Information I'd love to know

Jonathan_S wrote:

penny wrote:I'm having a hard time with there not being a nominal acceleration in hyper. I know that text says enemy forces meet in hyper to hide, plan, etc. But hyper has a velocity, though nowhere near the velocity of a grav wave, that is much faster than the would be velocity in n-space. That implies -- let's say for the sake of argument -- for every 1 km moved you actually move 100,000 km. Well, for every meter moved you actually travel 100,000 meters? On down to centimeters. That means ships would have to hold station perfectly to prevent any acceleration. I can't wrap my head around that. Thus, when entering hyper there simply has to be a nominal acceleration, at least until a relative velocity of zero is achieved. And if something is being towed, the beam should snap.

It's described more like the width of the galaxy is X% smaller each layer of hyper you go up.

So in the Alpha bands it isn't 4.246 LY from Earth to Proxima Centauri -- it's only 25 light-days. Distances between systems shrink by 62 times there.

But the text in the books makes the relative accelerations and distances between objects in hyper appear to behave normally. Within the Alpha bands if you move a meter you've moved a meter. At least relatively to everything else in the Alpha bands. If you accelerate at 9.8 m/s^2 for 1 seconds you'll have gone 4.9 meters and be moving at 9.8 m/s*. It's only when you translate back into normal space that you discover that you're 303-ism meters (62x further than that 4.9 meters) from where you'd entered hyper.

*Assuming you'd started with 0 velocity.

Thats also how I rmemember it. Higher bands have a higher velicity multiplier compared to lower bands, however the factors between bands decrease, so the beta bands have a factor of 767 (62 times 12.37) and not 62*62=3884. See http://www.davidweber.net/posts/15-hyperband-graph.html

(The table makes me wonder a little about the velocity multiplier in the iota bands, which seems not to fit in the decreasing progression of the multiplication factor of the other values: 62.0, 12.37, 1.92, 1.48, 1.32, 1.24, 1.2, 1.16, 1.2)

Acceleration within the band is according to normal rules, but the maximum speed is lower due to higher particle density, creating problems for the particle shields.

Exception here are the grav waves, which allow for higher acceleration while using less energy, but require sails - grav turbulences will destroy the ship without sails, and impeller nodes will be destroyed by the stronger gravity within the waves.

Jonathan_S wrote:How fleets can still emerge more or less in formation is a point not addressed in RFC's physics. By the power of plot they do.
And similarly sensors of ships waiting in hyper somehow can't see other ships waiting across the solar system even if hyperlimit diameter / compression ratio yields a distance that's smaller than sensor range in hyperspace. <shrug>

Agreed. Those are two questions we might nost likely never get an answer for.

Jonathan_S wrote:

penny wrote:I'm having a hard time with there not being a nominal acceleration in hyper. I know that text says enemy forces meet in hyper to hide, plan, etc. But hyper has a velocity, though nowhere near the velocity of a grav wave, that is much faster than the would be velocity in n-space. That implies -- let's say for the sake of argument -- for every 1 km moved you actually move 100,000 km. Well, for every meter moved you actually travel 100,000 meters? On down to centimeters. That means ships would have to hold station perfectly to prevent any acceleration. I can't wrap my head around that. Thus, when entering hyper there simply has to be a nominal acceleration, at least until a relative velocity of zero is achieved. And if something is being towed, the beam should snap.

It's described more like the width of the galaxy is X% smaller each layer of hyper you go up.

So in the Alpha bands it isn't 4.246 LY from Earth to Proxima Centauri -- it's only 25 light-days. Distances between systems shrink by 62 times there.

But the text in the books makes the relative accelerations and distances between objects in hyper appear to behave normally. Within the Alpha bands if you move a meter you've moved a meter. At least relatively to everything else in the Alpha bands. If you accelerate at 9.8 m/s^2 for 1 seconds you'll have gone 4.9 meters and be moving at 9.8 m/s*. It's only when you translate back into normal space that you discover that you're 303-ism meters (62x further than that 4.9 meters) from where you'd entered hyper.

