new/old dead horse, futher beating requested

n7axw wrote:I'm not really sure, but when the wedges are down, I am of the impression that there is no armor for the floors and roofs. Could it be that this would make the process of extracting the fusion plants a bit less difficult than we have been assuming?

The main example we have is the Nike's fusion plant replacement in SVW; Armor is at least thinner on areas protected by the Wedge, but that doesn't mean there is NO armor or that SDs wouldn't be armored heavily enough to cause problems.

I am mindful of RFC's assertion that to disassemble a SD requires a shipyard capable of building a SD.

I'm pretty sure that Manticoran (or Havenite) Fusion technology is smaller, more efficient and cheaper than trying to salvage SLN reactors.

I still think that you could cram in five times the normal complement for only one twelve-th of the time frame. But ... the air environment plants would have to be completely overhauled once you got to where you were going. Not cheap.

The funny problem that may present itself is the solid waste management facilities ... and not simply enough air to breath. Can you imagine all the clogged up sewers dumping aforementioned solid human waste everywhere imaginable?

Then perhaps enough clean safe water to drink. Perhaps rations would not be so much of a concern, however understand all the evacuated GA refugees would be very hungry by the time they got to where they were going. Stinky, thirsty, hungry refugees.

Yep ...rethinking it through, probably the only good thing all of the captured intact and slightly damaged Sollie warships are good for is recycling. Might just start up another growth industry.

I like the idea of selling off lots of stuff for the civilian end user. Can you imagine how much money a verge colonist on a nasty animal planet would pay for a good heavy battle rifle with 1000 rounds of suitable ammo? DCM are good guys.

Did anybody else pick up on the name of the aforementioned Sollie.. (Edit; Correction; "Peep") Army Group sized troop transports? "Roughneck" class? I think Mr. Weber was honoring Robert Heinlein and his old novel ... "Starship Troopers". HB of CJ (old coot) Cm.

HB of CJ wrote:Did anybody else pick up on the name of the aforementioned Sollie Army Group sized troop transports? "Roughneck" class? I think Mr. Weber was honoring Robert Heinlein and his old novel ... "Starship Troopers". HB of CJ (old coot) Cm.

Roughnecks are Havenite military transports, not SLN.

n7axw wrote:I'm not really sure, but when the wedges are down, I am of the impression that there is no armor for the floors and roofs. Could it be that this would make the process of extracting the fusion plants a bit less difficult than we have been assuming?

The top and bottom of an Honorverse warship (which are protected by the wedge) are armored considerably less than the sides (which are protected by sidewalls). That's not the same as 'not at all', though, at least not for anything heavier than a destroyer. And for something with waller-style heavily armored and compartmentalized construction, it's still pretty significant. Recall that swapping out the fusion plant on Honor's Nike was still a multi-month job even cutting through one of the relatively unarmored aspects, and that was a conventional BC, not an SD.

Besides, warship fusion plants have radically different design goals than civilian ones. And I'm fairly certain warship-style fusion plants aren't used on planets at all; I'm not sure I can see a universe where they make sense and solar power satellites are still used by a star nation with leading edge technology.

People have posted unambiguous proof that warships cannot be stuffed much over 50% capacity, yet you still think that they can achieve an order of magnitude over that? That is Skimper levels of willful blindness right there.

I still think that you could cram in five times the normal complement for only one twelve-th of the time frame. But ... the air environment plants would have to be completely overhauled once you got to where you were going. Not cheap.

The funny problem that may present itself is the solid waste management facilities ... and not simply enough air to breath. Can you imagine all the clogged up sewers dumping aforementioned solid human waste everywhere imaginable?

Then perhaps enough clean safe water to drink. Perhaps rations would not be so much of a concern, however understand all the evacuated GA refugees would be very hungry by the time they got to where they were going. Stinky, thirsty, hungry refugees.

HB of CJ wrote:I still think that you could cram in five times the normal complement for only one twelve-th of the time frame. But ... the air environment plants would have to be completely overhauled once you got to where you were going. Not cheap.

