Deckspace in Spheres: Math Calculation Question

[RainOfSteel]

The canon Imperial Palace has flat stacked decks.

The concentric spheres design does not allow for the Aquarium or Garden or Avionics Ring or Guards Torus (and the additional "Rings" I intend to add).

Also, I would find mapping such a surface to be, conceptually, very difficult. It would have all the problems inherent in normal curved map projection, and I have no software that will handle or assist with that.

 

[RainOfSteel]

In order to get some experience with Canvas 7, I'm working on some smaller designs first. I'm doing my 200 dTon "Heavy Scout" in d20 first. I have the three decks layed out, and the fuel tankage partioned off.

I'm going to do a more in depth re-read of several bits of deckplan rules before I go much further.

I'm doing planning on how I want the Imperial Palace to be layed-out pretty much at the same time.

 

[TKalbfus]

I don't know of any way to have a sphere spin in order to simulate 1G gravity across all parts of the inner surface. The areas closest to the axis of the spin wouldn't have any gravity. You would have to use grav plates to simulate the gravity.

Well, if you have grav plates on the inner core, the gravity can radiate outwards and you can stand on the outside of each sphere. Of course because of the inverse square law, the gravity would get stronger as you moved inward.

Another thing you can do is spin the sphere to simulate gravity instead of using grav plates. The deck plans would then be the inside of unrolled cylinders. The spin gravity would get less as you moved inward. Also when the ship accelerated the direction of "down" would move toward the back of the spinning sphere.

 

[RandyT0001]

Originally posted by Tom Kalbfus:
Well, if you have grav plates on the inner core, the gravity can radiate outwards and you can stand on the outside of each sphere. Of course because of the inverse square law, the gravity would get stronger as you moved inward.

I thought that normally each deck of a starship would have grav plates installed. Since the sphere in question is the Imperial Palace located just above the city on Capital/Core there really wouldn't be any need for grav plates to be installed since the planet will provide any needed gravity.

Another thing you can do is spin the sphere to simulate gravity instead of using grav plates. The deck plans would then be the inside of unrolled cylinders.

Huh? What unrolled cylinders? If you spin a sphere you could simulate gravity on the inner surfaces of each of the nested spherical decks at the equatorial band of the spheres. As you walk along the inner surface of a deck toward the axis of the spin (the poles as it were) the gravity decreases until reaching 0G at the poles. Also each of the nested spheres will have a different rotational speed to simulate the gravity. Those closer to the center of the outer sphere hull would have a higher rotation to simulate 1G. Even if you had every ten decks locked together and set to rotate at a certain speed the next ten decks would need a noticably faster rotation making elevator shafts impossible to fix in location and use.

The spin gravity would get less as you moved inward. Also when the ship accelerated the direction of "down" would move toward the back of the spinning sphere.

If you install interia compensators then the maneuver drive's G forces aren't felt by the occupants. Most ships (even those whose decks are oriented perpendicular to the axis of maneuver drive acceleration} have interia compensators installed to keep the occupants from banging against the walls as the ship uses evasive maneuvers when engaged in combat or experiencing violent atmosheric wind shears.

JMO

 

[Michael Taylor]

I once calculated the volume of a Tigress, and how many decks it had. Both numbers were large. Really, really large.

 

[Whipsnade]

Originally posted by Lord Vince:
However, as the humans of Piper's stories were masters of artificial gravity, they built their ships a little different. Instead of building horizontal decks -- like a stack of coins; wider at the middle, getting smaller as you go "up" or "down" -- Piper built his ships outwards from the ships center.

Vince,

That's because Piper's version of artificial gravity - not contra-gravity mind you - was different from Traveller's version of artificial gravity.

The Piper-verse can only build 'gravity point sources'. That is they can create point that attracts all other points in a given volume at one gee. In Traveller, artificial gravity can be a 'planer source', a plane and not a point acts as the one gee attraction source.

The difference is subtle yet telling. It has also been discussed to death on the Piper mailing list.

This 'point source' version of artificial gravity has its problems. First, to use it ships must be big - very, very, very, big. Piper writes of battleships being 1 mile in diameter and, thanks to his 'nuclear batteries' they don't even have to carry fuel!

Second, the 'bend' in the spherically layered decks is disconcerting. Characters in 'One Day Planet' talk about how riding in a 'small' destroyer is something to be avoided. In 'A Slave Is A Slave', the commanders and diplomats of a Imperial battlegroup make sure that a 'getting to know you' banquet is held on one of the outer decks so the 'bend' won't be enough to make their guests uncomfortable.

Finally, unlike Traveller's gravity plane sources, Piper's gravity point sources are turned off for those ships making planetfall. This means that ships need fitting and furnishings that work in different 'down' directions; one when the point source is in and another when the planet's gravity is used. This is much like Niven & Pournelle's descriptions of ships in the MiGE universe. With gravity provided by spin or thrust, ships must accomodate both.


Have fun,
Bill