*Assuming you'd started with 0 velocity.

---
How fleets can still emerge more or less in formation is a point not addressed in RFC's physics. By the power of plot they do.
And similarly sensors of ships waiting in hyper somehow can't see other ships waiting across the solar system even if hyperlimit diameter / compression ratio yields a distance that's smaller than sensor range in hyperspace. <shrug>

The conundrum about how ships can emerge from hyper and still be in formation is related to my same distress about how ships can float in hyper and not get away from each other. Even a slight variation in velocity will throw the formation in disarray. You say that's not how the author explains it. But isn't that simply kicking the can down the road? Moving up a band from varying coordinates should place ships some significant distance away from each other. Even a slight variation in velocity should do the same. A slight deviation in the bearing of each ship when the higher band is traversed along with a deviation in velocity should put the ships in an even worse position from each other. And ditto for that poor towed ship trailing behind with such a fragile tether.


Now that I think about it, I don't have a problem with ships in hyper not being able to see ships in n-space. They are out of phase with each other. Also, the view of ships in hyper should be obstructed by the density of the more frequently appearing particles in hyperspace. Obviously hyper space, in the form of bands, is folded space-time. How can sensors see around corners, er, bends.


PS

Shame on you markusschaber for confusing me even more.

penny wrote:The conundrum about how ships can emerge from hyper and still be in formation is related to my same distress about how ships can float in hyper and not get away from each other. Even a slight variation in velocity will throw the formation in disarray. You say that's not how the author explains it. But isn't that simply kicking the can down the road? Moving up a band from varying coordinates should place ships some significant distance away from each other. Even a slight variation in velocity should do the same. A slight deviation in the bearing of each ship when the higher band is traversed along with a deviation in velocity should put the ships in an even worse position from each other. And ditto for that poor towed ship trailing behind with such a fragile tether.


Now that I think about it, I don't have a problem with ships in hyper not being able to see ships in n-space. They are out of phase with each other. Also, the view of ships in hyper should be obstructed by the density of the more frequently appearing particles in hyperspace. Obviously hyper space, in the form of bands, is folded space-time. How can sensors see around corners, er, bends.

Noone is surprised the ships in hyper can't see ships (or stars, or anything) in normal space. Nor can a ship in one band of hyper see a ship in another band of hyper.

But we've had situations in the later books where two fleets were waiting near the hyper limit, in hyper, and neither saw each other. That's a bit surprising.
(I guess, by coincidence, they might have been waiting in different hyper bands.)

Again, the text gives zero indications that ships in hyper have formations (or convoys) thrown into disarray by minor velocity changes. (Or at least no more-so than that same formation or convoy in normal space) The disruptions, if any, would occur at moments of translation - when they crossed hyper bands)

And logically moving up a band would, if anything, wouldn't scatter them; it'd shrink the distances between them because distances between systems shrink more and more the higher you go.
Alpha is 62x reduction in distance
Beta is a further 12.37x reduction
Gamma a further 1.92x reduction
Delta a further 1.48x reduction
Epsilon a further 1.32x reduction
Zeta a further 1.24x reduction
Eta a further 1.20x reduction
Theta a further 1.16x reduction

So if the compression was uniform then you'd logically expect a pair of ships in formation with 1000 km separation to, upon going up to the Alpha bands, to suddenly have only a 16.12 km separation. (Which'd be a massive problem since that'd bring their wedges, or sails, into mutually destructive contact)
And by similar logic if they'd been in extremely tight formation in the Alpha bands, just 300 km separation you'd logically expect them to emerge in normal space with a sloppy 18,600 km separation -- which'd scatter a formation or convoy all to hell. (Well, okay, even the the accelerations a civie freighter can pull they could tighten back up pretty quickly -- but it'd suck if you came under fire on emergence)
However there's no mention in the books of formations or convoys having to compensate for relative separation distances altering when making hyperspace translations...
So they maybe don't work entirely as logic would suppose

