Trek Designers have moved to SW!

[Warspite]

OK, I concede on the whole Mil Mi-24 Hind subject.

But, my main point about the glass turrets still stands, regardless of their retraction into the fuselage or not.

If they're implementing micro-SL's, why not at the nose, where the other turrets are? That's why I mentioned the B25 as an example, or other close support/medium bomber craft, the heaviest guns are in the nose, and are usually controlled by the pilot/gunner. Side turrets may have good fields of fire, and with the main armament pointing forward, they would merely have a supressive role. It's unnecessary to have those turrets.

[Patrick Ogaard]

The wing turrets are remote controlled. They also have two emitters, one on the top half and one on the bottom. The arc's of fire are actually massive and each half has an arc of fire nearly equal to that of a centerline belly or top turret.

Wow,evidently I must have mistaken the gun apparatus for a clonetrooper.
After all the design is not so stupid as I feared initially.

Yep. The wing-mounted composite-beam doodads have their gun mechanisms contained within the sphere itself, with the sphere fitted in a ring mount. There is also a wing bulge immediately aft of the wing-mounted spheres, presumably for additional systems, which restricts aft fire. The wing-mounted guns also have, as already mentioned, one emitter above the wing and one below the wing. (Info taken from the ICS.)

As for the manned guns, a large part of their bulk appears to swing back into the small companionway between the troop compartment and the forward crew compartment.

The ball-mount guns have a maximum yield per shot of 300 gigajoules, essentially as a short-duration cutting beam with relatively little collateral blast damage. In contrast, the antipersonnel guns, two forward and one aft in ball turrets, have a maximum yield per shot of "just" 5 gigajoules. The antipersonnel guns are the same as those fitted to the AT-TE (at least in terms of yield).

[Vympel]

It's unnecessary to have those turrets.

Heya the more firepower the better really- the nose light anti-personnel turrets are very much like the Mi-24V HIND-E's 12.7mm YakB machine gun- the side ball turrets, the unmanned lasers on the wings- these are the true forward facing firepower. Putting the lasers on the front would restrict their field of fire for no good reason- they're already covered by the wing composite lasers.

[Darth Wong]

Since it already has guns on the wings, guns at the back, and two guns at the front, it seems silly to say that the ball turrets should have been moved somewhere else. And if you moved them inside the troop compartment to reduce frontal target profile (which is not that important in its role, as SS pointed out), you would reduce their arc of fire and eat up space used for hauling troops.

The proposals I see for improving this design seem to involve replacing some of the other guns with these turrets, thus reducing the overall firepower of the craft.

[SWPIGWANG]

Or simply adding more guns to the existing turrets locations instead.

I'd say that it would better to have guns by themselves in a semi-embadded turret and add a gunner (or two) and viewport at the bottom/side. Enlongate the hull if necessary.

Far better protection without loss of firing arc.


And for some reason airdynamics does not exist....

[Master of Ossus]

Or simply adding more guns to the existing turrets locations instead.

I'd say that it would better to have guns by themselves in a semi-embadded turret and add a gunner (or two) and viewport at the bottom/side. Enlongate the hull if necessary.

Far better protection without loss of firing arc.


And for some reason airdynamics does not exist....

But you also increase the mass of the aircraft tremendously. Aerodynamics are not as important for SW craft as they are for real life aircraft and helicopters, because repulsorlifts and fly-by wire systems help to preserve stability. Actually, even modern aircraft are frequently unstable on multiple axes in order to increase their maneuverability, and must use fly-by-wire systems to assist the pilots. Increasing the mass of an aircraft, however, creates a problem. A new design is generally needed, but it would dramatically decrease the transportability of the LAAT. You are treating the LAAT as if it were a complete weapon system in and of itself, but in fact it is part of a much larger weapon system--the Acclamator troop transport. Increasing the length of the hull would dramatically reduce the Acclamator's ability to carry LAAT's, and might reduce the effectiveness of each ship.

[SWPIGWANG]

You only need to enlongate/widen/deepen it enough so the amount of internal carrying space is the same. Because of this, the only addition of weight would be weight of armor, and that is what we are trying to fix aren't we? The redesigned ship would be more efficient weight-to-protection wise then up-armoring the turret.

Of course there is the matter of not armoring and relying on shields, but people here think its stupid and that is what the redesign is about.

[Master of Ossus]

You only need to enlongate/widen/deepen it enough so the amount of internal carrying space is the same. Because of this, the only addition of weight would be weight of armor, and that is what we are trying to fix aren't we? The redesigned ship would be more efficient weight-to-protection wise then up-armoring the turret.

Of course there is the matter of not armoring and relying on shields, but people here think its stupid and that is what the redesign is about.

The way that the LAAT's are carried in Acclamators, as shown by the ICS, shows that the relevent dimension is their length, and that their width and height can be relatively flexible. I'm not sure that your elongation of the ship would be effective, given the delivery mechanism that they are designed to operate with.

[Warspite]

Since it already has guns on the wings, guns at the back, and two guns at the front, it seems silly to say that the ball turrets should have been moved somewhere else. And if you moved them inside the troop compartment to reduce frontal target profile (which is not that important in its role, as SS pointed out), you would reduce their arc of fire and eat up space used for hauling troops.

The proposals I see for improving this design seem to involve replacing some of the other guns with these turrets, thus reducing the overall firepower of the craft.

I defend the removal of the glass turrets (completely taken out of the design), and relocation of the micro-SL's to the front of the LAAT, on gimbal turrets (of course), allowing plenty of rotation in both axis... Like modern day gunships. The other guns remain in the same place, providing the same firepower and supressive effect.

If the glass turrets are stowed inside of the LAAT when not in use, then that space is already lost for the carriage of troops, so we can use for the instalation of side guns, problaby taking less space than the whole glass turret installation. (But that we just don't know).

The LAAT is a fine craft, with plenty of teeth, but those glass turrets seem an unnecessary implementation.

[consequences]

Keep in mind that the clonetroopers equipment was probably designed in secret, and that this was their first combat deployment. Therefore, the design might not be as efficient as it would be if the Republic Board of Engineers had put a million man-hours into the thing. Then again, official design commitees fuck up too.