Answer me this time please people..

Originally posted by junior
What I stated was that if you took off under full afterburn from a hanger bay, you should lose your wings.

I like to take off (in WC3 and 4) with full AB, it´s faster than full throttle. and nobody say anything :p
 
my argument is solely based on the presented circumstance.


here they are : in non-vacant point per point manner



- can not exceed 1 kps in atmospheric conditions (reference book, yes i read it myself)

- carrier has atmosphere inside (reference book, game intros, etc)

- you can reach top speed in about 2 seconds (700'000 metres per second^2 accelleration relative to the arrow) (reference wc3)
1'400'000 metres per second in 2 seconds
700'000 metres per second^2

- maneuvering thrusters, not scoops, are used to maneuver. (reference privateer)

- scoops are used to gather hydrogen particles to maintain fuel supply (reference book)

- ships do not run out of fuel, but use internal fuel (reference any game)

- ships take off with fuel in the tanks (reference book)

- ships need to be loaded into the launch tubes (reference wcprop)

- artificial gravity is pointed into the floor (reference book, game intros)

- carrier mass is (concordia) 73'000 metric tonnes. (reference CIC)

- earths mass is 5.972e24 kg (5.972e21 tonnes) (reference http://www.seds.org/nineplanets/nineplanets/earth.html)

- earths gravity 9.8 m/s^2 (i hope i dont need to prove this to you)

- carrier gravity inside (9.8 m/s^2) (assimed from people walking about normally inside)

- carrier gravity well : (i hope you understand the formula)
(target / source) * source value = target value.
(73'000 metric tonnes / 5.972e21 tonnes) * 9.8 = ANS
7.3e4 / 5.972e21 = 5.06054e-8 m/s^2
thats 0.0000000506054 m/s^2 gravity well for the carrier

that is also 700'000/0.0000000506054 times weaker than the fighter engines.
that is 13832515900000 times WEAKER. meaning the fighter can effortlessly escape the ships gravity well.

- there is no collision issue with using scoops, of any sort. just see how perfectly fine fighters do on the victory. (reference wc3)

- fighters can hover in gravith of 9.8 m/s^2 (reference wc3 takeoff videos https://www.wcnews.com/news/update/3190)

- fighters dont spew out flames taking off on low power (reference wc3 takeoff videos https://www.wcnews.com/news/update/3190)

- launch tubes are not specified to have atmosphere inside them or no atmosphere, unknown (never mentioned)

- if a lunch tube has atmosphere, you are limited to 1 kps max. (resultant of 1kps cap with atmosphere, see above)

- if a launch tube has no atmosphere, you are unlimited for takeoff (resultant of no friction)

- if a launch tube has no atmosphere, there is noone there except the fighter ready for takeoff (people need air to breathe)

- if a launch bay is used, full afterburn is limited because of possible damages (people are there)

- if a launch bay is used, the speed cap is 1 kps (atmospheric cap, see above)

- carrier length (lets look at the shortest we have here, victory) 720 metres (reference CIC)

- time taken to reach 1 kps. (max you can do in atmosphere)
700'000 metres per second^2 accelleration
700 Kmetres per second^2 accelleration
1/700 seconds.
0.001428 seconds

- distance taken to reach 1 kps at full burn
accelleration function is 700x (KM, m would be 700'000x)
integral (the velocity) is 350x^2
integral2 (the position) is 116.666x^3

plug in the time into the position formula
116.666(0.001428 seconds)^3 = ANS
ANS = 3.397280525 e-7KM
= .00000033972 metres. not even a metre.

this is how far it would take to get up to max speed in a launch tube, for a fighter by itself, no catapult, with full burn, if the tube had an atmosphere.

- max speed reached in a tube, saying it was as long as the victory, with no atmosphere, no catapult.
take the position function and solve it for 720 metres.
integral2 (the position) is 116'666.666x^3
116'666.666x^3 = 720m
x^3 = .0061714286
x = .1834 u

plug into the velocity formula
350'000x^2
350'000(.1834^2) = ANS
11'772 m/s
11.772 kps

much slower than max speed.

- speed at the end of a catapult launch is max mil. 520kps for arrow.
so lets see what the lag time is in catching up to max mil. this would be the difference in time between a catapult launch and full burn launch.
time to max speed is about 2 seconds for arrow (known)
time to max military is .742 seconds
speed when leaving a ship with catapult launch is 520.
speed when leaving a ship with full burn from vacuum is 11

catapult in vacuum vs launch tube no catapult in vacuum :
speed needed to catch up is 509 kps.
thats time to max mil - time starting at
700x = 509 = .727 seconds
just under a quarter second advantage.

catapult in vacuum vs launchbay with atmosphere :
speed needed to catch up is 519 kps.
700x = 519 = .741 seconds.
a quarter second advantage.


- lock times are a few seconds. except FF missiles. (reference any game, cic, whatever)

- fighters are stored in their arking locations (reference cutscenes of the games)



now lets look at the evidence :

*if the launch tubes were in atmosphere, both normal and catapult launches would be capped to 1 kps. so they tie.

*if the launch tubes were vacuum, the catapult has almsot a quarter second advantage relative to getting fighters up to speed.

*if launching off the deck, the catapult were in vacuum, there would be a quarter second advantage in getting fighters up to speed.

*catapults must be loaded. taking time.

*launch tubes without catapults take time to load, but not as much since there is no latching to do.

*bay doesnt need to be loaded

* fighters dont need a catapult machine to get them off the deck since they can hover

* the accelleration due to the gravity well of the ship is 13832515900000 times weaker than the power of the fighter to escape it, meaning the fighter does not need the help getting away.

