Transmission of grav pulses

The E wrote:

Dafmeister wrote:I don't think they'd need station-keeping drives. The impression I have of the Hermes network isn't that there are chains of buoys connecting Manticore to Sphinx or Manticore-A to Manticore-B like semaphore towers. It seems to me that the buoys are seeded throughout the system to give FTL comm coverage for naval units, forts, Junction control etc wherever they are. They're more like cellphone towers; you just tie into the the nearest buoy in the network when you want to send a signal.

Yes, once you're in a star system, you can set up enough buoys to make that approach work. Even then, you're talking about a whole lot of buoys that need distribution and maintenance (unless you can run a grav pulse generator off of a couple solar panels, which I highly doubt). Still, not an insurmountable obstacle to be sure.

Yes. But Manticore has done it. They have FTL comm connections between A and B.

However, once you move out into interstellar space, that approach becomes impractical; even for a comparatively short distances like between Manticore A and the Junction, or Manticore A and B, maintaining a cell setup is prohibitive, and thus you have to rely on a single line of buoys to those targets, which in turn requires these buoys to make regular adjustments to their orbits so that they can stay in range.

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For interstellar distances, you would not have to adjust the positions--the stars are effectively moving in straight lines (over the timescales of human civilizations), so you can just have your string of buoys moving in similar straight lines at the right speed.

But the idea is still impractical for numerous other reasons that have been discussed repeatedly.

The E wrote:

Dafmeister wrote:I don't think they'd need station-keeping drives. The impression I have of the Hermes network isn't that there are chains of buoys connecting Manticore to Sphinx or Manticore-A to Manticore-B like semaphore towers. It seems to me that the buoys are seeded throughout the system to give FTL comm coverage for naval units, forts, Junction control etc wherever they are. They're more like cellphone towers; you just tie into the the nearest buoy in the network when you want to send a signal.

Yes, once you're in a star system, you can set up enough buoys to make that approach work. Even then, you're talking about a whole lot of buoys that need distribution and maintenance (unless you can run a grav pulse generator off of a couple solar panels, which I highly doubt). Still, not an insurmountable obstacle to be sure.

Why do it that way? Since they need fuel for the transmitter and receiver, just build them on a drone base. Smaller drive, more endurance, and it comes back to base itself when it needs maintenance.

Besides, that's the way Hermes buoys have to operate as part of a fleet detachment.

The E wrote:However, once you move out into interstellar space, that approach becomes impractical; even for a comparatively short distances like between Manticore A and the Junction, or Manticore A and B, maintaining a cell setup is prohibitive, and thus you have to rely on a single line of buoys to those targets, which in turn requires these buoys to make regular adjustments to their orbits so that they can stay in range.

Likewise.

n7axw wrote:Now Harold, I'm experiencing disgruntlement at your last statement. We do have a few cowboys, sheepherders and hermits outside the freeway corridors... They need to be rescued from "cell hell!"

But SD isn't a western state, it's midwest.

Out here in the real west, there's big areas with nothing at all interspersed with small towns with three or four cell towers branching off the freeway corridors.

check out the map: http://www.verizonwireless.com/dam/vzw/ ... arison.jpg

JohnRoth wrote:Why do it that way? Since they need fuel for the transmitter and receiver, just build them on a drone base. Smaller drive, more endurance, and it comes back to base itself when it needs maintenance.

The repeater stations between stars (of a binary system) have to be much bigger than Hermes Buoys because they need the range and sensitivity to span interstellar distances.

As estimated above, they'd need to be comparable in size and sensitivity to system defense arrays without needing to be omnidirectional. There's no telling exactly how big each repeater would need to be, but they'd pretty much have to be closer in size to a Junction Fort or Super-dreadnaught than an RD.

Weird Harold wrote:

JohnRoth wrote:Why do it that way? Since they need fuel for the transmitter and receiver, just build them on a drone base. Smaller drive, more endurance, and it comes back to base itself when it needs maintenance.

The repeater stations between stars (of a binary system) have to be much bigger than Hermes Buoys because they need the range and sensitivity to span interstellar distances.

As estimated above, they'd need to be comparable in size and sensitivity to system defense arrays without needing to be omnidirectional. There's no telling exactly how big each repeater would need to be, but they'd pretty much have to be closer in size to a Junction Fort or Super-dreadnaught than an RD.

You could do it that way. But there's no particular reason you couldn't just use a bunch more off the shelf hermes buoys to cover the distance.

