(...) when in atmospheric flight the slightly angled thrusters on the leading edge of the wing could provide the same sort of y axis control as the alerons of a flying wing.
You mean you wanted to use control thrusters in an atmosphere? In space control thrusters just have to get motion going, but in an atmostphere they would have to burn as long as you wanted a yaw effect. You'd be spending more fuel than you'd have to. I imagine you are not depicting this world like Star Trek where fuel seems to never run low. Sure, you could probably even avoid having any control surfaces and use thrusters... at a huge loss of fuel. Why reinvent the wheel?... err... control surface. Of course, few sci-fi designs ("proefessional" or hobbyist) take real world function 100% into consideration. Also, how often it would enter an atmosphere would determine how important atmospheric design is.
Whew Im almost tired from reading all that, lol.
Off to redesign the engines. Ill put the script down for a day.
Sorry. In forums, I tend to post infrequently, but make large posts when I do. Due to the latency in forum posts and emails, I try to anticipate possible comments and questions of the people reading it.
And Doc its good to have you around agian even if it is electronically.
Heh. Its been a long time since someone called me Doc. Good to talk to you again as well. Say, didn't we have lengthy disputes about form-vs-function and efficiency years ago?
@kborak: Well, since a month and a half I've been working at a new job, some high-level IT stuff and it's draining becaus eit's quite intense and high-priority stuff. Basically, when coming home from work I feel like I've been attacked by a brain bug and there's not much left of desire and energy to sit too long behind my PC at home sadly...
@meph: lol I am going through the same thing right now, however Im only doing tech support agian. The only thing I can seem to continue to do at any rates of speed is writing the damn story, but today I am actualy working on the new engines! so I may have an update today or tomorrow.
@DOC: The new engine is vectored, and thanks for the great conversation on engine designs the other night. It helped alot.
ok just a test of the new Yukhov 25-a Vectored thrust plasma jet, adaptive engines. I will put up more after the engine textures are a little more done. All feed back welcome.
Ok this feels like a long time coming, the (newly named) Starscream and the Mig 129 next to each other. I got a copy of the starscream from star_creations to try my hand at the texture. Thank you star! Here is what I have come up with so far, with a minor update on the Mig's texture as well.
The scale is slightly off between the two, but this is only to see them next to each other for the first time.
@meph: O have never used anti-ailising what does it do exactly?
Looks pretty good, I'm guessing that the opening in the bow is the hanger deck/launch bay area. If so maybe try to jut out the bottom part of it (sort of like the flight pods from BSG.
This would allow the pilots a greater choice of angle of attack for when they need to land, rather than having to fly straight into the opening.
This could also make your carrier look more aggressive, as we all know the Soviets are
Hmmm, avoid flight pods at all costs. As it's an original design in an original universe, try to avoid any cliche layouts that might be immediately linked to other current and popular franchises.
As for layout, keep a couple of things in mind and the shap will fall into place itself.
-How are the fighters launched? Launch tubes, catapults on the deck, catapults on the outer hull with airlock/lifts to bring them to the surface (in space, think 3D) Is the launching mechanism mechanical, electrical, magnetic, force-field driven?
-How are the fighters recovered? Free landing on skids? VTOL or STOL? Arresting mechanism? In case fo a bad landing, can they 'touch & go' or will they smack in to the fighters standing ready to launch? Once recovered, how can they be prepped and moved to the launch position?
-How do the fighters make the transition from atmosphere to vacuum? Star-Wars-like field? Airlock? BSG vagueness?
-How can the flight deck be defended against attack? Forcefield or shield, giant blast doors, segmented 'garage-doors' or nothing and damn the stray missile?
-Is this carrier atmo-capable? If so, you could take some design elements into account to keep it plausible. If it's a true space-born vessel you don't need to take some basic aerodynamics into account etc etc.
In general, the shape is looking pretty good and solid. A way to make it easier is to extend the hull both aft and bow a bit further than the actual hull opening, so that you create a sort of landing pad or runway that the pilots can use as visual reference for theur approach. A bit like the Tiger's Claw from Wing Commander or even just current day frigates and destroyers where you have a small flight deck sticking out of the helicopter hangar.
Those last two Gliese renders are looking mighty fine by the way, you're improving yourself with every render you make mate :thumb:
@Keyes: Good Idea on bringing the bottom out. I am going to incorperate that. TY!:thumb:
@Meph: I was thinking, maybe the magnetic tracks on the decking for moving the birds around, with a back up system on the birds themselves. For landing them I put an opening in the hull towards the rear on the port side so that they will land like on a modern carrier, at an angle. The trap system needs more thought! And that may mean giving the mig wheels after all. Im just not sure yet. I know your suggestion is go with the whels. I will post a more updated prototype for the carrier tomorrow.
