Just how big IS a hyper drive

Kael Posavatz wrote:

Jonathan_S wrote:I'm not finding where I got the impression from but I thought a courier ship had about the smallest hyper generator anybody knew how to build - but RFC has definitely said before that you can't build a hyper generator small enough to fit in anything like a missile or drone. So I'm thinking a minimum size in the 10 - 20 meter on a side cube range.

Large enough to constrain the minimum size of a dispatch boat/courier but not a major impact on the internal volume of even a DD(L) much less any larger warship.


But that's just my speculation.

Actually, it was a courier was the smallest vessel capable of carrying one (and ancillary equipment like alpha nodes, Warshawski tuners, &etc.; and that made economic sense/fulfilled a needed purpose). That is, the comment was in relationship to the size of the vessel, not the generator itself.

We know that reaching higher bands requires a larger generator. there's some discussion on this in HAE where RMMS Artemis suffered some damage to the hyper generator during the battle of selker drift. And I seem to recall that when the Sprint Drive was discussed it was noted for being larger than standard hyper-generators.

As far as I remember, the only component that has a definite minimum size is the fusion bottle - the smallest that can be can supply power to an old-style destroyer. That's why Manticore's modern LACs use the Grayson fission pile for power, with all the compromises that entails. The hyper generator is unlikely to be the largest component.

And the Streak Drive's hyper generator is supposed to be twice the size of a normal hyper generator. Whether that's volume or a single side hasn't been mentioned, but it's not enough to affect the size of courier boats and yachts sufficiently to excite comment.

A Courier Boat is essentilay a power plant, enviornemntal plant, communications and living quarters wrapped inside a shell that primarily contains a hyperdrive and all the peices it needs to function (like Alpha nodes, Sail, etc.).

You can build some dam big ships around a (or two) major sized diesel engines that will move a freighter at sufficent speed to handle weather and be economica but would- in a much smaller ship- make it almost warship fast.

Usually this stuff involves the amount of energy your powerplant can sustain on a consistant basis and the ability of your actual drive mechanism to propel your ship though (or on) the medium of choice.
How fast do you want/need to go? Really fast requires more stuff but also relativly lighter weight. Economical......there was a reason that the Liberty and Victory ships in WW II were built with tripple expansion steam boilers (fired by oil- NOT COAL). Much of it boils down (pun not intended) to a "simple" proven design, converted to oil fired boilers (instead of coal) and letting your ship cruse (operate at high efficiency/low fuel expenditure) at between 11 [ELEVEN] knots to 14 knots and haul sigificant cargo tonnage over thousands of miles. And you wanted warships that could do 22 knots or even up to 30+ knots/hr (well, as long as the fuel held out and you didn't get sunk because if you were craning out 22 to 30k/h you were probably in combat and "other things" could come into play.....like torpedos or naval gunfire.

"Simple", efficient engines and drive mechanisms (not the same thing) are a good thing if you are a commercial ship that has to make money on moving things from point A to point B etc.

BIG SMILE

Brigade XO wrote:A Courier Boat is essentilay a power plant, enviornemntal plant, communications and living quarters wrapped inside a shell that primarily contains a hyperdrive and all the peices it needs to function (like Alpha nodes, Sail, etc.).

You can build some dam big ships around a (or two) major sized diesel engines that will move a freighter at sufficent speed to handle weather and be economica but would- in a much smaller ship- make it almost warship fast.

Usually this stuff involves the amount of energy your powerplant can sustain on a consistant basis and the ability of your actual drive mechanism to propel your ship though (or on) the medium of choice.
How fast do you want/need to go? Really fast requires more stuff but also relativly lighter weight. Economical......there was a reason that the Liberty and Victory ships in WW II were built with tripple expansion steam boilers (fired by oil- NOT COAL). Much of it boils down (pun not intended) to a "simple" proven design, converted to oil fired boilers (instead of coal) and letting your ship cruse (operate at high efficiency/low fuel expenditure) at between 11 [ELEVEN] knots to 14 knots and haul sigificant cargo tonnage over thousands of miles. And you wanted warships that could do 22 knots or even up to 30+ knots/hr (well, as long as the fuel held out and you didn't get sunk because if you were craning out 22 to 30k/h you were probably in combat and "other things" could come into play.....like torpedos or naval gunfire.

"Simple", efficient engines and drive mechanisms (not the same thing) are a good thing if you are a commercial ship that has to make money on moving things from point A to point B etc.

