TYpe R - Subsidized Merchant Deckplan

[Whipsnade]

'Ouch' I never noticed that .... a very short upper deck.

Mithras,

Yup. The upper deck is only 60% of the length of the lower. There's nothing wrong with that, in fact it gives the design a nice twist, it just means the illo isn't a good representation.

I also don't like the escape pods banked up here and there cluttering up the craft. I'd prefer inflatable pods dotted around the ship - visible but not in the way.

Pods are more substantial than rescue balls, so I've always shown pods in my scrawled deckplans while rescue balls were simply assumed to be in lockers somewhere. I would have placed them differently, but I think showing those pods in a nice touch. After all, people have been wondering where all the "lifeboats" are for over thirty years.

I might do one more redraw .... then I'll start creating some varients. I want the Type R to be the Hercules or Dakota or 747 or its era. Found everywhere, doing all kinds of jobs...

IMTU, civilian designs are not as compartmentalized as military or paramilitary ones. Architects design civilian craft around discrete pressure "flats". The bridge is one such flat, main engineering is another, and the holds make up a third. The passenger block is a "flat" too. Aside from one or two staterooms that can act as "safes", the entire passenger quarters is a single air-tight compartment. The same holds true with the crew block; one or two "safes" inside a single airtight compartment.

All this means that there are relatively few permanent airtight bulkheads within the hull of a civilian ship. Fewer permanent bulkheads allows for greater flexibility in arranging all the non-airtight walls within each pressure "flat". Crews or, more likely yard personnel, can strike, shift, and erect walls as desired to create whatever stateroom/lounge layouts, sizes, and quantities that can fit within the space.


Regards,
Bill

 

[Swiftbrook]

My revised deckplan: http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v299/lord_mithras/subsidized005.jpg

The lower deck stays the same but for the elevator and perhaps a small one ton office or equipment store next to it on the cargo deck.

My take on plan #5.

Flip the passenger staterooms left to right. Place the 5 'horizontal' staterooms along the outside bulkhead and your vertical staterooms along the central spine. This allows the five outside staterooms to have windows and be a step up from the interior staterooms. Outside staterooms could be your high passengers.

I also agree that the low berths should be near the engineering section and medical bay, not up by the bridge.

-Swiftbrook

 

[Publius]

Hello Mithras,

I hope you don't mind my chiming in here, but I liked the direction you were going in and wanted to see what it would look like in my mapping style. I'm not trying to horn in or anything -- the planning of these things is more than half the battle for me and I liked your planning.

The first image is your plan, slightly modified. I replaced the sickbay with two communal freshers for the folks in Crew Country and placed a sickbay in the vicinity of the Low Berths (but I lost one Low Berth, of course that could be the one in dotted lines and there would be no "real" sickbay, but the Low Berth chamber could still be used for diagnostic tests and such, which is fine). I used communal freshers more than I would have liked, but those rooms on the edges are really really tiny.

The second image is my take on your plan, modified a bit more.
First I dropped the engineering section altogether. Replacing it with the extended Passenger Lounge, as well as room for two additional staterooms (and I also transferred one stateroom in the original into the Galley). I did this because I have made changes elsewhere and wanted the number of staterooms to balance out.
Second: Those skinny staterooms in crew country add up to a total of 15 squares or thereabout (5x1.5 square spaces (7.5) for each pair, 2 pair = 15),which sound like dual-occupancy to me, so I went with that and began looking for other areas to balance out the rest so I would end up with a total of 13 staterooms (but 15 beds since 2 of those 13 are dual occupancy).
Third: I moved the Staterooms on the Passenger side of the ship out a bit and skrunched in the mid-line larger staterooms. They are now 'more equal' (but not equal really). Since this is the top of the ship, I'm not distressed about the lack of side-access for windows (skylights work just as well)

Using the space originally allocated for Engineering granted me a little bit extra room to drop in the last two staterooms to balance out the total number of staterooms. One for a Steward/Medic (either/or or both; this is the one that has two doors, one facing the Crew Country the other facing the Passenger Lounge) and one for a Steward or an Extra Passenger (the one facing the outside which only accesses the Passenger Lounge).

Fourth: Because of the way that I re-adjusted the staterooms, there was a cut-off where the original Captain's Room connected to the Passenger Section. By re-adjusting the interior and door arrangement, I just turned that into an equipment room, either for Life Support "stuff" or storage space depending on what you prefer.

Recap:
The four staterooms in "Crew Country" are more or less = two real staterooms
The 2 Officer Staterooms up front are single occupancy = two staterooms
The 7 for Passengers= Seven Staterooms
The 2 Steward Rooms = two staterooms

total = 13 Staterooms as called for in original design.

Sickbay and Low Berths are now in one section at the rear of the ship (where they are more accessible for/by the Passengers and no longer adjoining the Bridge); I also stuck a dedicated fresher in there for the Austin Powers Post-Freezing visit to the Necessary.

Life Pods are now at the back end (except the emergency pilot pod in the bridge), not too far from the Passenger section. The Life Pod graphics are just modified Low Berth Chambers, which is sort of Appropriate, although I think such could easily be a combo of the inflatable Escape Bubble and a rigid structure (the Low-Berth like "tube" for ejection which essentially launches out of the ship and expands, then can doubtless be strung together with a bit of effort). The Only "problem" is that there are now 15 beds and only 13 Life Pods, but that is what the design calls for and I'm not feeling like reducing those pods any more than I have.

Oh yeah, I also replaced the Turrets from the original version.

