There was a sci-fi series of books written about a hospital ship that traveled
around to different worlds dealing with different races and researching
about them. Of course, I can’t remember the name or find it in my collection.
Maybe it was “Hospital Ship”? Or “Sector General”?
I thought it might be Star Surgeon by Alan E Nourse, the story of the
first non-Terran graduated from the massive medical school that Earth
hopes will be its ticket into the Galactic Federation.
But in looking for it I found out the second book in the Sector General
series by James White you and Rob mentioned has the same name,
but it’s clearly not the same story.
Or a small gunboat class with a lead boat named “Chorkie”. I had one of those. Named him Scooter. Took him camping with me a couple of times. He was an escape artist. Got out one time and somebody poisoned him. He came home acting sick on a Saturday and by Monday he was vomiting blood. What kind of person poisons a tiny dog?
Damn. I really, really need a forum here. Uh, Rob, any progress on your web design work?
I actually thought there was one, but I can’t find it.
The reason being, that Rob came up with some good ideas for defeating Wolf weapons,
in the comments on the previous page, and I’d like a forum for that. 41 comments is a
new record.
Hyper pulse radar would work, but not against gravitics, as they go for mass…
Same for the Mylar decoys. So, fairly short-range protection.
The sand casters, though, would be effective against C-fractional gravitics.
So, long-range protection. But grav weapons with explosive warheads used
at short range, or at low acceleration, would defeat both, but wouldn’t be precise.
More ideas please, people!
Here’s a simple one; A gravity driven missile that fires in a direction away from targets, but then switches it’s target to a gravity drive missile, targeted upon the ship that fired the counter missile. This would not only pull the first missile off target, but would also make a physical intercept, eliminating both missiles. Given enough time to reach near C fractional velocities, the gravity where could, conceivably, vaporize both missiles without impact. But remember; should both missiles impact with each other at C Fractional velocity, with enough kinetic energy, even Iron can fission..
I don’t see how a curtain of sand would stop a 100 lb block of concrete moving at .1%C. I can see it ablating the leading surface but unless it were thick enough to completely consume the projectile I believe you would still have significant mass impacting a warcraft’s armor. The only defense I can see against fractional C projectiles is armor – yards and yards of armor plating. A couple of authors I have read have their ships armored with tungsten mined from asteroids.
I think the power generating capacity that seems to have shown up with the gravitics breakthrough would be both sufficiently compact and sufficiently powerful to serve as the power source for directed energy weapons. A sand curtain there might well diffuse the incoming laser sufficiently to reduce its destructive ability.
I don’t see gravitics as being all that great an advantage for the empire. The Catman commented that tne core worlds’ tech level was at level I while the empire’s is at level III. I could not find any reference which listed tech levels which made sense in that context. I think the reason the initial encounter with THOs was because it caught the THOs flat footed. For one thing, having detected the pride, they may well not have looked for anything else. Of course the attack craft are very stealthy but if the THO’s sensor operators were not looking in the right direction they might not have detected the attack craft. Surely when the THOs are repatriated there will be something along the lines of a board of inquiry and they will figure out the over all outline of how the attack was carried out. They might not be able to reproduce the craft but I would expect them to start looking for a way to detect and counter them. Of course depending upon how stratified and ossified/petrified their society is they may simply elect to cashier the ships’ captains and pretend the empire has no real advantage. One can postulate a highly regemented and ordered societysimilar to imperial China under the Tao. From what I read no progress was allowed unless it could be integrated into the Tao. If the THOs society cannot accept upstarts such as the empire, the ships’captains would be court marshalled for incompetence and dereliction. I don’t know how PC envisions the societies of the core worlds. I expect them to be extremely set in their ways. It could take multiple bloody noses from the empire before the core worlds take official notice of the empire.
A curtain of sand would not stop incoming projectiles, but at 0.1% c (300,000 m/s, 186 miles/s, or 670,000 mph) the impact of one grain of sand would release energy that
would vaporize the concrete block. The problem is, that would still leave a 100 pounds (plus a bit from the sand) of plasma incoming at just barely under 0.1% c.
I don’t know how to calculate the effect of that, but I guess it would be like the jet from an armor-piercing shaped charge, only more powerful and wider than your ship!
Maybe the curtain of sand could be backed by an electromagnetic deflector to steer the plasma around the ship. That is still quite a challenge.
The plasma would still carry the momentum of that concrete block (mass times velocity), and that momentum is going somewhere, such as tearing the electromagnets
from their mounts and sending them crashing through the ship at thousands of miles per hour. If somehow you can reinforce the mountings to spread the
momentum evenly around the ship so it isn’t crushed or torn apart, it will accelerate a 1,000 ton ship by 33mph in an instant. It’s not impossible to protect
the equipment and crew against that, but any unrestrained crewmen will hit a wall at 33mph…
will be hitting a wall at 33mph. .
I’m thinking somewhere between tomato paste and tomato sauce.
I still think the best defense against kenetic kill weapons is armor – as thick and as hard as you can make it. Something like alternating layers of tungsten (which is many times harder and denser than steel) and transparent alumium (which is an alumina based ceramic that grav technology would help to produce. Since the ship itself would be so massive the projectile would be more likely to ablate part of the armor as opposed to really nudging the ship. That is where I disagree with markm. I figure the relative mass differential between a starship and a projectile would be on the order of a bb to an Abrams. The crew might get a jolt but I do not see a projectile actually transferring that much momentum to the ship. Think a sabot round hitting the belt armor of an Iowa class battleship.
Doberman? How many ships are in this fleet?
i almost wish for a big, ungainly hospital ship named St Bernard.
There was a sci-fi series of books written about a hospital ship that traveled
around to different worlds dealing with different races and researching
about them. Of course, I can’t remember the name or find it in my collection.
