Nyrath - I'm wondering if I'm pushing the bounds on how big a practical ship-based laser weapon can be. A fifteen meter diameter mirror, even assuming it's made of multiple independently controllable elements, plus all the plumbing and wiring and gunlaying hardware, is pretty damn big. You could put a modest sized walk-up apartment building inside the sphere.
Cavebear - you're right, there's no hiding this thing. It's too damn big and too damn obvious as a warship by its configuration.
BBZW - the Rule of Cool might have to step aside for the turrets. I'll think of something else.
Lee, Liam, and Will - thanks, I appreciate the feedback.
I've been playing around with different hull textures. This one is close to what I want, but I think it's still a bit too blue. I want something blue-ish, but still a little grey. Also, I despair at these latest renders, because I can really see how much more I still need to do on this model. So much of the surface is still bare, there are still telescopes and microwave dishes and a hangar and a refueling station to do, among the big things.
I don't think 15 meters is too big at all. NASA was working on 8-meter monolithic telescopes that would have dwarfed Hubble before its ARES V ride was (stupidly) cancelled.
Nyrath - I'm wondering if I'm pushing the bounds on how big a practical ship-based laser weapon can be. A fifteen meter diameter mirror, even assuming it's made of multiple independently controllable elements, plus all the plumbing and wiring and gunlaying hardware, is pretty damn big. You could put a modest sized walk-up apartment building inside the sphere.
Well, the size does not bother me, except for the cooling requirements. Remember that the turret is just the aiming portions, the laser weapon proper is buried deep inside the ship. For that matter, the same laser could feed each of the turrets, if you didn't care about redundancy.
After a very long hiatus, I have returned to the Alaska class battleship model. In a divergence from the original text in this post describing it as lacking a spinal mount weapon, I have since added a neutral particle beam spinal mount to the bow. The beam is steerable within about a 15Ao arc off of the keel-axis prior to electron neutralization, allowing it some flexibility as a weapon system useful against maneuvering targets.
She's still a brute- I love her! I admit I liked the fluff about it being an old ship being displaced by 'modern' spinal mount ships, but the new weapon does look great.
Posts
Cavebear - you're right, there's no hiding this thing. It's too damn big and too damn obvious as a warship by its configuration.
BBZW - the Rule of Cool might have to step aside for the turrets. I'll think of something else.
Lee, Liam, and Will - thanks, I appreciate the feedback.
I've been playing around with different hull textures. This one is close to what I want, but I think it's still a bit too blue. I want something blue-ish, but still a little grey. Also, I despair at these latest renders, because I can really see how much more I still need to do on this model. So much of the surface is still bare, there are still telescopes and microwave dishes and a hangar and a refueling station to do, among the big things.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LOsHAA000z0
http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/090121-aresv-space-telescopes.html
I can see Sea Dragon launching parts of this thing.
-Will