Shipping something along the Florian Route

[PsiTraveller]

http://wiki.travellerrpg.com/Florian_Route

Using this description of the Florian route the wiki states:
"The Route runs from Tobia Subsector to Yggdrasil Subsector.
The Route requires fourteen jumps for a Jump-2 freighter, taking on average 140 days. "

This works out to 10 days per jump, so 7 days in space, 3 days to refuel and restock and then jump again.

This would give 3 jumps per month instead of the standard 2 Jumps per month.

My question is about maintenance. The Core book says maintenance should be done each month or 2D is rolled and systems can take hits.
If the journey is taking 140 days and only spending 3 days in system. When or how would you deem maintenance is being done? Can it be done and paid for during Jump?

A subset question is: Suppose a client wants material shipped 6 parsecs. The crew has a J2 ship. The client arranges payment for the shipment and the players promise to deliver the goods. They have 3 Jumps ahead of them. Would you expect them to do Jumps back to back and take 30 days total, or do you have them Jump twice a week so the total delivery time would be 5 weeks?

 

[AnotherDilbert]

My question is about maintenance. The Core book says maintenance should be done each month or 2D is rolled and systems can take hits.
If the journey is taking 140 days and only spending 3 days in system. When or how would you deem maintenance is being done?

This might offer a clue:

This penalty can be removed by performing maintenance on the drive, a procedure that requires Engineer (m-drive) and 1D hours.

Running maintenance does not seem to take much time. You still need time at a yard every year.

Can it be done and paid for during Jump?

Anything that is not in use and accessible from within the hull should workable, e.g. M-Drive. This is what the in-flight Engineers do as regular duty. Paid for? No, supplies (oils, filters, gaskets, or whatever) have to be bought at a starport.

A subset question is: Suppose a client wants material shipped 6 parsecs. The crew has a J2 ship. The client arranges payment for the shipment and the players promise to deliver the goods. They have 3 Jumps ahead of them. Would you expect them to do Jumps back to back and take 30 days total, or do you have them Jump twice a week so the total delivery time would be 5 weeks?

If you want additional cargo or passengers you have to stop at the local starport for a week, otherwise I would expect them to jump as quickly as possible, just stopping for refuelling.

 

[phavoc]

What AnotherDilbert said. :lol:

Most regular maintenance could be done while in jump. Hell, you could even shut down your fusion plant and run on auxiliary power if you needed to because once you are in jump nothing you do is going to affect your tran sit through jumpspace.

The real limitation should be can you actually do what needs to be done without some sort of shipyard equipment to say pull the entire plant or if you needed more time to take it apart. Engine rooms are cramped, but it's still possible to perform basic work in them.

One caveat to that would depend on the shups configuration. If you had drive pods or engines located in external sponsoons, then yes, you would have to wait tI'll you reverted to realspace to gain access to them. But your trusty Free Trader would not have an issue.

 

[PsiTraveller]

The reason I wanted to check is the monthly costs, how are you spending the money and does it represent any tonnage on the ship for supplies that need to be stored, or do you need to buy something each month from a facility.

A Free Trader has a Maintenance cost of 4354 Credits a month in 2nd edition, if it was full the Life support cost would be 20 000 Credits a month, 10 000 Credits for the 10 cabins, and 10 000 for the 10 people on board, plus the 2000 Credits for the lowberths. So there is 26 000 Credits in money going into a ship to keep it running. Spare parts are 100 000 Credits a ton, so 1 ton of Spare Parts could last almost 4 months, if it was deemed that they could be used that way. This also means that some storage space would need to be set aside for the Spare Parts, cutting down on cargo space for paying cargo, or it is assumed there is some space in engineering for some Spare Parts to keep the ship moving.

This might become an issue on ships in the Wilds without access to a Port that they can replenish their supplies, or in a military operation if a ship is out of contact, or on a stealth operation where they cannot get supplied. If a ship is doing the 10 days per Jump cycle, can they get a supply of parts in order to avoid Skimping on maintenance? Clearly they must, otherwise the ships would take longer, but I am trying to decide if it means they are using cargo space for a few tons of spare parts, or are able to send a ship off to the GeDeCo service station to pick up some filters and 20 000 Credits of Life Support supplies.

 

[phavoc]

The reason I wanted to check is the monthly costs, how are you spending the money and does it represent any tonnage on the ship for supplies that need to be stored, or do you need to buy something each month from a facility.

A Free Trader has a Maintenance cost of 4354 Credits a month in 2nd edition, if it was full the Life support cost would be 20 000 Credits a month, 10 000 Credits for the 10 cabins, and 10 000 for the 10 people on board, plus the 2000 Credits for the lowberths. So there is 26 000 Credits in money going into a ship to keep it running. Spare parts are 100 000 Credits a ton, so 1 ton of Spare Parts could last almost 4 months, if it was deemed that they could be used that way. This also means that some storage space would need to be set aside for the Spare Parts, cutting down on cargo space for paying cargo, or it is assumed there is some space in engineering for some Spare Parts to keep the ship moving.

