TWTSNBN: hmm, maybe this soup could be thinner...

ThinksMarkedly wrote:It's not prohibitive, it's just not cost-effective. The refit would cost too much for obsolete ships. Don't forget that refitting also takes slip space, something they could be using for building or fitting out a brand new light cruiser or destroyer. So you have to add the cost of opportunity to the equation too. My guess is that it simply wasn't worth it: if you had the build slip, the budget, the personnel, and materials available to perform the refit, you'd simply instead do something else with those, for a more practical gain.

In fairness space isn't water, you don't actually need a proper drydock for construction purposes. So that's actually the EXACT reason you'd employ Grayson style yards. Which when building a brand-new ship is merely just enough framework to anchor your construction crews something to tether to.

If you're refitting literally anything, you don't really need a full-up construction slip especially if it's a low-priority refit, such as adding TWTMNBN to sub-capitals. Put the ship a short distance away from anything, or from an 'open-to-space' supply depot, assemble a minimal frame around the ship, and away you go with refitting. You could refit hundreds of ships simultaneously with standalones, while reserving your proper slips and their far superior time-to-efficiency rates for new construction.


Although in wartime you'd probably reverse that, and exclusively use standalones for new construction and reserve slips for repair and refitting. You'd minimize the time a ship is out of action for, while you simultaneously build far more brand-new ships than you have total slips.

Somtaaw wrote:

ThinksMarkedly wrote:It's not prohibitive, it's just not cost-effective. The refit would cost too much for obsolete ships. Don't forget that refitting also takes slip space, something they could be using for building or fitting out a brand new light cruiser or destroyer. So you have to add the cost of opportunity to the equation too. My guess is that it simply wasn't worth it: if you had the build slip, the budget, the personnel, and materials available to perform the refit, you'd simply instead do something else with those, for a more practical gain.

In fairness space isn't water, you don't actually need a proper drydock for construction purposes. So that's actually the EXACT reason you'd employ Grayson style yards. Which when building a brand-new ship is merely just enough framework to anchor your construction crews something to tether to.

If you're refitting literally anything, you don't really need a full-up construction slip especially if it's a low-priority refit, such as adding TWTMNBN to sub-capitals. Put the ship a short distance away from anything, or from an 'open-to-space' supply depot, assemble a minimal frame around the ship, and away you go with refitting. You could refit hundreds of ships simultaneously with standalones, while reserving your proper slips and their far superior time-to-efficiency rates for new construction.


Although in wartime you'd probably reverse that, and exclusively use standalones for new construction and reserve slips for repair and refitting. You'd minimize the time a ship is out of action for, while you simultaneously build far more brand-new ships than you have total slips.

I bought a newly built house in a new subdivision about 2 years ago, and while working from home one day, and watching out of the corner of my eye my neighbor's houses being built, I ha da revelation:

Grayson building is just like building a new house.

You start with a blank spot with no infrastructure, and on different days, different crews show up to do their jobs.

I know not really that big of a revelation, but...

You need to have the infrastructure somewhere, it's just distributed.

you still need to have dump trucks to bring the Gravel (and quarries to make the gravel), cement truck for the concrete ( and the concrete plant on the other side of town), flat bed trucks and fork lifts to bring in the timbers/ pre-constructed modules. plumber's and their trucks, furnace installers, and their trucks, electricians and their trucks, etc - every day, a different trade and a different truck outfitted withthe hardware to do that job.

Grayson construction would be the same - different specialties moving from build site to build site, bringing their required hardware on a cutter or barge to do their tasks, then moving on.

You still need the basic construction hardware, just not 30 copies of each located permanently at every build site, but a handful of each in a mobile form, working on part pre-manufactured at another place in the system.

So the infrastructure still has to exist, just not in the multiplicity of a fixed yard - and everything needs scheduled and shared between the build sites. And it's more manpower intensive than a fixed yard with it's built in labor saving devices.

Theemile wrote:I bought a newly built house in a new subdivision about 2 years ago, and while working from home one day, and watching out of the corner of my eye my neighbor's houses being built, I ha da revelation:

Grayson building is just like building a new house.

You start with a blank spot with no infrastructure, and on different days, different crews show up to do their jobs.

I know not really that big of a revelation, but...

You need to have the infrastructure somewhere, it's just distributed.

you still need to have dump trucks to bring the Gravel (and quarries to make the gravel), cement truck for the concrete ( and the concrete plant on the other side of town), flat bed trucks and fork lifts to bring in the timbers/ pre-constructed modules. plumber's and their trucks, furnace installers, and their trucks, electricians and their trucks, etc - every day, a different trade and a different truck outfitted withthe hardware to do that job.

Grayson construction would be the same - different specialties moving from build site to build site, bringing their required hardware on a cutter or barge to do their tasks, then moving on.

You still need the basic construction hardware, just not 30 copies of each located permanently at every build site, but a handful of each in a mobile form, working on part pre-manufactured at another place in the system.

So the infrastructure still has to exist, just not in the multiplicity of a fixed yard - and everything needs scheduled and shared between the build sites. And it's more manpower intensive than a fixed yard with it's built in labor saving devices.

Manticoran yards are closer to genuine factories, that happen to be next to their refineries, but also have a planned forest next to them. So they don't need most deliveries or as many trucks because nearly everything they could possibly need is close to hand, or only a few minutes away.

While yes older Grayson construction, they probably shared (some of) the larger equipment, and they were also far more manpower intensive than Manties. Per Honor's words, they didn't have all the grav-tugs and power tools and arc-welders, etc that Manticoran builders do. Once they got all the toys though, between HotQ and Yawata Strike, Graysons kept their original methods they just got much faster, which would suggest they didn't really share much equipment between sites.


So it's actually probably better to say Manticoran slips operate more like a direct-from-producer grocery store, and have far fresher goods with very few preservatives. Grayson standalone docks are closer to major corporate chains with more of a "just in time" schedule, getting what they need more or less as needed according to a strict schedule and they can't easily change things up on a whim.


That goes with how they badly screwed their own building schedules with the first generation of podnoughts to rush out the very first Harrington to get christened by the pregnant Allison. By 'borrowing' the grasers to commission that single Harrington-class, they delayed SEVERAL other dreadnoughts construction not just one or two. That implies Grayson construction style doesn't react too well to unexpected shortages.