@dove Im using 3dsmax. And thanks for the compliment.
Still slowly working the textures on the mig, and the thought of how the ships are going to be recovered has prompted a little remodling of the landing gear on it. So in the mean time a little more work on the carrier.
I hope to have an update on the mig textures soon!
but here is the redesign on the carrier at this point.
There seems to be an expectation in sci-fi that ships must land into an opening in the front or back of a ship - personally, as long as you have artificial gravity in your universe, I see no reason why you could not bring your fighters down onto the top deck of the carrier just like a sea-going one, surely the artificial gravity could have some degree of force up to 5-10m above the deck surface? (I personnally would not feel comfortable walking around if the artificial gravity only acted on my feet, and my head was in free-fall - projectile vomit for sure!). widen your top deck a little and narrow your bridge and have runways down either side perhaps? with a raised housing down the center that the fighters can turn into and ride elevators down into the lower hull (the elevators themselves can be airlocks, removing the worry about feilds, shutters etc to close off the air across the hanger opening), th weapons can mount on this center structure also. Perhaps have launch tubes down the sides or lower hull. you would not need an angled deck like a real carrier because there is no requirment to take off "into the wind" so to speak.
With artificial gravity, there is also no reason why only one direction must be up - just look at the flight pods on the pegesus in BSG! It would be possible to have a runway upside-down down the centerline of the belly also.
Ah, sorry, getting verbal diarrhea again - at the end of the day it's *your* design! But don't feel it needs to confirm to the famous movie or TV show design rules - it only needs to fit your concieved universe. Go wild!
sorry I've been missing the thread for a while keep getting sent to locations with patchy comms (I'm on a satellite connection with slower than dial-up right now!), the Mig looks fantastic by the way!
Good job on the design mate. :thumb:
As Monkey Boy said, don't hold back on the design, although I do like the amphibious landing ship-like approach to the back hangar.
@Monkey: Your dead right! Im going to consider alot of what you said and hit the drawing board agian on the carrier.
@Meph: I am keeping the back hanger thingy in any redesign, I like the idea of being able to dock larger ships for any reason that may be needed.
And in the middle of all this other stuff I have done a little more work to the planet the story is named after. The base of the textures was made using Lunar cell, and then of course I have added my own artistic touches. Lunar cell is a good way to start a planet texture, but it doesnt do a good job on the details. Things like, shallow parts of water or the detail of mountainous areas. This is only a test I have been adding detail to the water to start.
Ok monkey I took your thoughts to heart. Here is mark-4 of the Soviet carrier. And I think I like this idea. I have so many ideas of how this setup can add to the telling of my story. Thanks for reminding me to be creative.
Wow, I get a serious sense of the scale of the thing here!
I thought one runway per side, and having the planes in your picture turn left to enter doors in the side of the central structure, but yours looks really cool, don't listen to me!
The runways disappearing into the openings looks very like the concordia from wing commander, only reversed, good stuff.
The aft dock, how far in does that thing go? Its gonna eat alot into your available internal volume, will it close off with doors?
I take it the dark squares I can just see in the side bow are launch tubes?
But one main thing puzzles me.......Engines? Where will they go, will they be out board pods on the aft sides like BSG?
IMHO, too, I think it looks a little too terrestrial right now [Edit: meaning that if looks like a boat - kinda like a luxury cruiser in profile], (sorry!) I think something needs to be done to the aft dock to change the profile...
as the bow sweeps up, maybe sweep the aft down, so lower the roof of the dock a little and taper the aft upper deck downwards gently?
Maybe not, as, if you are adding engines, they will change the geometry of the aft section anyway (lol, sorry again, don't let me highjack the damn thing!)
And while I'm being pain in the neck......you have the hanger doors offset from the runways, so why not put little ski-jumps on the ends of the runways between the doors to aide in 'overshoot landing'?
monkey your great for ideas, and I will give answers to your questions most likely in the mornin lol. I have to get to bed. But on one thing, It is meant to resemble a boat. It was the fist design "theme" if you will that I came up with. I think its because I was in the USN myself, and I always looked at space fleets as more of a naval type deal.
I always had a hard time swallowing the Air force being the ones to fly Starships; IE Stargate. That was my only beef with that show by the way.
But anyway like I said more talk tomorrow. I thought i would put up a wireframe for fun to show off the internal volume a bit!
ha ha, that's cool, if you want a sea ship style, you certainly do, and inspite of what my comments might suggest, I think it looks great.
