Loren Pechtel wrote:Loren Pechtel wrote:I would think the only defenses would be for it to run into a wedge or for some outlying defender to spot it and engage.
kzt wrote:In the real world anything with a drive capable of maneuvering is almost certainly well above the 2.7K background temp of the universe, so you'd see it if you were looking for it.
Also consider that low PRF is 3000 pulses per second, so the range closed beween pulse 1 7 2 isn't that great. Also not sure how LIDAR would play.
I'm looking at the detection capabilities we saw at Cerberus. Starships aren't detected by IR.
Lidar would lock on faster which is why I didn't worry too much about the pulse rate. The timeline I gave were purely due to lightspeed delays.
IR certainly would have spotted Honor at Cerberus. She was capitalizing on the fact that any ship under power can be detected even more readily, far farther away, and at FTL speeds from its impeller signature and that her victi --- er,
opponents, I mean, "knew" there were no enemy starships in-system when they arrived and that they'd see anyone arriving after them long before anything coming in from outside the limit could get into range to be a threat. Because of all that, no one was using IR to look for serious threats. The situation was much like that of a 21st century naval captain who has 360-degree radar coverage. He may have visual lookouts as a last ditch tripwire, but he's not going to rely on them as his primary detection mode against hostile aircraft. In other words, there was a blindness of
technique not an incapacity of the
hardware that
could have been available.
You may, ah, assume that attitude has changed somewhat (on the GA's part, at least) post Oyster Bay.