Battle of Spindle

TFLYTSNBN wrote:Just perused On Basilisk Station, Chapter 27 where Honor gets ready for battle. She just got out of the shower and only had time to throw on a silk kimono to answer the emergency comm. ( Imagery of Honor wearing only a silk kimono that is wet.). She then grabs her skin suit out of her locker, removes her damp kimono, slips her feet into her skinsuit then makes the "plumbing connections with painful haste.). Definitely no panties to change if you loose bowel control. If the waste tube is transparent, then you are humiliated in front of your bridge crew.

Loren Pechtel wrote:

TFLYTSNBN wrote:Just perused On Basilisk Station, Chapter 27 where Honor gets ready for battle. She just got out of the shower and only had time to throw on a silk kimono to answer the emergency comm. ( Imagery of Honor wearing only a silk kimono that is wet.). She then grabs her skin suit out of her locker, removes her damp kimono, slips her feet into her skinsuit then makes the "plumbing connections with painful haste.). Definitely no panties to change if you loose bowel control. If the waste tube is transparent, then you are humiliated in front of your bridge crew.

Disagree--I very much doubt there's a tube sticking out there. The tube would have to follow the torso, not the legs and thus would seriously get in the way--you couldn't sit, for example. Thus the waste connection must make an immediate right-angle turn within the suit thickness. There has to be some sort of pump (although it could be gravitic in nature) that sends your dump to wherever it's held.

Jonathan_S wrote:

cthia wrote:I just realized that we are all probably assuming this one-off scenario being attempted at the far fringes of an Apollo brood's final stage, instead of a much closer-in combat where a lot more time is left on the MK 23 missile's drive system, thus the MK 23-E missile's drive as well. Leaving much more fuel for unscheduled maneuvers. No?

Enemy formations tend toward walls; they don't usually have depth. So once you miss your chance at the first target ship there usually aren't any behind it you could divert to.

And a Mk23 is basically never going to be fired on a profile that leaves enough time on the drives to kill its original velocity and come charging back at the enemy. To have a reasonable terminal velocity at its normal half-power it'd need to miss and reverse course after about just 10 million km (just over 1/3rd its run time, less than 1/6ths its range). But since its full-power range is 14.6 million km by the time an enemy was that close you wouldn't be taking half-power shots.


The cold equations show that remaining fuel is almost irrelevant. If the 23E escorts its brood to even 4x laserhead range (200,000 km) of its target its base velocity at any likely range is going to be over 150,000 km/s (burnout is at 242,432 km/s); even at the shorter end of that range it's going to have just 1.3 seconds to maneuver before flying into or past the target. At the usually 50% power level in 1.3 seconds it can divert a maximum of 586 km off its base course.

That might, barely, be enough to deflect into the closest adjacent ship. But only if the laserheads attack from nearly head on. If the target is rolled behind its wedge the attack birds are going to have to overfly it to get line of sight to the hull, which means the 23E will be 50,000+ km off to the side of the target without enough delta-V to achieve impact before its base velocity inexorably carries it off into the depths of space. (Except in the extremely uncommon situation where there's another target behind the first that it might be able to divert into)



But as I've said before, if the geometry lets it attempt to ram there's no reason not to try. But the engagement geometry doesn't always allow that and no plausible amount of remaining fuel will let it try again at ramming a wall of battle if it wasn't able to initially.

Loren Pechtel wrote:1) By the time the control missile can be engaged (while it's herding it's brood it's hidden behind them and thus it's pretty much impossible to shoot at it) it already through the countermissile zone. If it's going to be engaged it will be with a laser.

2) By the time it can be engaged the defense will know if it's a threat or not. If it's not going to hit they'll let it go. Furthermore, if it's going to hit there's no point in engaging it--use your last shots to help your friends because you can't save yourself. The only reason you would shoot is if the missile was going to be a very near miss--kill it's drive so it can't steer into an impact.

cthia wrote:
Disagree--I very much doubt there's a tube sticking out there. The tube would have to follow the torso, not the legs and thus would seriously get in the way--you couldn't sit, for example. Thus the waste connection must make an immediate right-angle turn within the suit thickness. There has to be some sort of pump (although it could be gravitic in nature) that sends your dump to wherever it's held.

Loren Pechtel wrote:Disagree--I very much doubt there's a tube sticking out there. The tube would have to follow the torso, not the legs and thus would seriously get in the way--you couldn't sit, for example. Thus the waste connection must make an immediate right-angle turn within the suit thickness. There has to be some sort of pump (although it could be gravitic in nature) that sends your dump to wherever it's held.

cthia wrote:Oh my, if you're a home owner, you'll know that 90 ° angles are the location of most backups needing a plumber. Unless there's a built-in roto-rooter. A pump? Causing a vacuum? That sounds. . . interesting.

Battle conditions may not always allow for one to take one's time to gingerly insert the plumbing. Arrrrrgh!

