Text 14040, 87 rader
Skriven 2007-04-26 11:37:06 av Jeffrey Kaplan (403.babylon5)
     Kommentar till en text av rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated
Ärende: Re: Relative ship sizes in the B5 universe (and others)
===============================================================
It is alleged that Vorlonagent claimed:

> >> I'm talking about the station.  If Earth made things that lasted 
> >> extra-long
> >> you'd see it in the maintenance that B5 crews weren't doing.
> > In that case, realize that the B5 station was built on a shoe-string
> > budget.  Lots of quality compromises were made in its construction.
> You see that in the brown and gray sectors.  They're a bit on the unfinished 
> side down there.  But you see maintenance going on everywhere.

We never actually saw any maintenance going on on the Agamemnon because
we never saw the Agamemnon that much.  Absence of evidence is not
evidence of Absence.  And the only times we've seen actual maintenance
going on on the station was when it was plot relevant.

As for things breaking on B5:  "By Any Means Necessary".  Catastrophic
failure happened because of substandard parts used to build the docking
bay control computers, in an attempt to cut costs.

> > The Omegas are warships.  They are, or at least should be, designed
> > with the intention of putting them in harm's way.  To that end, they
> > should be built sturdy and as unbreakable as possible.  Moreso than a
> > space station.
> 
> The omegas had to be.  They were designed during the Earth-Minbari War.

I thought they were designed after, based on the Novas, which were done
during the war.  The Novas have that look of desperation about them,
putting as much firepower as possible on a hull during a war of
survival.
 
> But that's not my point.  MY point is that Omegas don't get shot up on a 
> regular basis.

Neither does B5.  But getting shot at is part of the design criteria
for the Omegas, not so much B5.
 
> > Does the Nimitz need to carry air?  No, it never leaves the atmosphere.
> > Does the Nimitz need to carry water?  No, it runs seawater through a
> > desalination plant.  The Nimitz never roams alone, it's the centerpiece
> > of a battlegroup that travels and fights together, whereas an Omega on
> > patrol is usually alone.
> 
> The Nimiz better have water tankage and a fair amount.  I'd be very 
> surprised if it sucked seawater up on an as-needed basis. The holding 
> tankage the Nimitz has ought to compare well on a gallons-per-crewman basis 
> as what an Omega needs allowing for technology (recaliming wastewater is 
> harder but the Omega has better tech to do it with matching desalinazation 
> being easier but the Nimitz' tech is more primitive).  That means an Omega 
> needs a little over 1/6 the tankage as compared to a Nimitz-class carrier. 
> Air is a separate issue, I grant you, and one that will grow in proportion 
> to the ship's volume.  But the Nimitz carries about 5-6 times the fighters 
> an Omega does and fuel tankage and munitions stores take up a lot of space 
> and weight that an Omega doesn't need.

The EA ships still get their motive force by rockets.  Maybe nuclear or
ion powered instead of a chemical reaction like we have now in reality,
but they still need a reaction mass to eject out the engine nozzles.
And that means some kind of actual fuel that needs to be stored and
replaced.

The weapons, too.  PPGs require some physical matter (helium iirc), to
super-heat into plasma.  The guns on a Starfury are basically huge
PPGs.  And Starfuries carry missiles too.  As do the Omegas and other
capital ships.  And we've seen the station defense grid fire projectile
weapons as well.  All of these have ammo of one type or another that
needs to be stocked, stored and replaced.
 
> >> Nova-class dreadnought.
> > Is also smaller than an Omega.
> No so it makes a difference.  The Nova is 1470 meters long to the Omega's 
> 1580.

There's more to the size of a ship than just it's length.  The Nova has
a smaller cross-section.
 
-- 
Jeffrey Kaplan                                         www.gordol.org
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