Despite a generally positive response, there are two questions that
keep coming up about the Cramped Engine Spaces. One is that the
extra crew would have less space to work. Two is that some people
don't think that 50% work space is an accurate figure.
Responding to the first problem, I would argue that in most
vessels, a crew will be working from 10 to 12 hours on the drives,
at most, except during emergencies. The rest of the time, they're
being left alone. This is standard practice today with ships at sea;
you do routine maintenance during one "shift" with some overflow,
but leave it alone the rest of the time.
Since there would be less space to work, with the same number
of people doing say "replacing lateral heat exchanger" the job will take
say one and a half times as long. Which means that the two assistant
engineers will have two hours less to be calibrating the fuel feed
heater injectors, so you need someone else to handle that.
Not everyone is crawling over the physical drive at the same time.
You're just going to be increasing the length of time that the jobs
involving doing so take, thus requiring more people to handle the
other jobs.
As for the second... 8-) Look at any of the published deck
plans. Azhanti High Lightnings have more than 50% empty or access
space in their drive rooms. So do most (but not all) of the smaller
ships that have appeared in deck plan form.
Real naval vessels today have between 50% and 80% of their
drive spaces empty for maintenance and access purposes. I think that
using the 50% figure is safe.
- -george william herbert
[email removed]