Docking Slip VS Hangar Bay

[Patron Zero]

I've often wondered why on starships that have limited displacement for reasons of economy, specifically merchants and bonded couriers, that some have dedicated hangar bays rather than a less 'consumptive' docking slip ?

IMTU, particularly a starship I'm developing, the 200Ton Acinonyx Class Fast Courier has a docking 'slip' to accommodate small craft of the 20-30Ton range in-place of a dedicated hanger section. Said saved space better allocated to fuel, cargo or passenger usage for the vessel to be more profitable overall.

I can't see the need for a fully pressurized hangar for small craft on commercial-private sector ships as such generally are pressed to wring-out every usable bit of their displacement just for necessary-needed components.

One Classic Traveller starship in particular that begs for a more modest way to carry it's auxiliary craft is the 800Ton Broadsword Class Mercenary Ship, the two internal bays consume a lot of displacement that might better serve other purposes.

Given IMTU, Broadswords have found other work after refitting-renovation to passenger liners or bulk cargo haulers, the large internal 'silos' once housing modular cutters gone and arrangements for other small craft facilitated by docking slips or deployable docking collars located elsewhere.

A good example of a docking collar is on the 400Ton Type-L Lab Ship, simple and elegant in form and function. Such does the job of supporting a small craft at minimal cost to the ship's overall displacement.

All said, space saved is space earned, more so space saved is more profitable than space wasted.


http://www.travellerrpg.com/CotI/Gallery/images/8640/large/1_200Ton_Acinonyx_Class_Docking-slip.jpg


http://www.travellerrpg.com/CotI/Discuss/showthread.php?t=30591

 

[pendragonman]

I assume you are aware that broadswords carry a full spread of modules for the cutters? Those buggers take up significant space and there needs to be space to swap them out.

 

[Ran Targas]

Wouldnt an exterior small craft add to the volume of the mother ship? So a 50dT cutter strapped to a 400dT ship effectively makes the whole vessel 450dT?

 

[Condottiere]

For engine performance, which would have to be recalculated.

 

[samuelvss]

I assume you are aware that broadswords carry a full spread of modules for the cutters? Those buggers take up significant space and there needs to be space to swap them out.

Yes, so a collar, per the lab ship, wouldn't work. There was a redesign for the Broadsword where the nose protruded, however. It is an interesting question, with the cutter's weaponry protruding from the from front, and drives from the rear, why this wouldn't be generally a better arrangement.

Forward in, forward out. The portions of the ship sticking out would have to be part of the 800 tons, certainly, and the design would take this into account.

 

[rancke]

Wouldnt an exterior small craft add to the volume of the mother ship? So a 50dT cutter strapped to a 400dT ship effectively makes the whole vessel 450dT?

Yes.


Hans

 

[kilemall]

Depends on the business model.

One big ship type IMTU is the dispersed structure cargo vessel with an open girder framework, think Valley Forge from Silent Running sans domes and attaching containers to the exterior, said containers made to starship hull standards so they can take direct space exposure.

For the big ships that make runs on a regular schedule between big pop worlds on a guaranteed contract, they likely would run 100s of containers each way and have dedicated terminals to load and receive with associated small craft/grav shuttles for planetside interface.

But for smaller ships on intermittent feeder service on the D and E starports, it might be more economical to carry their own small craft to service planets with no permanent terminal or even rental craft while retaining the dispersed girder setup for interaction with the bigger starport container hubs.

 

[Patron Zero]

Wouldnt an exterior small craft add to the volume of the mother ship? So a 50dT cutter strapped to a 400dT ship effectively makes the whole vessel 450dT?

Yes but in the case of the 200Ton Fast Courier stated as example, such is included in the final numbers 'crunch' to not cause an 'overage'.

The other bit concerning ships having a docking slip would be the option of carrying a specifically designed cargo module in place of the small craft, a 20-30Ton 'pod' might be an additional source of revenue to ship-owners always looking to end up in the black.

Said 'pod' could be configured as additional fuel tankage, bulk cargo or even a passenger conveyance (think private rail car).