I couldn't agree more on the airforce part, I liked the old lumbering, less manouverable stye of capital ship (the newer Star Trek, with it's seemingly hyper-manuverable starships just don't work as well with me) The way BSG did it's slow turn into the nebula in the pilot for BSG, or the way the Roger Young backs out of the station in Starship troopers, or the slow turn and roll done by the Nostromo in its planet-fall in Alien - that's the way a large starship should move in my opinion! It should be "Space Navy" not "Space(air)-Force"
the mig looks damn sweet. I love the new paintjob, if anything I'd lower the bump a tiny bit and it would be perfect.
About the carrier, I haven't read your story yet, but it makes me think that it would be able to enter atmosphere and land on water. That would justify the shape. I have to say though I know that is likely the way it would look like, but it seems that something major in the design is really missing, could be because of the engines. But right now it looks very boxy and simplistic compared to your mig which is amazingly well done.
Also I don't know if you know this, but just in case for future reference, for much cooler looking wireframes, just check the "force wireframe" option in the rendered menu and render, it produces much better looking result than screencraps and only takes a second.
I must say your doing a great job, but i also agree, maybe it would be a cool thing to also give this baby and most ships of the fleet (for both sides) have the ability to land on Water, Land and Space....
Cool progress mate. One suggestion for the landing strips. Perhaps have one landing runway more off to the side without a hangar in it's way so in case the landing spacecraft doesn't have to crash into a hangar but can just take off again to have another go
Thanks for All the ideas and the compliments. You guys rock! I think that I am going to try the "ramp" idea on for size first. Im not to sure about landing, at least not this carrier due to its size, on any planet. Taking off agian seems alot problimatic, at least as far as the rules to my verse are going to go. The ship tech in the story is going to evolve however to a gravity drive system, maybe then we will see the larger ships making planet fall. But that tech leap isnt for a while in the story. However I do like the idea of capitol ships being able to land. So I think if its under 600 meters planet fall could be possible at the start of the story. I will have to think more on that part, but I know, big ships in my verse, but the BIG power is going to be in the smaller ships.
Just like monkey I think that the large ships should be laborious in there movements. For as much as I love Trek, I could never quite buy that a ships as large as a Galaxy class could move that way. Although since I have read alot, and I do mean alot, on actual space flight mechanics, I know that the fighters in my story are bogus themselves. Thank goodness for scifi.
To answer your question monkey about engine placement, they are going to be where the cutout on the keel is on the aft section. The big bays in the back is 1000 feet long, so thats around 300 meters i think. And yes I was planning on having a big honking door on it.
Posts
Sorry. In forums, I tend to post infrequently, but make large posts when I do. Due to the latency in forum posts and emails, I try to anticipate possible comments and questions of the people reading it.
Heh. Its been a long time since someone called me Doc.
@DOC: The new engine is vectored, and thanks for the great conversation on engine designs the other night. It helped alot.
Oh, and some Anti-Aliasing would be good too
The scale is slightly off between the two, but this is only to see them next to each other for the first time.
@meph: O have never used anti-ailising what does it do exactly?
This would allow the pilots a greater choice of angle of attack for when they need to land, rather than having to fly straight into the opening.
This could also make your carrier look more aggressive, as we all know the Soviets are
As for layout, keep a couple of things in mind and the shap will fall into place itself.
-How are the fighters launched? Launch tubes, catapults on the deck, catapults on the outer hull with airlock/lifts to bring them to the surface (in space, think 3D) Is the launching mechanism mechanical, electrical, magnetic, force-field driven?
-How are the fighters recovered? Free landing on skids? VTOL or STOL? Arresting mechanism? In case fo a bad landing, can they 'touch & go' or will they smack in to the fighters standing ready to launch? Once recovered, how can they be prepped and moved to the launch position?
-How do the fighters make the transition from atmosphere to vacuum? Star-Wars-like field? Airlock? BSG vagueness?
-How can the flight deck be defended against attack? Forcefield or shield, giant blast doors, segmented 'garage-doors' or nothing and damn the stray missile?
-Is this carrier atmo-capable? If so, you could take some design elements into account to keep it plausible. If it's a true space-born vessel you don't need to take some basic aerodynamics into account etc etc.
In general, the shape is looking pretty good and solid. A way to make it easier is to extend the hull both aft and bow a bit further than the actual hull opening, so that you create a sort of landing pad or runway that the pilots can use as visual reference for theur approach. A bit like the Tiger's Claw from Wing Commander or even just current day frigates and destroyers where you have a small flight deck sticking out of the helicopter hangar.
Those last two Gliese renders are looking mighty fine by the way, you're improving yourself with every render you make mate :thumb:
@Meph: I was thinking, maybe the magnetic tracks on the decking for moving the birds around, with a back up system on the birds themselves. For landing them I put an opening in the hull towards the rear on the port side so that they will land like on a modern carrier, at an angle. The trap system needs more thought! And that may mean giving the mig wheels after all. Im just not sure yet. I know your suggestion is go with the whels. I will post a more updated prototype for the carrier tomorrow.
