Deck Plans - Fresher Options

[PFVA63]

Hi,

A good point of reference might be the US Coast Guard's new proposed Setinel Class patrol boat (http://www.uscg.mil/acquisition/newsroom/pdf/sentinelmediabrief.pdf & http://www.uscg.mil/acquisition/programs/pdf/frcfactsheet.pdf). Its listed as being 353mt in displacement and is designed to patrol for about 5 days then come back in port, and then go out again.

Awhile back I did some calc's on larger naval vessels (such as mine counter-measures vessels, frigates, and destroyers) and found a relationship between metric tons of hydrostatic displacement (mt) and the total enclosed volume of the ship, where 1mt equated to about 0.25 Traveller dtons. I don't know if this relationship is fully valid for Patrol boats, but since the smallest Mine counter-Measures vessel that I looked at was 335mt, it might be a reasonable guess.

If this relationship holds for Patrol Boats, then the USCG Setinel class Patrol Boat would have an enclosed volume on the order of at least 88dtons. A real quick estimate of the staterooms suggests that the smallest may be about [edit] 6.75ft x 5.25ft (which is about 3/4 a dton if the deck heights were assumed to be like in Traveller), but most of the other staterooms are larger than this.

I did a quick scaling of the drawing and overall it looks like if you include all the staterooms, passages, T&S's, and the Galley and Mess Deck you come up with about 32.5 dtons of space for accommodations. This works out to about 1.5 dtons per person. There also appears to be about 1 dton of A/C space forward and the Admin spaces (which include the Pilot House, Office, Storage space, Comms and some lockers (plus a space not labeled) adds up to about another 11.1 dtons. I didn't look at any of the machinery spaces or the magazine though.

Anyway, this suggests that for a ship perhaps like a system defense boat in Traveller with a relatively short patrol duration perhaps maybe something along the lines of about 1.5 dtons per person might be do-able if you were to allow up to 4 persons per stateroom.[end edit]

Anyway, just thought it might be of interest with regards to this discussion.

Regards

PF

 

[aspqrz]

Actually I DID go on quite a few working ships. Current arrangement for hired hands on german ships seems to be single or double cabin (depending on ship type) with external bathroom/toilet, each cabin with 6-8m2 per person. There are things like "workspace rules" over here in civilised Europe after all.

And as I said: I don't care what MILITARY ships do. Most ships in Traveller that are relevant to players are civilian or build/crewed to civilian standards.

Yet in Traveller we have Low Berths ... and a death lottery for ghu's sake :shock:

If this isn't a hint that they might see crew accommodations more along the lines of bunkrooms a la 1920's Tramp steamers during the Great Depression, well, I don't know what would be regarded as a "hint" ...

... a bludgeon, perhaps :wink:

Of course, I don't believe that Low Berths are a viable option, legally or morally, in the sort of advanced society that insists on 3 dtons of space per person ... YMMV of course :shock:

Phil

 

[klingsor]

I would be inclined to have a compartment separate from the accommodation for life support. On larger ships or warships, more than a thousand tons at least, they might be divided up into a number of separate areas each with an independent life support system – though there would be excess capacity so if the life support in one section went down you could get along by putting the load on another section or sections. For the small PC scale ships this would be uneconomical and probably unnecessary.

The life support section would be secure, separate from the accommodation by a bulkhead. I think I would put it aft by engineering but up by the bridge would work as well. It is important so it would be kept locked and there are the possibilities of some nasty chemicals and gases as well particularly if anything goes wrong – echoes of some of Elizabeth Moon's SF stores here I think.

The piping for air and water would be quite vital so might be in an armoured conduit though I suppose British Olympic style pipe laying suspended from the deck head is also plausible – the military in particular seems to like all the pipe work accessible and colour coded for damage control and sanity.

 

[Infojunky]

Ok say a core plant and a Increment per person supported?

 

[klingsor]

In most things you do get economies of scale - so applying this the more people you cater for the more space you can spare to make them more comfortable - does that make sense? I think the logic is fine but I am not so sure about my writing. Having a cat standing between me and the keyboard is not helping either.

Examples are always good. A single place craft might be able to have .25 m^3 of 'comfort' space but a big, thousand place, liner might have 1.5m^3 available simply from economies of scale.