A few changes came to me while writing this all up: I could always drop in a door in that Galley facing Crew Country. I dunno, eh, it's fine as-is for now.

 

[Andrew Boulton]

Ooh, that's nice!

 

[Ran Targas]

Absolutely gorgeous! Great job. You got more?

 

[Beech]

That's a lovely style Publius,what program did you use?, it looks like it may be Autocad.
Let's see more, please.

 

[Publius]

I usually work with HERO and have had my maps published in a range of products for them. But I started with ship designs many years ago, and I have always loved Traveller. With the new OGL-esque nature of Traveller today, I do want to start publishing Traveller Material for pdf downloads.

My current problem is that I am working on a game monograph for Chaosium which hit a brick wall and yet still needs to get finished. I also need to get myself off my lazy rear-end. I'm probably stopped more due to the lazy-butt problem than the other project admittedly. I have a 400 ton vessel that I have finished, but it will need a bit of work before it can get published.

And I use Illustrator, very steep learning curve, very nice results.

 

[Andrew Boulton]

Two things: the boarding airlock (from the boat) should be on the centreline, and the passengers won't like sharing freshers (you can squeeze one into a 3m x 4.5m s/r).

 

[Publius]

Two things: the boarding airlock (from the boat) should be on the centreline, and the passengers won't like sharing freshers (you can squeeze one into a 3m x 4.5m s/r).

Well for both of those, I was trying to work within the map provided by the original poster. I cannot say that I disagree with either point, but those are approximately what we see with the original design so I kept things as they were within reason. The solution -- if the original poster wants to solve it at all --is to simply flip the Boarding airlock and that portion of the Passenger Lounge that is next to it. Of course, I may have mis-read their original drawing, if so mea culpa. While it isn't a particularly huge change, it requires several steps and I'm done with this one for now. Maybe if there are some other changes.

As far as sharing Freshers generally, while I can understand it might not be popular, it is still the most efficient way to handle what is at best a "part time" area -- an area only occupied in limited circumstances. If this were a passenger liner or something, I can see where the extra space would be used for this, but with what is essentially a tramp freighter (with a greater emphasis on bulk cargo over living/passenger cargo) there are probably too many of them rather than not enough. Again, I understand and to some reason agree with the critique generally, but in this case I think the mild discomfort it isn't worth the space that would have to be devoted to correct it.

 

[rancke]

As far as sharing Freshers generally, while I can understand it might not be popular, it is still the most efficient way to handle what is at best a "part time" area -- an area only occupied in limited circumstances. If this were a passenger liner or something, I can see where the extra space would be used for this, but with what is essentially a tramp freighter (with a greater emphasis on bulk cargo over living/passenger cargo) there are probably too many of them rather than not enough. Again, I understand and to some reason agree with the critique generally, but in this case I think the mild discomfort it isn't worth the space that would have to be devoted to correct it.

The obvious way to solve the problem is, of course, to differentiate passage costs. Those who have a personal freasher in their room pays more than those who share a fresher down the corridor.


Hans

 

[Publius]

The obvious way to solve the problem is, of course, to differentiate passage costs. Those who have a personal freasher in their room pays more than those who share a fresher down the corridor.


Hans

Generally speaking I agree completely. On this design, no real need to have all those different types of design (although ironically, the closest one to the original poster's design perhaps demonstrates this the best). In the revised design, the form of sharing is with just one other cabin. Not overly problematic.

I have designed a combined Stateroom with restroom, the size of the larger staterooms (it is a little wider than the smaller stateroom)

Don't know if I prefer it personally, but it allows for a sizable shower/pull down commode combo (it is actually a bit larger than the present-day shower stall, which I find a bit claustrophobic). I made the desk (.7m/~28 inch deep) a pulldown model because of it's location next to the bed.

 

[Mithras]

Publius, what can I say, those plans are gorgeous I prefer your second plan, it looks right to me. THe size, scale and colour are perfect - though my plans might not be perfect! THere is the all important shuttle docking hatch missing from plan 2. But in that plan I like the galley and sickbay, and the way the doc and steward are available for the passengers via connecting doors. Nice touuches I never thought of ...

Great stuff!!!!

I will use!

 

[lucasdigital]

Publius, what can I say, those plans are gorgeous I prefer your second plan, it looks right to me. THe size, scale and colour are perfect - though my plans might not be perfect! THere is the all important shuttle docking hatch missing from plan 2. But in that plan I like the galley and sickbay, and the way the doc and steward are available for the passengers via connecting doors. Nice touuches I never thought of ...

Great stuff!!!!

I will use!

Absolutely agree, great drafting, lots of detail, without the horrible clutter that is common to deck plans that show the door handles etc. The problem with presenting stuff in high detail is you suddenly have people commenting about minutiae. Of course, in my book, if you're getting these comments, it means you've made your viewer believe - which what it's all about.

 

[Swiftbrook]

While working on another thread I found this in The Traveller Adventure:

Hope it helps.

-Swiftbrook

Note: I think this is "Fair Use" but if I've violoated some copywrite or board rule, let me know, I'll not do it again.

 

[Mithras]

Ha, very nice. I think to prevent the 'crew-going-through-passenger-territory' problem, I'd shift all cabins forward one square, to enlarge the passenger lounge, then extend the crew corridor down to the shuttle hatch room.

Thanks!

I have those deckplans on the CD-ROM, so I will print them out.

 

[Icosahedron]

Dunno if the plan for the 'Resolution' I posted a few months back is any use to you? Feel free to borrow from it if so. Just click the 'Gallery' in the header of this post.