Retrofitting the RMN: A Saganami Island Assignment

tlb wrote:

SharkHunter wrote:Then again, I would have included the known-to-be-corrupt transtellars to be broken up on my list of surrender demands given when Honor is talking to everyone on planet Earth, but who am I to second guess...

I am not sure that it was necessary to name interstellar corporations, the reason that they were considered corrupt was the exploitation in border planets that was backed by Frontier Fleet. Although it should be possible to make additions to an incomplete list of corrupt companies; by eliminating the support of FF, the RMN ensured that the local governments (unless they were also corrupt - possibly a separate problem) could either force the SLN companies out or force a rewrite of the exploitive agreements...

Actually, I realized they have an easier way. From post-Nemesis date whatever, "Kalakainos (etc.) freighters will no longer be allowed to use any Laccoon II controlled wormholes." Bada bing! Bankruptcies ensue.

SharkHunter wrote:Actually, I realized they have an easier way. From post-Nemesis date whatever, "Kalakainos (etc.) freighters will no longer be allowed to use any Laccoon II controlled wormholes." Bada bing! Bankruptcies ensue.

A bunch of these are about as well led as Somolia. Guess where the food comes from?

Galactic Sapper wrote:

Galactic Sapper wrote:All of the armed Caravans were decommissioned shortly after Thunderbolt. In the years since they've almost certainly been scrapped rather than held in reserve.

ThinksMarkedly wrote:
Or sold as freighters.

I doubt that. Ripping out all the conversions to the point where it could be a worthwhile freighter would be almost as costly as building a brand new freighter of the same class. Ripping out missile launchers, grasers, LAC bays, an entire hold built into crew quarters, a second reactor, etc. etc. etc. would be massively expensive, whereas material reclamation seems to mostly consist of putting the ship through a robotic shredding machine.

But you're correct in that, either way, they're certainly not in service as AMCs and probably not just sitting in mothballs.

Actually it probably wouldn't be too expensive to convert them back to freighters. The expensive bits of a freighter are mostly the impeller rings and the hyper generator, followed by the fusion reactor, then and the rest of engineering/life-support and sensors.
The actual cargo bay bulkheads and hull sheathing are dirt cheap by comparison. When you just run it through a shredder, which yes is cheap, you're destroying all those expensive bits and losing their value.
Normally you'd first spend the time carefully extracting all the valuable components before shredding the remaining hulk - but the time and manpower to do that is expensive compared to the shredding process (but worth it because of the reclaimed value). But in this case extracting all those components seems like significantly more worth that removing all later add-ons; which were almost exclusively installed into the freighter's cargo bays.

The AMC modifications didn't really touch any of those existing expensive bits of the freighter. So it seems relatively easy to torch the additions (even entire LAC bays are small relative to the cargo bay volume) out of the cargo holds they were installed into, yank them out, and weld in bulkheads, hull, and hatches per the original plans.

After all it's not like you've got to work around armor like a refit to a warship would; and there'd be little in the way of fiddly bits back there, cargo bays are mostly big empty volume - no annoying electrical, plumbing, life-support to rerun.

Different student, new approach, which I've alluded to in other posts. I'm thinking the combination below could be built in about the same time as one SD(p)

So the admiralty orders that "From now on ALL remote commands (2 squadrons) in Talbott or SLN space will consist of --at minimum, the following ships:

1 FSV...
1 Nike
Either 4 Sag-Cs or Sag-Cs and a squadron of Rolands

Meanwhile, the remaining quick retrofit would be to rotate ALL single-drive missile ships up to "can assume tactical management" of Mark 16's launched by another starship in terms of control channels and ECM standards.

By the way, I like the concept behind the SLN's Husky(s) forward delivering themselves or perhaps a better tactic in an "outnumbered battlespace" would be to do something like HMS Angrim did and use the FSV plus LACS to spot a few different launch points with Loreleis under full whichever ship control.

And yes, I mean a LAC only towing the appropriate number of Husky style chains and not at any great accel, just moving them to the appropriate fake formation launch points, not the magical plot-hammer battle fought by Tremaine, et. al.

Thoughts?

It’s easy to forget that David blew up the entire RMN maint and repIr facility over the last few books, (as none of the characters are concerned about this) but he did. So given there is a slight shortage of the equipment and construction yard needed, how do you propose to execute this upgrade? Assuming there is one needed, I’m not sure there is.

kzt wrote:It’s easy to forget that David blew up the entire RMN maint and repIr facility over the last few books, (as none of the characters are concerned about this) but he did. So given there is a slight shortage of the equipment and construction yard needed, how do you propose to execute this upgrade? Assuming there is one needed, I’m not sure there is.

