Giant suit of Battledress: 6 meters tall!
- Thread starter Tom Kalbfus
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Tom Kalbfus
Mongoose
Well according to Einstein, gravity is a curvature of space, and there is very little difference between an accelerated frame of reference and a gravity field. That is if you are in a rocket ship accelerating smoothly at 9.81 meters per second squared, it would feel just like standing on the surface of the Earth. Similarly a centripetal acceleration (in a circle) feels just like standing on the surface of the Earth, if the radius of the circle is great enough such that there is no significant difference between the centrifugal force felt at one feet and head when standing up. Gravity is a rather unique force, in that it accelerates objects by applying force to then in proportion to their mass.dragoner said:
Now lets suppose you had magnetic shoes for example, and the floor has electromagnets in it, your shoes would have a sensor in them which tells the floor how high above the electromagnetic plate they are, by varying the electric current running through the electro-magnet, you can vary the intensity of the magnetic field pulling on your shoes. If you program it right, you can get it to accelerate your shoes and you in them down to the electromagnetic plating in the floor at 9.81 meters per second, to you this will not feel like falling under gravity, because as the magnetic field pulls you, the blood would rush to your head as your feet accelerate toward the floor. It won't feel like walking under gravity, and the magnetic field would have to vary to take into account the mass of each magnetic shoe wearer so as to apply enough pulling force to his shoes so as to accelerate him at 9.81 meters per second squared, and also the magnetic field would have to be reduced as the shoes draw closer to the floor plating, as magnetic field obey an inverse cubed law, not an inverse squared law as gravity does. Magnetic floors and iron plates in one's shoes is a poor substitute for grav plating, though a feasible one with current technology.
Einstein died a long time ago, and he wasn't happy with quantum theory, even if he agreed with it. The changes in the theories behind the mechanics, and in other fields like cosmology and astronomy is almost as much as going from thinking the world is flat to thinking it is round, much of it in the last 20 years. As far as using centripetal acceleration, or some acceleration, there is the difference of the mass's inertial rest state between that and gravity, just for example so there are differences.
if your building a humanoid walker like a tank, you have already messed up. Modern vehicles use steel, heavy alloys, and such things as depleted uranium in the armor. Mainly becuase the materials are plentiful, and easy to manufacture given the current technology...a jump of one or two tech levels and they become more practical.
A humanoid vehicle would not have to be manufactured of heavy metals and convention materials. carbon composites, carbon fibers, perhaps even carbon nano-tube materials.This reduces the size to mass ratio. It also allows more advanced systems than hydraulic/pneumatic/electro-mechanical systems.
With a simple jump of one, or two, tech levels over our current tech a six meter, (20ft) machine isn't going to weigh as much as an current Main Battle tank. it would most likely weigh more like an Allosaurus, or T-Rex. By the way an 8 ton elephant can "run" at nearly 25 miles an hour.
A humanoid vehicle would not have to be manufactured of heavy metals and convention materials. carbon composites, carbon fibers, perhaps even carbon nano-tube materials.This reduces the size to mass ratio. It also allows more advanced systems than hydraulic/pneumatic/electro-mechanical systems.
With a simple jump of one, or two, tech levels over our current tech a six meter, (20ft) machine isn't going to weigh as much as an current Main Battle tank. it would most likely weigh more like an Allosaurus, or T-Rex. By the way an 8 ton elephant can "run" at nearly 25 miles an hour.
Just to look at the kPa's of various things, an Abrams has a kPa of 103, while a human has a kPa of 55, even though the tank is about 600 times heavier. A 6 meter suit of battledress, basically a walking tank, now armored, modern armor works by density maybe the future is different and materials may be lighter, still sounds very heavy, with high ground pressure. That being said, there is a DARPA project for a quadruped robot, that is fairly fast, for use on rough terrain; but that is big leap from that to a giant suit of battledress.
Reynard
Emperor Mongoose
That would explain the statement in the Vehicle Handbook that walkers are purpose built and rare. They could also be an alternate for a world that hasn't discovered or fully exploited grav technology. Walkers would be advantageous compared to track or wheeled in certain terrain.
I'm going compare a set of exploratory vehicles either from existing ones from the books or by creating such as a walker. Want to see what type is most efficient. Might have to compare a walker and several AFV designs that have similar firepower and armor too.
I'm going compare a set of exploratory vehicles either from existing ones from the books or by creating such as a walker. Want to see what type is most efficient. Might have to compare a walker and several AFV designs that have similar firepower and armor too.
Tom Kalbfus
Mongoose
Walkers could operate in caves where artificial gravity fields might cause cave-ins!Reynard said:
Reynard
Emperor Mongoose
"Walkers could operate in caves where artificial gravity fields might cause cave-ins!"
