TL10 Dalton Spence class Deep Space Fueler

[tjoneslo]

Since I'm most familiar with GVB, I decided to try my hand at building a Deep Space supply ship. This is built using the GT Starships rules, via the Modular build system from GVB. I'm sorry I can't explain how to replicate this in the other programs.

TL10 Dalton Spence class Deep Space Fueler

The Dalton Spence class Deep space fueler is a speciality built craft to supply hydrogen fuel to a set of deep space cache in the Lesser Rift between the Imperium and the Julian Protectorate in the Empty Quarter sector.

The ship design consists of a bulbus nose section containing the crew quarters, bridge, and fuel processors. There is a narrow, reinforced, passage to a rear engineering section which contains the drives and the jump fuel. The middle section contains 12 100dton demountable fuel tanks as cargo.

Under full load the ship is capable of making one jump 2, and once the fuel tanks have been unloaded and demounted, make another jump 2 to return to base to gather more fuel. While the ship is cabaple of lifting with a full load of fuel from most worlds, usually the ship tanks are filled by cutters supplying raw fuel to the ship and it's cargo bay.

Ship crews complain repeatedly about having rough jump transitions. Especially on the outbound jumps with full tanks. The ship builder assures the crew the ship design in within safety limits. Many of the navigators employ extra time to compensate for this. There have been no known accidents with operations. But there are people who refuse to serve on these ships.

Crew: 24 Total, 5 Bridge Crew, 7 Engineers, 12 Service Crew.

Subassemblies: SL Hull +11.

Powertrain: engineering, 90 jump drive, 85 maneuver.

Fuel: 960 jump fuel tanks, 960 dtons hydrogen, 1,200 demountable tanks, 1,200 dtons hydrogen.

Occ: 12 staterooms Cargo:

Armor F RL B T U
Hull 4/100 4/100 4/100 4/100 4/100

Equipment
Hull: six utility (6G); nine fuel processors (30 hr); 12 modular couplings (15-ston capacity); computer system; basic bridge.

Statistics
Size: [LxWxH] 364’x90.9’x45.4’ Payload: 2,342 tons Lwt.: 5,101 tons
Volume: 3,003 dtons Maint.: 0.561 hours (171 mh/day) Price: MCr1,273

HT: 12 HP: 135,000 [Hull].

Performance: sAccel (unloaded) 0.667 G, ( 1.23 G), Jump 2, aSpeed 740 mph.


Design Notes:
TL10 medium frame standard materials [Vehicle].
TL10 DR 100 expensive metal [Vehicle].
Payload Cost: MCr0.756
Vehicle Features: computerized controls, very good streamlining.
Volume: 3,003 dtons [Hull].
Area: 90,000 sf [Hull].
Performance: Payload 4,686,000;

 

[DaltonSpence]

I'm flattered but my last name is spelled with a 'c'. Just remember when you are delivering fuel to a DSS (gee, I just noticed it has the same initials I do) you need to supply fuel for two 2-parsec jumps (there and back again) as well as the payload. A drop tank could handle the first leg but someone would have to pick it up later. Also it's untidy to leave your empties behind unless the plan is to use them to expand the station. And only so many could be used for that. (The rest would become navigation hazards.)

Dalton “I've been at this a while” Spence​

 

[tjoneslo]

The power of the edit button.

Two other notes:

The computer system module is an enhanced computer for the Jump program and navigation. This is to ensure the ship can handle the deep space jumps and the variable configuration of the ship.

Ship crews complain repeatedly about having rough jump transitions. Especially on the outbound jumps with full tanks. The ship builder assures the crew the ship design in within safety limits. Many of the navigators employ extra time to compensate for this. But there are people who refuse to serve on these ships

The internal fuel tanks have fuel for 1 J2 at full capacity and 1 J2 at unloaded capacity. If you keep 240 tons of fuel in the cargo tanks, you can make a return jump with the complete tanks.

Still making tweaks to make sure I've got everything set correctly.

 

[DaltonSpence]

One point to remember: the stations I was using for my setting have a weekly fuel requirement of 4,200 tons. From my notes:

Based on early feasibility studies, the DSS Project estimated an annual flow of 15,000 passengers and 300,000 dtons of cargo through these artificial starports. Those figured implied 300 passengers and 6000 dtons of cargo per week, or approximately five trade vessels per day. Unlike planetary starports, which may have multiple highports and downports, a single deep space station must manage all passenger and freight transfers coming through their region of space. To prevent each station from being overwhelmed by the occasional heavy traffic volume, naval architects created the deep space station design under the assumption that they may occasionally have as much as double the expected passenger or freight flow.

See the History of the Deep Space Station Project​

Example: For ships traversing the Saeghvung-Turley-Exile Run the maximum jump distance is two parsecs. According to “Determine Tonnage of Starships Served” on T:ST page 64 the raw figures would imply 10,500 dtons of shipping per week, which doubled for safety gives us 21,000 dtons per week. This traffic would use 4,200 tons of hydrogen per week (or 600 dtons/day) for the outgoing jumps. (Note: The estimated annual flows imply these stations have a port size of 5.)

For more information on this setting see GT: Starports and Deep Space Stations. I'm sure my old GVB CD is in one of my many storage boxes somewhere but it would take too long to find so I just DL'ed it from W23. If you could attach your ship file I would love to take a look at it.

Dalton “who has to re-learn yet another program” Spence​

 

[DaltonSpence]

A point just occurred to me. The shipping tonnage calculated above was "doubled for safety" which means the average amount of fuel actually used would be about half what I estimated. That doesn't mean the station's tanks should be reduced (having an emergency reserve just makes sense) but the amount delivered by the tankers would have to be. This means yet another redesign d**mit! Oh well!

Dalton “just when I thought it was safe to post them” Spence​

 

[DaltonSpence]

Well the redesign is finished and apparently cutting the tanker payload in half reduced the size of all the associated ships and drop tanks by 40%. I'm still a bit worried; if emergency reserves start getting low an order for extra fuel might take three weeks to arrive. This could interfere with the smooth flow of shipping traffic through the Deep Space Station but it can't be helped.

Dalton “Darn Loren's third rule anyway!” Spence​