Fortunately this is a paper assignment; so the students can ignore that aspect and try to decide on the best solution assuming that facilities are available.

tlb wrote:

kzt wrote:It’s easy to forget that David blew up the entire RMN maint and repIr facility over the last few books, (as none of the characters are concerned about this) but he did. So given there is a slight shortage of the equipment and construction yard needed, how do you propose to execute this upgrade? Assuming there is one needed, I’m not sure there is.

Fortunately this is a paper assignment; so the students can ignore that aspect and try to decide on the best solution assuming that facilities are available.

If you assume infinite money, resources, and political support a lot becomes possible. So how aboit the RMN builds 5000 SD(P) and goes a conqu, umm liberating the galaxy?

kzt wrote:It’s easy to forget that David blew up the entire RMN maint and repIr facility over the last few books, (as none of the characters are concerned about this) but he did. So given there is a slight shortage of the equipment and construction yard needed, how do you propose to execute this upgrade? Assuming there is one needed, I’m not sure there is.

tlb wrote:Fortunately this is a paper assignment; so the students can ignore that aspect and try to decide on the best solution assuming that facilities are available.

kzt wrote:If you assume infinite money, resources, and political support a lot becomes possible. So how aboit the RMN builds 5000 SD(P) and goes a conqu, umm liberating the galaxy?

With the victory over the Solarian League, haven't they nearly accomplished that? However that might not be a good answer for the research assignment.

The major task ahead of them is the Mesan Alignment, which will require finding out about Darius and the Renaissance Factor.

kzt wrote:It’s easy to forget that David blew up the entire RMN maint and repIr facility over the last few books, (as none of the characters are concerned about this) but he did. So given there is a slight shortage of the equipment and construction yard needed, how do you propose to execute this upgrade? Assuming there is one needed, I’m not sure there is.

I am assuming that since he specifically exempted Trevor's Star's yards that they would do the upgrades as part of an "as available" basis when it doesn't make Manticoran $$ sense to just replace the ship with a new built Roland or Sag C.

But -- and given that all of this is in a fictional universe -- the point of the exercise would be to find the non-tactical track all-stars to train up under Hemphill and Foraker and whomever is currently in charge of fleet maintenance. And just a fun brain exercise for us out here in the less futuristic more boring regular-verse.

You might want to insert into the opening portion of your responce that one of the peices that would be needed is to review the potential ability to upgrade or retrofit existing non-DD missile warships go carry, launch and control at lest MK 16's. That the modifications to accomodate such upgrades and maintain suffiencet tubes/energy mounts and Coutnter Measures to expected to allow the ship(s) to remain capable of performing the present roll of the same class of ship based on most recent experience for the next 5 to 10 years if the upgrades can be completed in under 2 years. .

The problem with this is not only is the RMN tech changing fast, there is a whole other set of at least one advisary out there with things the RMN has yet to come up with how they are doing that let alone be able to detect the Spider Drive ships.

So far we know- and possibly a Sr. at the Academy knows- that the Navy is now in flux as to which way to move with ship designs and what the transition from the most recent warfighter series. In any give class the mission is to some balance of new ships for several things. They are not mutualy exclusive but they cover a wide remit.
1st is the the hoped for return to a Navy that is going to be involved in commerce protection but also in having to deal with a new level of probable agressiveness of various Systems or alliances/Star Nations.

2nd there is a advisary out there which tech for which there is yet any detection or much in the way of direct defensive ability except what is being deployed like Mycroft. The Alignment has shown that it is more than willing to not abide by any recognized rules of warfare. It has also constantly used variations of asymentrical warfare and indirect attacks using 3rd parties. Finding these people is a major priority but other than the intelligence side of the equation, there is going to have to be a way to provide deterrence to the kind of attacks they have already engage in which is going to take more ships out there looking and defending.

3rd. Manticore needs to recover it's manufacturing capasity both for new building and maintenance/upgrades in military ships and equipment at the same time recoveing a similar capasity on the civilian side.

So, if you have the manufacturing and yard capability to upgrade ships which have at least 5 years of useful service in current non-war conditions and extend projected service life by another 3+ years, that might be feasable.

BuShips would have to select the most suitable and expedient to retrofit for the work to be done. The balance would receive what levels of normal/requried maintence can be provided and retained as long as serviceable for duties with the capability and mission for their type.

Those ships which would not be eligible/meet the criteria for that would