John H. Kim Writes:
> Subject: (1902) Minimum Starship Armor
> Here's a possible reason why the minimum ship armor should
> be 40 instead of 8 as Robert Dean came up with after glancing
> at how LDEF did in five years in orbit.
> In the Traveller universe, space is dirtier. There are
> a lot of ships moving around. There is debris from past
> battles. You didn't think all that sand you threw out
> to protect yourself from lasers just disappeared? There's
> bound to be lots of paint, metal, sand, and on and on
> floating around just waiting to punch a hole in your hull.
> True, your chances of running into a grain of sand or chunk
> of metal are still remote, but the probability will be higher
> (esp. if you consider a spacecraft lifetime of 50+ years)
> and the average damage from a collision will be greater due
> to larger particle size. Minimum design standards would
> reflect this.
Well, maybe so. On the other hand, it might well be more economical to
accept occasional damage and pay for repair costs. A possible analogy would
be modern automobile windshields, which could be made of bullet proof glass.
We don't because the odds of getting a stone chip big enough to require
replacing the window are small enough that it isn't worthwhile. It would
become even less worthwhile if you could patch your windshield for small
dings, rather than replace it. As far as this applies to TDR and vehicle rule
redesign, I am more interested in the moment in coming up with reasonable
values than I am in trying to rationalize the odd rules that currently exist.
Rob Dean