One real world example, not life quite life support but potentially useful. It is probably true, would my father lie to me? [1] The Scientologists used to have a fleet of ships and an engineer was called out as one had lost electrical power. She had three generators and all had failed. What was supposed to happen that one was running, one was on standby and the third was a spare in case one of the others went down or so you could work on one and still have a backup. They would also be swapped around so one was not being worn out. What they had done in their ignorance [2] was just run one continuously until it failed then run the next one until it failed and so on.

Notes
1. Actually he probably would he is infamous for wind ups.
2. They weren't marine engineers, they did not know any better. A good example I suppose that you can give a man a fancy hat and a title and it means precisely nothing when things go pear shaped.

 

[Infojunky]

Signs & Portents #57 gives us Half a ton per person out of the stateroom mass for life support. Interpolating from the Assault Barracks.

 

[PFVA63]

Hi,

With regards to arrangements, staterooms & freshers, & comparisons to modern ocean going ships, a couple thoughts come to mind.

First, as others have pointed out, on a starship space probably needs to be provided not just for the actual stateroom that the personnel will sleep in but also things like mess decks and galleys, passageways, laundy facilities, storage for the food and other stores, A/C, potable warter and other such stuff. As such when laying out a ship in Traveller, like alot of others have already mentioned I too don't assume that staterooms are 4 dtons in size but rather the 4 dtons includes the stateroom and sanitary facilities, passageways, and other stuff along the lines of what I mentioned above.

Here's a link to a deck plan I put together for a small 100 dton craft, where I used 2 dton staterooms (which included the sanitary facilities), and allocated the remaining 2 dtons per person to passageways, the mess deck, lounge & galley, plus a laundry and air lock. (http://members.cox.net/psjn/Pocket Trader.pdf) Because space was so tight I kind of assumed that alot of the life support stuff would be located in the overheads. Putting that deckplan together has helped convince me that 2 dtons is may be adequate for an actual stateroom with dedicated sanitary facilites.

Second, although I posted some info the other day for a small/short voyage naval vessel that suggests that maybe something along the lines of 1.5 dtons per person might be adeqaute for that type of ocean going vessel, a while back I also posted some stuff on another Traveller board comparing some data I had come across for the design of a relatively modern higher-endurance frigate sized vessel. Although the data came from a student paper, it was done at the Naval Post Graduate school by some actual naval officers, using the same tools that are used in real early stage US naval design.

If I did the math right, then for that 4000 mt ship (which had an enclosed volume of about 1000 Traveller dtons) then:

• Space directly dedicated to Human Support/Accommodations etc for 122 personnel equated to about 167 dtons or 1.37 dtons/person,
  however Internal Accesses (passageways) and the like added another 135 dtons,
  And other Ship Support spaces (like maintenance & stores etc) added another 125 dtons

Added together then the space dedicated to accommodations, passageways, galleys, mess decks, offices, storerooms, and maintenance areas equated to about 3.5 dtons per person (I think).

Additionally, at a presentation that I once saw for the US Coast Guard's new Deepwater cutters (if I am remembering correctly) the presenter indicated that on the new cutters that they were working on they were striving for something like single cabins for senior officers, double cabins for junior officers and Cheif Petty Officers, and no more than 4 people to a cabin for the rest of the crew, however, I believe that the presenter indicated that there may be some 6 man cabins to accommodate surge crew, or something like that. As such, I think even on military ships accommodations standards are increasing.

Anyway just some additional info I thought might be of use to the discussion.

Regards

PF

 

[klingsor]

Some of us are so used to working with certain basic assumptions of drawing deck plans that we forget others are new to them so it is always worth having them clearly stated - with examples to boot!

 

[Patron Zero]

I would be inclined to have a compartment separate from the accommodation for life support. On larger ships or warships, more than a thousand tons at least, they might be divided up into a number of separate areas each with an independent life support system – though there would be excess capacity so if the life support in one section went down you could get along by putting the load on another section or sections. For the small PC scale ships this would be uneconomical and probably unnecessary.

I've always had the starships (and non-starships) in my universe come with what I refer to as rescue lockers which come in different grades and features much in the way recreational vehicles have accommodations rated.

The most basic rescue locker is a storage space supplied with the minimal of life supporting gear, likely not much more than a breathing mask and a 'disposable' one person rescue ball. The other end would offer a dedicated small compartment with independent life support capacity as well as an emergency vac suit, rescue kit* and other items consistent with a modern world lifeboat. I see that space more or less being comparable to a 'standard' stateroom fresher.

*kits also vary by grade and size based upon contents and location.