Oolite scales (no, honest, read it!)

[Killer Wolf]

Erm, cargo pods ARE 6-sided! I don't know why Selezen drew a 5-side one - a moment of madness perhaps?

http://wiki.alioth.net/index.php/Cargo_ ... 8Oolite%29

i wondered if that was some kind of elaborate mind trick, but then i remembered your typical day's coffee count.

[DaddyHoggy]

Erm, cargo pods ARE 6-sided! I don't know why Selezen drew a 5-side one - a moment of madness perhaps?

http://wiki.alioth.net/index.php/Cargo_ ... 8Oolite%29

i wondered if that was some kind of elaborate mind trick, but then i remembered your typical day's coffee count.

You're right - I'd drunk only 5 cups of coffee by that point - clearly less than pin-sharp!

[ClymAngus]

I was having a

about this.

You could bevel you cargo bay, adding half hexagons to the floor. Personally I like to think of the term like "ton" in the same way we use "Barrel" as suggested earlier. I like oxp's that add to the diversity of cargo types. The size, shape and exact dimensions depend on what civilisation packed it up in the first place.

We have squares, hexagons pentagons, triangles, triangles with the corners cut off, circles, 3 sided pyramids. I don't know it's so massively inefficient it feels "real".

[Cmdr. Maegil]

I was having a

about this.

This is no place for toilet jokes!

[Eric Walch]

I wouldn't recommend stacking pentagons. The Anaconda picture is the mental image I have of most larger ship cargo bays - a big space with the canisters mounted in separate "slots" on the walls or floor. there would be a floor space with a certain amount of canisters on it but others could be hoisted to the roof or walls as necessary. The "pentagon" shape wouldn't allow containers to be stacked on top of other containers. There would need to be a sizeable space in the bay for the equivalent of a pallet lifter or fork lift to be able to move the canisters into and out of the docking bay.

Now being able to stack is a feature of the pods in my opinion. When the casing of the pods is to week to stack them and you make then hexagonal or square, some captains still might try piling them up. So the pods have a shape to discourage stacking them up.

Like what I learned with ergonomics: When you don't want people to put down their cup of coffee near sensible sensitive equipment, give it a surrounding surface under an angle and create a flat surface a bit further away. That will safe your equipment by getting soaked in coffee. At least it will reduce the risk. Works better and is much friendlier than placing 'don't-do' signs.

[Gimi]

There has been a lot of research on this in the logistics area. It is a case of fitting in as much goods as possible while still maintaining the integrity of the goods you are transporting. For strength, the sphere is unbeatable, but it doesn't stack well. After that you get the cylinder with spherical ends. Better than a sphere, but again, doesn't stack very well. So if you were to standardise on one shape, and loose as little cargo space as possible, while still maintaining the requirements of different types of cargo and strength of the container, the hexagonal cylinder is probably near your ideal solution. A pressurised cylinder would fit within without loosing to much space.
What would probably be even better is some kind of truncated dodecahedron or octahedra, but you would loose a lot of space around the edges.

[DaddyHoggy]

I love how this thread about scales has evolved beautifully and intelligently into a discussion about Logistics, Ergonomics, Physics.

[Selezen]

I love how this thread about scales has evolved beautifully and intelligently into a discussion about Logistics, Ergonomics, Physics.

...all of which is really really useful when thinking about cargo space in other, bigger ships!

Already I have a design in mind for the grapples that hold pods to the walls in the Anaconda and other "haulers".

I agree with the sentiment that the pods could be designed in order to discourage stacking. It fits with what's rapidly becoming my preferred design constraint, in that most pods are designed to be stored, loaded and unloaded with the long axis to the horizontal. I designed the cargo pod paper model with an eye to using it as a "trinket box" with an opening lid, and this is the rough mental image I have of the recommended method of opening the "real" thing.

The idea about making the surface areas of the cargo pod uneven to accommodate the shape of the pods is good, but impractical. It would make it nigh near impossible for a loading/unloading vehicle to transport the item in a stable fashion. Health and safety could be affected too, as an uneven surface can be dangerous to walk on. I know it's a small consideration (especially because IT'S JUST A GAME) but I'm trying to take a lot of "real world" considerations into account during this process to create a real working and living environment.

NOTE: I've modified the model to have a smaller living area and a bigger engineering section as well as remodelling the location of the "bathroom" facility by moving it to the other side of the ship in answer to some of the points raised here.

[ClymAngus]

one thing I forgot to ask you, with this ship design are you doing the ft or metres thing or some where in between?

[DaddyHoggy]

one thing I forgot to ask you, with this ship design are you doing the ft or metres thing or some where in between?

I think they should be in the standard milli-oolitians unit. (none of this metric or Imperial nonsense!)

[ClymAngus]

I'm seeing 1 gm (Galcop Metre) = (roughly) 50cm?

[Selezen]

I'm seeing 1 gm (Galcop Metre) = (roughly) 50cm?

Close, but 1gm=500cm.

Reducing the scale by 50% has made sizes seem to work.

Part of my theory is that a galcop metre and a galcop foot are the same thing, perhaps in an attempt to unify the measuring standards in the 30th century!

[RyanHoots]

Cargo canister compared with a Cobra Mk1:

There's no way ten will fit inside.

[Bugbear]

Cargo canister compared with a Cobra Mk1:
There's no way ten will fit inside.

Ah but that's explained by the fact that what you're view screen is displaying is an augmented reality view of what's actually out there - it's a pilots aid to make spotting the cargo pods that much easier.

Now, as for stacking of pentagons...true, you will get space between the canisters, but that space is required for the forklift to stick it's arms in and lift the pods out of the hold...

<now back to our scheduled programme...>

[Zieman]

I'm seeing 1 gm (Galcop Metre) = (roughly) 50cm?

Close, but 1gm=500cm.

Reducing the scale by 50% has made sizes seem to work.

Part of my theory is that a galcop metre and a galcop foot are the same thing, perhaps in an attempt to unify the measuring standards in the 30th century!

Quite contradictory statements IMHO...

Do you really mean that one galcop metre is 5 SI meters (~16.4 US/imperial feet) ?