Robot largest size?

[Geir]

Only 20 or so battleships from all nations were lost to aircraft during WWII, 14 were lost to enemy ships and 7 scuttled.

So the plurality from aircraft, then, with a strong trend line, I imagine (although Japanese planes not only hit Pearl Harbor but took out Prince of Wales and Repulse three days later, so maybe there is no trend line). Anyway, guided missiles, as Condottiere said. Guns only have so much range. I suppose somebody could have built a guided missile battleship (did anyone?), but since you don't need to support multi-thousand ton turrets, you can get away with splitting onto smaller hulls like cruisers, destroyers, frigates, or whatever.

Though this has nothing to do with robots.

 

[Condottiere]

Kirov is the lead ship of the Kirov class of nuclear-powered guided missile cruisers. Originally built for the Soviet Navy and passed onto the succeeding Russian Navy, she and her three sister ships are the largest and heaviest surface combatant warships (i.e. not an aircraft carrier or amphibious assault ship) built by them. The Soviet classification of the ship-type is "heavy nuclear-powered guided missile cruiser" (Russian: тяжёлый атомный ракетный крейсер), nonetheless Kirov's size and weapons complement have earned her the unofficial designation of a battlecruiser throughout much of the world, as her size and displacement is similar to a typical World War I battleship. The appearance of the Kirov class was a significant factor in the U.S. Navy recommissioning the Iowa class.[1] She was named after a Project 26 cruiser (named after Sergey Kirov, a Bolshevik hero).

 

[Condottiere]

Assuming Terran norm gravity, really big legged robots would likely have some form of anti gravity assistance.

 

[nats]

Wonder if the super-carrier, even with layered defenses, is essentially obsolete against UAVs, hypersonic missiles, and railguns, but I don't want the war that settles that question...

We are certainly seeing the mighty Russian mobilised army being brought to its knees by a few well placed bombs dropped by light drones (as well as a lot of human bravery of course). Once you start seeing intelligent munitions anything is possible I guess. Imagine what the Ukraine could do with robotic intelligent drones for example. Not just being used for surgical strikes, but the use of smart assassin drones carrying a capsule of VX nerve agent .... future robotic drone warfare could be very scary and we are certainly starting to see the beginnings of future warfare in the Ukrainian conflict.

You can guarantee quite a few countries will be working on robotic brains for drones already. I wouldnt be surprised if Elon Musk isn't involved in some way ...

Robotic Drones Can Now Fly, Stop and Perch Just Like Birds

Stanford researchers emulated the feet and legs of a peregrine falcon to enable a flying robot to land and perch on various surfaces, which could have lasting implications for future drone design and use.

science.howstuffworks.com

 

[Geir]

We are certainly seeing the mighty Russian mobilised army being brought to its knees by a few well placed bombs dropped by light drones (as well as a lot of human bravery of course). Once you start seeing intelligent munitions anything is possible I guess. Imagine what the Ukraine could do with robotic intelligent drones for example. Not just being used for surgical strikes, but the use of smart assassin drones carrying a capsule of VX nerve agent .... future robotic drone warfare could be very scary and we are certainly starting to see the beginnings of future warfare in the Ukrainian conflict.

You can guarantee quite a few countries will be working on robotic brains for drones already. I wouldnt be surprised if Elon Musk isn't involved in some way ...

Now that has something to do with robots. Rather than giant robots, the micro and nano robots are where the Robot Handbook comes in, um, handy.

 

[Sigtrygg]

AGM-114R9X - miniaturise, use grav motor, fit robot brain.

Before you know it you have a knife-missile

 

[Arkathan]

Kirov is the lead ship of the Kirov class of nuclear-powered guided missile cruisers. Originally built for the Soviet Navy and passed onto the succeeding Russian Navy, she and her three sister ships are the largest and heaviest surface combatant warships (i.e. not an aircraft carrier or amphibious assault ship) built by them. The Soviet classification of the ship-type is "heavy nuclear-powered guided missile cruiser" (Russian: тяжёлый атомный ракетный крейсер), nonetheless Kirov's size and weapons complement have earned her the unofficial designation of a battlecruiser throughout much of the world, as her size and displacement is similar to a typical World War I battleship. The appearance of the Kirov class was a significant factor in the U.S. Navy recommissioning the Iowa class.[1] She was named after a Project 26 cruiser (named after Sergey Kirov, a Bolshevik hero).

There were plans (that did not survive once the funding estimates came in) to convert the Iowa to half gas turbine and half nuclear. That way it could get underway immediately, and yet not need refueling while deployed.

 

[Condottiere]

One proposal was for a Harrier flight deck.

Speaking of which, breakaway hulls for robots.

 

[Jetrock]

It makes you think well what would that robot on the cover actually be for?

The robot on the cover is an extra-large maintenance drone, intended to repair damage on naval vessels in the cruiser through capital ship size category, principally working outside the ship or in large engineering spaces. Need something big and strong to move replacement hull plating into position, clear debris out of main engineering to let rescue teams get to trapped crew members, or manually reattach a petavolt power coupling to your spinal-mount meson gun? Here's the right tool for a big job.

For smaller repairs, there are human sized drones that can repair things at the same level as crewmembers, and tiny drones that can crawl into spaces too small for crew to fit, inside or outside the ship. My only complaint about maintenance drones as presented is their lack of grav thrust that would allow them to move around freely outside the ship, but the ones that would most benefit from a secondary grav drive (the large and extra large drones) have enough empty spaces for a secondary grav drive that gives them .1G thrust (I couldn't find chemical thrusters in the list of equipment but it may be in there somewhere) to move around the hull without having to be attached to it--or bring them back to the ship should they get detached during maneuvers in mid-repair (that's why you have repair drones, so you don't have crew in vacc suits outside the ship in a quick repair situation where you may have to start moving again to avoid more damage!)

 

[Jetrock]

Assuming Terran norm gravity, really big legged robots would likely have some form of anti gravity assistance.

Which begs the question, why not just make it a grav tank? On the other hand, can grav tanks do THIS?

 

[Condottiere]