* lets say the prep time for a fighter is 5 minutes.
* lets say the launch tube loading time is 10 seconds

(this would be radically fast anyways to move a giant machine into a tube and position it. i'm underestimating by leaps and bounds to keep you happy here)
remember the fighters are stored parked. they would have to be moved from there (not exactly on the spot) to the tubes, and attached to the catapult.

* lets say the latching time is 2 seconds (to connect the fighter to the catapult)

continued on next post ---
 
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Well, seeing as how you have no idea how fast 400kps is, exactly, I don't see how that argument can be made, anyway, nor how anyone could assume it'd be difficult to hit a target moving at that speed.
Keeping with our Arrow example, you have a ship that's abouut a quarter of a football field long (american Football). 400kps would be that that ship moves at over 20,000 times its own length in the space of a second which is clearly not the case in WC, which is why I say that the speed issue in WC is for another post (and many other previous posts also). So your saying that you can hit something from an attack vector (probably if your making an attack run on a ship, your doing it somewhat perpendicularly to the launch of a fighter - which would put you at relatively a dead stop in comparison with the direction of motion of that fighter) that is moving at a speed that would allow it to move from San Fransisco to New York in about 12 seconds? Your a much better shot than I am. Real World vs WC universe arguments.
I don't see what how this is in any way relevent to the discussion. Whether or not one chooses to slow their craft down to maintain their relative position in a dogfight has absolutely no bearing on whether or not catapults make sense as an accessory on WC carriers.
An earlier post was talking about how going 400kps instead of 500kps was relative suicide in an engagement. Well, you slow down to take a shot at an enemy craft, so whats the difference there. Actually you have a better chance of not getting hit by launching from the ship since an attacking craft is again probably on a perpedicular attack vector, which makes your directional velocity much greater than his. In the battle sequence mentioned earlier, the enemy wingman is probably pointed toward you just a bit in an effort to engage, therefore your relative speed in comparison with him is much less than the aforementioned 400kps.
Throughout that whole segment, I wasn't able to tell if you meant launching fighters with their scoops closed, or launching fighters from a carrier with its scoops closed.
Ok, I reread my post and that is my bad. Every scenario is with the carrier's scoops closed. Any other mention of scoops is when a fighter is decelerating or accelerating.
Okay, everyone needs to listen very carefully here: This is not about a Bear quote, it's about mis-reading a junior quote.
Sorry, my bad again.
Or just that the distance they travel when taking off is too short to have any effect.
Didn't think about that, good point, but if your in any kind of condition where atmospheric friction is involved I think a takeoff speed (sans catapult) of 300kps+ is a bit excessive, but again, a difference between 27th and 21st century physics.
How does that have anything to do with anything we're talking about here? We're not talking about 21st-century reality, we're talking about a completely fictional future universe.
Because every other post on this thread is comparing 21st century technology and physics to 27th in the WC universe. IF there isn't a 27th century reason (which there have been plenty discussed here), catapults in the WC universe don't make much sense by our 21st century reasonings and uses.

C-ya
 
continued from previous --- (see 2 posts down from this to see beginnind of this post, split into 2 cause of length limit)

*compare :
--------------------------------------------
from scratch - 5:12 to prep a catapult
- 5:10 to prep for tube launch w/o catapult
- 5:00 to prep a bay launch

from standby - 12 to prep catapult
- 10 to prep for tube launch w/o catapult
- 0 to prep bay launch

from ready - 0 to prep catapult
- 0 to prep for tube launch no catapult.
- 0 to prep bay launch

lets say takeoff time to get out in a bay (including maneuvering, etc) takes as long as the wc3 takeoff vids. (3 seconds, you can time it yourself)

total times are : (as functions) X = amount of time in seconds), and Fn = amount of fighters launched

CATAPULT
for scratch = ((x-300)/12)
for standby = (x/12)
for ready = (x/12)+1

TUBE no cat
for scratch =((x-300)/10)
for standby = (x/10)
for ready = (x/10)+1

BAY
for scratch = ((x-300)/3)
for standby = (x/3)
for ready = (x/3)

now lets see how many you have launched instantly, in 0 seconds. calues under 0 are treated as 0.

CATAPULT
for scratch = ((x-300)/12) @ 0 = 0
for standby = (x/12) @ 0 = 0
for ready = (x/12)+1 @ 0 = 1

TUBE no cat
for scratch =((x-300)/10) @ 0 = 0
for standby = (x/10) @ 0 = 0
for ready = (x/10)+1 @ 0 = 1

BAY
for scratch = ((x-300)/3) @ 0 = 0
for standby = (x/3) @ 0 = 0
for ready = (x/3) @ 0 = 0

The tube and catapult methods have a 1 fighter advantage here. now lets look at 3 seconds later.

CATAPULT
for scratch = ((x-300)/12) @ 0 = 0
for standby = (x/12) @ 0 = 0
for ready = (x/12)+1 @ 0 = 1

TUBE no cat
for scratch =((x-300)/10) @ 0 = 0
for standby = (x/10) @ 0 = 0
for ready = (x/10)+1 @ 0 = 1

BAY
for scratch = ((x-300)/3) @ 0 = 0
for standby = (x/3) @ 0 = 1
for ready = (x/3) @ 0 = 1

now the bay has the advantage. and if you look at the formulas, the bay will continue to have the advantage from here on out.

this means the tube and catapult systems would be better off for the first 3 seconds. in which time the launched fighters would accomplish (on average) nothing.

now lets say tehy were launching for 10 minutes. lets see what this looks like. who has more fighters out.

