You'll be choosing which IFV design to bring to the competition in the next vote, so if someone wanted to track down the various awesome pitches, that would be helpful
You'll be choosing which IFV design to bring to the competition in the next vote, so if someone wanted to track down the various awesome pitches, that would be helpful
The main turret/gun changes depending on who's inside! What? Too fictional? Aww. Alright. Alright! I get it. Be serious. Sheesh. Some people...
1.)
*Seems like a solid design. I don't suggest flying with this one though.
2.)
*Reminds me of the Mako a little. Just shorten/make the main gun smaller and there you go.
3.)
*Need to go over Mountains? Look no further!
An Infantry Fighting Vehicle (IFV) has two main roles.
-To fight against mobile infantry, whether they surpress and kill with the secondary/coaxial or flushing out targets from cover with the main gun.
-To transport troops/infantry to the front lines.
--When equipped with a proper main gun, they can also serve as anti-armor. Mostly against light armor or stupid low-flying aircraft.
--An IFV main advantage is mobility. Against an MBT they can win, as long as they have a cannon strong enough to punch through the MBT's armor and if they can stay out of the main gun arc.
Personally, if I had to go with one I will go with a mix of number (2) and (3). Using (3)'s main body design, mix (2) and (3) wheels [the wheels don't bulge out too much] and number (2)'s main turret (placed slightly behind the cockpit). Maybe add a secondary MG turret at the top body near the rear with the IFV having doors at the side and a larger entrance ramp as the rear.
Ok, first stab at making the stealth system proposal.
First of all, blue and red shift. This is how it's described in the mass effect wiki, and I think the description was lifted directly from the codex:
Light travels slower through glass than it does through open air; light also moves slower in conventional space than it does in a high-speed mass effect field. This causes refraction: any light entering a mass effect field will change in angle and be separated into a spectrum. Objects outside the affected ship will appear refracted. The greater the difference between the objective (exterior) and subjective (interior) speeds of light, the greater the refraction.
As the subjective speed of light is raised within the field, objects outside will appear to redshift, eventually becoming visible only to radio telescope antennas. High-energy electromagnetic sources normally hidden to the eye become visible on the spectrum. As the speed of light continues to rise, x-ray, gamma ray, and eventfully cosmic ray sources become visible. Stars will be replaced by pulsars, the accretion discs of black holes, quasars, and gamma ray bursts.
To an outside observer, a ship within a mass effect drive envelope appears to have blue-shifted. If within a field that allows travel at twice the speed of light, any radiation it emits has twice the energy as normal. If the ship is in a field of about 200 times lightspeed, it radiates visible light as x-rays and gamma rays, and the infrared heat from the hull is blue-shifted up into the visible spectrum or higher.
The refractive index can be seen as the factor by which the speed and the wavelength of the radiation are reduced with respect to their vacuum values: the speed of light in a medium is
, and similarly the wavelength in that medium is
, where
is the wavelength of that light in vacuum. This implies that vacuum has a refractive index of 1, and that the frequency (
) of the wave is not affected by the refractive index.
Now, this might or might not be applicable here, because we aren't simply dealing with changes in refractive index, but with actual changes in the speed of light and everything that implies (Basically: throw out (most of) our current understanding of physics and start from scratch). Changes in frequency imply that the photon changes its energy on the border of the field (as it leaves / enters the field). Changes of wavelength imply that the photon generated inside the field has different energy to start with. The second option looks a little bit more plausible. Still, I'll touch upon both.
According to Planck's law, the spectrum of a black body radiation (for the moment, let's assume that we have a perfectly black hull) can be described as:
where h is Planck's constant, f is the frequency, c is the speed of light, kb is Boltzmann's constant, T is temperature. The first form is useful if we assume frequency (and energy) shift, the second form is useful if we assume wavelength shift, but conversant energy.
Now, trying to (very clumsily) generalize it on the case of variable c, we might get
where sc is the ratio of the speed of light within the mass effect field to the speed of light without mass effect field. This is, however, the spectrum from the perspective of the observer inside the mass effect field (i.e. here f and L are the frequency and wavelength of light as perceived by the observer inside the field). For the observer outside of mass effect field, we'll have
Since we know that the shape of the spectrum of black body radiation only depends on the temperature of the body, this proves that the first situation, i.e. change in frequency is what happens. This is an important conclusion.