BIG SMILE

A word on Liberty and Victory ships engine plants. Most did use triple expansion but some also used low speed diesel while a few that were slated to become USN auxiliaries and amphibious ships were given low pressure steam turbine and turbine electric engines. What they wanted to do was avoid production bottlenecks with producing reduction gears.

Brigade XO wrote:A Courier Boat is essentilay a power plant, enviornemntal plant, communications and living quarters wrapped inside a shell that primarily contains a hyperdrive and all the peices it needs to function (like Alpha nodes, Sail, etc.).

You can build some dam big ships around a (or two) major sized diesel engines that will move a freighter at sufficent speed to handle weather and be economica but would- in a much smaller ship- make it almost warship fast.

Usually this stuff involves the amount of energy your powerplant can sustain on a consistant basis and the ability of your actual drive mechanism to propel your ship though (or on) the medium of choice.
How fast do you want/need to go? Really fast requires more stuff but also relativly lighter weight. Economical......there was a reason that the Liberty and Victory ships in WW II were built with tripple expansion steam boilers (fired by oil- NOT COAL). Much of it boils down (pun not intended) to a "simple" proven design, converted to oil fired boilers (instead of coal) and letting your ship cruse (operate at high efficiency/low fuel expenditure) at between 11 [ELEVEN] knots to 14 knots and haul sigificant cargo tonnage over thousands of miles.

Actually Victory ships, designed for 4-6 knots higher speed that the earlier Liberty ships, mostly used steam turbines. By that point in the war production of those had increased and they were no longer reserved exclusively for warships.

(In some ways a simpler design than triple expansion - though you needed available gear cutting capability to make the double-reduction gearsets that made turbines somewhat economical)

JohnRoth wrote:As far as I remember, the only component that has a definite minimum size is the fusion bottle - the smallest that can be can supply power to an old-style destroyer. That's why Manticore's modern LACs use the Grayson fission pile for power, with all the compromises that entails. The hyper generator is unlikely to be the largest component.

And the Streak Drive's hyper generator is supposed to be twice the size of a normal hyper generator. Whether that's volume or a single side hasn't been mentioned, but it's not enough to affect the size of courier boats and yachts sufficiently to excite comment.

Lots of old school LACs had fusion power plants; what they didn't have was much in the way of life support endurance or hydrogen bunker space for more than a few day's operation at a time. Those issues probably account for more tonnage than a slightly larger fusion plant.

For that matter, Manticore might well be building dispatch boats with fission piles for the inherent range advantage they have. That could be an issue if a streak drive takes significantly more sustained power than a standard hyperdrive, but if it's just initiation energy the standard capacitor coils can supply that.

Instead, the biggest obstacle to hyper-capable shipping is alpha nodes. Even with beta squared nodes you need an additional 8 nodes per ring, and a hyper capable ship needs both rings whereas missiles and drones generally only have one ring.

Just as a thought experiment, I've tried to consider whether GA carriers could be modified to carry a couple dispatch boats to ensure fleet commanders always have a supply available. They would definitely need to be specially built to fit the dimensions of a Shrike or Ferret, at least in the beam and draft plane. Additional length could be accommodated by modifying the carrier docks specifically for that purpose - mainly ripping out the outsized docking ring and munitions handling equipment to buy a dozen or more meters on the inboard end of the bay. That would prevent those LAC bays from being used for LACs, of course, but it might be worth the trade off as more and more of the GA fleet gets split into detachments covering wormhole termini.

It may be that the streak drive hyper generator would be too big to be fit into a boat small enough for this to work, which would mean scrapping the concept or accepting dispatch boats that are slower but more readily available.

Just an interesting bit of speculation on my part. Maybe it's already been addressed elsewhere; I'm only conversant with what's been published in the books.

I doubt the outsized docking ring and munitions handling equipment take up a dozen or more meters on the inboard end of the bay. There's only a max off 44 meters between the noses of LAC docked in opposite broadsides and some of that room is needed for CLAC ship systems and passageways. [Beam of a Hydra-class CLAC 188 meters, length of a pair of LACs 144 meters]

And frankly the issue with dispatch boats is buying and manning enough in the first place. If you've got them there's no need to stick them inside a CLAC as they're more than capable of tagging along with any fleet they've been assigned to. At most you might need to transfer them some fuel from time to time.