CATAPULT
for scratch = ((x-300)/12) @ 600 = 25
for standby = (x/12) @ 600 = 50
for ready = (x/12)+1 @ 600 = 51

TUBE no cat
for scratch =((x-300)/10) @ 600 = 30
for standby = (x/10) @ 600 = 60
for ready = (x/10)+1 @ 600 = 61

BAY
for scratch = ((x-300)/3) @ 600 = 100
for standby = (x/3) @ 600 = 200
for ready = (x/3) @ 600 = 200

now you can see that for extended periods of time, the bay launch system would have a tremendous numerical advantage.
--------------------------------------------

* so the final statement comes down to this.

catapult launch :
- 3/4 second speed advantage for fighters that took off vs bay
- 1 fighter extra launched for the first 3 seconds
- about 50 fighters launched in the long run (10 mins)
>> all are small values

tube launch :
- little speed difference vs bay, 3/4 seconds behind in speed vs catapult.
- 1 fighter extra launched for the first 3 seconds
- about 60 fighters launched in the long run
>> all are small values, but 10 extra fighters in the long run vs catapult.

bay launch :
- no speed advantage, 3/4 seconds benind catapult launch in speed.
- behind by 1 fighter for 3 seconds at launch time.
- about 200 fighters launched in the long run, 4x as much as the catapult.

so the choice comes down to,

would you rather use a catapult and have a miniscule sped advantage for not even a second, and have fighters out 3 seconds ahead of normal launch, and then wait for more.

or would you rather take that 3/4 seconds to catch up in speed, be behind by 1 fighter for 3 seconds, and then have reenforcements come in at 4x the rate you'd have otherwise.

its a simple choice. the advantages of a catpult are small.
if you're not in a hurry, you'd launch more with less effort with a bay.
if you are in a hurry, you'd still be better off with a bay, since when enemys are attacking, you want the most fighters out there to stop them, as quickly as possible, not a few that were out 3 seconds sooner and then feel isolated with no backup.

having more velocity on takeoff wont do much since you will be up to full speed before anyone can lock you.

if someone fires an FF missile at you (doesnt need a lock), and he did it so quickly that you were just exiting the ship, that means that they are ready for you and will use your excess speed to get behind you quicker.

the bay has the tactical advantage. better in the long run, and better in the short run.

the numbers dont lie.


note : i dont remember exactly if it was full military speed or full burn speed that a catapult launched you at. if it was full burn, increase the time to speed advantage for the catapult by just over a factor of 2, bringing it to about 1.5 seconds.
+ this makes no numerical advantage for the catpults, still they launch less.
+ its still a small time. if a world can happen in 1.5 seconds, then why bother even launching more fighters, its all over when it starts.
+ if you needed that 1.5 seconds, it sure would be nice to have that extra 8 seconds per launch (difference between bay and catapult readying time) using a bay system.

note #2 : launch tubes and catapults have no parallelism advantage. even if there is more then one launch tube launching at once, there can be more than one fighter taking off of a bay at once. or multiple bays.




i will though grant one complete advantage to the catapult system. WC just 'SAYS' its quicker. so under that statement it must be quicker. even if the numbers dont add up. -BECAUSE IT JUST IS-. thats the only serious argument that can be placed for catapult launching. you cant prove a tactical advantage otherwise.

the game may 'just use catapults faster'. but with the evidence it and the book present it in reality would be slower.

--------


and in reference ot the 1st post. there was no reason why fighters _couldnt_ be launched. not unless the exits to the bay and launch tubes were destroyed or damaged so bad they were physically impassable.

-scheherazade

p.s. frosty < i can grant your point only on the 'just because' grounds. and because 'it just is', you are right. there is no way to argue with a given situation. my point was that _if this were reality_, and _these were the given states and symptoms_, this situation would not exist where catapults have an advantage over bays. though i do think it would be interesting to launch from both. having the catpults to get something out for the sake of having it out in the first 3 seconds, and then continue launching more from the bays. its this inconsistency between games and books and reality that makes this even arguable. catapults are better, they just are. but to be better in reality, the evidence in the wc universe would have to be adjusted to make it sensible. because as of right now, if it were placed in reality, it would not match up. if the evidence were not to be adjusted in reality, then the catapults would have to be adjusted, no longer with an advantage. its one or the other. but this isnt reality. its WC. and in WC you are right.
 
Woah, this thread has gone all crazy.

There is *no difference* between a 'flight deck' and a 'launch tube'. In Wing Commander you will always (with the exception of on the Intrepid in WCIV) launch with a catapult when you are taking off from a carrier. The engines PC versions of WC3 and 4 let you fly around the decks if you want... but when the TCS Victory or the TCS Lexington launches fighters it's with a catapult.

Furthermore, with all these crazy speed calculations... when a fighter takes off and when a fighter is in combat it is not travelling at 400 (or whatever) *kilometers* per second. It may be travelling (according to Wing Commander 1 and 2) at as slowly as 400 *meters* per second. 400 kilometers per second is the *maximum* speed possible -- in deep space with enough hydrogen without maneuvering... in almost every situation (and especially in combat or near a capital ship) it's going to be far slower than that.
 
haha, ya it is crazy, but htats all the fun!

how come the victory shows normal takeoff without a catapult in the launch scenes? where did it say it uses catapults? was the catapult system in one of the later books?

also, the flight deck clearly looks disjoint from the launch tubes.
i mean look at the takeoff scenes of WCProp and wc3, its a world apart. one is some kinda tube and another is a bay. though i guess if the catapults were in the bay, that would mean that the 1kps cap exists ;) yay.

also the speeds were for the sake of argument, since 'having more speed on takeoff' was the main point of the pro-catapult side.

since catapults are not different than launch bays, it comes down to bay launches (wc1/2/3/4) vs tube launches (wcp).

meaning there is another reason why WCP is retarded and wc1/2/3/4 are the shit.

