier the closer you get to a sun (Due to the solar wind being an outpouring of charged particles). (and the effect of the wind should be to both rob velocity and make it likely to miss the star).

So doing something truly amazing either requires massive power to get something big to a high enough speed to not care (and remember impellers still take power and in Normal Space that becomes a bigger issue), or you get it going fast but then drop the acceleration for the use of a buckler.

Otoh as nasty as this stuff is, you'll need something with way more energy to seriously cause a nova.

feyhunde wrote:
Otoh long ago I made my self ok with it if it was 0.8 Relative to the system primary and accounting for Solar Wind. Especially nasty for such a device like this is solar wind and the particle density will be much nastier the closer you get to a sun (Due to the solar wind being an outpouring of charged particles). (and the effect of the wind should be to both rob velocity and make it likely to miss the star).

Well, i was under assumption that the impeller wedge, positioned perpendicular to the movemen vector would be able to act like an enormous ultra-effective dust shield. At least for some time (and we need only a tiny fraction of time to plunge our nova torpedo into the star).

Otoh as nasty as this stuff is, you'll need something with way more energy to seriously cause a nova.

Well, the current level of gravitation technology in Honorverce seems pretty capable to produce something, that would be able to compress the inner levels of star core to the point of collapse. Seems like the spider-drive is actually doing the job - it produce gravity beams intence enough to rip the time and space.

So, if we would be able to produce the gravitic beam into the star - it would eventually initated the neutronic process, and KABOOOM!

P.S. Also, a good job could be done by relativistically ramming the big gas planet; it owuld be much easier than the star, and the effect may start the compression inside very effectively.

This weapon could have at least some tactical use; if you would be able to lure the enemy fleet toward the gas giant, and then ignite in with relativistic strike... The enemy would be obliterated far before they understood, what happened.

Brigade XO wrote:I suspect that if you seriously perturbed the star, you would at least shift (and for quite a while destabilize) any wormhole associated with it.

Hm. Good question - what would happen with the wormhole junction, if somebody would try to destabilise one end?

P.S. Just another relativistic idea - what if we take two ships, and accelerate both of them to the near-c toward each other with the goal that they should collide in some predicted point?

Their relativistic mass would be enormous. Probably even a short-lived gravitic singularity could be achieved. It's hard to predict exactly what happened, but it seems that everything gravity-related in proximity should sence the disturbance.

Hm... Could this thing break down the impeller drives in close proximity? How, actually, impeller wedges react on the outer gravity disturbances on large scale? Would, for example, impeller work near the black hole, or it would shut down by the gravity?

Dilandu wrote:So. What if somebody take an old superdreadnought about 6.8 millions tonns in mass, get it out of hyperspace far enough of solar system to avoid detection and large concentration of space dust (some light-days should do the trick), accelerate it toward the system up to the 0,9 speed of light, then turn it impeller-forward and just dump it into the star?

Plugging those numbers into Wolfram Alpha yields a total kinetic energy of 7.175×10^26 Joules. Which is impressive; it's almost twice the amount of energy the sun produces every second.

I don't know what such an energy transfer would do to our poor little star; but given that it's still far below the gravitational binding energy of the sun (6.9×10^41 Joule), whatever effects there are will be temporary.

Let's also not forget that this hypothetical projectile is very small and has to travel a long way through a lot of highly energetic plasma. I'd assume that it's going to evaporate long before it could actually cause anything more harmful than a few disturbances in the overall makeup of the Sun.

Dilandu wrote:P.S. Just another relativistic idea - what if we take two ships, and accelerate both of them to the near-c toward each other with the goal that they should collide in some predicted point?

Their relativistic mass would be enormous. Probably even a short-lived gravitic singularity could be achieved. It's hard to predict exactly what happened, but it seems that everything gravity-related in proximity should sence the disturbance.

Except that relativistic mass is not actual mass. Here's a handy little quote that the internet gave me, from Taylor and Wheeler's Spacetime Physics:

The concept of `relativistic mass' is subject to misunderstanding. That's why we don't use it. First, it applies the name mass--belonging to the magnitude of a four-vector--to a very different concept, the time component of a four-vector. Second, it makes increase of energy of an object with velocity or momentum appear to be connected with some change in internal structure of the object.
In reality, the increase of energy with velocity originates not in the object but in the geometric properties of space-time itself.

Dilandu--

I say again, this will not cause a nova.

First of all, you probably won't get the ship up to 0.9 c. The rad shields will fail at 0.8 c. You can't rotate to put the wedge in front of your path until you stop accelerating.

Second of all, the impeller wedge will be destroyed long before the ship gets to the core of the star. The impeller wedge is not completely impervious. It will be destroyed if enough mass hits it at a high enough velocity. Hitting a star counts.

Dilandu wrote:Well, yes, if we actually use it. But at least it's the VERY EFFECTIVE Eridani Edict violation - effective on the level of Earth-based nuclear weapon as a deterrence measure. So, if we need to deter the enemy from.

This is not really any more effective as a deterrence than any other Eridani Edict violation. Everyone already has the ability to completely wipe out any planet they choose, and everyone already knows it. Adding yet one more way of doing it does not increase the deterrence effect. All it would do is get the attention of those forces who would be willing to enforce the Edict.

SWM, the point is not just the ability to destroy. The point is the ability to destroy quickly, ultimately and stunning.

This is comparable with old-fashioned HE bombs and atom bombs. You COULD destroy the city with old-fashioned HE bombs; it would take a lot of bombs, a lot of bombers and actually may not be effective and definitely not quick. With the atom bomb you coul do the same effective and quick. That's why the conventional bombers was unable to deter World War II, and the atom bomb was able to deter conflicts.