An idea I've always had for traveller

[Iron Warrior.]

In traveller ships must devote notable portions of their internal volumes to jump fuel tankage. Many warships seem to have jump 3 as a standard, making them nearly 1/3 jump fuel tankage.

Here's an idea I had about that.

Suppose someone arranged the jump fuel tanks around the ship to in essence serve as a form of internal armor, covering vital internal systems by being between them and the outer hull?

Now, obviously, a big hunk of empty space isn't much armor, but hold on there, captain criticism, I'm not done yet.

Suppose after the jump fuel tanks were emptied by going into jump a ship's crew spent their jump week filling the empty fuel tanks with an ablative foam containing stuff like ceramic compounds and crystals meant to absorb, diffuse or ablate away laser attacks and such? The foam could be stored in a compressed form then mixed and allowed to expand into the jump take volume, and essentially turn a jump tank into a big mass of absorptive, ablative armor to resist lasers, a common weapon in traveller.

Yes, yes, it would be impossible to refuel the ship while it's tank is full of this, but the tank could be give a liner before being filled that would make cleaning it out easier.

Anyone have any comments on the feasibility of this idea? Let's hear 'em.

If it ends up being adopted into the traveller universe, I'm happy with that.

 

[barnest2]

I think the big problem would be jumping back out of the enemy system in an emergency
Unless you only use, say, one parsec of jump to get into the system. But then you have problems of determining which bits of the ship are covered etc etc. Very cool idea, but difficult to work out in game.

 

[rust]

Ah ... the ship would get the armour immediately after entering jump
space, where no armour is needed, and would have to get rid of it im-
mediately after the exit from jump space if gas giant refueling is inten-
ded. A lot of money and effort for a protection which is not there most
of the time when it could be useful.

 

[Iron Warrior.]

Well, obviously it would be for jumping into an area where combat is expected. I mean, if you were dispatching a force into system xx just for combat then they'd do it in jump and have it ready when they emerged.

 

[middenface]

MMMM crunchy on the outside chewey in the middle...

Theres some example of vehicles slapping additional armour on them (sandbags, reactive plates, 'spaced armour' (?) )

So ship can't see why not, still I'd want some spare juice so I can jump out.

 

[DFW]

I don't know about putting particulate matter into a tank that is used for J-fuel. One little bit of contamination and ... misjump.

 

[BP]

Yeah, certainly doesn't sound good in terms of contamination - treat as unrefined fuel perhaps?

The concept of re-utilizing the jump fuel volume is good, but filling such a large volume with an effective anti-laser compound doesn't sound more practical than simply using sandcaster rounds given the expense of having to obtain and carry the material first, putting it in place and then removing it...

From a believability standpoint, with such low density (or lots of lost dtons to begin with) - absorbing the energy of an anti-ship weapon seems impractical, whereas reflecting the energy inside the hull doesn't sound all that great either.

As to a design with critical sections behind the tanks - that might justify a different hit table (or imply automatic hits to tanks when other areas are indicated).

 

[DFW]

Y
As to a design with critical sections behind the tanks - that might justify a different hit table (or imply automatic hits to tanks when other areas are indicated).

If you look at my last two designs, they had tanks surrounding the entire internal areas.

 

[Liam Devlin]

What about disposable ablative armor externally mounted? Granted, against N-PAWS & M-PAWS its not much. But lasers are the most common-energy ship's weapon. Vessels can move themselves +10% with their Jump engines, and if one doesn't cover the lanthanum grid, shouldn't be a problem.

 

[DFW]

What about disposable ablative armor externally mounted? ... and if one doesn't cover the lanthanum grid, shouldn't be a problem.

It would have to cover the 'grid' to cover the hull.

 

[Rick]

Has anyone considered adapting the (present day tech) idea of fuel tank safety foam for this idea? Granted it would reduce the fuel tankage by a certain %, and it would be less dense than a solid ablative foam, but it has the advantages of not needing to be cleaned out and would work even if there was still fuel in the tank. Just a thought.

 

[Liam Devlin]

What about disposable ablative armor externally mounted? ... and if one doesn't cover the lanthanum grid, shouldn't be a problem.

It would have to cover the 'grid' to cover the hull.

Okay. But what about for Non-jump vessels? :twisted:

 

[MikeB]

I think I saw this "fuel tank - extra armor" idea in Clancey's novel, "The Hunt for Red October."

 

[BP]

To me these concepts are already covered (pun ) by the existing rules for reflect and hull armour.

The only difference I can see is using temporary reflect and armour options (different prices/effectiveness).

As to utilizing wasted jump tank space - a good portion could probably be utilized for moving baggage/cargo into to free up passenger/crew space and also for other recreational purposes. Also would be good for conditioning and training troops - ala obstacle courses, target location run thru's with dummy structures, etc.

One could even setup ship to have couches for passengers till after jump, then move in the portable 'staterooms'...

[Personally, jump fuel is used during the jump IMTU - and this is one of the reasons. Otherwise I can't see a market/military not utilizing this space...]

 

[DFW]

Okay. But what about for Non-jump vessels? :twisted:

Then, you're not dealing with large J-fuel volume and thus, weird ways to armor the ship...

 

[Liam Devlin]

Okay. But what about for Non-jump vessels? :twisted:

Then, you're not dealing with large J-fuel volume and thus, weird ways to armor the ship...

Welllllllllllll.... I'm funny that way. Especially for poor systems with a handful of merchie starships that they haven't the ability to retrofit armor on inside with (D-class ports only), so they up-armored their ships externally with ablative disposable plates, cut to fit to leave the grid exposed.

 

[Liam Devlin]

Especially where jump-frame, tender ships were used. This poor-man's Navy was harnessed up, jumped into a system to 'show-the-flag' etc, and of course to have to deal with hostiles defending their Close orbital space. The tenders of course never entered the fray.

 

[BP]

After reading about 'reactive armour' used by tanks - I added this option to CT designs in the past to counter/reduce missile damage.

For combat ships, detachable tanks could also be outfitted as independent decoys (mis-information) on reentry - at range this could be strategically useful (especially if real 'fleet' is arriving elsewhere...).

 

[Liam Devlin]

I recall an idea by one Peter Gray of the TML boards about the military application of frozen LHyd fuel externally laid onto the hull, consumed into the drives by the PP (thus does not get in the way of the 'grid'), saving the full internal tanks for maximum capability upon arrival. He had this worked out in Fusion/Fire/Steel math. Personally, I like the idea--definitely a refined fuel technique worthy for the Imperial Navy's use.

 

[BP]

The 'grid' is an aspect of other versions of Traveller as far as I know - don't recall any mention in MgT.

My limited CT collection made no mention of these details either.

The idea of a grid that needs to be external to everything encompassed in a jump doesn't seem to fit with other MgT 'explanations', most notably armour...