-scheherazade
 
Originally posted by scheherazade
since catapults are not different than launch bays, it comes down to bay launches (wc1/2/3/4) vs tube launches (wcp).

meaning there is another reason why WCP is retarded and wc1/2/3/4 are the shit.

WC1 uses launch tubes, as well, which is a point that has been mentioned prior to this. So I think you need to rethink this particular argument for denigrating WCP.
You also keep overlooking the biggest advantage of the Midway's tubes. The ONLY situation in which the speed that you can get a large number of fighters out will matter is when you have a scramble, and your carrier is under attack. The launch tubes give you some very nice acceleration on the way out, and get you a nice distance away from the carrier, and hopefully toward the enemy, which means you can intercept the incoming ships further out from the carrier, and hopefully keep them from getting within range.
 
thats true. the wc1 takeoff thing was a tube launch like WCP.

i dont argue the speed of tube launches, i argue that in reality they would be slow, even though in game they are fast.

but you're right, in wcp, the tube launches are prette darn fast.

-scheherazde
 
i outlined the reasons very clearly :)

the absolute value of anything compared to 0 is more, and at best equal. its just that simple.

once fighters are prepared in their parking spots, its up to getting them out of there. you can take off directly ( 0 delay), or you can ready it in a catapult (some time, even if miniscule, its still more than 0)

-scheherazade
 
Well, consider this... the 2/3/4 versions of launching required a fighter to taxi to the launching area(runway), then bring itself to full speed via it's own engines. This, too, would require time to do... moreso than the launching "assembly line" from WCP. As far as I can tell, the WCP fighters are located in areas easily accessable to the loading grappler, which would bring the fighters to the launching tubes in just about the same time as taxiing(spelling?). The thing is, though... even in WC2, where there were two runways, or WC3/4(wide runway, staggered launch pattern), there can only be two fighters launched at any given time.(sometimes 4, given enough runway length[Vesuvius]) WC1 we just don't see anything of the actual launching process, save the pilot actually entering the fighter... so we can't really ascertain how much time was required to launch those suckers.
 
i think of it in scramble fashion.

you got a runway (flight deck in wc3), and aircraft parked along the sides (space fighters sitting in parking spots along the sides).

all the pilots get into their planes, all taxi out at the same time.

the first 2 hit the gas, then the next2, and the next2, etc. its a well practiced symphony that is in essence without delay.

i've seen videos of soviet mig-21's taking off 7 at a time in successive waves. one wave on the tail of another wave.

well practiced scrambles (and i assume space force military would be at least as well practiced as todays military aircraft pilots) are very fast. entire wings can take off in seconds. i think they could manage something like this in the wc universe. its not a very difficult thing to do.

-scheherazade
 
Originally posted by Bandit LOAF
Furthermore, with all these crazy speed calculations... when a fighter takes off and when a fighter is in combat it is not travelling at 400 (or whatever) *kilometers* per second. It may be travelling (according to Wing Commander 1 and 2) at as slowly as 400 *meters* per second. 400 kilometers per second is the *maximum* speed possible -- in deep space with enough hydrogen without maneuvering... in almost every situation (and especially in combat or near a capital ship) it's going to be far slower than that.

OK, now I'm curious. Exactly how does the speed system work in WC. It says ???kps in your display, so how are you moving at maybe ???mps instead?

C-ya
 
- maneuvering thrusters, not scoops, are used to maneuver. (reference privateer)

There are also thrusters mentioned in the CCG... of course, they still aren't what you think they are... The primary method of changing direction is through manipulation of the scoop field (Confed Handbook and other sources). I assume thrusters either augment the scoops abilities or are used to rotate or stabalize around the z-axis (as with the dralthi's wing mounted thrusters). The scoops are what give a fighter it's atmospheric handling style and what give it a top speed.

- scoops are used to gather hydrogen particles to maintain fuel supply (reference book)

yes, and?

- ships do not run out of fuel, but use internal fuel (reference any game)

They use fuel gathered constantly by the scoops. Once again, the Confed Handbook would be the best source. Fighters work at approximately fuel equilibrium, they take in around as much fuel as they use (slightly less, usually, but not noticably). When afterburners are used, the fuel comes out of the reserve and/or the scoops are actually slightly lowered, depending on the afterburner system. This depletes a certain amount of fuel. Since extra fuel isn't gathered by the scoops, the fuel level doesn't increase.

- ships take off with fuel in the tanks (reference book)

Yeah so? They also take off with scoops on... What's your point?

- ships need to be loaded into the launch tubes (reference wcprop)

Ships need to be loaded onto flight decks as well... once again, does this have a point?

- artificial gravity is pointed into the floor (reference book, game intros)

Wow, you're sure the field lines aren't perpindicular to the walls? That'd be way more fun!

- carrier mass is (concordia) 73'000 metric tonnes. (reference CIC)

- earths mass is 5.972e24 kg (5.972e21 tonnes) (reference http://www.seds.org/nineplanets/nineplanets/earth.html)

- earths gravity 9.8 m/s^2 (i hope i dont need to prove this to you)

- carrier gravity inside (9.8 m/s^2) (assimed from people walking about normally inside)

- carrier gravity well : (i hope you understand the formula)
(target / source) * source value = target value.
(73'000 metric tonnes / 5.972e21 tonnes) * 9.8 = ANS
7.3e4 / 5.972e21 = 5.06054e-8 m/s^2
thats 0.0000000506054 m/s^2 gravity well for the carrier

that is also 700'000/0.0000000506054 times weaker than the fighter engines.