How I am describing a docking slip is as an integral part of a hull, best example is the Classic Traveller 200Ton Type-K Safari Ship, such having a docking slip for a 20Ton launch.

A docking collar could be a permanent external fixture but more likely a deployable arrangement either retracted in or folded-upon a ship's hull.

Given the size of cargo doors on a freighter allowing such, it is conceivable that a cargo bay could be modified to act as a docking slip.

A variation of a docking collar would be a docking cradle that physically grasps a small craft and provides a 'hard-dock' point to the starship for crew transfer or movement of small cargo.

 

[Condottiere]

If you can convince commercial entities, and possibly military ones, to have more or less standard configurations, standards and volumes.

Wouldn't bother doing that in Vargr space.

 

[Selandia]

remember:

The design system of Traveller is for Sci-Fi game purpose. Nothing serious could be designed where Tons (mass) and dTons (volume) are not taken into account separatly.

The Ton system of CT reflected (IMHO) the need for deckplans. For gaming (D&D style) purpose, who realy cared about mass? So they were "Gaming Tons", functionnaly dtons.

Who stopped playing because it is absurd to believe that a G-1 Free Trader with 80 dtons of Iron ingots in hold would have the same handling as if it had 80 dtons of thin air ?

So if I take a boat hangar, hook the boat on brackets, and turn the hangar into a squach court? The combined ship-boat volume would increase but the mass would hardly. Yet, the rules are stricts: characteristics evolve with combined hull volume (p 288 in T5).

As long as we have fun

Selandia

 

[flykiller]

the reason for bays is if you intend to go places where 1) you don't know if there will be small craft service and you want to be sure you have your own, and 2) you may be travelling through atmo and you want a streamlined hull rather than a dispersed structure.

for a passenger liner jumping between civilized points with their own small craft services, slips are fine. for a scout cruiser exploring new worlds and landing who-knows-where, bays are preferable.

just had an idea, the cargo rider concept. a jump-capable merchant simply hooks up various traders with their own cargo shuttles and jumps them to a destination. they drop and go their way, others awaiting the arrival of the jumper at the jump point simply hook up, and a new jump is executed.

 

[Selandia]

the
just had an idea, the cargo rider concept. a jump-capable merchant simply hooks up various traders with their own cargo shuttles and jumps them to a destination. they drop and go their way, others awaiting the arrival of the jumper at the jump point simply hook up, and a new jump is executed.

IMTU That system is Jumping FLASH. It was discussed a few times around here.

(For an obscure reason lost in time, space hands call it Jumping Jack Flash.)

FLASH stand for Free Lighter Aboard SHip. That is the basic mean to perform volume over high trafic trade routes.

i) The expensive part of a starship is the Jump drive.

ii) Moving it to the planet and back to the jump point is having that massive capital investment iddle for 50% of the time.

iii) Jump fuel tanks emptied to energize the Jump are a huge waste of jump capabilities if kept for the jump.

Therefore:

Jump Tug (commercial tenders, with flotilla of lighters) will :


---arival in new system---
a) drop the powered lighters that speed to destination
b) move at G1 toward the meeting point / jump point
c) receive the replenishment ship that will
- bring supplies and part
- replacement crew
- fuel for operation
- additionnal /specialized maintenance/repair personnel
- act a Jump Tanker (a "sub hull" spaceship) designed to "piggy back" the Jump Tug for the purpose
d) all along perform repair and maintenance on J Drive.
e) engage in the coregraphy of releasing the inbound dumb lighter and loading the outbound lighters as the M-Tug come around
f) pick up the outbound powered lighters
g) drain the fuel tanks of the "jump tanker"
h) The jump tanker will "drop" as would drop tanks and very rapidly diverge course to more than 100 d
i) The Jump Tug will jump

---start the new cycle at a)

Note lighter is a generic term. They are either powered: Spaceship (100t+) or Spacecraft (100t-); they could also be unpowered: Barges (100t+) or Pods (100t-). Lighter with flotation hull are called Swim lighter (powered) or Dumb lighter.

