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Leif Ericson Scoutship

I didn't do any measurements, it was just a gut level estimate based on Merrill's (iirc) deck slices, the window layouts and the crew figures. I could be way off :)

savage said:
...Seems like a 471dt hanger deck is enormous even for 2 large scouts.
Click to expand...

Actually, for anything like a 95ton shuttle that'd be quite reasonable looking at it. That square hanger has a lot of waste space. I mean A LOT. And 4x the craft size is the closest I was ever able to build a square hanger for any cannon small craft iirc. So some 400tons for 100tons of small craft is quite resonable imo, for a square hanger. Small craft with wings were usually 6x or more iirc. In this regard T4 and FF&S had much better rules for small craft facilities. We all know how ridiculous CT's 1x is :smirk:

I might take a close look at the plans and run some numbers, but if anyone has the right software for the 3D models I saw in one link it'd be dead easy to get the volume. That might even be where Winchell got his numbers (I can't recall who did the 3D models).
 
Sizing the Shuttle and LE

Yep point taken and no 3d software here. Winchell has an excellent review using 3d software. I see validity to both approaches and Winchell questions not only his own

On a side note, this is a conversion to Traveller. The crew numbers, sml craft and stats work nicely below 2k. Still working on the 5k version.

I may have to break down and deckplan the smaller one to see if it work for the model or if the blueprints (which I would have to get) are off. Perhaps re-read the books for clues...:smirk:

This could become a quest... obsession or politically correct "investigation".
:rofl:
 
Obsession. :D

Maybe they just build bigger ships, or have a bigger or different crew requirement. I'm getting the impression that many fans of the ship get a "ubiquitous" or "workhorse" vibe from it. As in a lot of them being built on-orbit. Maybe it somehow, in some way is made to fit a multirole capacity. The cargo bay may hold the scout, but also any other gear that a mission might require.

Then of course comes the question of having such a large crew for a 1400 ton ship risked in combat. Unless its the scale tilter. This universe's Enterpise, in a way.

When's chargen start?
 
Mission Specific

Just my two cents but I wonder if that square area was an after-hour thought to act as a hanger bay, all too easy to imagine mission specific 'modules' being slipped in that space.

I see such 'modules' as plug-and-play units that could be as varied as the tasks set for them, from missile packs to bulk cargo containers could fill that area, taking the cue from the designs of modern world naval vessels of recent deployment.

That said, a starship is much more than a simple box truck but if so called for an aircraft carrier would make a workable impromptu cargo ship all the same after giving up their flight decks to stacked containers.
 
multi-purpose ship

"Then of course comes the question of having such a large crew for a 1400 ton ship risked in combat" -- Baron [FONT=arial,helvetica]Saarthuran[/FONT]

With the smaller ship 87 crew members means there is the ability to have a double crew to reduce shifts and have longer missions. Patrols, research, etc. I can see a long history in the imperium for these designs.

I'm trying to fit the ship within the model/story whether its 1.6-2k or 5k as I've done with numerous designs fiting them into Traveller T20. There are actually several designs for the ship. So whatever is left over can become another design. Frigates.. carriers. I've finished a redesign of 1.4k explorer and military versions.

"When's chargen start?" -- Baron Saarthuran
Well that is an amusing thought. Bummer that I don't see the Empire of Man campaign on the net any longer. IMTU Corridor Campaign (T20 rules, TNE timeline) gov't are re-building old tech to get back in the game. I have considered putting it on online (just downloaded openrpg). But don't know how long that would take.

"imagine mission specific 'modules' being slipped in that space." -- Patron Zero
Agreed. Note that towards the tower is another hatch. Winchell considered it a location for a reactor that could be ejected in disaster. Or it could be cargo, in my opinion, with the reactor down a deck.

5000dt screams "give me a spinal mount" ... this is tough. So far the numbers aren't working out. It might be a better traveller fit with one.
Back to the Gear Head drawing board.:devil:
 
5Ktons is hard to squeeze a spinal mount into and still come up with a combat worthy vessel once you add in armor and decent maneuver/agility. I think I've done it but wasn't happy with it, and might have needed antimatter for the powerplant and drop tanks for the jump drive. I seem to recall something closer to 13Ktons being the smallest viable (imo) spinal mount platform. At least with HG and similar design rules. Where you can build a custom spinal weapon (like FF&S) you can make it work.