Firstly that math makes absolutely no sense... you appear to have lost the 9.8 somewhere and then failed to properly divide... something times 10 to the fourth divided by something times ten to the twenty-first won't ever give you something times ten to the negative 8...

Secondly, you're trying to relate gravitational field without taking the radius into account... That formula will only work at a distance from the ship's center of gravity that's equal to the radius of the Earth. This isn't a realistic comparison. The gravitational field is still negligable, you just appear to have gone about showing this in an incorrect fashion.

that is 13832515900000 times WEAKER. meaning the fighter can effortlessly escape the ships gravity well.

it's nice how you provided a number much much more precise than your known values are...

- there is no collision issue with using scoops, of any sort. just see how perfectly fine fighters do on the victory. (reference wc3)

I'm not quite sure what you're refering to...

- fighters can hover in gravith of 9.8 m/s^2 (reference wc3 takeoff videos https://www.wcnews.com/news/update/3190[/url])

Better sources: The fricking game, where you can hover over the planets...

- launch tubes are not specified to have atmosphere inside them or no atmosphere, unknown (never mentioned)

Why would they bother to keep atmosphere in them?

- if a lunch tube has atmosphere, you are limited to 1 kps max. (resultant of 1kps cap with atmosphere, see above)

We have no idea how long it takes for damage to occur in atmosphere... if you're only accelerating in it for a moment, the ship may be able to take it.

- if a launch tube has no atmosphere, you are unlimited for takeoff (resultant of no friction)

You're limited to the point where the force of your thrust is equal to the drag force of the scoops.

- if a launch tube has no atmosphere, there is noone there except the fighter ready for takeoff (people need air to breathe)

Brilliant deduction!

- if a launch bay is used, full afterburn is limited because of possible damages (people are there)

and?

- if a launch bay is used, the speed cap is 1 kps (atmospheric cap, see above)

You can see above too!

- carrier length (lets look at the shortest we have here, victory) 720 metres (reference CIC)

Well... that isn't the shortest one we've seen, but I'll let it go...

- time taken to reach 1 kps. (max you can do in atmosphere)
700'000 metres per second^2 accelleration
700 Kmetres per second^2 accelleration
1/700 seconds.
0.001428 seconds

- distance taken to reach 1 kps at full burn
accelleration function is 700x (KM, m would be 700'000x)
integral (the velocity) is 350x^2
integral2 (the position) is 116.666x^3

plug in the time into the position formula
116.666(0.001428 seconds)^3 = ANS
ANS = 3.397280525 e-7KM
= .00000033972 metres. not even a metre.

this is how far it would take to get up to max speed in a launch tube, for a fighter by itself, no catapult, with full burn, if the tube had an atmosphere.

I'm much too lazy to deal with integrals right now... let's just use basic kinematic equations!

V(final)^2 = V(initial)^2 + 2ad
V(initial)=0

therefore:

d= V(final)^2 / (2a)

d= (1000m/s)^2 / 2(700000)
d=0.7m

Still small, but you don't appear to be correct... Even though I said I was too lazy for integration, I took a look. You actually took one too many integrals... The fuction of acceleration is merely 700, the function of velocity is 700x and the funtion for displacement is 350x^2

- max speed reached in a tube, saying it was as long as the victory, with no atmosphere, no catapult...

snipped stuff based on bad integration


You're using the same bad math as before... I haven't actually bothered to read more than the first few lines as a result...

- lock times are a few seconds. except FF missiles. (reference any game, cic, whatever)

Missile locks are a stupid reason for launching with catapults... Anyway, if you're shooting at the opening of a launch deck, just use dumbfires...

- fighters are stored in their arking locations (reference cutscenes of the games)

Yeah?



now lets look at the evidence :

*if the launch tubes were in atmosphere, both normal and catapult launches would be capped to 1 kps. so they tie.

No... you're working on assumptions.

*if the launch tubes were vacuum, the catapult has almsot a quarter second advantage relative to getting fighters up to speed.

and your math is bad! Hurrah!

*if launching off the deck, the catapult were in vacuum, there would be a quarter second advantage in getting fighters up to speed.

Once again, since this is based on math that I'm not confident about and I don't feel is worth the time to do myself, there's very little to say...

*catapults must be loaded. taking time.

And ships magically appear on the flight line!

*launch tubes without catapults take time to load, but not as much since there is no latching to do.

And they're also dangerous, as you can quite easily nudge your fighter into a wall... How much time do you estimate 'latching' will take?

*bay doesnt need to be loaded

The ships still need to be brought up to the deck by the elevators...

* fighters dont need a catapult machine to get them off the deck since they can hover

Wow, so?

* the accelleration due to the gravity well of the ship is 13832515900000 times weaker than the power of the fighter to escape it, meaning the fighter does not need the help getting away.

True, but that's not the right number.

* lets say the prep time for a fighter is 5 minutes.
* lets say the launch tube loading time is 10 seconds

(this would be radically fast anyways to move a giant machine into a tube and position it. i'm underestimating by leaps and bounds to keep you happy here)
remember the fighters are stored parked. they would have to be moved from there (not exactly on the spot) to the tubes, and attached to the catapult.

* lets say the latching time is 2 seconds (to connect the fighter to the catapult)


Whoo! Conclusions based on huge assumptions!
 
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the point was to state the obvious. many arguments were against the obvious. so i stated it.

yes i did calculate wrong, though when corrected the answers still exprecc the same conclucions.