This might become an issue on ships in the Wilds without access to a Port that they can replenish their supplies, or in a military operation if a ship is out of contact, or on a stealth operation where they cannot get supplied. If a ship is doing the 10 days per Jump cycle, can they get a supply of parts in order to avoid Skimping on maintenance? Clearly they must, otherwise the ships would take longer, but I am trying to decide if it means they are using cargo space for a few tons of spare parts, or are able to send a ship off to the GeDeCo service station to pick up some filters and 20 000 Credits of Life Support supplies.

In theory you are purchasing parts that are meant to wear out, replacing lubricants, etc. However for ships that have a usable lifetime of a century it seems like a lot to spend. Parts themselves aren't really recorded anywhere on the ship, so one can assume that you paying a premium for starship-grade WD-40, etc. Other than that the parts you are replacing would be stored somewhere in the engineering spaces. I guess this is were you would have to use the +20% space on the deckplans to displacement. I'm sure there are plenty of cubbyholes holding your spanners and such.

I would only think that actual cargo space would need to be consumed if the ship was travelling a great distance and would be gone for 6 months or so. At that point you'd want to know where the food, spares and other consumables would be stored. Even then, ships designed or intended for long deployments should already have that space set aside for storage.

 

[Tenacious-Techhunter]

In theory, people would track the storage capacity of the Ship’s Locker, and use any remaining space for spare parts, and then resort to Cargo Space as necessary. The rules are insufficiently detailed, so it’s up to the GM to determine the extent to which the Ship’s Locker has room for more spare parts, or is, instead, full.

 

[Condottiere]

Since you're docking at a starport every fortnight, critical parts at most would be a requirement, like life support, maybe jump drive, though since it doesn't operate during transition, it would only matter during misjumps that leave you out in the wilderness.

 

[PsiTraveller]

I am just double checking with the Hivemind. With a 3 day turnaround time in a system to get the 10 day jump cycle I was trying to figure out if the ship was skimming a gas giant and converting fuel on the go, assuming enough processors to create refined fuel in 2 days. (Assuming 1day to get to gas giant and skim and the other days to get to Jump point refining along the way and jumping.)

The other version is heading to a Starport or supply point to buy fuel and supplies and then getting back out to the Jump Point.

 

[phavoc]

I am just double checking with the Hivemind. With a 3 day turnaround time in a system to get the 10 day jump cycle I was trying to figure out if the ship was skimming a gas giant and converting fuel on the go, assuming enough processors to create refined fuel in 2 days. (Assuming 1day to get to gas giant and skim and the other days to get to Jump point refining along the way and jumping.)

The other version is heading to a Starport or supply point to buy fuel and supplies and then getting back out to the Jump Point.

If you were just passing through the system, it would be possible to do so. Otherwise, no, probably not. If I recall the tables correctly, it's about 17hrs for a 1G ship to clear the 100D of a average sized gas giant. Assume 6hrs to skim and you have 40hrs of time expended just getting back out. Your fuel.processors would have to be sized to process your fuel completely in less time than that. Or minimally your jump fuel. How reactors run fine on unprocessed fuel I don't know.

In general arriving in system, flying to the port and the leaving and flying to the nearest gas giant would take longer than 72hrs. It would be cheaper, time wise at least, to buy your unrefined fuel in port.

 

[Condottiere]

Time is money, and building a terminal as close as possible to the point of exit and entry would certainly speed up turnover.

 

[phavoc]

Indeed. You should be seeing busier worlds with orbital warehousing, stations and support infrastructure trailing worlds at about 99 diameters out. Most should be inside the 100D limit for safety's sake. While a ship can't emerge from jumpspace on top of or inside a station, because ships retain their velocity coming out of jump space it's possible they could pose a hazard. Being 1 diameter within the jump bubble means you'd have some reaction time. If it became more of a safety issue you'd start seeing them be closer to the planet.

Now that I mention it, has anyone ever used jump emergence failures like a ship popping out of jump space due to strange circumstances either right on top or say inside an object (a planet would be too massive I think to justify, but say a smaller asteroid, another ship or a small station)? Sort of like a Philadelphia Experiment in space (or that episode of ST:TNG where the Enterprise discovered the phase cloaking tech)?

 

[Condottiere]

Odds are really low, and then you have the bounce effect.

 

[phavoc]

Odds are really low, and then you have the bounce effect.

I was looking specifically at a catastrophic failure and no bounce.

 

[Tenacious-Techhunter]

Now that I mention it, has anyone ever used jump emergence failures like a ship popping out of jump space due to strange circumstances either right on top or say inside an object (a planet would be too massive I think to justify, but say a smaller asteroid, another ship or a small station)? Sort of like a Philadelphia Experiment in space (or that episode of ST:TNG where the Enterprise discovered the phase cloaking tech)?

Physical consistency says you pop out whenver you are within 100 diameters of anything... but with the case of atoms and subatomic particles, that is obviously not true. Clearly, there is some sort of cutoff that prevents smaller objects from meaningfully disturbing the Jump Bubble. Unfortunately, it’s completely undescribed, so we have no idea what sort of failure modes it should have.

What we do know is, canon-wise, anything the size of a ship or greater definitely does pop things out within 100 diameters. So it’s only smaller things you have to worry about. For instance, what if your ship comes out of jump in the middle of a micrometeoroid filed, and the ship’s interior is suddenly filled with what the Marines refer to as “nature’s suppressing fire”?