Suncrusher Armor Threshold?

CaptJodan · Post by **CaptJodan** » 2003-06-05 02:48pm

Yes, I'm new to POSTING to the board (not to reading it). Poke away.

But a question...has anyone ever tried to determine how resistant the Suncrusher's armor would have to have been to withstand the blast from a star going nova? (not to mention being inbedded in a gas giant for as long as it was, and taking no damage) Just how tough is that armor?

Ender · Post by **Ender** » 2003-06-05 03:10pm

It took the prototype DS's shot with the only damage beign from the momentum shaking things up inside the ship. So it can take atleast 1E32 joules (unless the thing was firing at low power, I don't recall if it was or not)

Lord Pounder · Post by **Lord Pounder** » 2003-06-05 03:15pm

The prototype never hit the Sun Crusher. It simply grazed it. The Black Holes of the Maw made the beam curve and miss.

Connor MacLeod · Post by **Connor MacLeod** » 2003-06-05 03:48pm

The Sun Crusher Armor can shrug off ISD-grade firepower (at least single bolts, probably entire broadsides or parts of broadsides) without a scratch.

IIRC the Death Star prototype, it merely grazed the Sun Crusher with the edge of the beam, and as I recall there WAS damage from the impact (although it still survived.)

CaptJodan · Post by **CaptJodan** » 2003-06-05 04:20pm

Hmm, now I didn't read the entier series of the books featuring it, but I've heard that it did survive the destruction of a star going nova. Would the energy from an event like this be greater than that of a superlaser bast (grazing or otherwise)?

consequences · Post by **consequences** » 2003-06-05 05:27pm

All dependent on the magnitude of the supernova, and the Sun crusher's distance from it, both of which are pretty well unknown.

Grand Admiral Thrawn · Post by **Grand Admiral Thrawn** » 2003-06-05 07:10pm

Ender wrote:It took the prototype DS's shot with the only damage beign from the momentum shaking things up inside the ship. So it can take atleast 1E32 joules (unless the thing was firing at low power, I don't recall if it was or not)

Hardly. It took a grasing shot, and barely survived.

YT300000 · Post by **YT300000** » 2003-06-05 08:53pm

Me in another thread wrote:The Sun Crusher can withstand multiple supernovas, lots of enemy fire, a glancing hit from the Prototype Death Star's superlaser, and still be intact and fully functional.

Basically, the Sun Crusher can take a lot fire.

The superlaser on the Prototye Death Star was set on low power, with a ~ 15 minute recharge rate.

consequences · Post by **consequences** » 2003-06-05 09:17pm

Let's see, if we buy the WEG's stats, and take 15 minutes as opposed to 24 hours, then about 5E30 would be correct for the beam intensity, although how much of it actually hit is debatable.

CaptainChewbacca · Post by **CaptainChewbacca** » 2003-06-05 09:27pm

consequences wrote:All dependent on the magnitude of the supernova, and the Sun crusher's distance from it, both of which are pretty well unknown.

It makes it easier if you assume for the sake of argument that Caridia orbited a G-Type star (it was yellow, as I recall). Also, Caridia was a bit warmer than earth, and if the star was the same as sol, that means the planet was a bit closer (steaming jungles).

Fuzzy logic says: G-Type Star, 90 million miles away.

Anyone got a better idea?

YT300000 · Post by **YT300000** » 2003-06-05 09:30pm

consequences wrote:Let's see, if we buy the WEG's stats, and take 15 minutes as opposed to 24 hours, then about 5E30 would be correct for the beam intensity, although how much of it actually hit is debatable.

The blast was a lot weaker than a full power one.

consequences · Post by **consequences** » 2003-06-05 09:44pm

Okay. more like 1E30 at fifteen minutes, sorry, blew the math.

YT300000 · Post by **YT300000** » 2003-06-05 09:48pm

consequences wrote:Okay. more like 1E30 at fifteen minutes, sorry, blew the math.

That's okay. I'm not very good at math myself (well, I'm only in high school).

Ender · Post by **Ender** » 2003-06-05 11:37pm

Grand Admiral Thrawn wrote:
Ender wrote:It took the prototype DS's shot with the only damage beign from the momentum shaking things up inside the ship. So it can take atleast 1E32 joules (unless the thing was firing at low power, I don't recall if it was or not)

Hardly. It took a grasing shot, and barely survived.

You are all correct that it just grazed it. But the quote says it nearly shook itself apart IIRC. Thus the damage was from the momentum of the blast, not the blast hurting the armor.

Solauren · Post by **Solauren** » 2003-06-06 07:34am

I don't think we can come up with concrete numbers, but we can come up with some good approximations from the rather dramatic events

First, it rammed through the bridge of a Star Destroyer, face to back, and suffered no apparant structural damage. It is entirely possible, and probably likely, that the Star Destroyers shields were up.

