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Sorry if this has been discussed before, but my search-Fu is week.

I was wondering how one would actually go about manufacturing MD armor and gear. Obviously they require a number of different components and I imagine fairly elaborate processes (that most likely require significant resources and energy), but I have no idea WHAT goes into them.

Does anyone know what metals and other substances go into MD armor? Where does the CS/NG/everyone else get these materials? I'm sure at least initially they relied on recycling for a large chunk of their material needs, but where are they getting the new stuff?

I ask, because I'm interested in doing a trade and commerce base game, and I'm thinking of setting the characters initially in a place like Deadwood, only instead of a gold mine something like a Tungsten mine or something. I just have no idea what it would be.

Thanks!

They leave that vague in the books; it is a composite of some design, but basically whatever you made up, like 4 parts titanium-II plus 1/2 part Silver plus 1-1/2 parts 440 steel folded 1000 times then coated in a diamond paste equals weak MD metal would be as acurate as anything else.

Another example could be that they change a composite titanium-zinc-carbon combination (because anything good has titanium in it) changed at the sub-atomic level is what they make MD material out of.

That is a cool idea though; you could just designate certain types of MD material as different in grades; minor, construction, military; light(equipment & weapons), medium (body armour & small PA), heavy (for vehicles and giant robots), and finally special composites - like mirrored or laser-resistant types (you know, like what the Glitterboy is made out of).

well tank armor is MDC and that is baslically depleted uranium encased in lead.

Well, yeah, but, I really don't anything about minerals or material construction (stupid Psychology degree....), so I was looking for some cool ideas/inspirations...I could just say it's a Tungsten-Zercanium polymer alloy, but I don't even know what those words mean, ya know? Seems like the materials necessary to construction of MDC equipment would be THE backbone of trade in Rifts earth, esp. since the CS/NG/NGR/Free Quebec goes through that stuff like it's going out of style...

Check out this thread!


Rifts "Up Close" Armor and Weaponry Megathread

It give you a great many ideas on body armor and weapons. It dissects them for your happy usage. I just bumped it to the top of the forum the other day. I'll bump it up again so look it over.

Cool!

i generally assume it's the structure of the materials that gives MDC. the simplest of course being modern Chobam type armors, which are a sandwich of high strength metals, ceramics, and ultradense metals, that combined are very hard for weapons to defeat.

for body armor and PA, i tend to assume a layer of synthetic crystal (like diamond, sapphire, or ruby) between plates of woven metallic nanotubes.

flexible MDC armor generally organic nanotubes, perhaps with some sheer thickening fliud involved.

robots, taks, and other vehicles, just sort of "super-Chobam", with the metal plates using the same woven metal nanotube and synthetic cyrstal layer as body armor, but with a layer of some molecularly aligned dense material added in as well.

of course, Glitter-chrome is just this taken to an extreme, with molecular alignments and stuff to make the whole plate one giant single crystal, each layer bonded to the next..thus why it's so expensive and hard to work with and make...

That is a good way of putting it. I hope someone checked out the thread I mentioned. At least I hope they do. Lots of great matrerial.