I toyed a bit with container ships in HighGuard.
At TL-12 you can design a 60k dT ship capable of moving up to 140k dT of containers at 1G & Jump-2. This ship will have no way to refuel on its own (it has less than 1 200 dT available for hangars, & internal cargo space), and Jump-2 is short in a frontier area.
Making it a Jump-3, will reduce the containers to 73 333 dT. And for Jump-4, it will be limited to 40k dT.
| dT | MCr | EP |
Hull 60k dT - Close Structure | | 2 400 | 40 000 (for ship + containers) |
Jump Drive - J2 (for 200k dT) | 10 005 | 15 007.5 | 40 000 |
Maneuver Drive - 1G (for 200k dT) | 2 000 | 4 000 | 20 000 |
Powerplant | 5 360 | 5 360 | +80 400 |
Fuel - J2 + 4 weeks | 40 536 | - | - |
Bridge | 60 | 300 | - |
Core/40 | - | 45 + 13 for software | - |
Civilian Sensors (-2DM) | 1 | 3 | 1 |
10x Double Pulse Laser Turrets | 10 | 25 | 90 |
170 Staterooms | 680 | 85 | - |
Commom Area | 170 | 17 | - |
External Cargo Mount (140k dT) | - | 140 | - |
Remaining space | 1 178 | - | - |
Total | 60 000 | 27 375.5 | 309 remaining EP |
Softwares includes Anti-Hijack/2 & Virtual Gunners/1 (to replace all gunners).
Crew: Captain, 1 Pilot, 1 Navigator, 248 Engineers, 30 Maintenance, 15 Admin, 2 medics & 14 Officers.
It can be optimized a bit more by reducing the powerplant by 20 000EP (so that the ship needs to dim light before jumping).
I also tried with a TL-11 150dT ship transporting a 20dT shuttle for unloading & refueling and a 6dT pod for manipulating the containers (loading the shuttle). I managed to cram 124dT worth of containers. Such a ship would transport containers to world lacking the infrastructure (and population) required by large ships.
| DT | MCr | EP |
Hull - 150dT Close Structure | | 6 | 54 (for ship + containers) |
Jump Drive - J2 for 300dT | 35 | 52.5 | 60 |
Maneuver Drive - 1g for 300dT | 3 | 6 | 30 |
Power Plant | 13 | 6.5 | +130 |
Fuel - J2 + 4 weeks | 62 | - | - |
Bridge | 10 | .75 | - |
Computer /10/Bis | - | .24 + 2.2 for software | - |
Civilian Sensors (-2 DM) | 1 | 3 | 1 |
1 Double Pulse Laser Turret | 1 | 2.5 | 9 |
3 Staterooms | 12 | 1.5 | - |
Common Area | 3 | .3 | - |
Fuel Processors - 20dT per day | 1 | .05 | 1 |
External Cargo Mount for 31x 4dT Containers - 124dT total | - | .124 | - |
2 Type I Docking Clamps | 2 | 1 | - |
Cargo | 7 | - | - |
Totals | 150dT | 84.614 MCr | 5 remaining EP |
Software includes Jump Control /2 & Fire Control /1 (to replace the gunner). Crew : Pilot, Navigator & Engineer.
Since the containers are usually unpowered, I consider the ship needs to provide the energy for life support should the containers needs it (at least for the artifical gravity). Thus the 54 EP on the Hull line.
Possible optimization : It should be possible to make the staterooms double occupancy & reduce the powerplant so that you need to dim lights for jumping. That would free 9 dT (4dT room + 1dT common area + 3dT powerplant & 1 dT fuel). Move the 6dT pod to a docking space (remove 1 clamp, takes 6 dT and free 6dT for containers). Replace the 20dT shuttle by a 12dT one (but only 8dT worth of containers/fuels can be transported) & add 8dT worth of containers... Total 138dT of external cargo & 9dT of internal cargo. But I like the unoptimized version.
The 20dT shuttle is capable of transporting 12 dT worth of containers or 13dT of fuel (Fuel/Cargo containers, HG p49), and thus can serve to refuel the ship. (Unless I missunderstood the Fuel/Cargo containers rules), has 4G, a dual cockpit and 1 additionnal seat.
The 12dT shuttle is capable of transporting 8 dT worth of containers or fuel, has 2G, a single cockpit and 2 additionnal seats.