Brigade XO wrote:Plumbing connections, always try for the most gentle angle-and downward with gravity- as possible. Why, because shit and water don't ususaly like to flow uphill. Actually we might have to nip over to DUNE and the discussion of how to wear and how it operates of a Stillsuit. Mechanical pumping driven my muscles rather than electronic engines move the materials (fluid or solids).
Sure, people put in 90º bends all the time, ususaly because it is both easier and to do otherwise requires both more planning and takes up more space. But, if you have the choice, something less sharp is better and less subject to blockages.
Of course I don't think we have see a skin suit image where the "holding areas" for body waste are obvious.
Now that we are into such detail as kimono to skinsuit after shower with an alarm going off, it is plainly obvious that we need another book or two otherwise somebody might want to see a short story about the design testing of new skinsuit prototypes and the effect of body types vs the Gumby version as the practical emergency wear for non-military passengers on warships (no issued military skinsuit) or commercial transports/liners. So many interesting topics, so few books

Loren Pechtel wrote:

tlb wrote:I think that means the 23-E is going too busy finding openings for its flock to attack. for it to impact anything before the birds have finished. Maybe afterwards there could be a target to hit, but it would be strange if it were presenting the bow or stern.

The computation required to guide it to impact is going to be trivial compared to what else it's doing so there's no issue of it being too busy.

However, it's only an option if the missile is in the plane of the wedge opening. If the defenders roll the wedge there's no possibility of an impact. (Note that if ramming missile are introduced the combat reality is going to be that the defenders must roll as the missile storm arrives. I would not expect hits against mobile units, but rather it forces the defenders to roll and stay rolled.)

cthia wrote:

Loren Pechtel wrote:Disagree--I very much doubt there's a tube sticking out there. The tube would have to follow the torso, not the legs and thus would seriously get in the way--you couldn't sit, for example. Thus the waste connection must make an immediate right-angle turn within the suit thickness. There has to be some sort of pump (although it could be gravitic in nature) that sends your dump to wherever it's held.

cthia wrote:Oh my, if you're a home owner, you'll know that 90 ° angles are the location of most backups needing a plumber. Unless there's a built-in roto-rooter. A pump? Causing a vacuum? That sounds. . . interesting.

Battle conditions may not always allow for one to take one's time to gingerly insert the plumbing. Arrrrrgh!

Brigade XO wrote:Plumbing connections, always try for the most gentle angle-and downward with gravity- as possible. Why, because shit and water don't ususaly like to flow uphill. Actually we might have to nip over to DUNE and the discussion of how to wear and how it operates of a Stillsuit. Mechanical pumping driven my muscles rather than electronic engines move the materials (fluid or solids).
Sure, people put in 90º bends all the time, ususaly because it is both easier and to do otherwise requires both more planning and takes up more space. But, if you have the choice, something less sharp is better and less subject to blockages.
Of course I don't think we have see a skin suit image where the "holding areas" for body waste are obvious.
Now that we are into such detail as kimono to skinsuit after shower with an alarm going off, it is plainly obvious that we need another book or two otherwise somebody might want to see a short story about the design testing of new skinsuit prototypes and the effect of body types vs the Gumby version as the practical emergency wear for non-military passengers on warships (no issued military skinsuit) or commercial transports/liners. So many interesting topics, so few books

Something just as frightening to me is the prospect of hand to hand combat while in a skinsuit with plumbing digging into your backside. Or heartily being slammed into a bulkhead, buttocks first.

"Aiyyeeeee!"



Hitting below the belt sudenly takes on a new meaning. Imagine a heavy handed Gryphonder pivoting then slapping the palm of his hand as hard as possible against one's backside.

"Yikes!"

"You like that huh?"

cthia wrote:

Loren Pechtel wrote:Disagree--I very much doubt there's a tube sticking out there. The tube would have to follow the torso, not the legs and thus would seriously get in the way--you couldn't sit, for example. Thus the waste connection must make an immediate right-angle turn within the suit thickness. There has to be some sort of pump (although it could be gravitic in nature) that sends your dump to wherever it's held.

Oh my, if you're a home owner, you'll know that 90 ° angles are the location of most backups needing a plumber. Unless there's a built-in roto-rooter. A pump? Causing a vacuum? That sounds. . . interesting.

Battle conditions may not always allow for one to take one's time to gingerly insert the plumbing. Arrrrrgh!

Jonathan_S wrote:

Loren Pechtel wrote:1) By the time the control missile can be engaged (while it's herding it's brood it's hidden behind them and thus it's pretty much impossible to shoot at it) it already through the countermissile zone. If it's going to be engaged it will be with a laser.

2) By the time it can be engaged the defense will know if it's a threat or not. If it's not going to hit they'll let it go. Furthermore, if it's going to hit there's no point in engaging it--use your last shots to help your friends because you can't save yourself. The only reason you would shoot is if the missile was going to be a very near miss--kill it's drive so it can't steer into an impact.

They'll have to be very confident that it is an unarmed control missile to avoid shooting it if it's going to pass within 50,000 km of them.

Because a sneaky tac officer would occasionally slip in a laserhead attack bird or 'contact' nuke in that trailing control position if they see the enemy consistently not engaging the "harmless" missile there.

(Though at that range they may be able to tell that it's larger than the rest of the missiles; which is a pretty good clue that its a 23E. At least until someone builds armed fake 23Es on that same oversized missile chassis)