(73'000 metric tonnes / 5.972e21 tonnes) * 9.8 = ANS
.00000926...
still getting to the same conclusion. the figher is not strained.

and it is valid because 9.8 already takes into account radius. it is taken at earth surface, which is at the end of a radian. i'm sure if you concentrated earths mass into a point and placed yourself at it the force would be greater, but that isnt really possible to do. plus i remember gravity falloff isnt that fast. its strong enough to attract foreign objects and curve heavy comets from hundreds of thousands of miles away. the point is that if a fighter can oppose a force of acceleration as influential as the earth, it will defiantely oppose the force generated by a carriers mass. this was in reference to a comment made that the fighter actually has to 'escape' from the carriers gravity well.

as for fuel and scoops, its game vs book there. game never says what it is, but since it doesnt mention scoops 'internal power' is as good as any other reason. book uses scoops. but hey, whatever works. i mention it cause there was a mention that using scoops would cause the fighter to get run into by the carrier on takeoff. but i have never seen this happen in any game or book. but hey, maybe its *possible. besides someone taking off would have some power applied to the engines, why would they even let themselves decellerate so much that they would get run into. a scoop-caused-collision its something someone would have to make happen.

hey do you know if scoops are physical scoops or some sort of gathering energy field? physical ones would seem rather ineffective.

book says scoops maneuver, game says thrusters ( can accume wcpriv speaks for the games, since there is no other mention how they maneuver). whatever. its still going to the scoop-caused-collision issue, which doesnt happen, maybe its possible, but someone would have to let it happen. regardless which it is, it doesnt affect the main point. its another of those 'state the obvious' things i was doing.

the fighter parking spots are along the flight line. so there is no time to travel to the flight line. you can see this in the cut scenes of a couple wc games. maybe more are in storage areas, but from the look of the concordia cut scenes the craft seem parked about in little container areas. but if they gotta be brought out for both flight-line and catapult, it means catapults doesnt have any advantage there, they merely match with that issue, they both do it...

yes i did do one extra integral, thank you for pointing that out. i was too busy typing to notice, gj for knowing :) and thanks for also showing that the real value still gives the same message : you will get to 1 kps as good as instantly.

"
Missile locks are a stupid reason for launching with catapults... Anyway, if you're shooting at the opening of a launch deck, just use dumbfires...
"
that is my point actually. i stated this in a previous message. i said that if someone is so close to the launch area that you wont have time to accelleate on your own, he would just blow up the exit and trap you inside, or something to a similar end.

though if he wasnt that close, you would have time to accellerate on your own :). so there goes the catapult advantage in speed.

and in regard to the last bit, fighter prep time doesnt matter, it would be a constant. -just get the fighter ready- fuel, arms, etc. it can be any time, it wont matter in catapult vs bay cause it has to be done for both, just like you said fighters would have to be brought from storage for both. and the 10 seconds to load a tube was a random number, it could be 1 second. its still more than 0.

even if taxiing took time, loading takes time too. who's to say taxiing a few feet takes more time than having a maching grapple you and move you somewhere.

in general, catapults at best would tie. they have no clear advantage.

besides, the scramble example was the best pro bay argument. you can scramble an entire wing in seconds, why wouldnt you be able to do that in a space scenario. in both cases fighters are prepped and waiting along the flight line. i dont see how loading tubes with giant machines is faster than a scarmble. if people wanted to, they could all take off all at once in grid formation. that would get them all out in one giant wave, provided they fit. (they would fit a lot, maybe not all, but since they dont need a 'runway', and can fill the whole bay).

-scheherazade
 
Originally posted by scheherazade
i outlined the reasons very clearly :)
Yes, but all your reasons are based entirely on the fallacious assumption that Wing Commander's completely fictional future-technology is unable to circumvent the problems you say it faces, which it quite obviously has, since catapults exist in WC, and are used all the time.

Put it this way: Catapults are quite clearly an excellent solution for launching fighters in a Wing Commander context simply because they exist and are used regularly. If they were frivolous accessories that offered no tangible advantage over manual take-off, then they would not exist. Ergo, we can assume that there is no reasonable argument against them, for if there were, they would not be in use.
 
Originally posted by scheherazade
the point was to state the obvious. many arguments were against the obvious. so i stated it.

yes i did calculate wrong, though when corrected the answers still exprecc the same conclucions.

(73'000 metric tonnes / 5.972e21 tonnes) * 9.8 = ANS
.00000926...
still getting to the same conclusion. the figher is not strained.

How the hell do you get that answer from that? I get 1.20x10^-16...

and it is valid because 9.8 already takes into account radius. it is taken at earth surface, which is at the end of a radian. i'm sure if you concentrated earths mass into a point and placed yourself at it the force would be greater, but that isnt really possible to do. plus i remember gravity falloff isnt that fast. its strong enough to attract foreign objects and curve heavy comets from hundreds of thousands of miles away. the point is that if a fighter can oppose a force of acceleration as influential as the earth, it will defiantely oppose the force generated by a carriers mass. this was in reference to a comment made that the fighter actually has to 'escape' from the carriers gravity well.

Don't use equations you don't understand. The relationship you're using is, I assume, derived from the standard gravitational field equation...

Gravitational Field = G * (m/r^2)

where:
G is the Gravitational constant
m is the mass of the object
r is the distance from the center of gravity of the object

g (acceleration due to gravity) is equal to 9.8 because when you calculate that equation with the radius and mass of the Earth you get 9.8m/s^2.

Your relation only remains true if everything but mass and gravitational field remain constant. Since the radius of the Earth is different than the distance between the fighter and carrier, your relation doesn't hold true.

Radius is quite important in this case as the radius of the earth is around 6.4x10^6 m while you're only 1.0x10^3 m from the center of the carrier at the most in this case (more like 4 or 5x10^2, but I like round numbers)... that'll end up resulting in a difference of 7 orders of magnitude once you square them, which is rather large

as for fuel and scoops, its game vs book there. game never says what it is, but since it doesnt mention scoops 'internal power' is as good as any other reason. book uses scoops. but hey, whatever works.