Now, moving towards the practical application. Cosmic microwave background radiation has a spectrum of a perfect black body at a temperature of 2.72 K. The idea is to hide the ship by varying sc in such a way that the spectrum of the ship's radiation will approach the spectrum of the background radiation as much as possible. We have a function of delta_I(f,sc,T_hull)=abs(I_sc_out_f(f,sc,T_Hull)-I_norm_f(f,T_background)), where T_Hull is the temperature of the ship's hull (we don't care about the insides since it's the hull's radiation that we observe) and T_background is 2.72 K the background temperature of the universe.
In principle, to solve this, we need to do a very big task. We need to integrate the function
from zero to infinity, then find its minimum by sc, and from there determine how close we get to a perfect match and whether it's good enough. This task can't be done analytically. It requires numerical solution. I'll be honest, I'm too lazy to do it. So, let's just try to match the total powers emitted.
The total radiated power P would be:
P_norm=sigma*T^4
P_out_f=(1/sc)^5*sigma*(sc*T)^4=sigma*T^4/sc
Interestingly enough it appears that the total radiated power drops with increase of mass effect field, despite the shift of the spectrum into higher frequencies. Equating these two we'll arrive to an equation of
T_background^4=T_Hull^4/sc
sc=(T_hull/T_background)^4={T_hull=300K = room temperature under the zero-dimensional model of a homogeneously hot ship}=1.41*10^8;
Let's calculate whether this is anywhere near possible or not. An average cruising speed is V_FTL=12 lightyears per day. We know that the relativistic effects are negligible when traveling in FTL, so we can say that V_ftl/(c*sc_ftl)<<1, from here we obtain sc_ftl>>4380. Five orders of magnitude. I am not confident at calling this possible at all and would refer to @Esbilon on how high he thinks sc might go.
TL;DR: Some (possibly very wrong) physics, and conclusion that stealth is hard in space. Even with eezo.
Because that's the single least likely way to spot something in open space. It's just not something they worried about vs, for example, thermal or radar. Any energy emissions could get you spotted, it's just that the mark 1 eyeball is the worst tool for the job.
Also it's FTL drive was still visible, because the mass effect fields upshift the ships radiation to bands that the stealth system cannot absorb, so everyone should be able to pick the Normandy as she jumps in and out.
The IES stealth system has a few limitations: The system doesn't work during FTL flight because this blue-shifts the Normandy's emissions beyond the sinks' ability to store, and even while out of FTL, any visual scan (i.e. looking out of a window) will reveal her. However, this is rare since most ships rely on scanners rather than visual contact and spotting another ship in space is difficult. The Normandy can go to 'silent running' for around 2-3 hours, or drift passively through a system for days before having to vent and give away her position. The stored heat must eventually be radiated, or it will build up to levels capable of cooking the crew alive.
Considering the stealth only lasts for 2-3 hours, I'm honestly surprised no-one has picked up on the Normandy because that would mean the Normandy would have to jump in at less than 1 Light - hour away (due to not being able to travel at near light speed without time dilation), the moment the light/radiation from the FTL event hits the enemy sensors, they should be able to roughly guess where the Normandy is, consdiering that starships should follow a few rules in regards to fuel expeniture and orbital mathematics.
Also, wouldn't LIDAR still work even if the Normandy doesn't emit heat because doesn't it work by picking up the refracted laser as it bounces back?
Description:
The Paragon Industries' Tiger is a complete paradigm shift compared foreign Infantry Fighting Vehicles and even it's competitors here today. While it's Arc Reactors provide it with the incredible power, seventy five gigawatts to be exact, expected from Paragon Industries that's not it's most impressive feature. No. Today I have three, never before seen, technologies to present. Two of which are just as revolutionary as the Arc Reactor itself.
MM-01 Sagitta
First up is the MM-01 Sagitta. While many of you saw how our Pilum changed the face of modern day anti-tank combat the Sagitta aims to do the same on for infantry combat. The Sagitta is rather small by missile standards, small enough to fit in my hand as you can see, but don't let it's size fool you. A single Sagitta can blow right past a Batarian's kinetic barriers and reduce his head to chunky salsa.
And while it's damage is quite impressive what really makes the Sagitta a stand out is that thanks to it's advanced VI and propulsive system it's capable of navigating to it's target while avoiding obstacles such as physical barriers or even hostages, which thanks to the Sagitta's precision design would only have to a nasty stain to worry about.