LASH use design suitable for tightly packed lighter. Free LASH refers to the ability to load almost any size or shape of cargo or lighter that will fit the jump bubble. Regular freight fowarder will have easy to tightly pack lighters, themselves tightly packed with multy modal containers.

XXI century Flash Jump-Tug equivalent would be the semi-submersible Flo-Flo/Ro-Ro/Lo-Lo ships.

have fun

Selandia

 

[Patron Zero]

the reason for bays is if you intend to go places where 1) you don't know if there will be small craft service and you want to be sure you have your own, and 2) you may be travelling through atmo and you want a streamlined hull rather than a dispersed structure.

for a passenger liner jumping between civilized points with their own small craft services, slips are fine. for a scout cruiser exploring new worlds and landing who-knows-where, bays are preferable.

.....

I see docking slips as being part of a streamlined hull as a design standard, docking cradles would be more the choice on a dispersed hull configuration. A docking collar, as a fixed permanent structure on a hull, could be streamlined with little difficulty.

I do see the purpose of a hangar bay on a scout-cruiser, such could function in different duties other than parking small craft. A pressurized workspace would be very useful for a myriad of tasks that a scout vessel might encounter in their missions.

 

[flykiller]

It was discussed a few times around here.

and I thought I was cool ....

 

[kilemall]

IMTU That system is Jumping FLASH. It was discussed a few times around here.

(For an obscure reason lost in time, space hands call it Jumping Jack Flash.)

FLASH stand for Free Lighter Aboard SHip. That is the basic mean to perform volume over high trafic trade routes.

i) The expensive part of a starship is the Jump drive.

ii) Moving it to the planet and back to the jump point is having that massive capital investment iddle for 50% of the time.

iii) Jump fuel tanks emptied to energize the Jump are a huge waste of jump capabilities if kept for the jump.

Therefore:

Jump Tug (commercial tenders, with flotilla of lighters) will :


---arival in new system---
a) drop the powered lighters that speed to destination
b) move at G1 toward the meeting point / jump point
c) receive the replenishment ship that will
- bring supplies and part
- replacement crew
- fuel for operation
- additionnal /specialized maintenance/repair personnel
- act a Jump Tanker (a "sub hull" spaceship) designed to "piggy back" the Jump Tug for the purpose
d) all along perform repair and maintenance on J Drive.
e) engage in the coregraphy of releasing the inbound dumb lighter and loading the outbound lighters as the M-Tug come around
f) pick up the outbound powered lighters
g) drain the fuel tanks of the "jump tanker"
h) The jump tanker will "drop" as would drop tanks and very rapidly diverge course to more than 100 d
i) The Jump Tug will jump

---start the new cycle at a)

Note lighter is a generic term. They are either powered: Spaceship (100t+) or Spacecraft (100t-); they could also be unpowered: Barges (100t+) or Pods (100t-). Lighter with flotation hull are called Swim lighter (powered) or Dumb lighter.

LASH use design suitable for tightly packed lighter. Free LASH refers to the ability to load almost any size or shape of cargo or lighter that will fit the jump bubble. Regular freight fowarder will have easy to tightly pack lighters, themselves tightly packed with multy modal containers.

XXI century Flash Jump-Tug equivalent would be the semi-submersible Flo-Flo/Ro-Ro/Lo-Lo ships.

have fun

Selandia

So, basically, Guild Heighliners.

Minus the spice immersed navigators cause that's not how we roll.

 

[Selandia]

and I thought I was cool ....

Of course you are cool, there are so many cool people around here...

It is just that whenever somebody talk about the commercial use of drop tank or "battle tender" it moves to that

Lash was already GURP stuff. T5 answered the questions that made it difficult to have a credible Flash system in CT

BTW the TI Navy loves the concept. Merchant Jump Tugs could be drafted to act as Aux Battle tender and move about SDB flotillas. No more iddle SDB jump shuttles.

Have fun

Selandia