A handy thing to have in your stateroom when the ship gets a hole in it. the Imperial Encyclopedia rescue ball is a cylinder 5 cm in diameter and 10 cm long that expands out into a 1 meter sphere for you to shelter in.
Except - it's listed as one liter in volume. A 5 cm cylinder is not one liter in volume. My math says at 10 cm length it needs to be around 11 cm in diameter. 10 cm diameter puts it within spitting distance; I wonder of that was intended to be 5 cm in radius.
It's a TL 7 device. Our available O2 tanks give 2 hours for 5 liters at TL 5 and 4 hours for 4 liters at TL 12. I don't know if the rescue ball delivers a pure oxygen atmosphere or a standard air mix. The former would limit it to 0.3 atmospheres - if I'm trying to get in and seal it before the external pressure drops to 0.5 atmospheres (which is where I'd be passing out), I've got the O2 mixing with whatever air I brought with me, but delivery gets tricky 'cause much over a 30% partial pressure starts meaning eventual oxygen toxicity injury to tissue. I don't know if a TL 7 1-liter volume O2 delivery system's sophisticated enough to monitor O2 levels to prevent that.
The latter, a standard air mix, means I can get in and save myself from a smoke inhalation death (or death by halon suffocation) in a 1 atmosphere ship undergoing a fire emergency without the rescue ball itself trying to kill me. Problem is, as an air mix, that less-than-1-liter capsule has to deliver 520 liters to inflate the sphere: 7600+ psi? It'd be good to deliver that performance to the vacc suit O2 tanks.
It has a first aid kit. I figure that's about the size of a deck of cards and holds a bit of gauze and tape, maybe a few pills - a sedative would be good about that time. Not much room for more.
Per the description, it expands out and it can give you air for 2 hours - but air is not your problem. A 1 meter sphere, with no air source, has enough air in there to keep you going for maybe 3 hours, Not comfortably: after an hour and a half, O2 levels are around 16% and it's getting uncomfortable. However, you could make it to 3 hours before the O2 level dropped enough to knock you out, and you might even survive another half-hour to an hour before the levels dropped low enough to kill.
Here's the problem: CO2. You inhale air, you exhale air with less oxygen and more CO2 - a lot more CO2. The CO2 level hits 2% in a bit over half an hour - you start having headaches and sweating. At an hour and a half you are decidedly uncomfortable. At two hours you are unconscious.
This is technically keeping you alive for two hours, but it makes for a much more dramatic couple of hours for the hapless player. Stick a little CO2 absorber in there, something the size of a playing card box, you could extend survival for an hour.
IMTU, I put an umbilical connection on it, to be able to hook up a ship's air feed, allow a person to stay in there longer in a ship, and there's a dose of fast drug in the first aid kit, so the person doesn't feel like he's spending as long in the thing and so he can endure longer.
Except - it's listed as one liter in volume. A 5 cm cylinder is not one liter in volume. My math says at 10 cm length it needs to be around 11 cm in diameter. 10 cm diameter puts it within spitting distance; I wonder of that was intended to be 5 cm in radius.
It's a TL 7 device. Our available O2 tanks give 2 hours for 5 liters at TL 5 and 4 hours for 4 liters at TL 12. I don't know if the rescue ball delivers a pure oxygen atmosphere or a standard air mix. The former would limit it to 0.3 atmospheres - if I'm trying to get in and seal it before the external pressure drops to 0.5 atmospheres (which is where I'd be passing out), I've got the O2 mixing with whatever air I brought with me, but delivery gets tricky 'cause much over a 30% partial pressure starts meaning eventual oxygen toxicity injury to tissue. I don't know if a TL 7 1-liter volume O2 delivery system's sophisticated enough to monitor O2 levels to prevent that.
The latter, a standard air mix, means I can get in and save myself from a smoke inhalation death (or death by halon suffocation) in a 1 atmosphere ship undergoing a fire emergency without the rescue ball itself trying to kill me. Problem is, as an air mix, that less-than-1-liter capsule has to deliver 520 liters to inflate the sphere: 7600+ psi? It'd be good to deliver that performance to the vacc suit O2 tanks.
It has a first aid kit. I figure that's about the size of a deck of cards and holds a bit of gauze and tape, maybe a few pills - a sedative would be good about that time. Not much room for more.
Per the description, it expands out and it can give you air for 2 hours - but air is not your problem. A 1 meter sphere, with no air source, has enough air in there to keep you going for maybe 3 hours, Not comfortably: after an hour and a half, O2 levels are around 16% and it's getting uncomfortable. However, you could make it to 3 hours before the O2 level dropped enough to knock you out, and you might even survive another half-hour to an hour before the levels dropped low enough to kill.
Here's the problem: CO2. You inhale air, you exhale air with less oxygen and more CO2 - a lot more CO2. The CO2 level hits 2% in a bit over half an hour - you start having headaches and sweating. At an hour and a half you are decidedly uncomfortable. At two hours you are unconscious.
This is technically keeping you alive for two hours, but it makes for a much more dramatic couple of hours for the hapless player. Stick a little CO2 absorber in there, something the size of a playing card box, you could extend survival for an hour.
IMTU, I put an umbilical connection on it, to be able to hook up a ship's air feed, allow a person to stay in there longer in a ship, and there's a dose of fast drug in the first aid kit, so the person doesn't feel like he's spending as long in the thing and so he can endure longer.
