How fast can the Streak Drive climb hyper bands?

TheMonster wrote:

Vince wrote:We do know the Leonard Detweiler class does have a hyper drive* and Warshawski sails*, courtesy of the author stating? snerking? on this forum that they can pass through wormholes. That being established, since all the streak drive is when all is said and done is a souped up military hyper generator that can reach 2 bands higher in hyperspace, why wouldn't the Mesan Alignment equip the LD's with streak drive hyper generators, instead of limiting them to standard military hyper generators?

*Both a hyper generator and Warshawski sails are needed to transit a wormhole, per much textev. The best and most complete description of transiting a wormhole is given in Honor Among Enemies. Nearly all of chapter 9 is given over to a complete step-by-step description of a wormhole transit.

But if a Lenny Det has Warshawski sails, then it has Alpha nodes. And if it has Alpha nodes, it might just as well have Beta nodes too, and be able to produce a wedge.

What am I missing here? Is there something about the triple-keel design of a spider-drive ship that allows it to mount sails but not a wedge? What could that "something" possibly be?

To produce a wedge, the impeller nodes need to be in a very particular arrangement. To produce Warshawski sails, the arrangement is a little more forgiving. The triple-keel design of a spider drive is incompatible with the necessary arrangement for an impeller wedge, but apparently still allows a Warshawsk sail.

SWM wrote:

TheMonster wrote:But if a Lenny Det has Warshawski sails, then it has Alpha nodes. And if it has Alpha nodes, it might just as well have Beta nodes too, and be able to produce a wedge.

What am I missing here? Is there something about the triple-keel design of a spider-drive ship that allows it to mount sails but not a wedge? What could that "something" possibly be?

To produce a wedge, the impeller nodes need to be in a very particular arrangement. To produce Warshawski sails, the arrangement is a little more forgiving. The triple-keel design of a spider drive is incompatible with the necessary arrangement for an impeller wedge, but apparently still allows a Warshawsk sail.

Alpha nodes are the ones that really have the hull placement impact on starships.

Beta node only wedges (such as on pinnaces, shuttles, and forts) allow significantly more flexibility in hull shape than the double spindle shape shared by all Warshawski sail equipped starships.


But I'm not sure how that squares with RFCs statement that spider drive equipped ships could use wormholes. I guess we'll see, sooner or later.

Jonathan_S wrote:

SWM wrote:To produce a wedge, the impeller nodes need to be in a very particular arrangement. To produce Warshawski sails, the arrangement is a little more forgiving. The triple-keel design of a spider drive is incompatible with the necessary arrangement for an impeller wedge, but apparently still allows a Warshawsk sail.

Alpha nodes are the ones that really have the hull placement impact on starships.

Beta node only wedges (such as on pinnaces, shuttles, and forts) allow significantly more flexibility in hull shape than the double spindle shape shared by all Warshawski sail equipped starships.


But I'm not sure how that squares with RFCs statement that spider drive equipped ships could use wormholes. I guess we'll see, sooner or later.

I am fairly certain that David specifically said that it was the impeller wedge that required the spindle shape.

Here it is, in viewtopic.php?f=1&t=3282&p=75495&hilit=impeller+spindle#p75495:

(7) It is the beta nodes and the generation of the impeller wedge which require the reduction in cross-section were the ring is mounted.

SWM wrote:

Jonathan_S wrote:Alpha nodes are the ones that really have the hull placement impact on starships.

Beta node only wedges (such as on pinnaces, shuttles, and forts) allow significantly more flexibility in hull shape than the double spindle shape shared by all Warshawski sail equipped starships.


But I'm not sure how that squares with RFCs statement that spider drive equipped ships could use wormholes. I guess we'll see, sooner or later.

I am fairly certain that David specifically said that it was the impeller wedge that required the spindle shape.

Here it is, in viewtopic.php?f=1&t=3282&p=75495&hilit=impeller+spindle#p75495:

(7) It is the beta nodes and the generation of the impeller wedge which require the reduction in cross-section were the ring is mounted.

Hmm, I'd forgotten that post; I'd been thinking of a slightly older post of his
viewtopic.php?f=1&t=2928&p=61949&hilit=one+major+reason+for+using+fortresses#p61949

runsforcelery wrote:It should be remembered both that fortresses are not truly immobile and that their hull forms are significantly different from those of hyper-capable warships. Because they aren't hyper-capable, they don't require Warshawski sails, which means they don't require the "double-ended spindle" design of a superdreadnought.

That gave me the impression that a fort would have only beta nodes (why mount the larger more complex alpha nodes if you aren't going to use grav waves or wormholes?) - and forts had more flexibility in hull shape.

So I put 2 and 2 together and quite possibly got 5.