That might be more annoying in terms of fuel and maintenance to have a bunch of normal sized relays instead of just a few bigger more capable ones. But from a technical standpoint either should work.


For example, if a hermes buoy can relay for 5 lightminutes (just a guess) you'd need less than 200 to get coverage of the Manticore A-B gap at its widest. Sure, if you can use a bigger relay that can reach several lighthour you cut that down to under 10. But even 200 isn't an insurmountable maintenance and fueling headache; there are probably a good fraction of that scattered around either of the Manitocore systems to minimize the final light-speed part of their communication link. (Sure warships can talk to them directly over FTL, but they're not infrequently used to talk to ships that don't have FTL comms of their own)

n7axw wrote:
Now Harold, I'm experiencing disgruntlement at your last statement. We do have a few cowboys, sheepherders and hermits outside the freeway corridors... They need to be rescued from "cell hell!"

Don

When they need to make a phone call they need to choose between "Their way or the highway!"

Hi Jonathon_S,

A minor nit; from the textev the Hermes buoy range appears to be close to a light hour than 5 light minutes.

So ~15 ought to be fine, and redundancy makes it thirty.

Since we have no textev for how long the fuel of those distantly orbiting in system last, what rate of refueling those in the Manticore A-B link do people think is really required?

L

Jonathan_S wrote:*quote="Weird Harold"*[quote="JohnRoth"]Why do it that way? Since they need fuel for the transmitter and receiver, just build them on a drone base. Smaller drive, more endurance, and it comes back to base itself when it needs maintenance.*quote*

The repeater stations between stars (of a binary system) have to be much bigger than Hermes Buoys because they need the range and sensitivity to span interstellar distances.

As estimated above, they'd need to be comparable in size and sensitivity to system defense arrays without needing to be omnidirectional. There's no telling exactly how big each repeater would need to be, but they'd pretty much have to be closer in size to a Junction Fort or Super-dreadnaught than an RD.

You could do it that way. But there's no particular reason you couldn't just use a bunch more off the shelf hermes buoys to cover the distance.

That might be more annoying in terms of fuel and maintenance to have a bunch of normal sized relays instead of just a few bigger more capable ones. But from a technical standpoint either should work.


For example, if a hermes buoy can relay for 5 lightminutes (just a guess) you'd need less than 200 to get coverage of the Manticore A-B gap at its widest. Sure, if you can use a bigger relay that can reach several lighthour you cut that down to under 10. But even 200 isn't an insurmountable maintenance and fueling headache; there are probably a good fraction of that scattered around either of the Manitocore systems to minimize the final light-speed part of their communication link. (Sure warships can talk to them directly over FTL, but they're not infrequently used to talk to ships that don't have FTL comms of their own)[/quote]

lyonheart wrote:Since we have no textev for how long the fuel of those distantly orbiting in system last, what rate of refueling those in the Manticore A-B link do people think is really required?

I would add additional fuel tanks if required to make a monthly resupply/refuel/repair trip standard. That should allow a sublight freighter time to make a round trip servicing repeaters and give the crew some time off between trips. A lot would depend on how many in-system buoys need servicing between trips to Gryphon and back.

Weird Harold wrote:

KNick wrote:They would need to shrink something the size of a system defense array down to the size of a drone.

They wouldn't have to shrink it much if was going to be placed in interstellar space. A FTL repeater station would also be a tight-beam receiver rather than the omnidirectional requirement of a system defense array. It would be no bigger than half the size of a system array, more likely smaller than a quarter-sized array.

If we compare a radio-transceiver to a grav ditto it's usually more complex to make the antenna directional rather than omni-directional, ie. an omni-directional antenna is very simple and takes up little space but a directional antenna is usually much more complex and takes up considerable more space.

In other words, it's not clear-cut that a directional FTL-repeater would be smaller in size.

lyonheart wrote:Hi Jonathon_S,

A minor nit; from the textev the Hermes buoy range appears to be close to a light hour than 5 light minutes.

So ~15 ought to be fine, and redundancy makes it thirty.

Since we have no textev for how long the fuel of those distantly orbiting in system last, what rate of refueling those in the Manticore A-B link do people think is really required?

L

Thanks for that. I admit I didn't go back and try to find the reference.

So it was more a paper exercise of "what if they were very short ranged". If we only need 30 or so it seems quite reasonable to place a chain from Manticore A to B.


As to the fuel capacity I've no idea. (But I look forward to everyone's speculation)