penny wrote:The conundrum about how ships can emerge from hyper and still be in formation is related to my same distress about how ships can float in hyper and not get away from each other. Even a slight variation in velocity will throw the formation in disarray. You say that's not how the author explains it. But isn't that simply kicking the can down the road? Moving up a band from varying coordinates should place ships some significant distance away from each other. Even a slight variation in velocity should do the same. A slight deviation in the bearing of each ship when the higher band is traversed along with a deviation in velocity should put the ships in an even worse position from each other. And ditto for that poor towed ship trailing behind with such a fragile tether.

I could say that's why hyper navigation has been described as so difficult throughout the books.

On the other hand, ships flying in formation are in permanent coordination through communication and positioning, and permanently correcting their relative positions and accelerations.

penny wrote:Shame on you markusschaber for confusing me even more.

I'm sorry. My intent is to enlighten you, not confuse you. And sometimes, some of your texts tend to confuse me.

Jonathan_S wrote:So if the compression was uniform then you'd logically expect a pair of ships in formation with 1000 km separation to, upon going up to the Alpha bands, to suddenly have only a 16.12 km separation. (Which'd be a massive problem since that'd bring their wedges, or sails, into mutually destructive contact)
And by similar logic if they'd been in extremely tight formation in the Alpha bands, just 300 km separation you'd logically expect them to emerge in normal space with a sloppy 18,600 km separation -- which'd scatter a formation or convoy all to hell. (Well, okay, even the the accelerations a civie freighter can pull they could tighten back up pretty quickly -- but it'd suck if you came under fire on emergence)
However there's no mention in the books of formations or convoys having to compensate for relative separation distances altering when making hyperspace translations...
So they maybe don't work entirely as logic would suppose

I could think of a procedure where the ships change bands in a staggered manner, so they appear close together in real space. But it will only work within certain speed ranges to compensate the space difference with time difference, which also means it will not work when ships are not moving at all. (Someone else could do the maths of the required speeds as an exercise )
And it doesn't really match the descriptions in the books which gave me the impression that the whole fleet transisted synchroneously. (But maybe that's part of what makes an "impressive" hyper footprint, not only the strength, but also the duration...)

It finally occurred to me that we have (and have discussed in other contexts) a 2nd example of ships exiting hyper with a tractor involved. (The first obviously being the Masadan's LACs from HotQ)

Storm From the Shadows wrote:At the moment, Kolstad was concentrating all of her own attention on the readouts which showed the exact position of every unit of Topolev's task force, literally down to the last centimeter. All twenty of his ships were tractored together into two big, ungainly formations, nine hundred kilometers apart, as they floated with the closest thing possible to a zero velocity relative to one another and to the normal-space universe they'd left three months earlier.
"All right, people," Topolev said as calmly as he could, "let's do this."
"Yes, Sir," Coleman acknowledged, and passed the order to Captain Joshua Walsh, MANS Mako's captain.
Absolutely nothing seemed to happen for the next two or three minutes, but appearances were deceiving, and Topolev waited patiently, watching his own displays, as Task Force One of the Mesan Alignment Navy translated ever so slowly and gradually back into normal-space.
This maneuver had been tested against the Mesa System's sensor arrays by crews using the early Ghost-class ships even before the first of the Shark-class prototypes had ever been laid down, and Task Force One had practiced it over a hundred times once the mission had been okayed.
[snip]
"Translation completed, Sir," Lieutenant Commander Vivienne Henning, his staff astrogator, announced. "Preliminary checks indicate we're right on the money: one light-month out on almost exactly the right bearing."
"Good work," Topolev complemented her, and she smiled with pleasure at the sincerity in his voice. He smiled back, then cleared his throat. "And now that we're here, let's go someplace else."
"Yes, Sir."
The twenty Shark-class ships, each about midway between an old-fashioned battleship and a dreadnought for size, deactivated the tractors which had held them together. Reaction thrusters flared, pushing them apart

So we have their separation in hyperspace* and the text strongly implies that the tractors continued to hold them throughout the translation out of hyper. (And that it wasn't any kind of staggered translation)

---
* Presumably; though not explicitly stated only starting in the Alpha bands -- as there's no reason not to have independently translated down to there before coming to a halt and assuming this 'stealth-entry' formation.