But forts definitely do have impeller wedges, and they're not a "double-ended spindle". And HoS (and the Jaynes books) have diagrams of pinnaces (not to mention Maxxq's renderings) and they're not double spindled either; thought for them the diagrams appear to show they only have a single impeller ring. (Don't know if that's also true for forts)


So it's apparently not as simple as "Alpha node require spindle shape" or "Beta nodes require spindle shape" or even "impeller wedge requires spindle shape"... (But that means I'm not 100% sure what the rules actually are - maybe part of it is single rings are more flexible with regards to hull shape than double rings; but that doesn't address Alpha nodes used only for sails with might be another special case)

Impeller node placement defines a volume in which a ship can reside.

The shape of the ship within said volume matters not.

Spiddy ships could have impellers.

What weighs less: Sperical sidewall generators or impeller nodes?

Relax wrote:Impeller node placement defines a volume in which a ship can reside.

The shape of the ship within said volume matters not.

Spiddy ships could have impellers.

What weighs less: Sperical sidewall generators or impeller nodes?

RFC has said pretty clearly that spider drive ships cannot have impeller wedges.

SWM wrote:

Relax wrote:Impeller node placement defines a volume in which a ship can reside.

The shape of the ship within said volume matters not.

Spiddy ships could have impellers.

What weighs less: Sperical sidewall generators or impeller nodes?

RFC has said pretty clearly that spider drive ships cannot have impeller wedges.

What he specifically did say, was that impeller and spiddy cannot be used at the same time.

SWM wrote:

Relax wrote:Impeller node placement defines a volume in which a ship can reside.

The shape of the ship within said volume matters not.

Spiddy ships could have impellers.

What weighs less: Sperical sidewall generators or impeller nodes?

RFC has said pretty clearly that spider drive ships cannot have impeller wedges.

Given the description of Honorverse physics in the books, I suspect that they could mount nodes on a spider ship if they really wanted to, even if you had to build a gantry around the ship to mount them on. However, given the required hull form for the spider, they would have to be placed much further out than an optimally impeller design for a given ships mass. This would lead to a horrible acceleration curve, possibly even worse then with the spider drive.

crewdude48 wrote:Given the description of Honorverse physics in the books, I suspect that they could mount nodes on a spider ship if they really wanted to, even if you had to build a gantry around the ship to mount them on. However, given the required hull form for the spider, they would have to be placed much further out than an optimally impeller design for a given ships mass. This would lead to a horrible acceleration curve, possibly even worse then with the spider drive.

Since impeller nodes have to be in certain positions for a given volume, your thesis seems non nonsensical. Non nonsensical in the sense, pun intended, where the acceleration given is for the volume. Either the spider ship fits or it does not. An either or proposition.

A triple skeg. Sure sounds like a triangle to me where the triangle tips are more pointy. Not a true equilateral triangle as it has 3 broadsides. No reason a triangle couldn't fit inside a cylindrical volume. Would work fine for light units. Run into problems for the Bigger classes as one hits that ol' 8M impeller ton limit. If a large portion of that 8M ton volume is empty air instead of warship it would make a piss poor accelerating capitol ship who may as well go with its spider drive for acceleration. Of course for light units a far better unit/cost/capabilities may be a straight up standard impeller design.

A spider/impeller BC class could be interesting. Wouldn't work for larger units, and smaller units, the applicability seems rather severe for a smaller classes capabilities. All that cost/mass taken up in star drive instead of missiles.

Jonathan_S wrote:

SWM wrote:I am fairly certain that David specifically said that it was the impeller wedge that required the spindle shape.

Here it is, in viewtopic.php?f=1&t=3282&p=75495&hilit=impeller+spindle#p75495:

Hmm, I'd forgotten that post; I'd been thinking of a slightly older post of his
viewtopic.php?f=1&t=2928&p=61949&hilit=one+major+reason+for+using+fortresses#p61949
That gave me the impression that a fort would have only beta nodes (why mount the larger more complex alpha nodes if you aren't going to use grav waves or wormholes?) - and forts had more flexibility in hull shape.

So I put 2 and 2 together and quite possibly got 5.


But forts definitely do have impeller wedges, and they're not a "double-ended spindle". And HoS (and the Jaynes books) have diagrams of pinnaces (not to mention Maxxq's renderings) and they're not double spindled either; thought for them the diagrams appear to show they only have a single impeller ring. (Don't know if that's also true for forts)


So it's apparently not as simple as "Alpha node require spindle shape" or "Beta nodes require spindle shape" or even "impeller wedge requires spindle shape"... (But that means I'm not 100% sure what the rules actually are - maybe part of it is single rings are more flexible with regards to hull shape than double rings; but that doesn't address Alpha nodes used only for sails with might be another special case)

Ah, and I just stumbled across an older infodump that includes this tidbit "the reason ships have two impeller rings is that it is the alpha nodes which must be placed near the ends of the hull"
(http://infodump.thefifthimperium.com/en ... gton/132/0)