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How Hard Can It Be? A Battletech Arms Manufacturer Quest

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PeaceMaker03 said:
If we do a 50ton Tank @4/6 200 ICE engine
You could create a 40ton IFV,@5/8, with an engine compatibility between the two.
For militia out on the end of a 6 month-year long supply chain, compatibility will be a huge selling point. Hanger queen a single IFV/Tank in order to bring 4 other Vic's back up.
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You could make a 5/8 40-ton IFV, but what are you planning to arm it with that'll make it worth all the extra expense compared to a 6/9 APC? Parts commonality doesn't really mean much if one of the vehicles that is compatible is not deemed useful/economical enough to buy in the first place.

EDIT: Here's the best I could come up with; an SRM-6, a machinegun and a recon camera to support a full platoon of PBIs, coming in at 'only' a bit under 520,000 C-bills, meaning you could comfortably buy eight standard APCs for the cost of one of these. But at least it's well-armoured.
Name/Model: Carrack IFV
Technology: Inner Sphere
Technology Rating: D
Tonnage: 40
Configuration: Combat Vehicle
Era/Year: Succession Wars / 2940
Rules (Current): Advanced
Rules (Era): Advanced
Rules (Year): Advanced
Total Cost: 519,167 C-Bills
Battle Value: 535

Movement Type: Tracked
Power Plant: 200 Internal Combustion
Cruising Speed: 54 kph
Maximum Speed: 86.4 kph
Armor: Standard
Armament:
1 SRM 6
1 Machine Gun
Manufacturer: Unknown
Primary Factory: Unknown
Communications: Unknown
Targeting & Tracking: Unknown

================================================================================================
Equipment Mass
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Internal Structure: Standard 4.00
Engine: 200 Internal Combustion 17.00
Cruising MP: 5
Flanking MP: 8
Heat Sinks (Single): 0 0.00
Control Equipment: 2.00
Lift Equipment: 0.00
Power Amplifier: 0.00
Turret: 0.50
Armor Factor: 128 8.00
Type: Standard

Armor
Value
Front: 32
R/L Side: 26
Rear: 19
Turret: 25

================================================================================================
Weapons and Ammo Location Tonnage
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Machine Gun Turret 0.50
Recon Camera Turret 0.50
SRM 6 Turret 3.00
Compartment, Infantry (3 tons) Body 3.00
Machine Gun (Ammo 100) Body 0.50
SRM 6 (Ammo 15) Body 1.00
 
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Guys, I have a great idea. We should make Tankette but we sell them to children as toys. So that the child can be good with a tank when they grow up. Then instead of boy scouts, we will have tank scouts! Think of all the sales we can get on the holiday!!!!

.......

😆😁😆
 
High Admiral said:
Guys, I have a great idea. We should make Tankette but we sell them to children as toys. So that the child can be good with a tank when they grow up. Then instead of boy scouts, we will have tank scouts! Think of all the sales we can get on the holiday!!!!

.......

😆😁😆
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A more serious idea might be able to make something under the small support vic rules with a two man crew and armed with a machinegun.
 
High Admiral said:
Guys, I have a great idea. We should make Tankette but we sell them to children as toys.
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It's still 17-20k if you want it to have a proper machinegun as a support vehicle. Basically the same price as a decent cargo truck. Not something everyone can afford. Though you could probably do "one per school".
As a combat vehicle it goes to up to 40k but actually can have some armor.
Silversun17 said:
A more serious idea might be able to make something under the small support vic rules with a two man crew and armed with a machinegun.
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It's not really worth it. You get 2 armor and say two infantry machineguns on a pintle mount. It's kinda sad since it will die to any crew served weapon.
On the other hand with a combat vehicle you get 6-8 armor and a proper mech sized machinegun with better range and damage.
 
Zoolimar said:
For stealth operations you more or less must have Fuel Cells since they are the only ones that in lore can be lost in background noise heat wise.
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From what I am reading about fuel cell, it is civilian tech. That does present an interesting option later down the line. Though we will have to work on it later down the line for military use.

Edit:
I wonder what other civilian tech we can convert to military use?
 
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High Admiral said:
From what I am reading about fuel cell, it is civilian tech. That does present an interesting option later down the line. Though we will have to work on it later down the line for military use.

Edit:
I wonder what other civilian tech we can convert to military use?
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Would love to bring the "fuel cell" (FC) revolution to military vics. Downside is range compared to ICE, upside much lighter weight & FC engine can recharge off of a fusion engine. Like a mech or generator do not need fuel logistics like ICE Vic's.

Sir_Travelsalot said:
You could make a 5/8 40-ton IFV, but what are you planning to arm it with that'll make it worth all the extra expense compared to a 6/9 APC? Parts commonality doesn't really mean much if one of the vehicles that is compatible is not deemed useful/economical enough to buy in the first place.