Gah... that's the stupidest argument ever. It basically amounts to you saying, 'It says there are scoops, but I don't want there to be'

i mention it cause there was a mention that using scoops would cause the fighter to get run into by the carrier on takeoff. but i have never seen this happen in any game or book.

Yes, I'm the one who mentioned it, because it's a distinct possibility. It's been mentioned in the books that you need to make a clearing turn on launch in case your engines die so the ship doesn't plow into you. This is an extention of that. Fighters are, pretty much, limited to travel with scoops on due to their limited fuel. Capital ships routinely travel with scoops closed across systems. When being chased, one wishes to launch fighters. With a catapult you can get your speed high enough to get the hell out of the way before your scoops slow you down. That way you don't have to do odd scoops closed launches which would cause interesting maneuvering problems for the fighter pilots.


but hey, maybe its *possible. besides someone taking off would have some power applied to the engines, why would they even let themselves decellerate so much that they would get run into. a scoop-caused-collision its something someone would have to make happen.

Um... no...
Carrier: Scoops closed, no limit to speed. Travelling thousands of kps and accellerating

Fighter: Scoops open, limited to top speed when on it's own thrust. Extra push of catapult and the short term speed given to it by the motion of the carrier allows it to lauch without getting smacked into.

hey do you know if scoops are physical scoops or some sort of gathering energy field? physical ones would seem rather ineffective.

Energy fields kilometers wide... it seems somewhat odd that you're arguing about them and don't know what they are...

book says scoops maneuver, game says thrusters ( can accume wcpriv speaks for the games, since there is no other mention how they maneuver). whatever. its still going to the scoop-caused-collision issue, which doesnt happen, maybe its possible, but someone would have to let it happen. regardless which it is, it doesnt affect the main point. its another of those 'state the obvious' things i was doing.

Except your 'state the obvious' thing appears to have been incorect... The books and games aren't exclusive of each other... they're the same thing. Since we're told that primary maneuvering is done via the scoops, one must believe that that's true. Thrusters must be used to augment this (or they're just what you call the system the scoops use to channel the thrust in various directions...)

the fighter parking spots are along the flight line. so there is no time to travel to the flight line. you can see this in the cut scenes of a couple wc games. maybe more are in storage areas, but from the look of the concordia cut scenes the craft seem parked about in little container areas.

Most are in the bays... you have some on deck for either maintainace or because they're the squad on the line in case hostiles show up...

but if they gotta be brought out for both flight-line and catapult, it means catapults doesnt have any advantage there, they merely match with that issue, they both do it...

Which successfully counters you point that it's a disadvantage of a catapult... Especially since the books give the impression that it's bringing the ships up to the line and prepping them that's the bottleneck.

yes i did do one extra integral, thank you for pointing that out. i was too busy typing to notice, gj for knowing :) and thanks for also showing that the real value still gives the same message : you will get to 1 kps as good as instantly.

You, of course, ignored the comment reguarding the limit to 1k/s...

and in regard to the last bit, fighter prep time doesnt matter, it would be a constant. -just get the fighter ready- fuel, arms, etc. it can be any time, it wont matter in catapult vs bay cause it has to be done for both, just like you said fighters would have to be brought from storage for both. and the 10 seconds to load a tube was a random number, it could be 1 second. its still more than 0.

Except loading a tube can be part of the 'bringing from storage' equation. Instead of bringing it up the elevator and moving it into place, it comes through and right into the tube... You're making assumptions.

even if taxiing took time, loading takes time too. who's to say taxiing a few feet takes more time than having a maching grapple you and move you somewhere.

Nobody, you were making assumptions. I pointed that out. I have no preference one way or another on whether catapults have an advantage or not.

in general, catapults at best would tie. they have no clear advantage.

Except that they clearly get the ship launched at a higher speed, and therefore cleared out of the way faster... It's also a safety issue as mentioned in TPoF novel where apparantly confed pilots might refuse to launch without a proper catapult...

besides, the scramble example was the best pro bay argument. you can scramble an entire wing in seconds, why wouldnt you be able to do that in a space scenario. in both cases fighters are prepped and waiting along the flight line. i dont see how loading tubes with giant machines is faster than a scarmble. if people wanted to, they could all take off all at once in grid formation. that would get them all out in one giant wave, provided they fit. (they would fit a lot, maybe not all, but since they dont need a 'runway', and can fill the whole bay).

Wow, that would be horribly stupid... None of the ships have large enough bays to even attempt that... no bay based ships we've seen have been capable or launching more than two fighters at a time. Launching a bunch side by side in a small area just opens you up to having one clip something and take out the fighters and the flight bay. Scrambles are just as fast for both systems, when going into a possibly hostile situation there are pilots manned and ready to launch, either sitting in the tubes or in the decks. You'll get your first wave out suprisingly quickly either way.
 
I will come back to this thread to make a few more points:

1) In "End Run", the Tarawa can't maneuver about Kilrah except by using its tractor beam to grab the planet to slingshot it because they're running with scoops closed. That has the effect of a) making them burn most of their fuel for the acceleration, and b) the scoops are stated as being the only way to maneuver short of burning reaction mass to change course. Fighters do the same thing, or at least military fighters do.