Vince wrote: Definitely bigger than a breadbox. Aboard the Hali Sowle:

Torch of Freedom, Chapter 48 wrote:"So how bad is it?" Friede Butry leaned over, peering into the space uncovered by a removed cover plate. The inside of that space was filled with a lot of equipment whose precise purpose she understood only vaguely.
Andrew Artlett straightened up from the piece of machinery he'd been working on, squatted on his heels, and started wiping his hands with a rag. That was rather silly, really. The interior of a hyper generator—even one for a ship as small as a mere million tons—needed to be kept clean at all times. In fact, Andrew had washed his hands before starting to work on it as thoroughly as a surgeon washes his hands before undertaking an operation.
But old habits died hard. Andrew always thought of himself as what he called a "jackleg mechanic," and such stalwart and doughty souls by definition always had dirty hands that needed to be wiped clean.

munroburton wrote: Depending on how one reads this, they're all standing inside the hyper generator.

Has anyone else thought it strange that a hyper generator contains a part that I visualize as though it were a camshaft (or crankshaft)?
Of course the plot required something to break that could be fixed by a mechanic in the workshop of a cargo ship.

tlb wrote:..snip..
Has anyone else thought it strange that a hyper generator contains a part that I visualize as though it were a camshaft (or crankshaft)?
Of course the plot required something to break that could be fixed by a mechanic in the workshop of a cargo ship.

I don't find it as far fetched. It could be that the hyper drive has some components made out of exotic materials that spins and generates the hyper field which makes the travel possible. Something comparable to a magnetic field but related to hyper space or whatever.

In the end it's all handwavium, and getting confounded because a hyper drive needs spinning mechanical parts but not getting confounded about a drive that can make you bounce around hyper space is a tad strange in my opinion...

tlb wrote:Has anyone else thought it strange that a hyper generator contains a part that I visualize as though it were a camshaft (or crankshaft)?
Of course the plot required something to break that could be fixed by a mechanic in the workshop of a cargo ship.

Joat42 wrote:I don't find it as far fetched. It could be that the hyper drive has some components made out of exotic materials that spins and generates the hyper field which makes the travel possible. Something comparable to a magnetic field but related to hyper space or whatever.

In the end it's all handwavium, and getting confounded because a hyper drive needs spinning mechanical parts but not getting confounded about a drive that can make you bounce around hyper space is a tad strange in my opinion...

To each his own. My impression of even current technology is that if a moving part can be replaced by a solid state device, then it will happen - for example: computer controlled ignition. But that need not mean that all rotary parts will disappear.

Galactic Sapper wrote:

JohnRoth wrote:As far as I remember, the only component that has a definite minimum size is the fusion bottle - the smallest that can be can supply power to an old-style destroyer. That's why Manticore's modern LACs use the Grayson fission pile for power, with all the compromises that entails. The hyper generator is unlikely to be the largest component.

And the Streak Drive's hyper generator is supposed to be twice the size of a normal hyper generator. Whether that's volume or a single side hasn't been mentioned, but it's not enough to affect the size of courier boats and yachts sufficiently to excite comment.

Lots of old school LACs had fusion power plants; what they didn't have was much in the way of life support endurance or hydrogen bunker space for more than a few day's operation at a time. Those issues probably account for more tonnage than a slightly larger fusion plant.

For that matter, Manticore might well be building dispatch boats with fission piles for the inherent range advantage they have. That could be an issue if a streak drive takes significantly more sustained power than a standard hyperdrive, but if it's just initiation energy the standard capacitor coils can supply that.

Instead, the biggest obstacle to hyper-capable shipping is alpha nodes. Even with beta squared nodes you need an additional 8 nodes per ring, and a hyper capable ship needs both rings whereas missiles and drones generally only have one ring.

Just as a thought experiment, I've tried to consider whether GA carriers could be modified to carry a couple dispatch boats to ensure fleet commanders always have a supply available. They would definitely need to be specially built to fit the dimensions of a Shrike or Ferret, at least in the beam and draft plane. Additional length could be accommodated by modifying the carrier docks specifically for that purpose - mainly ripping out the outsized docking ring and munitions handling equipment to buy a dozen or more meters on the inboard end of the bay. That would prevent those LAC bays from being used for LACs, of course, but it might be worth the trade off as more and more of the GA fleet gets split into detachments covering wormhole termini.

It may be that the streak drive hyper generator would be too big to be fit into a boat small enough for this to work, which would mean scrapping the concept or accepting dispatch boats that are slower but more readily available.

Just an interesting bit of speculation on my part. Maybe it's already been addressed elsewhere; I'm only conversant with what's been published in the books.

Would it be possible to tractor CBs to the hull of an SD(p)?