EDIT: Here's the best I could come up with; an SRM-6, a machinegun and a recon camera to support a full platoon of PBIs, coming in at 'only' a bit under 520,000 C-bills, meaning you could comfortably buy eight standard APCs for the cost of one of these. But at least it's well-armoured.
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An APC is an armored taxi, a IFV is used to support the dismounts. The Carrack is a good design, I would add more MGs to cover other arcs against infantry.
 
PeaceMaker03 said:
An APC is an armored taxi, a IFV is used to support the dismounts. The Carrack is a good design, I would add more MGs to cover other arcs against infantry.
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I may have missed the Carrack design.

With that said, I will note that IFVs normally focus not on all-around firepower, but on having turreted or fixed weapons dramatically more powerful than the infantry can reasonably carry. Whether an IFV can hit targets behind it is much less important than whether it can blast the bunker that's got its dismounts pinned down with machine gun fire. Doctrinally the IFVs are, by definition, always supposed to be fighting in close proximity to supporting infantry. Otherwise they're not really IFVs at all.
 
PeaceMaker03 said:
Would love to bring the "fuel cell" (FC) revolution to military vics. Downside is range compared to ICE, upside much lighter weight & FC engine can recharge off of a fusion engine. Like a mech or generator do not need fuel logistics like ICE Vic's.
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Lighter yes, but we can add more weight to it to make it go longer. That's why I suggest a military version instead of putting the civilian one in. We could have our people look into it at minimum to research.

Though we won't attempt to make them anytime soon but research is okay.
 
Sir_Travelsalot said:
Scroll up, it's at the top of this page.
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Oh, I'm sorry, I forgot the name and thought it was something older. Yeah, that looks fine in terms of armament. Turreted machine gun and SRM-6 in a turret. One of these won't scare off a battlemech, but they could plausibly put some hurt down and they have enough firepower to really fuck up merely 'normal' hard targets in support of an infantry attack.
 
And of course most of the time you're likely sending 4 of them around to move a whole infantry company around. The lack of a second ton of ammo to have your pick of smoke, fragmentation and inferno Ammo is a drawback but not a huge one.
 
Point. Also a tad undergunned for a 40 ton vehicle

Honestly the meta for combat vehicles to me seems to go 3/5 or 4/6 if above 35 tons and not hover or VTOL or maybe wheeled especially if you're not fusion powered.

You lose a lot on the opportunity costs for speed.
See the Carrack as a good example honestly
42.5% of its mass is it's engine/the propulsion system it's linked to and that doesn't account for the other mandatory pieces of equipment like the crew and the stuff they need to run the thing and of course the structure of the vehicle.

All told even before the armor is added 57.5% of the vehicle's mass is already being used.
 
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Yeah. I gather the design rules are very much intended to force diminishing returns on larger vehicles, especially ICE-powered vehicles, where the parasitic mass needed to keep the thing moving and to give it enough armor protection to provide survivability commensurate with a heavy vehicle's cost and tonnage wind up leaving the big vehicle in question without enough actual payload to be relevant.
 
Yeah, the Carrack was supposed to very much be a demonstrator as to why a 5/8 40-ton IFV isn't very viable as a vehicle. Even with my best efforts, its armament is pretty anemic for a 40-tonner.

I wish the chainguns from To War is Human, To Design Divine were actually part of the canon arsenal; they'd open so many options.
 
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40 ton IFV w/ ICE engine is going to make compromises. Ironic that we could possibly use the Sloop turret on the IFV but with 2x 4 SRM & an MG. Drop troop bay to 2 tons. 6 Carrack IFV could carry a company of INF.

Cross platform comparability from Sloop to Carrack to 50ton Tank.
As for fuel cell engine range while it is an issue the weight difference makes up for it. Plus militia is fighting on home turf so ranges and logistics should more than compensate.
 
Honestly personally I'd rather we just modify the 50 ton chasis to be an IFV than develop an entirely new platform.
We'd save a lot of time and money and get a good enough soloution rather than a perfect one

My proposed command variant even works for the most part in the role. Just pull the coms gear for a missile rack be it LRM or SRM or an option for either depending on the variant/have it a modular weapon for relatively quick swaps and for the most part we'd be good overall.

And a AC-5 in direct support of the troops is hardly a bad option especially in universe where the AC5 is a respectable gun and frankly most of them are slinging big shells that you can pack a explosive scary charge into.
 
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Knowledgeispower said:
Honestly personally I'd rather we just modify the 50 ton chasis to be an IFV than develop an entirely new platform.
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You can't easily modify a normal tank or combat vehicle to be an IFV. While mass wise they are the same their volume would be very different. You can carry over engine and say turret but structure and armor layout would need to be remade from the ground up.
PeaceMaker03 said:
As for fuel cell engine range while it is an issue the weight difference makes up for it. Plus militia is fighting on home turf so ranges and logistics should more than compensate.
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You could just slap a ton of fuel on the thing, still would come out ahead on anything over 30 tons. Plus 600 km is still pretty decent range.
Logistics wise Fuel Cells are great because you can make fuel out of water which when used turns back into water.
 
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