Date: Tue, 4 Feb 1992 9:14:15 -0600 (CST)
From: [email removed] (Brandon Cope)
Subject: (3649) armor volume
Brandon Cope writes:
>The subject of armor volume got me thinking a little bit (a dangerous
>thing...). I worked out the ship and armor volume of three different ships,
>with the armor staying constant in thickness (300mm of WHATEVER). However,
>to simplify things, I assumed that the ships were box-like, and I did not
>subtract overlapping volumes (I wasn't in the mood for the math involved,
>and it just means that the armor is listed as taking more space than it really
>does; as you will see, this DOES NOT hurt the conclusion).
>
>ship dimensions hull volume armor volume armor % of hull
>
> 3m x 12m x 20m 720 m^3 ~100 m^3 14%
> 6m x 24m x 40m 5760 m^3 ~400 m^3 7%
>12m x 48m x 80m 46,080 m^3 ~1600 m^3 3.5%
>As you can see, if the ship's protection is held steady, the effect on
>available volume IS NOT CONSTANT! Thus, the system in Book 5: High Guard
>is in error. I also found out that even if the hull volume is held
>constant, but the actual dimensions are changed, the armor volume DOES
>change. Thus, things get VERY complicated, since the dimensions of the ship
>are what determines armor volume, not just straight hull volume.
Nice idea, but you had to think of the structural support of your armor. While
the ship is small, you only need small amounts of strutural support, because
the hull is stable. If the hull gets bigger, the armor is thick as before, but
its stability is weaker. So you had to support the hull.
These supports will fill the gap between High Guard and your calculation.
Juergen
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Juergen Kirsch
Institut fuer Informatik, Universitaet Bonn
Germany
[email removed]