Clinton wrote:
A question I would have for airships in the traveler setting involves
getting rid of hydrogen or helium all together. If light and strong
enough materials can be imported from offworld to make rigid vacuum bags
for lift, why not use them?
VXii13 has vacuum airships at TL(4+4), i.e. as steampunk alternate
technology. It wouldn't be much of a stretch to call them straight TL8
instead. However, a vacuum airship needs DR 12 rigid hulls. There are no
"rigid bags", you need "rigid tanks" for that vacuum. TL8 is the TL
where GURPS Traveller introduces contragrav.
I'm not familiar enough with the traveler universe or the Gurps vehicles
rules to know if this could be done and what the cost difference would be
from imported contra-grav. But as I read this thread I could not help but
think about this.
If you want technical and commercial reasons for airships, you need
cheap, slow blimps at a low TL. So far I have three blimps:
* 3+7 people, 1,750 lbs. cargo, 40 mph, $41,200 at TL6.
* 5+15 people, 3,750 lbs. cargo, 50 mph, $223,000 at TL6.
* 10+80 people, 4,000 lbs. cargo, 50 mph, $373,0000 at TL6.
The largest blimp is Cr233 per passenger seat. The cost per
passenger-mile is fairly high because it is so slow and the crew is so
large. In that size range a non-rigid airship wasn't competitive, but
I'll have to see if a much larger one will do.
The vacuum airship could be a "because we can" toy at higher TLs.
Probably TL12 or TL13, because there is no reason to do a toy at any
lower TL, and because the high TL makes the hull armor lighter. Iain
Banks had a vacuum airshipin his Culture setting, where it was used as a
cruise liner on an Orbital (a mini-Ringworld).
Regards,
Onno
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