DarkWarriorKarg wrote:"Steam! The world shall be saved by steam!"
- Prof. Steamhead, Ninja High School
Yep, I had something like that in mind. That and something from an anime called Robot Carnival, with two big 'mechs' fighting in Japan around 16-1700's (IIRC). I think one was steam powered, the other was a walking battery stockpile and the pilot was a mad scientist with pedal bike hooked up to a generator...
I can see a steam powered mech packing more energy weapons than a nuke powered robot.
svartalf wrote:R. Ditto started speaking of Sirling engines... What's that? is it Rifts stuff I don't know about, real world technology, or something out of SF that I've yet to come across? (huge holes in my culture, I have to admit)
Stirling was some guy from long ago who created an interesting system kind of called a "hot air" engine that operated simply by having a hot side and a cold side. It was meant to be an alternative to steam engines, since boilers back then had a habit of exploding.
One recent version actually worked just off the heat of a human hand. (although it was more of a novelty than anything else.)
Stirling Engine info sources
http://www.stirlingengine.com/http://www.stirlingengine.com/faq/one?scope=public&faq_id=1As for TW steam engines... what were the Tolkeen Juggernauts all about?
I haven't looked in any SoT books much, at least not in a year at least (except the one with CKs).
I was thinking as an alternative power source for various things, I never really though about the IJ's.
and since there have been figures quoted as to the enregy output of some engines... anybody know the energy needed to power a bot or suit of PA?
I've estimated a PA might need a few hundred to a few thousand watts to operate at full capacity, perhaps another few thousand watts for multiple or high power energy weapons.
Larger vehicles and robots probably need a few times as much or more, perhaps a few dozen times more for heavier ones or ones packing a lot of energy weapons.
also... I'd go much more easily with micro fusion reactors being around than with the idea or having a SAMAS carrying a micro *fission* reactor (the text says "nuclear" so it has to be either of those), good for 20 years without refueling... given the rate a modern nuclear reactor has to be refueled, even if great progresses are made in reactor efficiency, I can't believe that fission can fit the bill : not so small, nor for so long. Then again, since Rifts earth may very well be the direct heir of HU earth, ther is nothing to say that there were no alien influences in our mastering fusion technology.
Can't fit the bill?
Technology is always advancing, and during the golden age, it will likely have advanced at an even faster and greater rate.
If we have man sized systems putting out 290 watts using a bunch (18 total) of 2x4in "General Purpose Heat Sources" (each containing 4 iridium-clad Pu238 fuel pellets), then 94 more years of advancement, including a few decades of rapid advancements, makes it seem even more possible to me that such a system could be made both small and very efficient.
Another factor is that nuclear material is expensive, and some nuke powered things seems to cost millions upon millions of dollars more than non-nuke ones, indicating a nuclear power source with a dangerous and not to common fuel source (which needs a lot of time and care to handle safely). Those high prices are not of some small, clean efficient power source that has potential fuel sources being more common than dirt.
Some civilian vehicles in Rifts have no energy weapons, and nuke powered ones only cost a few hundred thousand credits more than other versions, which makes sense for something that doesn't need that much power at all, needing little nuclear material. For military vehicles, I've seen nuke powered ones costing a good 10-20 million credits more compared to gas/electric ones costing a few million or less.
For fusion power... well, considering you have to maintain and contain a reaction with temperatures into millions of degrees and extremely high pressures, I think such a thing is poorly suited for things like PA and such, especially since a powerful "magnetic bottle" and insulation against neutron radiation is needed to make it work "safely".
Any fusion power plants in Rifts that are based on "native human tech", IMHO, would be limited to bases, cities, larger naval ships, and perhaps really BIG vehicles (Like the CS Firestorm or original DHT), or perhaps a CS APC (the original one) that has been converted into a mobile fusion power plant.
RTG = size of a man, and in use for 30-40 years. Excellent potential power source in 90 years. (BTW, Russia actually used these things on a large scale, that is, modern day russia has like 1000 nuke powered lighthouses with aging RTGs! I'm not making this up!)
Fusion Reactor (found a pic of one) = bigger than a house, a test "pulse" generated 16mw... but required 23mw just to create that energy. One goal I saw was to get one to run for 400 seconds...
Hmm... Man sized to smaller than shoe box size in 90 years? Or bigger than a house and no fully sustainable to smaller than a shoe box and lasting 20 years in 90 years?
The RTG setup still seems more likely to me.
RTG info sources.
http://www.uic.com.au/nip82.htm
http://me.eng.sunysb.edu/~mec290/rtgs/page5.html
And yes, I'm stuborn and persistant at times... and I have nothing better to do...
... and I like to get to the bottom of things.
