Wanted: Curmudgeony Grognards (to talk TL 5-7 Rockets)

[atpollard]

So I have an idea and a few questions.

FIRST QUESTION: Has anyone used Hard Times and FF&S to design Reaction Rockets?

• Which is "better"?
• Which has more "options"?
• Which produces results closer to "reality"?
• Do they produce similar results?

I am familiar with Hard Times and Rocket Design, but I have never really used that part of FF&S ... so I wondered how they compared.

 

[atpollard]

SECOND QUESTION: Traveller is famous for hiding rules in unexpected places: Does anyone know of any other places to find rules on Reaction Rockets in Traveller?

 

[atpollard]

The plan is to eventually "reverse engineer" either Hard Times or FF&S Reaction Drives into a LBB2 style table and a LBB5 style formula to make them usable with CT in LBB2 and LBB5 at TL7 (or thereabouts based on what data the other rules provide). There are already some CT rules for so many Gs of burn (for missiles) that can be adapted to Primitive Spacecraft, so the core tools are already there in CT.

 

[Baroun Tardis]

SECOND QUESTION: Traveller is famous for hiding rules in unexpected places: Does anyone know of any other places to find rules on Reaction Rockets in Traveller?

T5 has chemical rockets, HEPLAR, and Orion
It's very CT-ish in complexity level, but nifty

 

[AnotherDilbert]

FIRST QUESTION: Has anyone used Hard Times and FF&S to design Reaction Rockets?

I have used FF&S, but not Hard Times. I get the impression that Hard Times is a subset of FF&S, perhaps a bit simplified.

If you can use FF&S to design HEPlaR craft, it shouldn't be much more difficult to do rockets instead.


Mongoose 2nd has very simple rockets.

 

[atpollard]

and Orion

Orion? Like the NASA Spacecraft or something else?

 

[Baroun Tardis]

Orion? Like the NASA Spacecraft or something else?

"We're 2 AU from the ISS Chicago. We've got sunglasses, a half a pack of cigarettes and 15 d-tons of mini-nukes. "
"Hit it."
---- The Blue Agents, hit movie in 1102

Yeah, Orion, like the Space Battleship proposed to Pres Kennedy in 1962

T5 Orion offers fission, microfission, fusion, and antimatter boom-boom.
The very high tech versions use modified nuclear dampers instead of a physical pusher plate.

 

[atpollard]

"We're 2 AU from the ISS Chicago. We've got sunglasses, a half a pack of cigarettes and 15 d-tons of mini-nukes. "
"Hit it."
---- The Blue Agents, hit movie in 1102

Yeah, Orion, like the Space Battleship proposed to Pres Kennedy in 1962

T5 Orion offers fission, microfission, fusion, and antimatter boom-boom.
The very high tech versions use modified nuclear dampers instead of a physical pusher plate.

OH ... THAT Orion. I was thinking Apollo II that they are trying to build right now. I loved the nuclear pusher plate concept!

[Personally, I am a fan of an engine called TRITON (TriModal Nuclear Thermal Rocket) AIAA Paper AIAA-2004-3863 ]

(EDIT: add copy of paper NOT hidden behind PAY WALL ... Hooray!)

 

[Grav_Moped]

"We're 2 AU from the ISS Chicago. We've got sunglasses, a half a pack of cigarettes and 15 d-tons of mini-nukes. "
"Hit it."
---- The Blue Agents, hit movie in 1102

Yeah, Orion, like the Space Battleship proposed to Pres Kennedy in 1962

T5 Orion offers fission, microfission, fusion, and antimatter boom-boom.
The very high tech versions use modified nuclear dampers instead of a physical pusher plate.

Also, in conventional-explosives form, a key plot point in Pournelle's King David's Spaceship. (WIkipedia)

Edit: It's amazing the things one remembers after all those years... didn't even have to guess at the title.

 

[Baroun Tardis]

Also, in conventional-explosives form, a key plot point in Pournelle's King David's Spaceship. (WIkipedia)

Edit: It's amazing the things one remembers after all those years... didn't even have to guess at the title.

Loved that book. One of my favorites.

 

[Condottiere]

You could have a range of hull volume percentage, and fuel consumption.

Also, differing fuel compositions, some of which might be more unstable and hazardous.

 

[mike wightman]

If you want real world engineering solutions ported over to Traveller

1- mass, this is the main variable, not volume of liquid hydrogen
2- fuel, you need lots of it
3- reaction mass, you need lots of it

The rules in Hard Times and FF&S allow you to use mass as the key variable, but they get fuel use and reaction mass use rates very wrong (and the MgT reaction engines are bought from ACME by a certain coyote).

My preferred method is build it in Kerbal and then port it to Traveller.

 

[mike wightman]

There may be some use in looking over this old thread:

The Chemical Rocket Third Imperium

Imagine the OTU - without reactionless thrusters, without Contragravity or anything like it, not even with fusion rockets, but instead, with extremely cheap chemical rockets and chemical rocket fuel. Yes, no artificial gravity either. Instead, there is side-effect-free medication that prevents...

www.travellerrpg.com

 

[atpollard]

If you want real world engineering solutions ported over to Traveller

Real world will only get you so far when the REAL WORLD is trying to catch up to 1969 again.
We STILL don't even know if a Human Being can survive indefinitely at less than 1G. (Living on another planet may be biologically IMPOSSIBLE.) They have plans going back to "ATLAS" ... collecting dust and pages turning yellow ... and no 'plans' to actually implement them.

(That's why I play Traveller instead ... politicians and NASA annoy the heck out of me ... and don't get me started on Jupiter and what could have been from the Space Shuttle parts!)

 

[mike wightman]

Real world engineering possibilities, we could do now if the political and economic will were there -

cheap reusable launch vehicles (Space X leads the way but there are other options)
permanent refueling stations in Earth orbit
permanent Lunar station and permanent Lunar surface bases
Lunar mining and manufacturing of solar power satellites
asteroid mining
rotating habitats
O'Neil cylinders (possible with 1970 tech)

almost ready
single stage to orbit spaceplanes
skyhooks
manufacturing industry on the Moon
nuclear electric propulsion
nuclear thermal propulsion (not really needed except for military use)
magsails, solarsails

 

[Dragoner]

Around 10 years ago I used MgT HG rules for rockets, and fission reactors on ships. Nobody cared, also I had something for thermal management (homebrew).

 

[atpollard]

Nobody cared

You got off easy.
I expect anything that I come up with to be torn to shreds … this is CLASSIC TRAVELLER on COTI … that’s what we do here is point out how everything violates some R.A.W.

 

[Spinward Flow]

that’s what we do here is point out how everything violates some R.A.W.

Well ... some people do ...

Half empty vs half full ... versus "I've got the rest of the water in a redundant glass" ...

 

[mike wightman]

Tech Level	real world	could have been done
5	V1, V2, Me 163	Earth orbital space station,
6	rockets up to and including Saturn V, X series rocket planes	Lunar orbital station, Lunar base
7	space shuttle, ISS, Space X, X series hypersonic rocket planes, ion engines	Mars orbital base, Mars base, nuclear electric propulsion, nuclear thermal rockets, asteroid mining, space industry

 

[AnotherDilbert]

I expect anything that I come up with to be torn to shreds … this is CLASSIC TRAVELLER on COTI … that’s what we do here is point out how everything violates some R.A.W.

There's an easy solution: Call your house rules house rules and don't claim they are RAW.

We all use house rule, so why pretend we don't?