That's not how Traveller AG units work. They neutralize and push against the gravity vector. Even a heavy grav unit doesn't have the force capacity to cause a cave in if it somehow worked any other way and they would be crushing anything or anyone who were under them while in Nape of the Earth flight. Actually, a heavy walker could be more inclined to stomp its weight around compared to a tracked or even wheeled unit. That would be a bit dangerous in any place prone to vibration.
That's not how Traveller AG units work. They neutralize and push against the gravity vector. Even a heavy grav unit doesn't have the force capacity to cause a cave in if it somehow worked any other way and they would be crushing anything or anyone who were under them while in Nape of the Earth flight. Actually, a heavy walker could be more inclined to stomp its weight around compared to a tracked or even wheeled unit. That would be a bit dangerous in any place prone to vibration.
Tom Kalbfus said:
Except that gravity is not really a force. Free floating objects in a gravitational field, such as falling objects or objects in orbit, expereince no acceleration and no forces. That is in direct contrast to say ferrous objects in a magnetic field, which do experience a force. That's because magnetic fields are a thing - they are a measurable field of force that acts on things, whereas gravity being a mere distortion of spacetime is imperceptible without some external frame of reference*.
To be more specific, suppose you are in the international space station with all the widnows closed. There is no known scientific experiment you can perform to determine whether you are in orbit round the earth, or in orbit round the Sun, or floating in interstellar space. Those three situations are indistinguishable (with the sole exception that if in orbit round a very dense planet, you might be able to detect shearing stresses due to different altitudes within the experimental aparatus. I'm talking about the situation at a point.)
If your space station was made of ferrous metal and in orbit round a magnetic 'planet' that would be trivial to determine.
We talk loosely about the force of gravity and the magnetic force, but actually they are fundamentally different things.
Simon Hibbs
* I considered launching into a discussion that actualy things free-floating or 'falling' in a gravity field (loose terminology, I know) aren't actually moving at all, but maybe I'll save that for another post if necessary.
Tom Kalbfus
Mongoose
Well gravity exerts a force on objects proportional to their mass, just as the electric force exerts a force proportional to their charge. We don't know what charge is either or magnetism, they too might be a different sort of curvature in space time. I don't really know how opposite charges can attract or exert a negative force on each other while same charges repel, the strong and weak nuclear forces, I know even less about. In antiquity people used to talk about 4 basic elements, Earth, Air, Fire, and Water, today we have four basic forces, Gravity, Strong, Weak, and Electromagnetism, and everything in this Universe seems to be made of these four forces.simonh said:
Reynard
Emperor Mongoose
"Except that gravity is not really a force. Free floating objects in a gravitational field, such as falling objects or objects in orbit, expereince no acceleration and no forces."
Where in the world did you find that definition. Every source I found does call it 'gravitational force'. It causes attraction between objects, even light and imparts acceleration as part of attraction. Gravity exists! Go read a book!
Where in the world did you find that definition. Every source I found does call it 'gravitational force'. It causes attraction between objects, even light and imparts acceleration as part of attraction. Gravity exists! Go read a book!
Nathan Brazil
Banded Mongoose
Walker Design Sequence is in Supplement 5-6: The Vehicle Handbook on page 25-26. Have you looked at that yet Tom?
Nathan Brazil said:
Working in reverse, a 6 meter bipedal walker would be a 12 space heavy walker. (Heavy walkers have 1 Hull point per 3 spaces, and are 1.5 meters tall per Hull point.) At 4 Hull and 4 Structure points, that puts it smaller than all other military walkers in the book with the exception of the Chameleon scout walker.
Tom Kalbfus
Mongoose
I've got the core rules so far, maybe I'll get another book this spring.Nathan Brazil said:
Oh jeez.
Looks like the over engineers have once again muddled and drowned the power armor discussion. With the same old arguments: "Ground pressure vs. foot size! It's impractical!" :roll: Also reminds me of the armchairs getting fighting in Vietnam wrong: "Why have infantry when you can have tanks!" Seems like it's coming from people who are either too into desk design. Rather than seeking input from soldiers in the field. Or people who don't understand real warfare. Especially combined arms.
