Ship survivability
Skip laughed, he was still of the two types of ships, submarines and targets mindset. Gizmo had already demonstrated a smuglarine capable of launching a hypersonic missile. If it hits target, score a kill. In order not to be considered a “kill”, a target, er uh, ship must still have mobility and power.to perform her mission. A waterline hit by an explosive device at mach 6 would certainly take mobility off the table.
Why High Table was even considering surface ships was beyond him. Smuglarine could launch from just about anywhere off Madagascar, travel with stealth, that is what they are designed for, surface just long enough to release the weapon and skidaddle. The normal crew was one human and a couple AIs, so it was also minimal exposure of human life, at least ours.
High Table had approved 12 of the subs for Depository II protection, so why floaters when a sewer pipe would do? Oh well, he just ran the assembly line, so he built a team.
To be survivable in a hostile combat environment you need component redundancy with effective separation starting with a starboard forward, port aft command centers. Wisely choose the location of critical parts, pumps and motors. Designing the ship to be mostly electric allowed distributed placement of the batteries, the motor, shaft, and prop is pretty much gotta be aft and below the water line. From the first warship on, the weight, speed, armor trade off has raged. If you can distribute your batteries, they can have a secondary role as armor, we can deal with the loss of a couple battery banks far better than the loss of a command center, or occupied crew compartment.
When it came to hull materials, in a perfect world you would specify a lot of titanium, strength, weight, corrosion, heat, but alas, in short supply. Skip knew what they wanted when they came to him, he was a carbon fiber manufacturer. Forget all of that stronger than steel for the weight stuff you have read about, for a ship, we are talking fiber reinforced plastic, meaning it burns really well.
Phone: Traveler, Skip, you know those Bucky ball and rod panels you did for me for the RVs?
Sure Skip.
You got those down to 2% plastic right?
Right.
That was years ago, but you are better at it, can you get watertight with 1% plastic?
Hmmm, flat panels, or very slight radius, yeah, u bends and stuff like that, no way.
A million simulations later, Skip made his pitch to High Table. Trimaran, 4 engine, one in each outer hull, two in the center. Each hull was an isolated system. Solar powered, during peace time, a big solar array powered the batteries, during combat the array folds and stores down in the hull. Keel and bow are titanium, the rest is carbon fiber with almost no plastic, so you get strength, low weight, at insane mode, max power, this would be the fastest combat vessels in the world, for about 3 hours until you drain the batteries, but at more normal speeds you can operate for several weeks on a full charge.
Crew of 4, two hypersonic missile launchers, 6 total missiles, 3 on each outer hull. I know you guys wanted a death ray, we do have a laser. I call it the six gun, 6 4-farad capacitors in the center hull, it needs at least sixty seconds cool down between shots. Bunch of Spike ER7 ship to ships, I think 30, 20 Spike AAs to keep the drones at bay. Of course each crew has a .50, every PSE is a rifleman, and the outer fulls each have a robotic one fore and aft.
Cost, the first one is more than another dozen smuglerines I'm sorry to say.
High Table approved 4 without comment and another dozen sumuglerines. Yes, it's a lot of money and yes, High Table has resources, you know how compound interest calculators work, start with $10 200 years ago at a mere 5% interest. And they could see the gathering storm clouds. Households, corporations, nations under a staggering amount of debt. A pot of gold never looked so good.
Why High Table was even considering surface ships was beyond him. Smuglarine could launch from just about anywhere off Madagascar, travel with stealth, that is what they are designed for, surface just long enough to release the weapon and skidaddle. The normal crew was one human and a couple AIs, so it was also minimal exposure of human life, at least ours.
High Table had approved 12 of the subs for Depository II protection, so why floaters when a sewer pipe would do? Oh well, he just ran the assembly line, so he built a team.
To be survivable in a hostile combat environment you need component redundancy with effective separation starting with a starboard forward, port aft command centers. Wisely choose the location of critical parts, pumps and motors. Designing the ship to be mostly electric allowed distributed placement of the batteries, the motor, shaft, and prop is pretty much gotta be aft and below the water line. From the first warship on, the weight, speed, armor trade off has raged. If you can distribute your batteries, they can have a secondary role as armor, we can deal with the loss of a couple battery banks far better than the loss of a command center, or occupied crew compartment.
When it came to hull materials, in a perfect world you would specify a lot of titanium, strength, weight, corrosion, heat, but alas, in short supply. Skip knew what they wanted when they came to him, he was a carbon fiber manufacturer. Forget all of that stronger than steel for the weight stuff you have read about, for a ship, we are talking fiber reinforced plastic, meaning it burns really well.
Phone: Traveler, Skip, you know those Bucky ball and rod panels you did for me for the RVs?
Sure Skip.
You got those down to 2% plastic right?
Right.
That was years ago, but you are better at it, can you get watertight with 1% plastic?
Hmmm, flat panels, or very slight radius, yeah, u bends and stuff like that, no way.
A million simulations later, Skip made his pitch to High Table. Trimaran, 4 engine, one in each outer hull, two in the center. Each hull was an isolated system. Solar powered, during peace time, a big solar array powered the batteries, during combat the array folds and stores down in the hull. Keel and bow are titanium, the rest is carbon fiber with almost no plastic, so you get strength, low weight, at insane mode, max power, this would be the fastest combat vessels in the world, for about 3 hours until you drain the batteries, but at more normal speeds you can operate for several weeks on a full charge.
Crew of 4, two hypersonic missile launchers, 6 total missiles, 3 on each outer hull. I know you guys wanted a death ray, we do have a laser. I call it the six gun, 6 4-farad capacitors in the center hull, it needs at least sixty seconds cool down between shots. Bunch of Spike ER7 ship to ships, I think 30, 20 Spike AAs to keep the drones at bay. Of course each crew has a .50, every PSE is a rifleman, and the outer fulls each have a robotic one fore and aft.
Cost, the first one is more than another dozen smuglerines I'm sorry to say.
High Table approved 4 without comment and another dozen sumuglerines. Yes, it's a lot of money and yes, High Table has resources, you know how compound interest calculators work, start with $10 200 years ago at a mere 5% interest. And they could see the gathering storm clouds. Households, corporations, nations under a staggering amount of debt. A pot of gold never looked so good.
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