Outrigger Spacecraft Designs

[agorski]

Speaking of modularity, here's a design I did of a flexible modular military transport which can be reconfigured for different missions:

http://www.travellerrpg.com/CotI/Discuss/showthread.php?t=41194

 

[BRJN]

But then think about a 200t Free Trader. Would we ever see two 100t hulls connected together? What are you going to do, put the payload in one hull, and the ops in the other?

Long Night, or post-Virus:
I have a Type-S Scout and a 95-ton Shuttle but I really need a J-1 Trader ...
Maybe James Bond and Q at the shipyard can come up with something?

 

[agorski]

Long Night, or post-Virus:
I have a Type-S Scout and a 95-ton Shuttle but I really need a J-1 Trader ...
Maybe James Bond and Q at the shipyard can come up with something?

Reminds me of the movie Flight of the Phoenix where a plane crash lands in the Sahara and the survivors hack together a smaller plane from the wreckage.

 

[robject]

Reminds me of the movie Flight of the Phoenix where a plane crash lands in the Sahara and the survivors hack together a smaller plane from the wreckage.

Hard Times designs -- potentially -- could see outriggers as a world reuses material on hand. Check.

 

[Magnus von Thornwood]

My responses.

If I read the T5.10 ship construction tables correctly, a streamlined 90 dTon pod costs 5.6 Million Credits, The pod, if carried in space, must be both airtight and well insulated. It will also need to have sufficient cargo hatches to be able to load and unload cargo, preferably at both ends, so as to avoid having to totally unload the pod to get at the item of cargo to be unloaded first. Before you say this is not possible, I have seen it happen with cargo trucks, where the first pallet to be unloaded is the first pallet put on the truck, meaning that all of the other pallets have to be moved to get at that one

Now, this cargo pod is not weightless, but is the equivalent of a 450 gross register ton submarine hull. Say it weighs about 200 or so metric tons. Does it also have some form of landing gear or feet so as to prevent it from sinking into the ground, or is it only dropped off on a hard loading-bearing surface like a runway? How much cargo are you planning to put into this? You return on investment per fully loaded pod is 90,000 Credits per loaded trip. The numbers do not seem to add up real well.

As I recall the idea was the Pods were generally used as a space only function for the cargo variants. It gets loaded at the high port for transport to System Y, once loaded it gets installed on the ship's grapple system, and it carries the Pod to System Y where it gets dropped and picked by a port tug or something. As for as I recall they were conceived as working like drop tanks. They're temporary, cheap, and for use in space not ports, though they can be if the port has the right equipment.

I mean the truth is the Pods require at least 1 grapple/35 tons so that's one ton gone from payload and then you just use 2 more tons for a Lifter package and Landing Gear. Thus for 3 tons taken out of potential payload you get ability to land it on worlds and move it about as well.

Hell, if you can get a 1 ton Maneuver Drive (which I think you, but going on memory...) which means it basically is now a Smallcraft. At that point though you might as well invest in an actual Smallcraft.

Sounds like a Dispersed Structure (configuration: 7) hosting additional Planetoid craft (configuration: 8 or 9).

Agreed.

Speaking of modularity, here's a design I did of a flexible modular military transport which can be reconfigured for different missions:

http://www.travellerrpg.com/CotI/Discuss/showthread.php?t=41194

Did you? [o]Or did your T5 VehicleMaker App do it? Now, off to see what you got since the 2nd FLIR (C) needs some transport craft.[/o] McDerp here misread, but still gonna check it out. I plan on messing with T5 Traveller Fleets, because the 2 FLIB (C) still needs to be worked up.

 

[aramis]

Hard Times designs -- potentially -- could see outriggers as a world reuses material on hand. Check.

ISTR a 150 scout mod in TTNE.

 

[kilemall]

We designed a ship years ago, partially for freight but mostly for belter ops.


100-tons of it is flattened sphere, staterooms/engineering/bridge, some cargo/fuel bladder space, wholly jump-capable on it's own.


100-tons is dispersed structure, essentially a big gantry, that bolts onto the front of the crew/jump sphere. The gantry is largely empty except for an engineering corridor running down the middile of it, otherwise 5 and 10 ton containers attach to them.


The idea is that the prospectors can detach the cargo section and have it on tap to support continuous operations at the rock being worked presumably with at least one container being an advance base, while the jump saucer part can fly off to refuel, drop off samples, get personnel, etc.


Not strictly outrigger, the gantry would be centerline to the saucer pusher tug because IMTU has pseudoreaction drives, but presumably a wholly gravitic drive wouldn't care that much about such considerations.

 

[robject]

Here's an out-rigged Scout-Raider conversion. Mainly because I want to Frankenstein the scout/courier.
The bay weapon isn't necessarily on a pontoon, but it does seem to require a structural change or cantilever or something.

It's not a comfortable space for ops. It looks like it's designed as a large jump-capable fighter, not suitable for prolonged time in space.

Raider RQ-AL42 Scout-Raider MCr67.2

Owner: Arkesh Spacers

Using a 100-ton, modified scout/courier hull, the Scout-Raider mounts jump drive-A, maneuver drive-B, and power plant-B, giving a performance of jump-2 and 4G acceleration. Fuel tankage supports a 1 parsec jump, at 10t per parsec, and 2 months of operations. Attached to the bridge is a Computer Model/2 std. There are 4 double staterooms and no low berths. Installed weaponry include one short-ranged missile launcher bay. Cargo capacity is 3 tons. The ship has a lift body hull, with scoops for frontier refueling.

   Tons	 Component                          	  MCr	Notes
-------	 -----------------------------------	-----	--------------------
    100	 Lift body Hull, lifters, 1 a/l free	   16	L, lifters, 1 a/l free
      1	 Landing legs with pads             	    1	
      0	 AV=11. 1 Blast Plate               	    0	
      0	 AV=0. c Slick                      	    0	
     10	 Jump Fuel (1  parsec)              	    0	1 parsec jump, at 10t per parsec
      8	 Plant Fuel (2 months)              	    0	2 months
      3	 Maneuver Drive-4 (B)               	    6	4 G
     10	 Jump Drive-2 (A)                   	   10	J 2
      7	 PowerPlant-4 (B)                   	    7	P 4
      2	 Fuel Scoops with Purifier          	  1.1	100 t/hr
      0	 AR Surf Communicator               	    2	
      0	 AR Surf Jammer                     	    2	
      0	 AR Surf Neutrino Detector          	    2	
      0	 AR Surf Radar                      	    2	
      0	 AR Surf Scope                      	    2	
      0	 SR Surf Stealth Mask               	  1.5	
     25	 SR Bay Missile                  	  5.5	
      1	 Magazine                           	    0	50 x Size-5
      1	 Life Support Standard              	    1	10 person-months
      2	 Clinic                             	    1	
      2	 Computer Model/2 std               	    5	
     12	 Spacious Bridge                    	  0.7	1cc 5op 0ws
      8	 4x Crew Double                     	  0.4	#4 2 crew
      4	 Crew Commons                       	    0	
      1	 Crew Common Fresher                	    1	10 crew
      3	 Cargo Hold Basic                   	    0

 

[Condottiere]

You could launch the components of a starship separately into orbit, and assemble them, so if the final configuration isn't streamlined, atmosphere wouldn't be an issue.

 

[GypsyComet]

There is the modular A2 from the QLI run as well, the Salamander. See The Forgotten War and The Gabriel Enigma.