Problems with B5

[fgalkin]

Intelligent? I think not. I'm a Fiver, an allegiance which quite clearly demonstrates my utter lack of sanity.

And to be frank, my impression is that this place doesn't find Fivers very intelligent. I hope I can live up to your expectations. After all, I wouldn't want to deprive you folks of the opportunity to make fun of someone to stoke your own egos.

His second post on the board and without a shred of provocation, he's already casting an enormous ad-hominem attack against the entire board. Oh, goody. This bodes so well for his willingness to debate objectively in future.

Mind you, this is the guy who thought IXJac's "weapons do not penetrate based on force or pressure" argument was a devastating critique of my website.

he's a SpaceBattler.

Have a very nice day.
-fgalkin

[HemlockGrey]

'Weapons do not penetrate based on force or pressure'?!?

What the flying fuck?

[[BL]Phalanx]

His second post on the board and without a shred of provocation, he's already casting an enormous ad-hominem attack against the entire board. Oh, goody. This bodes so well for his willingness to debate objectively in future.

Mind you, this is the guy who thought IXJac's "weapons do not penetrate based on force or pressure" argument was a devastating critique of my website.

LOL. Where's the attack? Do you deny that you guys generally don't find Fivers intelligent? Do you deny that you enjoy ridiculing those with less intelligence? Did I say that was wrong?

As for IXJac's argument, he later admitted he was wrong. While I was following the debate, I thought he had some legitimate points, but I was hardly characterizing his arguments as a "devastating critique"... that's something you made up. The problem I had was that you were being rude to him even while he was civil throughout. He even had the good grace at the end to admit he had made a mistake. What ever happened to polite?

[[BL]Phalanx]

POKE Welcome ^_^

About your second paragraph:

This site's name is Stardestroyer.net. What else can you expect from a message board named that??

My only advice to you is: don't be a troll. Follow that, and you'll do fine here, even if your not a warsie.

Ask anybody at SpaceBattles if I'm a troll over there. Of course, you guys probably don't put much stock in the testimony of SB'ers anyway.

[fgalkin]

Shinova is a SB'er, too.

Have a very nice day.
-fgalkin

[Mike_6002]

The 500 Gigaton Fusion bomb in the final battle between AoL, Shadows, and Vorlon, only blew up a few battlecrabs at a couple of meters distance talk about a inefficent warhead!!! That's just my thought!!!!!!!! Don't have picture for it someone post it and I'll look in the morning

[fgalkin]

The 500 Gigaton Fusion bomb in the final battle between AoL, Shadows, and Vorlon, only blew up a few battlecrabs at a couple of meters distance talk about a inefficent warhead!!! That's just my thought!!!!!!!! Don't have picture for it someone post it and I'll look in the morning

It was Megatons, not Gigatons, fool. And it did not blow up the BCs.

Have a very nice day.
-fgalkin

[Slartibartfast]

4. How feasible is it to have a ship with an independent rotating section? I think the Omega-class destroyers look cool, but somehow it seems wrong. I have a BS in Computer science, and only passing knowledge of engineering, so maybe I'm offbase with this one.

Aside from the massive engineering headache, there are still a few problems. One being a very nasty coreolis effect in the center. And then there is manuverability. Tell me, have you ever tried to push a gyroscope?

I think having two opposing rotating sections kinda solves part of the problem, doesn't it?

[weemadando]

The shape of the rotating section is the biggest joke. Never mind the tactical concerns; let's look at what kind of moronically incompetent engineer would have chosen that shape. By making it rectangular (and having it rotate about the wrong axis!), it has a much larger moment of rotational inertia than it would have if it were cylindrical, rotating about its lengthwise axis.

Let's take a rectangular piece which is (for example) 400 metres long and 150 metres square. Its rotational moment of inertia I (rotating about an axis drawn perpendicular to its length, as in the show) would be M(a^2+b^2)/12 where a is length and b is width, so it would be I=15208M.

Now, let's take the rotational moment of inertia I for a rotating cylinder of roughly similar cross-section area (roughly 275m diameter) rotating about an axis drawn through its length. Rotational moment of inertia I for a thick-walled cylinder is 0.5M(R1^2+R2^2). Assume R2 is zero, ie- it's a solid cylinder, which is an easy way to approximate constant density. This gives us I=9453M. Note that the length would be the same.

In other words, if they made it a cylindrical rotating section instead of an elongated rectangular section, they could keep the same internal volume but they would cut the rotational moment of inertia by nearly 40%, not to mention reducing the head-on target profile from 400m wide to 275m wide (you B5 guys can plug in proper scaling figures for one of those ships at your leisure).

Ah, but do we ever see Omega class destroyers suffering from the side-effects of this design "flaw"? No. As such we must make the assumption that there is a system in place that minimises any problems with the design.

[[BL]Phalanx]

Ah, but do we ever see Omega class destroyers suffering from the side-effects of this design "flaw"? No. As such we must make the assumption that there is a system in place that minimises any problems with the design.

Sure, but that doesn't change the fact that its design is sub-optimal. Again, look at the Starfury. Obviously in the show it works fine, it accelerates and turns quickly, so obviously the technology is there to overcome the flaws. That doesn't change the fact that the flaws are still there.