While infantry weapons, including pistols, capable of firing it will be coming out later this year the Tiger houses six VLS tubes capable of delivering these deadly micro-missiles to enemy heads at a range of two kilometers.
Autonomous Control
If you thought the Sagitta was impressive then this will blow you away. For you see all the Tiger's demonstration footage? It's all been done autonomously. And I'm not talking about something like Hahne-Kedar's mechs, which while good for their job, are too simple for military purposes. The Tiger is ninety percent as capable without crew as it is with.
This means that rather then leaving the Tiger inoperative it is fully capable of providing infantry assistance even when unmanned as well as been deployed on missions judged too dangerous to risk actual human lives.
RT-01-300E Repulsor
And I've saved the best for last!
//Points to the Red light in the sky//*
//Everyone watches at the red light grows closer. Only for the light to fade into a glowing yellow rocketing down. It impacts the testing area and kicks up a massive cloud of dust//
Presenting the RT-01-300E
//Dust cloud clears to reveal an unscratched Tiger//
Repulsor!
Yes. You saw right. The Repulsor is a completely revolutionary engine system which allows the Tiger to not only perform orbital drops as you just saw but enter orbit under her own power.
But that's only a fraction of how amazing this technology is. After all the Legionary could theoretically do the same with a heat shroud for re-entry. What makes this a truly stand out engine is that it is absolute,y one hundred percent, propellent-less.
Yes, not a single drop of propellent is required. The Repulsor can thrust away at full power for as long as it's got sufficient power, and with the Tiger's Arc Reactors that's a very long time.
RT-01-100C Repulsor
But that's only half of Repuslors amazing potential. For the other half I'd like to introduce you to the RT-01-100C. Also known as one of the Tiger's interchangeable main guns. You see I've taken the Kzinti lesson to heart and the Repulsor is just as deadly a weapon as it is an excellent engine.
//The Tiger's main gun swivels to point at a target and unleashes a golden beam which slices through the target like a hot knife through butter//
Capable of devastating pulses in addition to the sustained beam you just witnessed there really isn't anything on land, sea, or air that can match the Repulsor's raw destructive ability.
But for all it's power the current generation Repulsors are limited to a maximum range of 500m before the beam loses focus and the damage drops sharply after that. And while that's more then enough for most situations the Tiger is likely to face we know that there will be ones where that just isn't enough range. Which is why the Tiger comes with a quick change main gun so you can equip it with a MAC-01-155** for long distance battles or a LT-01-001M*** for times when absolute precision is required.
*(What is the point of been a billionaire hero with contacts if you can't pull off something crazy even now and again?)
**(Basically the Mako's main gun but adapted to take advantage of our better materials and energy production for a bit more damage and a bit more speed)
***(That would be the laser shrunk down to IFV size. The 001M is to signify that it's only capable of an effective 1MW thanks to issues with lasers in the atmosphere. I just randomly picked that since Esbilon didn't really give us any information other then it's possible.)
Tiger IFV Repulsor Thruster Calcs:
Uses most the same reasoning as my prior set of calcs however this time I'm using eight repulosrs.
Force = 2,207,250 newtons
This would require 88.29 palm sized Repulsors. That's obviously impractical so lets scale them up. Based upon thread opinion we're going with eight engines, for redundancy and stability, so that means each thruster must provide 275,906.25 newtons of thrust.
Therefore a diameter of 330mm or just a bit bigger then your standard 30cm (15") ruler. With the 3.3 scale factor each Repulsor takes 7,623MW of power and with eight Repulsors at full thrust the Tiger's engines would consume a total of 60,984MW (110% of Great Britan's daily electrical consumption in 2008)
Tiger IFV Main Gun Calcs
The M1 Abram has between 500 and 600 kilonewtons of recoil from it's main gun. Now it's significantly more massive at 62,000 kilograms and only receives that force for a fraction of a second however I figure that with future recoil dampening technology, the Tiger's mass effect core, and firing the thrusters on the opposite side the tiger can handle that much.
The Tiger could handle a 450mm Repulsor cannon. Of course 500 kilonewtons of force is enough to accelerate the Tiger at 2gs to it might be too much even with the core and repulsor counterbalance.
So just in case I figure might as well go with a 100mm main gun. That cuts down the acceleration to 1m/s with friction and the Tiger's brakes I figure it can keep stationary.