Jonathan_S wrote:So we have their separation in hyperspace* and the text strongly implies that the tractors continued to hold them throughout the translation out of hyper. (And that it wasn't any kind of staggered translation)

---
* Presumably; though not explicitly stated only starting in the Alpha bands -- as there's no reason not to have independently translated down to there before coming to a halt and assuming this 'stealth-entry' formation.

But these are spider ships, you were worried before about wedge powered ships and that explained the extra separation needed then. Yes, it only needed to be from the Alpha band to normal space, because here the tractor beams are to force a signal form usually associated with a false signature when seen by the gravitic array.

Jonathan_S wrote:It finally occurred to me that we have (and have discussed in other contexts) a 2nd example of ships exiting hyper with a tractor involved. (The first obviously being the Masadan's LACs from HotQ)

Storm From the Shadows wrote:At the moment, Kolstad was concentrating all of her own attention on the readouts which showed the exact position of every unit of Topolev's task force, literally down to the last centimeter. All twenty of his ships were tractored together into two big, ungainly formations, nine hundred kilometers apart, as they floated with the closest thing possible to a zero velocity relative to one another and to the normal-space universe they'd left three months earlier.
"All right, people," Topolev said as calmly as he could, "let's do this."
"Yes, Sir," Coleman acknowledged, and passed the order to Captain Joshua Walsh, MANS Mako's captain.
Absolutely nothing seemed to happen for the next two or three minutes, but appearances were deceiving, and Topolev waited patiently, watching his own displays, as Task Force One of the Mesan Alignment Navy translated ever so slowly and gradually back into normal-space.
This maneuver had been tested against the Mesa System's sensor arrays by crews using the early Ghost-class ships even before the first of the Shark-class prototypes had ever been laid down, and Task Force One had practiced it over a hundred times once the mission had been okayed.
[snip]
"Translation completed, Sir," Lieutenant Commander Vivienne Henning, his staff astrogator, announced. "Preliminary checks indicate we're right on the money: one light-month out on almost exactly the right bearing."
"Good work," Topolev complemented her, and she smiled with pleasure at the sincerity in his voice. He smiled back, then cleared his throat. "And now that we're here, let's go someplace else."
"Yes, Sir."
The twenty Shark-class ships, each about midway between an old-fashioned battleship and a dreadnought for size, deactivated the tractors which had held them together. Reaction thrusters flared, pushing them apart

So we have their separation in hyperspace* and the text strongly implies that the tractors continued to hold them throughout the translation out of hyper. (And that it wasn't any kind of staggered translation)

---
* Presumably; though not explicitly stated only starting in the Alpha bands -- as there's no reason not to have independently translated down to there before coming to a halt and assuming this 'stealth-entry' formation.

Maybe the tractors (or the close distance) allows their hyper generators to work together to create one big field instead of a small one for each ship.

I also guess that part of the hyper generators work is to somehow compensate the distance/velocity multiplier so the ship itself doesn't get crushed/expanded during the translation.

So when the ships are close enough, this should clearly work - as it's the case for tractored pods, Masadan LACs, or the MA ships to stay in formation. However, will it work for a big formation of impeller-driven ships (bigger distances) doing a crash translation through several bands?