And as Sgt Zimm can tell you:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FNhYJgDdCu4
Okay, so why big armor suits? Well, they're basically big infantry. What can infantry do that tanks & fighters can't? Hold territory. Sure tanks can hold a position, but they're in trouble if the enemy gets in close combat range. Then the tanks would have to be protected by infantry. Big power armors and even giant suits could deal with that. And having manipulators really helps with mech on tank fighting:
http://fc04.deviantart.net/fs14/f/2007/036/7/d/mech_ripping_a_tank_by_SC4V3NG3R.jpg
Oh and about giant armor being too tall? Making them easier to hit? Well, they can lie down :wink: Again like infantry. Dropping prone to reduce silhouette. Then fire back from that position. Also with their anthropomorphic shape, they can manipulate their environment to their advantage. Like building their own foxholes. (Tanks would need a bulldozer to do that for them, or plow attachments) Or hold up collapsing bridges by hand (or bring them down), pick up and moved debris for cover, etc etc.
That's the advantages they'd have over regular tanks. But what about grav tanks? Why would we need them then? Why do we have tanks now when we have attack helicopters? Obviously we still need them for certain missions.
But you say they still have a major advantage, probably right, but what happens when you do this?
Bam!
http://vignette2.wikia.nocookie.net/appleseed/images/f/f7/Landmate_3.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20110224040311
Now you've got flying grav mechs. Sure the tanks might have better weight & power. But I think the suits would still have some tricks.
Looks like the over engineers have once again muddled and drowned the power armor discussion. With the same old arguments: "Ground pressure vs. foot size! It's impractical!" :roll: Also reminds me of the armchairs getting fighting in Vietnam wrong: "Why have infantry when you can have tanks!" Seems like it's coming from people who are either too into desk design. Rather than seeking input from soldiers in the field. Or people who don't understand real warfare. Especially combined arms.
And as Sgt Zimm can tell you:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FNhYJgDdCu4
Okay, so why big armor suits? Well, they're basically big infantry. What can infantry do that tanks & fighters can't? Hold territory. Sure tanks can hold a position, but they're in trouble if the enemy gets in close combat range. Then the tanks would have to be protected by infantry. Big power armors and even giant suits could deal with that. And having manipulators really helps with mech on tank fighting:
http://fc04.deviantart.net/fs14/f/2007/036/7/d/mech_ripping_a_tank_by_SC4V3NG3R.jpg
Oh and about giant armor being too tall? Making them easier to hit? Well, they can lie down :wink: Again like infantry. Dropping prone to reduce silhouette. Then fire back from that position. Also with their anthropomorphic shape, they can manipulate their environment to their advantage. Like building their own foxholes. (Tanks would need a bulldozer to do that for them, or plow attachments) Or hold up collapsing bridges by hand (or bring them down), pick up and moved debris for cover, etc etc.
That's the advantages they'd have over regular tanks. But what about grav tanks? Why would we need them then? Why do we have tanks now when we have attack helicopters? Obviously we still need them for certain missions.
But you say they still have a major advantage, probably right, but what happens when you do this?
Bam!
http://vignette2.wikia.nocookie.net/appleseed/images/f/f7/Landmate_3.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20110224040311
Now you've got flying grav mechs. Sure the tanks might have better weight & power. But I think the suits would still have some tricks.
A
Anonymous
Guest
Tikon2000 said:Also this
http://en.rocketnews24.com/2014/01/27/our-anime-dreams-come-true-as-we-operate-a-robot-suit-from-appleseed/
Your robot appears to be using a Zimmer frame...
:mrgreen:
A
Anonymous
Guest
Combined forces are indeed essential: I can't quite see a 6m tall mecha being used for house clearing to get to the roof to act as overwatch for the other 6m tall mech below even if the roof could support its multi tonne weight...
The mech is simply another vehicle and falls victim to the same pitfalls. Grav vehicles are definitely more mobile but until you own the airspace they're going to be flying NOE and using all available cover and even then infantry with anti vehicle weapons will still be a major thorn in their side.
I could see mecha being of use in extremely rugged terrain in a pre/no grav setting but I don't think they'd be anthropomorphic, two legs are too vulnerable, 6 legs would be more practical.
All you're doing is swapping out one mode of transport for another that's more mechanically complicated and requires a lot of computing power to keep it upright. Now, fair enough, we will see more computers in vehicles as progress marches on but this thread is starting to sound like reinventing the wheel...
The mech is simply another vehicle and falls victim to the same pitfalls. Grav vehicles are definitely more mobile but until you own the airspace they're going to be flying NOE and using all available cover and even then infantry with anti vehicle weapons will still be a major thorn in their side.
I could see mecha being of use in extremely rugged terrain in a pre/no grav setting but I don't think they'd be anthropomorphic, two legs are too vulnerable, 6 legs would be more practical.
All you're doing is swapping out one mode of transport for another that's more mechanically complicated and requires a lot of computing power to keep it upright. Now, fair enough, we will see more computers in vehicles as progress marches on but this thread is starting to sound like reinventing the wheel...