[[BL]Phalanx]

The 500 Gigaton Fusion bomb in the final battle between AoL, Shadows, and Vorlon, only blew up a few battlecrabs at a couple of meters distance talk about a inefficent warhead!!! That's just my thought!!!!!!!! Don't have picture for it someone post it and I'll look in the morning

There was only ever one 500 GT bomb in Babylon 5, and that was in "A Day in the Strife", where the bomb detonated at a distance of 4000 kilometers from the station.

As for the bombs you're actually referring to... the main advantage of those bombs was in concealment. Going up against 10,000 ship fleets... even with all the bombs they had, it wasn't going to make much difference. Even so, they had to try everything they had. It's not like they were going to win by brute force anyway. They were outnumbered 10,000 to 8,000 against ships superior to their own.

That means the bombs weren't there to be "decisive" to the battle.

Note that every one of the bombs they had was used up at that final battle. We only saw the detonations of 3 of them at the beginning, but information from B5Wars tells us that all were used in the last Shadow War. This probably means that as the Vorlons and Shadows and Army of Light clashed, the remaining nukes were used up.

[weemadando]

Ah, but do we ever see Omega class destroyers suffering from the side-effects of this design "flaw"? No. As such we must make the assumption that there is a system in place that minimises any problems with the design.

Sure, but that doesn't change the fact that its design is sub-optimal. Again, look at the Starfury. Obviously in the show it works fine, it accelerates and turns quickly, so obviously the technology is there to overcome the flaws. That doesn't change the fact that the flaws are still there.

I don't argue the point that the Omega's design is "different" but I do make the point that we never see any adverse side effects of the design either in terms of ship performance or crew health and safety. So... One must assume that it works the way it was intended to and that the design is made that way for a reason.

[Patrick Degan]

I don't argue the point that the Omega's design is "different" but I do make the point that we never see any adverse side effects of the design either in terms of ship performance or crew health and safety. So... One must assume that it works the way it was intended to and that the design is made that way for a reason.

Hmm... I've no doubt that the Omega must employ some form of contrarotating flywheel or hub(s) to bleed off angular momentum transfer. But still, those two modular sections are not the way I'd go in designing my starship.

About the only justification I can think of for such a design is that the modules are designed as detatchable sections and optimised for a specific mission profile. Perhaps it is possible to turn an Omega into a troop carrier by exchanging modules at the navy yard for containers with extra personnel accomodation built in. Perhaps others are intended as missile systems and contain VL silos. But for all that, you'd be better off designing modular sections you can pull out of and plug into a cyllindrical rotational section, or simply building specialised ships.

No matter how you look at it, it's not the best design by any stretch of the imagination.

[Shinova]

Or simply the Omega just has stronger engines and stronger hull material than today's.

[Stormbringer]

Or simply the Omega just has stronger engines and stronger hull material than today's.

True, but you can still build a ship with less stress if you didn't design t that way. Unless you're a dumb engineer you don't put any stress on something if you can avoid it with proper design.

[[BL]Phalanx]

I don't argue the point that the Omega's design is "different" but I do make the point that we never see any adverse side effects of the design either in terms of ship performance or crew health and safety. So... One must assume that it works the way it was intended to and that the design is made that way for a reason.

Of *course* it "works". Just like the Starfury "works". But it's not just a matter of being different... it's a matter of the design being sub-optimal, and in fact having several glaring flaws.

Heck, we see Omegas execute a full 180 in about ~5 seconds in "Severed Dreams". Fans used to call that the "magic turn", because it was simply impossible for an Omega to execute such a turn and not have the crew smashed all over the walls and floor and ceiling.

We usually chalk it up to FX error, and stick with more reasonable rotation speeds of an Omega turning around. I did some calcs awhile back, and don't remember them exactly... but assuming that the axis of rotation is in the middle of the rotating section, and that the crew experiences 1 g outward (towards the bow and stern), it would take about 30 seconds for a full 360 degree rotation.

[[BL]Phalanx]

Or simply the Omega just has stronger engines and stronger hull material than today's.

You'd think so, wouldn't you? But no... B5 ships are made of cardboard.

[Shinova]

Or simply the Omega just has stronger engines and stronger hull material than today's.

You'd think so, wouldn't you? But no... B5 ships are made of cardboard.

And...that statement means???

[Stormbringer]

Or simply the Omega just has stronger engines and stronger hull material than today's.

You'd think so, wouldn't you? But no... B5 ships are made of cardboard.

And...that statement means???

It means according to some questionable calculation B5 has very weak structural materials. Most assume the worst possible of B5 and go from there so they're distinctly low end.

[Darth Wong]

What different does it make anyway? No matter how strong the materials are, you can still reduce the stress and increase the ship's ability to withstand damage and acceleration by improving the structural design. The design is shit. With stronger materials, the design would still be shit.

As for the supposed invisibility of these problems, we have a ship's captain worrying that a hit amidships will kill their gravity, and we have the visibly observed large target profile from the front, and we have the ships' ponderous forward acceleration. The penalties for this design are obvious.

And it gets worse. Counter-rotating flywheels would reduce (not eliminate) the gyroscope problem, but not the stress concentration problem. And load imbalancing or damage to one end of the rotating section could cause destructive vibrations.