Hi folks!
Hydrogen Fuel Leaks:
Now consider: When we talk about fuel leaks in Trav, we are not talking
about leaking gasoline in air. We are talking about leaking Liquid
*HYDROGEN* into *VACCUM*.
What is gonna happen? Well as soon as the pressure in the tank is reduced,
the hydrogen is gonna vaporize. VOOM! At that point you're gonna loose any
hope of keeping your leak contained. It's worse than opening your airlock
to space. Everything is going to escape. No hope of containing it. I
rather doubt that self sealing stuff would work. Certainly not at TL 8 or 9.
The way self sealing tanks work today is when a bullet punches a whole in the
tank, there's a rubber liner which moves molds itself into the hole and plugs
the leak. At liquid hydrogen temps, you're gonna have trouble finding
*ANYTHING* that is sufficiently plyable to function in this manner. And
considering the weapons doing the hole punching, that hole is probably gonna
be a bit on the LARGE size.
As Steve pointed out, the fuel tanks are compartmentalized. Thus when a
fuel hit occurs, we only loose 1% of total fuel. (or 10 tons which ever
is greater) This makes sence to me: Slow leaks do not.
When a leak occurs, it is going to loose fuel all of a sudden, but then it
will stop when that fuel compartment is empty. But *even* if you use 4
minute combat terms, it's gonna be all gone by the end of that turn.
About Armor Maximums:
Yes Steve, they do say max add-on armor is TL*5, but they never define add
on armor. They have never explained weither we are to add that number to
40 or to 4. The table seems to indicate that it is added on to 4, but I
could be mistaken. If it is added on to 4 then the Apollo capsule could
*Almost* make it. (Armor=39)
If we are to say that max armor is TL*5+40 then a TL 3 ironclad could have
Armor 55? That doesn't sound right to me.
Scott 2G Kellogg