Proposed Ship mission codes

[whartung]

The reason to have tubes is so that ship launches look cool like in BSG.

The reason to have catapults is so that you can push the craft away from the ship quickly before its fusion rocket engine incinerates the hangar and hapless crew members.

Probably the most efficient mechanic is something more like a "magazine" fed launch system. Lay out the craft side by side, open the door, shove 'em out sideways. There's really no reason to have some kind of high powered, high velocity launch system. It's dangerous and expensive, and the ships don't need that much velocity. They just need to be pushed out the door, and then they can use their station keeping engines to clear the ship before they light their main motors (if that's an actual concern vs the blue light M-drive mode).

It's not like the carrier is going to be surprised. It's going to have hours of warning to schedule, time, and deploy its craft.

A more likely scenario is the wide open hangar bay, again ala BSG. Just deploy the craft in the bay, and have them lightly lift off and clear the hangar. Now become an issue of getting the craft staged to lift off in the first place.

Imagine a helicopter carrier. Elevator the helicopters to the deck and...they take off! No catapults, springs, jets, rockets, or trebuchets necessary.

 

[McPerth]

Launching tubes would also depend on the vrsion and tech.

In T4, to give an example, fusion drive equipped fighters would fry their mothership...

 

[Condottiere]

There's no stealth in space, so surprise would most likely occur during the exit part of the jump.

So, if you're planning on exiting next to a planet with a task force, you might want to be able to launch the fighters in a hurry, either by the defender, or the offender.

 

[whartung]

There's no stealth in space, so surprise would most likely occur during the exit part of the jump.

Um...no? The probability of "jumping" on top of, well, anything is...uh...astronomical?

"Space is big..."

Then add in the 33 hours arrival window from Jump (just can't schedule anything any more).

100D to a planet takes hours.

There's plenty of time to launch the ships. If you're worried about response time, stage and ready the craft in Jump to start launching as soon as they arrive.

If the fleet is afraid of surprise, they can arrive farther away.

Recall, the attacking fleet, pretty much, has "all week" to do whatever it wants to do. It takes a week for the Gas Giant fleets to respond in normal space, and arrivals from Jump aren't coming for two weeks (barring pre-scheduled ships that just happen to show up, certainly not in response to the attacking fleet).

So spending a few hours to marshal and organize the fleet isn't a real problem.

 

[Condottiere]

Terra is under thirteen kay kilometres diameter, which times a hundred would make an exit point one and a half million klix.

Which I estimate would take a task force about half an hour to get within weapon range of the Earth.

 

[Grav_Moped]

Terra is under thirteen kay kilometres diameter, which times a hundred would make an exit point one and a half million klix.

Which I estimate would take a task force about half an hour to get within weapon range of the Earth.

From a "running" jump or a 0-velocity jump? Also consider jump duration variation -- even if the first ships get there that fast, the rest of the fleet could be scattered across a 33-hour arrival window.

 

[Condottiere]

Synchronized jump is an option.

 

[aramis]

I think one reason you do have tubes, is that it's prevent the launchee from crashing into one of the sides of the hangar.

Also, I've always thought that if the carrier is accelerating forward, you might want to launch out the rear, with or without a tube.

If your pilots are that bad, you kick them out of service. Launch from a bay is almost as easy as it gets,
Launch racks are a bit easier. And probably spring loaded, too.

Landing is where launch racks suck.

Launch tubes are only useful in rules because of an artificial limit on launches. They are setting nonsense.

 

[whartung]

There's no stealth in space, so surprise would most likely occur during the exit part of the jump.

Um...no? The probability of "jumping" on top of, well, anything is...uh...astronomical?

"Space is big..."

Then add in the 33 hours arrival window from Jump (just can't schedule anything any more).

100D to a planet takes hours.

There's plenty of time to launch the ships. If you're worried about response time, stage and ready the craft in Jump to start launching as soon as they arrive.

If the fleet is afraid of surprise, they can arrive farther away.

Recall, the attacking fleet, pretty much, has "all week" to do whatever it wants to do. It takes a week for the Gas Giant fleets to respond in normal space, and arrivals from Jump aren't coming for two weeks (barring pre-scheduled ships that just happen to show up, certainly not in response to the attacking fleet).

So spending a few hours to marshal and organize the fleet isn't a real problem.

 

[Condottiere]

A million klix at six gees is listed at one hundred thirty six minutes, and the task force won't be decelerating, and if positioned correctly, the planet would be approaching.

Most inhabited planets in Traveller are smaller than Terra.

 

[whartung]

A million klix at six gees is listed at one hundred thirty six minutes, and the task force won't be decelerating, and if positioned correctly, the planet would be approaching.

Well, that's 2 hours.

Earths 100D is a 1.2 million "klix", so 20% longer.

It takes 2 hours to launch your craft? I suggest some better drills. Apparently a USN Aircraft carrier can launch everything in 45m...and that includes arming the aircraft, and refueling returning tankers topping the flights off after launch.

And, as I said, you want 12 hours to marshal the fleet? Arrive 12 hours travel from the target. It's not like there isn't room. When it comes to space combat, nothing happens in "minutes", everything takes forever.

