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Airships?

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Re: Airships?
Post by doug941   » Sun Sep 27, 2015 5:19 am

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Dilandu wrote:
Bluestrike2 wrote: Explosive shells and incendiary rounds--fire vine oil, for instance--would offer CoGA forces the weapons to repel any airship attacks.


Completely wrong. It's pretty hard to hit airship even with World War I level of technology; and the middle-XIX century level of technology, avaliable for CoGA, is just unable to produce effective AA gun.

And bombing is completely out. Airships would really only offer strategic bombing capabilities


Again, completely wrong. There were a lot of cases when airships was used against tactical targets with a lot of sucsess.


and that'd be subject to huge accuracy issues,


Astronomically wrong. The airship could, actually, bob with high persision - because it could simply stall in air, allowing to drop bombs with great accuracy even with primitive bombsights.

You definitely haven't got any idea about airships on the real battlefield.


As you and Orlando mentioned, an airship could hover relative to air currents. What wasn't mentioned was by use of flour/smoke bombs ballistically matched to the explosive bombs, your aim could be fine tuned. This method will not cancel out fluctuations in wind vectors and speed, but will allow near pinpoint bombing.
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Re: Airships?
Post by JustCurious   » Sun Sep 27, 2015 6:42 am

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There are technologies that Charis could have easily introduced but deliberately has not. These are technologies that would be easily copied by their opponents and which if used by both sides would work to their dis advantage.
An obvious example is sea mines. One of their people came up with the idea and was told not to take it any further. In the next round of the war the development of mines will be inevitable but Charis sees no reason to accelerate this development.
At the moment Charis has an information gathering advantage. I can see a case for thinking that the introduction of balloons might help the Church more than it would help Charis and their allies.
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Re: Airships?
Post by Dilandu   » Sun Sep 27, 2015 7:38 am

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JustCurious wrote:At the moment Charis has an information gathering advantage. I can see a case for thinking that the introduction of balloons might help the Church more than it would help Charis and their allies.


Exactly HOW? The Church is completely unable to build any aircraft engine, and would still be unable for a long time - probably decades.
------------------------------

Oh well, if shortening the front is what the Germans crave,
Let's shorten it to very end - the length of Fuhrer's grave.

(Red Army lyrics from 1945)
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Re: Airships?
Post by Keith_w   » Sun Sep 27, 2015 11:45 am

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Dilandu wrote:
JustCurious wrote:At the moment Charis has an information gathering advantage. I can see a case for thinking that the introduction of balloons might help the Church more than it would help Charis and their allies.


Exactly HOW? The Church is completely unable to build any aircraft engine, and would still be unable for a long time - probably decades.


Justcurious is talking about tethered balloons used for reconnaissance and artillery spotting, not Zeppelins.
--
A common mistake people make when trying to design something completely foolproof is to underestimate the ingenuity of complete fools.
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Re: Airships?
Post by Expert snuggler   » Sun Sep 27, 2015 1:18 pm

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I just went to a presentation by the official historian of the National Reconnaissance Office. US photo intelligence on the USSR began with high-altitude balloons inserted into the jet stream so they would cross the denied areas taking pictures automatically. The success rate was low but infinitely better than nothing.

Safehold has clockwork for automation, photography doesn't absolutely require electricity, and lifting gas is arguably possible. Highly arguably. Schueler's Tears or any other acid on top of any base metal might not be economical in quantity, and the town gas reaction would require some way to separate the CO from the hydrogen.

And that's what the Temple mafia might be able to do. May they never get the idea.
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Re: Airships?
Post by Dilandu   » Sun Sep 27, 2015 2:51 pm

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Keith_w wrote:
Justcurious is talking about tethered balloons used for reconnaissance and artillery spotting, not Zeppelins.


Well, this tehcnology is clearly better suited for those who have superior artillery. And this is clearly the Charis. So... they may just ignore the Temple's balooning as generally insignificant in short therm (and in long therm, the Church attempts into the balooning would actually serve the Merlin ideas perfectly, by greatly inspiring innovations).
------------------------------

Oh well, if shortening the front is what the Germans crave,
Let's shorten it to very end - the length of Fuhrer's grave.

(Red Army lyrics from 1945)
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Re: Airships?
Post by Expert snuggler   » Sun Sep 27, 2015 2:57 pm

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A line of aerostats with semaphores would be a deployable means of long range communication, for example to an army in the field. Heliographs would be lighter and more compact.
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Re: Airships?
Post by Dilandu   » Sun Sep 27, 2015 3:00 pm

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Expert snuggler wrote:
And that's what the Temple mafia might be able to do. May they never get the idea.


On the contrary - let's them have this idea! :) Let's them try! It would be the best drain of the Temple's resources possible!

Seriously, are you kidding? The Temple is trying to re-create Project Genetrix on the middle-XIX century level of technology? And this should pose some threat to Charis? Only if Merlin short-circuted, laughing.

Seriously, dude! Even the original Project Genetrix worked poorly. The US launced over than five hundreds of balloons, and were able to recover less than 1/10. And this was mid-XX century level of photography.

And you supposed, that the Church may try something like that? Firstly: they didn't have ANY photography at all. Secondly: the mid-XIX-century level of photography aren't suited for this job at all. The cameras are huge, and the photos aren't good at all.

And HOW, please, HOW would Church recover the balloons?! They need to be recovered, you know! The Church, as i recallm didn't have any radio beacons to put onto baloons; so, they could recover them only if Clyntahn suddenly become a prophet and predict the balloon landing point by viewing through a crystal ball. But, in that case, he probably wouldn't need ballons at all. :)
------------------------------

Oh well, if shortening the front is what the Germans crave,
Let's shorten it to very end - the length of Fuhrer's grave.

(Red Army lyrics from 1945)
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Re: Airships?
Post by n7axw   » Sun Sep 27, 2015 6:40 pm

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Dilandu wrote:
Expert snuggler wrote:
And that's what the Temple mafia might be able to do. May they never get the idea.


On the contrary - let's them have this idea! :) Let's them try! It would be the best drain of the Temple's resources possible!

Seriously, are you kidding? The Temple is trying to re-create Project Genetrix on the middle-XIX century level of technology? And this should pose some threat to Charis? Only if Merlin short-circuted, laughing.

Seriously, dude! Even the original Project Genetrix worked poorly. The US launced over than five hundreds of balloons, and were able to recover less than 1/10. And this was mid-XX century level of photography.

And you supposed, that the Church may try something like that? Firstly: they didn't have ANY photography at all. Secondly: the mid-XIX-century level of photography aren't suited for this job at all. The cameras are huge, and the photos aren't good at all.

And HOW, please, HOW would Church recover the balloons?! They need to be recovered, you know! The Church, as i recallm didn't have any radio beacons to put onto baloons; so, they could recover them only if Clyntahn suddenly become a prophet and predict the balloon landing point by viewing through a crystal ball. But, in that case, he probably wouldn't need ballons at all. :)


Recover the ballons? By pulling in the tether lines... :lol:

Don
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Re: Airships?
Post by Dilandu   » Sun Sep 27, 2015 11:55 pm

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n7axw wrote:Recover the ballons? By pulling in the tether lines... :lol:

Don



I just went to a presentation by the official historian of the National Reconnaissance Office. US photo intelligence on the USSR began with high-altitude balloons inserted into the jet stream so they would cross the denied areas taking pictures automatically. The success rate was low but infinitely better than nothing.
------------------------------

Oh well, if shortening the front is what the Germans crave,
Let's shorten it to very end - the length of Fuhrer's grave.

(Red Army lyrics from 1945)
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