Sub 100 ton tugs and man G when tugging!

[phavoc]

I just kind of use a rule of thumb. A ship can move double it's rated drive capacity at half the speed. So a 10ton tug that could normally do 1G by itself can move 100 tons at .1G. The rules for scaling up aren't quite the same. I wish it was more clear on whether or not you could easily determine if a drive rated for 1G could actually do 6G in a scenario where the displacement was radically altered. For now I kind of go with the idea that a drive rated for 1G with a lot of displacement still does 1G with that gone (like a tanker).

As far as using a tow cable... sure, in an emergency. But since Traveller uses momentum for movement you'd have to be able to do a 180 with your attached vessel or cargo, and that could get interesting. Not impossible, but not a piece of cake either. Some sort of attachment or docking would be required. I think it would be easy enough to say that most ships primary airlock is structurally reinforced to take special towing adapters. If you want to get more detailed you could create a G rating, and anything over that requires more special equipment, probably on the tug itself.

 

[Reynard]

Found the rule for Tugging in Starports (Page 111). Maximum thrust available is by adding the tonnage of two ships then use Performance by Hull Volume in Core Book page 108 for Maximum thrust by the tugging vessel. Multiple tugging vessels divide the tugged vessel volume to determine each vessels' Thrust. Example: Two Recovery Ships (200 ton, Maneuver drive F, Thrust 6) moving a 1000 ton ship. Each RS will add 500 tons to its 200 tons for 700 tons each which is a max thrust of 1G. Five RSs would be 400 tons each for max 3Gs. The majority of vessels performing tug or tow operations use Magnetic grapples. You could use Small craft as tugs and tows but the High Guard PbHV for small craft shows they aren't very powerful to move larger vessels.

 

[Anonymous]

Thanks for finding the Starport rule, I'm not sure how to apply that to small craft (which I think most tugs would be) but it adds to the KB.

 

[Anonymous]

Some sort of attachment or docking would be required. I think it would be easy enough to say that most ships primary airlock is structurally reinforced to take special towing adapters. If you want to get more detailed you could create a G rating, and anything over that requires more special equipment, probably on the tug itself.

Thinking about the docking clamp in HG, I'm trying to imagine what it would actually be. At first I thought it was basically a thick tube that fixed around an airlock but surely that would need both ships to be reinforced for it to work?

Perhaps some kind of grapple, a claw of some kind? For that to work it would need to be pretty big to grab a ship in the range of each clamp.

Perhaps some kind of tube as I first thought but multiples and smaller points of contact?

How do you picture them?

 

[dragoner]

I think of it like a big mechanical gripper:

Unless it was something like a coupler.

 

[Anonymous]

and every ship would have a standard point at which it could be gripped built into it's design?

 

[dragoner]

No, though it would be a skill check to do the rigging.

 

[Anonymous]

EVA?

Remote ops?

 

[dragoner]

Remote ops would be most logical, but I'd settle for mech.

 

[Anonymous]

While each (auto) pilot holds the ships in position.

Very low-fi!

 

[dragoner]

Well, if you have the computer do everything ...

 

[Anonymous]

Yeah, especially those smart ones with something approaching what we might call intelligence :wink:

 

[dragoner]

The bridge is a comfy place where you can sit. Oh no, don't touch anything.

 

[Anonymous]

Bridges now come fitted with hammocks as standard, there are no joysticks as such but there are really big screens with really nice colourful pictures...

And an excellent entertainment system...

 

[dragoner]

Acceleration hammocks, with VR helmets.

The 13mann robots has pilot and astro robots you can buy at TL13. :mrgreen:

 

[Anonymous]

hahaha

Twisting Traveller since somewhere in the 1980s

A new sig line perhaps?

 

[Condottiere]

Regarding the docking clamp, I doubt it has an integral airlock, certainly not at one-tonne.

 

[Reynard]

For specific towing purposes, the Starport sourcebook makes the Magnetic Clamp the standard.

The Recovery Ship is purpose built to aid disabled ships. I don't think I've seen an actual tug or tow vessels analogous to naval port tugs. It seems the conditions in space don't call for it. Any decent ship pilot should be able to dock their ship at a port like an aircraft pilot at an airport.
The Freight Handler Pod is a short ranged cargo pod pusher, a lift truck in space. It seems Modular ships are more popular for that kind of hauling.

 

[Anonymous]

Regarding the docking clamp, I doubt it has an integral airlock, certainly not at one-tonne.

Yeah, I can see that but I was thinking that there would be a way of people going between ships without EVA. I guess I'm integrating a docking tube when I should be adding them separately.

 

[Anonymous]

For specific towing purposes, the Starport sourcebook makes the Magnetic Clamp the standard.

I don't own the Starport book, looks like I should be getting it. I'm not convinced that starship hulls would be ferrous based and therefore magnetic but OK, I am letting my preference for 2300 seep into Traveller.

The Recovery Ship is purpose built to aid disabled ships. I don't think I've seen an actual tug or tow vessels analogous to naval port tugs. It seems the conditions in space don't call for it. Any decent ship pilot should be able to dock their ship at a port like an aircraft pilot at an airport.
The Freight Handler Pod is a short ranged cargo pod pusher, a lift truck in space. It seems Modular ships are more popular for that kind of hauling.

What's prompted this thread are the players in the game I am GMing are in a ring system and have found a ship that needs salvaging. The ship has lost power. They got to the ship by buying a ride in a belters ship, they don't have a ship of their own.

I started looking for a tug for them to charter and found the 30dT tug on page 94 of HG. It has a 14G manoeuvre drive and uses docking from page 137 of the CRB and has,in it's deck plan, a push brace. I was a little taken aback by that, you're going to perform controlled ramming manoeuvres on another multi million credit starship? Really? Docking as described in the CRB/137 uses what appears to be some kind of tube close to the airlock. From the way this is described it's braced and will support high G manoeuvres. That didn't seem right to me but hey, that's how it reads to me. Makes the addition of a docking clamp from page 45/46 of HG a bit redundant and I was perplexed as to why the tug didn't have one when it's published in the same book (and that there's no detailing the push brace both in terms of how it's used and it's tonnage/cost.)

The ship needing to be recovered is a Seeker class mining ship stripped of it's jump drive. The combined displacement of 130dT is off the table on the small craft drive, hence the question I started with.