Jonathan_S wrote:

penny wrote:The conundrum about how ships can emerge from hyper and still be in formation is related to my same distress about how ships can float in hyper and not get away from each other. Even a slight variation in velocity will throw the formation in disarray. You say that's not how the author explains it. But isn't that simply kicking the can down the road? Moving up a band from varying coordinates should place ships some significant distance away from each other. Even a slight variation in velocity should do the same. A slight deviation in the bearing of each ship when the higher band is traversed along with a deviation in velocity should put the ships in an even worse position from each other. And ditto for that poor towed ship trailing behind with such a fragile tether.


Now that I think about it, I don't have a problem with ships in hyper not being able to see ships in n-space. They are out of phase with each other. Also, the view of ships in hyper should be obstructed by the density of the more frequently appearing particles in hyperspace. Obviously hyper space, in the form of bands, is folded space-time. How can sensors see around corners, er, bends.

Noone is surprised the ships in hyper can't see ships (or stars, or anything) in normal space. Nor can a ship in one band of hyper see a ship in another band of hyper.

But we've had situations in the later books where two fleets were waiting near the hyper limit, in hyper, and neither saw each other. That's a bit surprising.
(I guess, by coincidence, they might have been waiting in different hyper bands.)

Again, the text gives zero indications that ships in hyper have formations (or convoys) thrown into disarray by minor velocity changes. (Or at least no more-so than that same formation or convoy in normal space) The disruptions, if any, would occur at moments of translation - when they crossed hyper bands)

And logically moving up a band would, if anything, wouldn't scatter them; it'd shrink the distances between them because distances between systems shrink more and more the higher you go.
Alpha is 62x reduction in distance
Beta is a further 12.37x reduction
Gamma a further 1.92x reduction
Delta a further 1.48x reduction
Epsilon a further 1.32x reduction
Zeta a further 1.24x reduction
Eta a further 1.20x reduction
Theta a further 1.16x reduction

So if the compression was uniform then you'd logically expect a pair of ships in formation with 1000 km separation to, upon going up to the Alpha bands, to suddenly have only a 16.12 km separation. (Which'd be a massive problem since that'd bring their wedges, or sails, into mutually destructive contact)
And by similar logic if they'd been in extremely tight formation in the Alpha bands, just 300 km separation you'd logically expect them to emerge in normal space with a sloppy 18,600 km separation -- which'd scatter a formation or convoy all to hell. (Well, okay, even the the accelerations a civie freighter can pull they could tighten back up pretty quickly -- but it'd suck if you came under fire on emergence)
However there's no mention in the books of formations or convoys having to compensate for relative separation distances altering when making hyperspace translations...
So they maybe don't work entirely as logic would suppose

Bold mine.

But isn't that in step with the fact that sensor range is very limited in hyper? Near each other in hyper is very vague. Anyway, it seems to me the fact that they cannot see each other lends credence to my entire objection / problem posted upstream about hyper, and the fact that small deviations in position should manifest itself in a big way.

penny wrote:But isn't that in step with the fact that sensor range is very limited in hyper? Near each other in hyper is very vague. Anyway, it seems to me the fact that they cannot see each other lends credence to my entire objection / problem posted upstream about hyper, and the fact that small deviations in position should manifest itself in a big way.

Limited, compared to sensor range in normal space. But not that limited.

I think there's a better sensor range number somewhere, but the first I found was the liner Artemis easily observed the destroyer Hawkwing during her unannounced drill at 30 lightseconds -- basically 9 million km.


To give an idea of how large that range really still is, take the quickest destroyer we've numbers for, a Wolfhound, which had a military max (10% safety margin) 706.2g when laid down. If it headed directly away from its convoy (in a rift) at that acceleration it'd take it about 1,600 seconds (nearly 27 minutes) to get to 30 LS separation. (Double that if going for a zero-zero stop at that range).

Even in a grav wave, where accelerations go up basically 10 fold, the fastest breakaway (so hardly representative of a small deviation in position) would still take 510 seconds (about 8.5 minutes) to reach 30 LS -- and that's not the maximum sensor range; just one that we conveniently know is definitely within military grade sensor range.