"Enemy fleet detected! They're attacking!" "Ok, acknowledged. We'll call battle stations after dinner, my nap, and a bath."

 

[AnotherDilbert]

Launch tubes are only useful in rules because of an artificial limit on launches. They are setting nonsense.

Yes, but it's reasonable for large craft carrying many small craft, e.g. the Tigress.

The Tigress is not likely to have 300 small cubbies with 300 individual hatches through the armour, one for each fighter. It would be more like a parking garage with individual parking spaces and a lot of empty space for the craft to move to/from the parking space to a larger hatch, and that's what a Launch Tube is, just empty space.

Note that Launch Tubes cost the same as Hangars, next to nothing (MCr 0.002 per Dt). I can't see that any complex machinery is implied.

An M-drive equipped small craft obviously doesn't need a small amount of extra shove out the hatch.

 

[whartung]

I can't see that any complex machinery is implied.

So you see launch tubes as simply long holes in the hull? Corridors for ships? Really, really, really thick hangar doors (or, at least, casings)?

How do you reconcile the launch tubes fast launch capability with it simply being a long tube? How does the launch tube facilitate rapid launch in contrast to a large hangar floor and door?

 

[AnotherDilbert]

Corridors for ships?

Yes.

How do you reconcile the launch tubes fast launch capability with it simply being a long tube?

Launch Tubes allows you to launch more craft per round, they don't come out at any higher speed.

How does the launch tube facilitate rapid launch in contrast to a large hangar floor and door?

Without a Launch Tube you just have the space the craft takes up, nothing extra. See the Mercenary Cruiser, if you want to launch an extra module you have to launch the cutter, eject the carried module, dock the cutter, load the module, and finally launch the cutter again. With a Launch Tube you would have extra space, a corridor if you wish, so you could launch any craft into the "corridor" and out of the hull without all the intermediary steps.

Without the extra space of a Launch Tube only the craft closest to the hatch could launch, any other craft would have to wait.

This is how I see it:

Think of a parking space without any extra space, unwieldy. The extra empty space you use to manoeuvre into and out of the parking space is the Launch Tube.

It isn't very necessary when you have five craft, but when you have a few hundred craft, it is very useful.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

Perhaps this picture is shows what I mean more clearly:

 

[AnotherDilbert]

Tigress:

 

[Condottiere]

Have a cargo hold run the length of the ship, with huge hatches at both ends.

Roll on, roll off.

Or short take off vertical landing.

 

[whartung]

Perhaps this picture is shows what I mean more clearly:

That's very informative, thanks.

Mind, I don't necessarily subscribe to you multiple hangar rendition per se. Obviously, if you have multiple, separate hangars (like on opposite sides of the ship), you'd have "individual hangars". But me thinks that once you start mounting several craft, you end up with a shared hangar space. There's no real reason to isolate the craft, like, say, on an air base that has individual a aircraft in their own bunkered parking area.

Most of the modern aircraft carriers have common hangers that the craft are maneuvered around in, and they launch quite rapidly.

Finally, of course, while I like your perspective on what the launch tube is, I think we can all agree that the inspiration came from BSG.

For ships with smaller numbers of craft, I can see space would be at a premium, and there'd be a lot more "8 puzzling" to maneuver the craft and get them ready to launch, but once you get to a higher number, I'd say even 6 or more, there'd be "more room".

That said, I don't think that "110%" of space necessary compared to craft size is enough free space, but at the same time, I don't think you need 25x (HG '80) the space either.

If you look at your parking lot example, seems that an extra 30-40% is more than enough.

 

[AnotherDilbert]

Mind, I don't necessarily subscribe to you multiple hangar rendition per se. Obviously, if you have multiple, separate hangars (like on opposite sides of the ship), you'd have "individual hangars". But me thinks that once you start mounting several craft, you end up with a shared hangar space. There's no real reason to isolate the craft, like, say, on an air base that has individual a aircraft in their own bunkered parking area.

Agreed.

Finally, of course, while I like your perspective on what the launch tube is, I think we can all agree that the inspiration came from BSG.

Cartoon physics, really?

Anything that can accelerate by several Gs for hours (or weeks) does not need nor will notice a fraction of a second of extra boost from a launch system. It would be utterly pointless, like shooting a cruise-missile out of a cannon...

For ships with smaller numbers of craft, I can see space would be at a premium, and there'd be a lot more "8 puzzling" to maneuver the craft and get them ready to launch, but once you get to a higher number, I'd say even 6 or more, there'd be "more room".

Quite, and the "more room" is the "Launch Tube".

That said, I don't think that "110%" of space necessary compared to craft size is enough free space, but at the same time, I don't think you need 25x (HG '80) the space either.

If you look at your parking lot example, seems that an extra 30-40% is more than enough.

Remember that a "Launch Tube" can handle 40-80 craft, so it's just ~30-60% of the craft extra and the basic hangar is 130% of the craft, so about 25-50% extra compared to the hangar space.

If you think 30-40% extra is reasonable, you can perhaps also accept 50% extra?

 

[mike wightman]

The original AHL deck plans illustrate launch tubes nicely and match your description.