Night for now Gents!
that kind of thing looks like it belongs to some military magazine or web page images. very very good.
what programm did you use this again? i forget, but i knew someone who used to come up with something similar:thumb::thumb:
Still slowly working the textures on the mig, and the thought of how the ships are going to be recovered has prompted a little remodling of the landing gear on it. So in the mean time a little more work on the carrier.
I hope to have an update on the mig textures soon!
but here is the redesign on the carrier at this point.
With artificial gravity, there is also no reason why only one direction must be up - just look at the flight pods on the pegesus in BSG! It would be possible to have a runway upside-down down the centerline of the belly also.
Ah, sorry, getting verbal diarrhea again - at the end of the day it's *your* design! But don't feel it needs to confirm to the famous movie or TV show design rules - it only needs to fit your concieved universe. Go wild!
sorry I've been missing the thread for a while keep getting sent to locations with patchy comms (I'm on a satellite connection with slower than dial-up right now!), the Mig looks fantastic by the way!
As Monkey Boy said, don't hold back on the design, although I do like the amphibious landing ship-like approach to the back hangar.
@Meph: I am keeping the back hanger thingy in any redesign, I like the idea of being able to dock larger ships for any reason that may be needed.
And in the middle of all this other stuff I have done a little more work to the planet the story is named after. The base of the textures was made using Lunar cell, and then of course I have added my own artistic touches. Lunar cell is a good way to start a planet texture, but it doesnt do a good job on the details. Things like, shallow parts of water or the detail of mountainous areas. This is only a test I have been adding detail to the water to start.
I thought one runway per side, and having the planes in your picture turn left to enter doors in the side of the central structure, but yours looks really cool, don't listen to me!
The runways disappearing into the openings looks very like the concordia from wing commander, only reversed, good stuff.
The aft dock, how far in does that thing go? Its gonna eat alot into your available internal volume, will it close off with doors?
I take it the dark squares I can just see in the side bow are launch tubes?
But one main thing puzzles me.......Engines? Where will they go, will they be out board pods on the aft sides like BSG?
IMHO, too, I think it looks a little too terrestrial right now [Edit: meaning that if looks like a boat - kinda like a luxury cruiser in profile], (sorry!) I think something needs to be done to the aft dock to change the profile...
as the bow sweeps up, maybe sweep the aft down, so lower the roof of the dock a little and taper the aft upper deck downwards gently?
Maybe not, as, if you are adding engines, they will change the geometry of the aft section anyway (lol, sorry again, don't let me highjack the damn thing!)
I always had a hard time swallowing the Air force being the ones to fly Starships; IE Stargate. That was my only beef with that show by the way.
But anyway like I said more talk tomorrow. I thought i would put up a wireframe for fun to show off the internal volume a bit!
I couldn't agree more on the airforce part, I liked the old lumbering, less manouverable stye of capital ship (the newer Star Trek, with it's seemingly hyper-manuverable starships just don't work as well with me) The way BSG did it's slow turn into the nebula in the pilot for BSG, or the way the Roger Young backs out of the station in Starship troopers, or the slow turn and roll done by the Nostromo in its planet-fall in Alien - that's the way a large starship should move in my opinion! It should be "Space Navy" not "Space(air)-Force"
Cheers, on the wire-frame!
About the carrier, I haven't read your story yet, but it makes me think that it would be able to enter atmosphere and land on water. That would justify the shape. I have to say though I know that is likely the way it would look like, but it seems that something major in the design is really missing, could be because of the engines. But right now it looks very boxy and simplistic compared to your mig which is amazingly well done.
Also I don't know if you know this, but just in case for future reference, for much cooler looking wireframes, just check the "force wireframe" option in the rendered menu and render, it produces much better looking result than screencraps and only takes a second.
I must say your doing a great job, but i also agree, maybe it would be a cool thing to also give this baby and most ships of the fleet (for both sides) have the ability to land on Water, Land and Space....
Just an idea.
Just like monkey I think that the large ships should be laborious in there movements. For as much as I love Trek, I could never quite buy that a ships as large as a Galaxy class could move that way. Although since I have read alot, and I do mean alot, on actual space flight mechanics, I know that the fighters in my story are bogus themselves. Thank goodness for scifi.
To answer your question monkey about engine placement, they are going to be where the cutout on the keel is on the aft section. The big bays in the back is 1000 feet long, so thats around 300 meters i think. And yes I was planning on having a big honking door on it.
Oh well more of this later.