100m gun gives 700MW of power on target at 100% and 7MW on target at 1%. That's between 167kg (30% larger then 16inch shell) of TNT and 1.67 (120mm tank gun) per second.
Tiger Ammo Calculations
I figure for the Sagitta pods we can fit a cube 500mm a side giving it a total volume of 125,000,000mm^3 or enough to fit (125,000,000/2931.5) 40,000 missiles while leaving 7,740,000 cubic millimeters for the loading system. If the day ever comes where 166,000 Sagitta missiles are required...
Well the Tiger can (with 4 pods) do it. Damn that's a scary thought.
For the Pilum I'm going to assume that the launching, loading and rotating systems take up about half the volume leaving 62,500,000mm^3 for rounds. Assuming the Pilum is based off that forearm missile from the first Iron Man movie then going off the averages of the length and width of the forearm I'm estimating it at about 200mm long and 70mm wide for a rough volume of:
V = (70/2)^2 * pi * 200
V = 35^2 * pi * 200
V = 1,225 * 200 * pi
V = 245,000 * pi
V = 769,690mm^3
Which means there is enough room for 80 rounds.
With the 20mm grenade launcher while it was hard, no one seems to like 20mm for grenades, I found a RL one. The South African Neopup PAW-20.
Length = 845mm
Width = 115m
Height = 185mm
Volume = 845*115*185 = 17,977,375mm^3
Let's call that 18,000,000mm^3 which leaves 107,000,000mm^3 for ammo. Assuming the 20x42mm is actually that size (it's usually a bit bigger) each grenade has a volume of:
V = 10 * 10 * 42 * pi
V = 4,200 * pi
V = 13,195mm^3
Therefore it can carry 8,100 grenades.
Now I wouldn't be surprised to see these numbers rounded down in various ways but this provides a good starting base.
--------
I think that's everything I needed to cover. Edit: Spoilers are cool!
Considering the stealth only lasts for 2-3 hours, I'm honestly surprised no-one has picked up on the Normandy because that would mean the Normandy would have to jump in at less than 1 Light - hour away (due to not being able to travel at near light speed without time dilation), the moment the light/radiation from the FTL event hits the enemy sensors, they should be able to roughly guess where the Normandy is, consdiering that starships should follow a few rules in regards to fuel expeniture and orbital mathematics.
I understand the drifting part, it's the travelling in a certain direction what gets me.
Like I said, the Normandy can only travel for two to three hours using the core to move around, which means it has to be economical in it's flight just as every other starship in existance, considering that:
1: It cannot travel faster than light while in stealth, it means it has to get in close to it's target.
2: It's FTL entry is brightly light up due to being unable to be absorbed.
3: It's limited to two-three hours worth of flight.
It should be easy to pick up on it dropping in and from the location of its arrival and it's 'black body' against the backdrop of the thermal/light bloom of it's FTL travel, actually track down the most likely routes that the Normandy would take its destination.
It should be easy to pick up on it dropping in and from the location of its arrival and it's 'black body' against the backdrop of the thermal/light bloom of it's FTL travel, actually track down the most likely routes that the Normandy would take its destination.
It should be easy to pick up on it dropping in and from the location of its arrival and it's 'black body' against the backdrop of the thermal/light bloom of it's FTL travel, actually track down the most likely routes that the Normandy would take its destination.
Not really. Let's say the Normandy drops in 1 light hour away. It drifts for five minutes and then uses it's Tantalus drive for fifteen minutes of accelerating in some direction. At which point it drifts again for say ten minutes before an ten minute acceleration in a different direction.
AFAIK it would be basically impossible to track the Normandy's path at this point.
Also while we know it can't go FTL due to blue shifting they don't specify how fast she can go using just the Tantalus drive. The Normandy might be able to hit 90PSL for all we know.
Not to mention one of the most important things here is that your assuming the enemy have an idea of how long the Normandy can travel while stealthy is. They don't know if she's stuck drifting, capable of a five minute acceleration or a five day acceleration.
So, how long until SA intelligence agencies have dedicated teams tracking Shepherd and watching over her so that nothing happens to her? If they haven't already.
So, how long until SA intelligence agencies have dedicated teams tracking Shepherd and watching over her so that nothing happens to her? If they haven't already.
, and similarly the wavelength in that medium is 
, where 
is the wavelength of that light in vacuum. This implies that vacuum has a refractive index of 1, and that the 
) of the wave is not affected by the refractive index.