That might be the case if Honorverse starships carried around vast tanks of compressed (probably to the point of being liquid) oxygen, giving a given ship an atmospheric cappacity of X person-days. Crew of 6,000 for a ninety-day voyage gives 540,000 person-days of air, allowing 27,000 people to breathe for 20 days. All you'd need to do is release that oxygen more rapidly than for a normal crew.

The problem is, they don't. They may have some reserve oxygen storage (warships, at least, probably do so they can repressurise sections that have been lost pressure due to damage), but for the most part they have the atmosphere contained in the hull's volume and that's it. The life-support systems process that atmosphere to keep it breathable long-term. Warships have significant redundancy in their life support systems, in the expectation that battle damage may destroy processors faster than they kill crew, but once all the processors are redlined the CO2 is going to start building up with every breath.

Weird Harold wrote:

n7axw wrote:I'm not really sure, but when the wedges are down, I am of the impression that there is no armor for the floors and roofs. Could it be that this would make the process of extracting the fusion plants a bit less difficult than we have been assuming?

The main example we have is the Nike's fusion plant replacement in SVW; Armor is at least thinner on areas protected by the Wedge, but that doesn't mean there is NO armor or that SDs wouldn't be armored heavily enough to cause problems.

I am mindful of RFC's assertion that to disassemble a SD requires a shipyard capable of building a SD.

I'm pretty sure that Manticoran (or Havenite) Fusion technology is smaller, more efficient and cheaper than trying to salvage SLN reactors.

Let's not forget that, even going in vertically, Nike's reactor repair took weeks, and she was only a battlecruiser. Superdreadnaughts have more armour all around, and far more internal subdivision and cofferdamming than any battlecruiser. The new Nike-class battlecruisers are described in House of Steel as having internal protection of the same pattern as a pre-war RMN superdreadnaught, but it's still happening over a much smaller physical area; a Nike may have SD-thickness bulkheads, but she's still got fewer of those bulkheads between her hull and her reactor rooms.

drothgery wrote:Besides, warship fusion plants have radically different design goals than civilian ones. And I'm fairly certain warship-style fusion plants aren't used on planets at all; I'm not sure I can see a universe where they make sense and solar power satellites are still used by a star nation with leading edge technology.

True, they use the smaller fusion plant technology. The reason for using both reactors and solar power is discussed in Chapter 40 of Torch of Freedom, bottom of page 414 of the hardcover. I don't have it in machine-readable so I can't post the paragraph; the search term is probably "fusion reactors in the basement."

HB of CJ wrote:I still think that you could cram in five times the normal complement for only one twelve-th of the time frame. But ... the air environment plants would have to be completely overhauled once you got to where you were going. Not cheap.

No sane people would run an environmental system above 100% including the redundant systems since just one failure would start to have serious consequences.

I'm still kind of befuddled by the notion that some people equal redundancy with capacity, it's not. There is a correlation but normally it's not 1:1.

In most cases redundancy is only used when the primary system is down (battledamage, servicing etc), how it's done aboard battleships in Honorverse I have no idea about but I guess they follow the same pattern.

Folks, it sounds like you're figuring that these hulks have to be disassembled by next Tuesday. There isn't that big a rush and things tend not to rust in space.

Look, bring three Sollie SD's (ferry with minimal crews) to a system that is still behind in developing (say Nuncio or Pequod). Remove all missiles (since you have to load missiles it should not be hard to unload them) and "spike" most of the lasers/grazers. Deed them over to the planetary government and let them strip what they can immediately use (medical, computers, any number of other systems). Sell the pinnaces, shuttles, to companies that are dedicated to system industrial development (probably in partnership with Manty corporations as detailed in SftS, IIRC, who can help provide expertise).

Once that is done, the system can either retain the 'hollowed out' SD either in a 'scarecrow mode' as suggested above by lyonheart above, with minimal caretaker personnel, or sell them (perhaps to Manty or Grayson or even Haven/Andy/Erewhon/Maya) businesses for scrap--they may have the technology to bring to the sight to properly breakup a SD. Or let them float somewhere in the system for a few decades until you do have the capabilty to break them up. No rust, remember (OK, maybe minor micrometeorite damage).

Either way, the planet gets (at minimum) a modest economic boost without committing any real investment funds needed for other parts of their economy. What's not to love?