King Haalahd VII's design

The Leopard tank introduced in 1979 had a diesel engine, admittedly a twin turbo V12, but worked very well.

Daryl wrote:The Leopard tank introduced in 1979 had a diesel engine, admittedly a twin turbo V12, but worked very well.

IIRC, the US and possibly the French are the only countries that didn't use Diesel engines in their tanks in WWII.

Weird Harold wrote:

Daryl wrote:The Leopard tank introduced in 1979 had a diesel engine, admittedly a twin turbo V12, but worked very well.

IIRC, the US and possibly the French are the only countries that didn't use Diesel engines in their tanks in WWII.

The US didn't use diesels as their PRIMARY tank power plants, but they did use them and secondary source engines. The UK and Germany also used gas engines almost exclusively.

US tank and/or armored vehicles that used diesels were M3 lights, M3mediums, M4 mediums, M10 tank destroyers and M36 TDs,

Hi Weird Harold,

Actually we built thousands of diesel engined tanks in WW2, over 8000 M4A2's that had a pair of GM Diesel engines mainly for the Russians and some for the Marines and a few for the army in the Pacific; as well as a half dozen different IC engine types (which is where the second number designator is used) but because Detroit didn't want the GI's possibly preferring steam engines, they nixed the Doble proposed steam powered tank that also attempted to meet the tank engine bottle neck.

The French had a larger motor vehicle industry than Germany before WW2, with decent engines and fuel network [which the Germans used very well in 1940] so they didn't feel the need for Diesels.

L

Weird Harold wrote:

Daryl wrote:The Leopard tank introduced in 1979 had a diesel engine, admittedly a twin turbo V12, but worked very well.

IIRC, the US and possibly the French are the only countries that didn't use Diesel engines in their tanks in WWII.

Charis will not be the first to introduce any naval weapon that on balance works to its disadvantage. Someone in Charis came up with the idea of a sea-mine and was sat on. Yes it was developed by the enemy later but Charis did not introduce it.
So do not assume that anyone will come up with the torpedo, something much more complicated, I do not see Charis introducing it though they would respond rapidly to.its introduction. And even if it is introduced I do not know whether they would introduce the engine improvements that increased its range before the First World War.
If the torpedo is not introduced then the destroyer will not be either. And there will be less reason to develop submarines. They would require electricity anyhow.
Also without electricity it would be difficult to develop the fire control systems that made long range actions possible. This would have consequences for the armour schemes.

I wonder if the Inner Circle will want to introduce torpedos and destroyers not for primarily military reasons, but for economic reasons. Sure inventing torpedos will help weaker navies. However, building a navy with BBs, cruisers and DDs will be more expensive than any economy without steam power can afford. Thus forcing Safehold nations to confront greater demands for public funds is the best strategic tool to incent the adoption of technical innovations by those nations.

So, the ICN will constantly improve existing ship types as well as introduce new ship types that will alter the combat environment. That change will force a greater demand for public revenues. Raising those funds will require a much more efficient economy to afford the expanded expenditures.

PeterZ wrote:I wonder if the Inner Circle will want to introduce torpedos and destroyers not for primarily military reasons, but for economic reasons. Sure inventing torpedos will help weaker navies. However, building a navy with BBs, cruisers and DDs will be more expensive than any economy without steam power can afford. Thus forcing Safehold nations to confront greater demands for public funds is the best strategic tool to incent the adoption of technical innovations by those nations.

So, the ICN will constantly improve existing ship types as well as introduce new ship types that will alter the combat environment. That change will force a greater demand for public revenues. Raising those funds will require a much more efficient economy to afford the expanded expenditures.

I suspect that it might be easier than you think. Introducing the new tech to the civilian side of the economy will produce boom times to Charis like the dot.com bubble back in the nineties.

Don

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n7axw wrote:

PeterZ wrote:I wonder if the Inner Circle will want to introduce torpedos and destroyers not for primarily military reasons, but for economic reasons. Sure inventing torpedos will help weaker navies. However, building a navy with BBs, cruisers and DDs will be more expensive than any economy without steam power can afford. Thus forcing Safehold nations to confront greater demands for public funds is the best strategic tool to incent the adoption of technical innovations by those nations.

So, the ICN will constantly improve existing ship types as well as introduce new ship types that will alter the combat environment. That change will force a greater demand for public revenues. Raising those funds will require a much more efficient economy to afford the expanded expenditures.

I suspect that it might be easier than you think. Introducing the new tech to the civilian side of the economy will produce boom times to Charis like the dot.com bubble back in the nineties.

Don

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Yeah, it will. However, the Inner Circle needs to pile on the incentives to adopt ALL of Charis' innovations. The wider te adoption the less likely the Return ends in rakurai strikes, since the tech will be so wide spread.

Re: aircraft gas turbine engines, and ignition thereof, a couple of questions occur to me:

1) would an induction sparker violate the Proscriptions? Probably, I'm thinking, though it wouldn't be much of an electrical system - just a coil moving through a magnet, going to electrodes in the burner can(s). I'm wondering if magnets (or lodestones) are known on Safehold?

2) alternatively to an induction sparker, is it possible to have a fairly robust (i.e., high-temperature tolerant) flint-type striker mounted in the burner can(s)? Or some sort of mechanical arrangement to move one into the can for ignition, then out again afterwards?

3) as an alternative to a sparker, is it possible to build a high enough compression in a turbine for self-ignition? Maybe with the addition of plates that block gas flow out of the burner cans until ignition occurs? Basically, I'm wondering if an analogue to the diesel engine is possible in a turbine.

This all presumes, of course, that the basic notion of an internal combustion engine, whether reciprocating or rotating, gets introduced. Personally I'm inclined in favour of turbine engines; they're mechanically simpler than reciprocating and can run on a wider range of combustible fuels. I don't recall RFC dropping any hints as to whether petroleum deposits exist, but the existence of coal implies (to me, anyway) that they do.

William Underhill wrote:Re: aircraft gas turbine engines, and ignition thereof, a couple of questions occur to me:

1) would an induction sparker violate the Proscriptions? Probably, I'm thinking, though it wouldn't be much of an electrical system - just a coil moving through a magnet, going to electrodes in the burner can(s). I'm wondering if magnets (or lodestones) are known on Safehold?

2) alternatively to an induction sparker, is it possible to have a fairly robust (i.e., high-temperature tolerant) flint-type striker mounted in the burner can(s)? Or some sort of mechanical arrangement to move one into the can for ignition, then out again afterwards?

3) as an alternative to a sparker, is it possible to build a high enough compression in a turbine for self-ignition? Maybe with the addition of plates that block gas flow out of the burner cans until ignition occurs? Basically, I'm wondering if an analogue to the diesel engine is possible in a turbine.

This all presumes, of course, that the basic notion of an internal combustion engine, whether reciprocating or rotating, gets introduced. Personally I'm inclined in favour of turbine engines; they're mechanically simpler than reciprocating and can run on a wider range of combustible fuels. I don't recall RFC dropping any hints as to whether petroleum deposits exist, but the existence of coal implies (to me, anyway) that they do.

Yes. There are references to petroleum deposits. I don't have references at my fingertips and am too lazy to hunt them down right now. But they are there.

I don't see any valid reason why a turbine engine couldn't be diesel. But then again, I'm not an engineer!

Don

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