I agree.
I also like the idea that man+machine can be better than man alone or machine alone. The gunner and pilot programs suggest this can be the case in CT.
heat sinks, radiators, and happy handwaves of the heat problem
- Thread starter BwapTED
- Start date
I agree.
I also like the idea that man+machine can be better than man alone or machine alone. The gunner and pilot programs suggest this can be the case in CT.
TNE ( and T4) Fire Fusion and Steel supplements give rules on heat sinks with just the power plant (MAX output) being the determinant for heat sink area. The area of heat sinks can be X10, or X100 to give some more control of the temperature and directionality of the radiation the radiators produce. In the sensor errata such increased radiator area gives a -1 to your engineering signature for each factor of 10 increase in area.
Now the FF&S books use MW directly, not EP, but even with MW in the 100 or so range you still end up with radiators that may be at the temperature usually reserved for boiling Iron in a standard pressure. Pease note that with increasing tech level the area required per MW goes down, so higher tech means your radiators are at a higher temperature. Increasing the area of your radiator by X10 just reduces the temperature at which your radiators reach a steady state and radiate away the heat being generated. The total energy being radiated remains the same, it's just peaked at a lower frequency. ( Please look up black body radiation curves on the internet) Having more radiator area allows one to shift your peak emission frequency to longer wavelengths.
If your worry is that the inside of your ship is getting too hot, well that is why we have handwavium. The volume and hull configuration and solar infusion and aspect that is being presented to the local star(s) all determine the rate at which your ship loses or gains heat in the system it is currently in. Turning on a power plant then adds an additional heat source, causing the ship to reach a higher temp steady state. Radiators are supposed to be at very high temperatures so that the rest of the ship does not need to be so hot, but we are playing a game, and the math required to figure out the thermodynamics of the space ship are a bit beyond most of the people playing this game, so don't sweat it.
Now the FF&S books use MW directly, not EP, but even with MW in the 100 or so range you still end up with radiators that may be at the temperature usually reserved for boiling Iron in a standard pressure. Pease note that with increasing tech level the area required per MW goes down, so higher tech means your radiators are at a higher temperature. Increasing the area of your radiator by X10 just reduces the temperature at which your radiators reach a steady state and radiate away the heat being generated. The total energy being radiated remains the same, it's just peaked at a lower frequency. ( Please look up black body radiation curves on the internet) Having more radiator area allows one to shift your peak emission frequency to longer wavelengths.
If your worry is that the inside of your ship is getting too hot, well that is why we have handwavium. The volume and hull configuration and solar infusion and aspect that is being presented to the local star(s) all determine the rate at which your ship loses or gains heat in the system it is currently in. Turning on a power plant then adds an additional heat source, causing the ship to reach a higher temp steady state. Radiators are supposed to be at very high temperatures so that the rest of the ship does not need to be so hot, but we are playing a game, and the math required to figure out the thermodynamics of the space ship are a bit beyond most of the people playing this game, so don't sweat it.
AnotherDilbert
SOC-14 1K
I don't think I have ever seen that. Can you point out where the rules are?
http://dmckinne.winterwar.org/pdfs/ConsolidatedT4Errata.pdf is no longer in existence, as this was linked by one of our absent friends, we'll need to get it back to FFE's site.
T4 FF&S P.P. 112 table 218 Fusion Power Plants Area m2/MW ranges from 1 square meter per MW at TL = 9 to .001 square meters per MW at TL 14 and above, these are your radiators.
Table 217 shows the Fission plants need 10 square meters of radiator per MW produced. See the third paragraph on page 81 for mods to this radiator area for atmospheric craft. See tables 12 through 14 on page 86 for the signature calculations, see page 74 for how you can change your signatures, and there is errata for this section. The rules are on the TNE CD and T4 CD that are on sale on this site.
The FF&S errata on page 34 of the TNE consolidated errata shows changes to the surface features section and specifically mentions radiators. You may assume that TNE and T4 treat the radiators the same.
T4 FF&S P.P. 112 table 218 Fusion Power Plants Area m2/MW ranges from 1 square meter per MW at TL = 9 to .001 square meters per MW at TL 14 and above, these are your radiators.
Table 217 shows the Fission plants need 10 square meters of radiator per MW produced. See the third paragraph on page 81 for mods to this radiator area for atmospheric craft. See tables 12 through 14 on page 86 for the signature calculations, see page 74 for how you can change your signatures, and there is errata for this section. The rules are on the TNE CD and T4 CD that are on sale on this site.
The FF&S errata on page 34 of the TNE consolidated errata shows changes to the surface features section and specifically mentions radiators. You may assume that TNE and T4 treat the radiators the same.
AnotherDilbert
SOC-14 1K
Thanks, I have the "ConsolidatedTNEErrata.pdf", version "v0.02 (09/19/09)".
The only radiators in the TNE system are those necessary for EMM (FF&S, p53). I can't see that the errata introduces any radiators for power plants. The only errata for power plants are the description of steam engines on p35 of the errata.
As far as I can see T4 added radiators for the power plants, they do not seems to be included in TNE.
Nobody would run consumer applications software directly on the avionics systems. In order to get flight certification they would have to use specific builds that were tested and certified - even the O/S and development toolchain normally have to be certified.1 Users installing their own software on the avionics systems would be in breach of regulations, manufacturer support T&C's and anything that might remotely be considered prudent best practice.
Not that this would necessarily prevent folks from doing it. However, the vectors for doing this would typically be subject to physical security (i.e. you typically have to open the lid and plug something in to download the software) - so it's not going to be terribly amenable to remote exploits.
Having said that, in many applications, the systems are networked to a greater or lesser extent. If the flight systems were accessible from a shared network - which would be necessary for (for example) any sort of networked battlefield system - then they could present an exploitable attack surface.
Exploiting this could be done by skilled parties with access to the right kit but most J. Random hackers wouldn't be able to afford a Model/7 computer to try fuzzing on. In practice, this means that this capability would be limited to state or quasi-state actors with the resources to procure physical examples of the hardware or software.
An example of this type of hack by a state actor was a zero-day exploit on the Russian S-300 missile systems that the Israelis used to disable Syrian SAM batteries for an air raid they did on an (IIRC) Al-Qaeda training camp. This allowed a denial-of-service attack on the radar systems, disabling the batteries and allowing Israeli strike aircraft to attack targets covered by Syrian air defences. A somewhat tinfoil-hattish writeup can be seen at http://www.1913intel.com/2013/05/21/neutralizing-the-russian-s-300-air-defense-system/.[/QUOTE]
1Often to the horror of the developers who have to actually use the tooling. I have an acquaintance who had the pleasure of being given a job to modify radar systems software written in CORAL-66, a dialect of JOVIAL - not all that long ago. JOVIAL is a dialect of ALGOL that dates back to somewhere about 1960, and its influence in avionics circles can be felt to this day - Ada is a direct descendant of JOVIAL and there is still plenty of kit flying today that runs software written in JOVIAL.
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mike wightman
SOC-14 10K
At last Spacedock has covered this:
and yes, there are radiators mentioned in CT 
While looking stuff up in Supplement 5 AHL I noticed this:
While looking stuff up in Supplement 5 AHL I noticed this:
So it looks like there are waste heat radiators after all.