If the Star Destroyers shields were up, the Sun Crusher took ramming a 70 trillion GW+ shield, and then rammed through rather dense armor, as well as other major systems, than flew off happily without damage.

Does anyone know how to calculate the damage the armor should have taken from doing that? Assume the Sun Crusher is as fast as a Tie Interceptor.

Next, they toss it down into Yavin, and it sits there, unshielded, for at least several weeks, probably longer (I base this time estimate on the fact Wedge was getting cuddly with Qwi Xux, Kyp's force training under both Luke and Exar Kun was probably more then a few days, and other story elements)

Assume it was in Jupiter near the core of the planet (about 90% of the way down) and figure out how much preasure per second was being put on it.

Next, Kyp steals it and goes and beats on Daala's fleet by blowing up 7 Blue Supergiant stars. The Sun Crusher was hit by all 7 supernova shockwaves. I have no freaking idea how you'd figure that one out, but if anyone knows, go right ahead

Finally, it was dueling the Death star and was hit by a superlaser blast at 1/4 - 1/2 power. He was only hit by at most 10% of the beam. Probably 1%.

The best way I can see to do it is
Low end: 1% of 1/4 of the power of the Death Star superlaser (according to this website, that's about 1E38 J joules, divided by 4, then divided by 1) which is 625000000000000000000000000000 joules
(625000000000000000 Terrajoules). That itself is something like 14 Trillion turbolaser blasts

High end: 10% of 1/2 of the power of the Death Star superlaser
which is 500000000000000000000000000000 joules, or
500000000000000000 Terrajoules. That is somethig like 10 Billion trillon Turbolaser blasts

And that was what was needed to moderately - nearly cripple a STARFIGHTER armored in the stuff

Imagine what it would take to destroy a Star Destroyer covered in 3 layers of it?

CaptJodan · Post by **CaptJodan** » 2003-06-06 10:48am

Thanks for the replies.

Yeah, since I never read the end books, I had figured that with all it HAD done, it was pretty much indestructable (sitting inside a gas giant can't be a good thing for anyone, as there's intense heat, as well as pressure, IIRC), but I obviously had not heard of the superlaser blast. Still, that little bugger took a lot. If the Empire could field even one Star Destroyer with that type of armor, it would be it's own little super weapon. (However, it would probably be more practical on a Galaxy Gun or Death Star, but that would take far more massive amounts of the armor)

consequences · Post by **consequences** » 2003-06-06 11:09am

That wasn't a full DS superlaser though. Scaled down version, which afects the base number being divided.

Solauren · Post by **Solauren** » 2003-06-06 11:34am

May I remind you that they descibed it as a fully functional prototype.

Function of the Death Star: Blow up planets
Full Functional: Can blow up planets.

It also had no trouble blowing up Kessels moon, and they were going to blow Kessel up with it.

*Which resulted in the funniest line from any sci-fi book I've ever read, forgive me if I mess up the qoute, I'm at work on a break*

[qoute]
"You missed"

"What do you mean I missed? How do you miss with a planet destroying superlaser?"

"You hit the moon"
[/qoute]

Crazedwraith · Post by **Crazedwraith** » 2003-06-06 11:36am

wasn't the armour supposed to be "invincible" IIRC

CaptJodan · Post by **CaptJodan** » 2003-06-06 04:52pm

Alas, "supposed to be" and "is" are two totally different things. The Titanic was "supposed to be" unsinkable. Don't need to go any further than that.

I suppose it wasn't "indestructable" or whatnaught.

YT300000 · Post by **YT300000** » 2003-06-06 09:10pm

Crazedwraith wrote:wasn't the armour supposed to be "invincible" IIRC

The armour was near-invincible. Just have a look at Solauren's post above to see what it endured.

IIRC, there are multiple grades of quantum armour. The highest (Sun Crusher) was near-invincible. The lowest would probably be about the armour the Shadow Chaser had, tough, but not invincible. KJA, I know.

Striderteen · Post by **Striderteen** » 2003-06-07 03:46am

Give Thrawn an Eclipse armored in that stuff, and he'll take the galaxy single-handed.

Illuminatus Primus · Post by **Illuminatus Primus** » 2003-06-07 11:58am

Striderteen wrote:Give Thrawn an Eclipse armored in that stuff, and he'll take the galaxy single-handed.

It's not polite to jack off in public.

consequences · Post by **consequences** » 2003-06-08 09:51pm

Yeah, but if you gave Daala that same ship, she'd have a decent shot. Thrawn doesn't need that big an advantage.

Admiral Johnason · Post by **Admiral Johnason** » 2003-06-08 10:28pm

It surivived a friggin' supernova. That puts it a little out of my calculation range.