2) Using Privateer's ships as the justification for 'all ships maneuver with thrusters' is a fallacy that needs to be corrected. Reason being is that we're dealing with older technology on the Kilrathi and Confed side's garrison forces... AND because we're flying CIVILIAN craft. Or are you going to tell me that a LearJet or a Concorde supersonic transport represents the limits of aerospace technology? Notice that MILITARY jets have capabilities far beyond either of those two craft... maneuverability for the F-16 is achieved by having an unstable airframe, while the F-22 has vectored thrust capability for increased maneuverability. Using civvie craft to declare that 'this is how things are done' is pretty weak reasoning.

3) Reading posts completely helps a lot in figuring out what people are saying. Catapults have been stated as being useful in the WC setting for the following three main reasons: a) Speed is life, and starting fast means you're able to fight that much sooner; b) Getting clear of the carrier is good; c) they can give you acceleration that you don't usually get even on full afterburner, without wasting your fuel - see Prophecy; d) they're safer than launching by having everyone try to fly out of the bay at the same time, by controlling the launches and allowing you to spit people out on known trajectories so you can fire them off without worrying about one guy clipping another the way you'd do with a 'empty the deck' magnum launch like what Intrepid did in the TPoF novel. When the alignment coils were destroyed in this same novel because of a torpedo strike, the Lexington's pilots refused to fly... because, as Seether notes, they couldn't ensure that pilots were aligned correctly for launch.

4) Go back to your physics homework. Your gravitational 'calculations' assumed that you had a nicely rounded sphere with which to measure the gravitational attraction with... AND you used Earth's gravitational constant as the attraction the ship would have. Yes, the fields on the ship are at 1 Earth gravity. But that's generated by generators below the deck... and the ship itself is an irregular shape which won't have the same gravitation attraction at all points, since the surface isn't evenly spaced from the center of mass. Plus we need to consider the problem that, unlike Earth or another planet, the carrier's mass isn't concentrated at the center - but spread out irregularly as well. More mass may be in the engines at the rear of the ship, with the remainder of the mass stretched out across superstructure and armor.

5) Stick with WC if you're arguing WC. Don't drag in other genres or 'real life'. Mixing these is almost as bad as dragging in Star Wars to justify your answer. Different measurements, technologies, and the like exist. It's like comparing apples to oranges; meaningless.
 
Originally posted by Haesslich

2) Using Privateer's ships as the justification for 'all ships maneuver with thrusters' is a fallacy that needs to be corrected. Reason being is that we're dealing with older technology on the Kilrathi and Confed side's garrison forces... AND because we're flying CIVILIAN craft. Or are you going to tell me that a LearJet or a Concorde supersonic transport represents the limits of aerospace technology? Notice that MILITARY jets have capabilities far beyond either of those two craft... maneuverability for the F-16 is achieved by having an unstable airframe, while the F-22 has vectored thrust capability for increased maneuverability. Using civvie craft to declare that 'this is how things are done' is pretty weak reasoning.

Of course, since military craft have things called thrusters as well, that pretty much negates what you just said.

4) Go back to your physics homework. Your gravitational 'calculations' assumed that you had a nicely rounded sphere with which to measure the gravitational attraction with... AND you used Earth's gravitational constant as the attraction the ship would have.

You seem to have misunderstood his calculations. He was assuming that the gravitational field of two objects is related only by mass. So the calculation he used effectively worked out the field per unit mass and then multiplied it by the mass of the ship. That's what the 9.8 was being used for. It's wrong, but not as stupid as you seem to think he was doing :)

Yes, the fields on the ship are at 1 Earth gravity. But that's generated by generators below the deck...

This is just related to the misunderstanding above....

and the ship itself is an irregular shape which won't have the same gravitation attraction at all points, since the surface isn't evenly spaced from the center of mass. Plus we need to consider the problem that, unlike Earth or another planet, the carrier's mass isn't concentrated at the center - but spread out irregularly as well. More mass may be in the engines at the rear of the ship, with the remainder of the mass stretched out across superstructure and armor.

Conveniently, the ships appear to have their center of masses right in the center of the ship... When a torque force is applied to a free moving body, it will act around the center of gravity. Since capital ships generally seem to turn around their centers, the center of gravity will be right about the geometric center of the ship. Then you just treat it as a point mass for calculation's sake and you should get something more than accurate for the purposes of something like this. Of course, this has absolutely nothing to do with what he calculated since he did it wrong and didn't take radius into account at all, so where to measure it from has no bearing on anything...
 
Originally posted by TC
Of course, since military craft have things called thrusters as well, that pretty much negates what you just said.

My mistake. I recall the comment about the CCG noting craft also have thrusters, and earlier debates about the 'thrusters versus scoops' role - though primary maneuvering still seems to be scoop-based, at least for gross movements. This would include things like 'bank hard 90 degrees' versus 'rotate slowly 1 degree right', unless you're using autoslide or something - where I can't imagine using scoops to change the fighter's orientation.

You seem to have misunderstood his calculations. He was assuming that the gravitational field of two objects is related only by mass. So the calculation he used effectively worked out the field per unit mass and then multiplied it by the mass of the ship. That's what the 9.8 was being used for. It's wrong, but not as stupid as you seem to thing :)

Still, wrong constant, and I'm trying to figure out where the minimal gravitation attraction kicks in. It'd be easy to overcome - but I'm still more worried about that carrier behind me accelerating than overcoming its minor gravity.

Conveniently, the ships appear to have their center of masses right in the center of the ship... When a torque force is applied to a free moving body, it will act around the center of gravity. Since capital ships generally seem to turn around their centers, the center of gravity will be right about the geometric center of the ship. Then you just treat it as a point mass for calculation's sake and you should get something fairly accurate. Of course, this has absolutely nothing to do with what he calculated since he did it wrong and didn't take radius into account at all, so where to measure it from has no bearing on anything...

Back to the debate which was, originally... aobut what stopped Concordia from launching fighters?
 
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