Maybe it was “Hospital Ship”? Or “Sector General”?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hospital_Station .. first book of the series “Sector General.”
so,, right on both 🙂
I thought it might be Star Surgeon by Alan E Nourse, the story of the
first non-Terran graduated from the massive medical school that Earth
hopes will be its ticket into the Galactic Federation.
But in looking for it I found out the second book in the Sector General
series by James White you and Rob mentioned has the same name,
but it’s clearly not the same story.
Well, at least they don’t have a fast corvette named Chihuahua…
Or a small gunboat class with a lead boat named “Chorkie”. I had one of those. Named him Scooter. Took him camping with me a couple of times. He was an escape artist. Got out one time and somebody poisoned him. He came home acting sick on a Saturday and by Monday he was vomiting blood. What kind of person poisons a tiny dog?
One question: why would Cats name their ships after dogs?
Patience, Bill. Patience.
Damn. I really, really need a forum here. Uh, Rob, any progress on your web design work?
I actually thought there was one, but I can’t find it.
The reason being, that Rob came up with some good ideas for defeating Wolf weapons,
in the comments on the previous page, and I’d like a forum for that. 41 comments is a
new record.
Hyper pulse radar would work, but not against gravitics, as they go for mass…
Same for the Mylar decoys. So, fairly short-range protection.
The sand casters, though, would be effective against C-fractional gravitics.
So, long-range protection. But grav weapons with explosive warheads used
at short range, or at low acceleration, would defeat both, but wouldn’t be precise.
More ideas please, people!
Here’s a simple one; A gravity driven missile that fires in a direction away from targets, but then switches it’s target to a gravity drive missile, targeted upon the ship that fired the counter missile. This would not only pull the first missile off target, but would also make a physical intercept, eliminating both missiles. Given enough time to reach near C fractional velocities, the gravity where could, conceivably, vaporize both missiles without impact. But remember; should both missiles impact with each other at C Fractional velocity, with enough kinetic energy, even Iron can fission..
I don’t see how a curtain of sand would stop a 100 lb block of concrete moving at .1%C. I can see it ablating the leading surface but unless it were thick enough to completely consume the projectile I believe you would still have significant mass impacting a warcraft’s armor. The only defense I can see against fractional C projectiles is armor – yards and yards of armor plating. A couple of authors I have read have their ships armored with tungsten mined from asteroids.
I think the power generating capacity that seems to have shown up with the gravitics breakthrough would be both sufficiently compact and sufficiently powerful to serve as the power source for directed energy weapons. A sand curtain there might well diffuse the incoming laser sufficiently to reduce its destructive ability.
I don’t see gravitics as being all that great an advantage for the empire. The Catman commented that tne core worlds’ tech level was at level I while the empire’s is at level III. I could not find any reference which listed tech levels which made sense in that context. I think the reason the initial encounter with THOs was because it caught the THOs flat footed. For one thing, having detected the pride, they may well not have looked for anything else. Of course the attack craft are very stealthy but if the THO’s sensor operators were not looking in the right direction they might not have detected the attack craft. Surely when the THOs are repatriated there will be something along the lines of a board of inquiry and they will figure out the over all outline of how the attack was carried out. They might not be able to reproduce the craft but I would expect them to start looking for a way to detect and counter them. Of course depending upon how stratified and ossified/petrified their society is they may simply elect to cashier the ships’ captains and pretend the empire has no real advantage. One can postulate a highly regemented and ordered societysimilar to imperial China under the Tao. From what I read no progress was allowed unless it could be integrated into the Tao. If the THOs society cannot accept upstarts such as the empire, the ships’captains would be court marshalled for incompetence and dereliction. I don’t know how PC envisions the societies of the core worlds. I expect them to be extremely set in their ways. It could take multiple bloody noses from the empire before the core worlds take official notice of the empire.
A curtain of sand would not stop incoming projectiles, but at 0.1% c (300,000 m/s, 186 miles/s, or 670,000 mph) the impact of one grain of sand would release energy that
would vaporize the concrete block. The problem is, that would still leave a 100 pounds (plus a bit from the sand) of plasma incoming at just barely under 0.1% c.
I don’t know how to calculate the effect of that, but I guess it would be like the jet from an armor-piercing shaped charge, only more powerful and wider than your ship!
Maybe the curtain of sand could be backed by an electromagnetic deflector to steer the plasma around the ship. That is still quite a challenge.
The plasma would still carry the momentum of that concrete block (mass times velocity), and that momentum is going somewhere, such as tearing the electromagnets
from their mounts and sending them crashing through the ship at thousands of miles per hour. If somehow you can reinforce the mountings to spread the
momentum evenly around the ship so it isn’t crushed or torn apart, it will accelerate a 1,000 ton ship by 33mph in an instant. It’s not impossible to protect
the equipment and crew against that, but any unrestrained crewmen will hit a wall at 33mph…
will be hitting a wall at 33mph. .
What would the G force be in that instant? We talking strawberry preserves or strawberry jelly?
I’m thinking somewhere between tomato paste and tomato sauce.
I still think the best defense against kenetic kill weapons is armor – as thick and as hard as you can make it. Something like alternating layers of tungsten (which is many times harder and denser than steel) and transparent alumium (which is an alumina based ceramic that grav technology would help to produce. Since the ship itself would be so massive the projectile would be more likely to ablate part of the armor as opposed to really nudging the ship. That is where I disagree with markm. I figure the relative mass differential between a starship and a projectile would be on the order of a bb to an Abrams. The crew might get a jolt but I do not see a projectile actually transferring that much momentum to the ship. Think a sabot round hitting the belt armor of an Iowa class battleship.
Awwww, no chunky sal as?
Catman,
Down on the farm indeed!
Stand at Attention and SALUTE!!