And Bay weapons are another thing entirely :)
 
Spinal Mounts

Excellent point. I'm far too use to thinking TL16 (where I implement the optional 1/2 jump fuel house rule).
 
RockViper said:
Thanks that poster is so small I didn't notice the deck cross section when I scanned over it.
Click to expand...

You're welcome.

Yeah, even the larger version on the web site is hard to see them well :) I can't be sure of the scale on it which would be nice. Can't afford the coin to satisfy the low level of curiosity though and buy the poster ;)
 
far-trader said:
You're welcome.

Yeah, even the larger version on the web site is hard to see them well :) I can't be sure of the scale on it which would be nice. Can't afford the coin to satisfy the low level of curiosity though and buy the poster ;)
Click to expand...


For some reason I really want to use this ship in my campaign, so its tempting to splurge on the poster, but I guess I just need to suck it up and throw together a rough deckplan myself. :)
 
Scoutship Sketches

"For some reason I really want to use this ship in my campaign, so its tempting to splurge on the poster, but I guess I just need to suck it up and throw together a rough deckplan myself." - RockViper


More than happy to rework my old sketches of the scoutship if that might be of any assistance to you, have scans of the original drawings available as well.
 
Patron Zero said:
"For some reason I really want to use this ship in my campaign, so its tempting to splurge on the poster, but I guess I just need to suck it up and throw together a rough deckplan myself." - RockViper


More than happy to rework my old sketches of the scoutship if that might be of any assistance to you, have scans of the original drawings available as well.
Click to expand...


Cool, that would defiantly be useful.
 
Here's an amusing quote from Winchel Chung about the Lief:

Dr. Yo wrote:
(1) If the LE can land on a earth-sized planet, how does it do it?

Dunno. I did run some figures off my slide rule, but somebody should double check them.

I assumed that the Lief was approximately the same mass as an Oscar-II submarine, since they are of similar sizes. About 18,000 metric tons.

To take off or land from Earth, a conventional rocket requires an acceleration higher than one gravity (otherwise the rocket just sits there vibrating while the exhaust burns a hole in the ground). A nice average acceleration is 1.5g.

T = M * A
where T = thrust in newtons, M = ship mass in kilograms, and A = acceleration in meters per second. In this case M = 18,000,000 and A = 14.72, so T = 2.65e8 newtons. Yipe.

Now:
P = (T * V) / 2
where V = exhaust velocity and P = thrust power in watts. If the Lief uses a theoretical maximum IC fusion, V = 1e7 m/s, so thrust power equals 1.32 petaWatts, which is a freaking huge number (i.e.,1,320,000,000,000,000 watts).

How huge? Not as bad as I thought. If the Lief takes 20 seconds to get out of range of the ground, the ground will be subjected to only about the equivalent of the detonation of a 6.6 megaton bomb, about three hundred Hiroshima bombs. If the exhaust was concentrated into a ten meter diameter circle and the ground was composed of rock with a heat capacity of 1 kJ/kg-K, the exhaust would theoretically burn a hole one and a half kilometers deep. In reality it would probably just blast a crater about 500 meters in diameter.

The blast would instantly kill all the people within about six kilometers, and kill about half the people who were from six to fifteen kilometers from the lift off or landing point.

So the Leif can land, then the exploration team can break out their mountain climbing gear and climb out of the bottom of the glowing crater. Then do a survey of the vast plain of fresh Trinitite and hike to the point where the trees are merely snapped off at the roots instead of being actually vaporized.

This is why some sort of shortcut like artificial gravity would be desireable.
Click to expand...

The original topic is here.

Enjoy!
 
There are 4 ships from my youth that I really loved beyond reason: the Leif Ericson (I had the UFO version), the Viper, and the Starbird. All three disappeared sometime after high school.

So I am looking forward to a rerelease of the LE. Hopefully, it will stand up to play as well as my UFO Leif did...
 
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