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Full Version: We choose to go to the moon... (challenge/game)
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'Okay, what the hell?' The idea is to have fun by coming up with a reasonably detailed and plausible plan for the space race of an alternate world where the events of the second half of the nineteenth and first half of the twentieth centuries resulted in a relatively small number of continent-spanning major nations rather than the endless sprawl of small ones seen in the real world. The only reason it's even that different a world is that funding a competitive space program is nontrivial.
Judging who gets there first - or best - is kind of up in the air until I know how much interest there is; at the moment I'm expecting to rely on a good-faith consensus amoung the entrants.
Things I'd say'd be needed for a full entry off the top of my head: An overall game plan, a mission plan, and thumbnail dossiers on all hardware required for both.
I've got a plan entry in hand and I'll try and work up at least one dossier before class today so people can see what I'm thinking of.
Ja, -n

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"I'm terribly sorry, but I have to kill you quite horribly now."
Imperial Brazilian Aerospace Directorate
PLAN FORM A, ENTRY 1 (12 July 1960)
Items required for Lunar landing, in intended order
- Maximum speed at maximum altitude aircraft study (reference RED)
- Solicit designs for ORANGE
- Orbital vehicle plan-form and reentry studies (reference YELLOW)
- Spacesuit design and ground testing - Hard atmospheric, soft atmospheric, mechanical
- ORANGE design selection
- Solicit designs for GREEN (reference RED results)
- ORANGE delivery
- Design expendable rocket for orbital studies off of ORANGE mothership
- GREEN design selection
- Second orbital vehicle design test series (reference BLUE); unmanned suborbital launches (BLUE I)
- Solicit designs for INDIGO
- GREEN delivery
- Manned suborbital launch series (BLUE II)
- Unmanned orbital launch series (BLUE III)
- INDIGO design selection
- Solicit designs for VIOLET and SPECTRUM (reference VIOLET, reference SPECTRUM)
- Manned orbital launch series (BLUE IV)
- INDIGO delivery
- SPECTRUM design selection
- VIOLET design selection
- SPECTRUM delivery and launch
- SPECTRUM assembly
- Unmanned lunar flyby
- VIOLET delivery and launch
- Unmanned lunar landing
- VIOLET assembly
- VIOLET manned lunar flyby
- VIOLET manned lunar landing

Out of character soundbytes, so people won't be left wondering.
RED - an X-15 clone/parallel
ORANGE - 'We need three hundred tons to sixty thousand feet. We want five hundred tons to a hundred thousand feet.'
YELLOW - lifting body research a la the X-24
GREEN - a hypertrophic Blackbird on steroids
BLUE - your basic itty-bitty space capsule - heat shield, radio, and a cavity big enough to fit a man who wasn't moving much
INDIGO - reusable lifting-body spaceplane about two-thirds the size of the Shuttle orbiter
VIOLET - a pure spacecraft with no provision for reentry; assembled in orbit rather than boosted up whole; initial concept would land on the moon in its own right.
SPECTRUM - a space station
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"V, did you do something foolish?"
"Yes, and it was glorious."

Kokuten

eheheheh.. I have to ask.. what color is the SPECTRUM station?Wire Geek - Burning the weak and trampling the dead since 1979Wire Geek - Burning the weak and trampling the dead since 1979
Quote:
eheheheh.. I have to ask.. what color is the SPECTRUM station?

Plaid. [Image: laugh.gif] __________________
I bet that if you cooked an elephant, you'd have a lot of leftovers.
___________________________
"I've always wanted to be somebody, but I should have been more specific." - George Carlin

Kokuten

oh, so not 'green' then.
Wire Geek - Burning the weak and trampling the dead since 1979Wire Geek - Burning the weak and trampling the dead since 1979


-- Bob
---------
The Internet Is For Norns.

Kokuten

Canadian Mounted Aerospace Division (Division Arospatiale Monte Canadienne)
PLAN FORM A, Revision 13;
Requirement for Canadian Moon Mission are as follows.
1) Supraorbital vehicle
2) Orbital Construction
3) Intrastellar Transit
4) Foreign Body Landing
5) Return Mission.

1) Supraorbital Vehicle.
a) It is the submission of this division that the most feasible way to break free of the gravitational well of this planet is with a three-pronged approach. The initial launch to approximately 15 kilometres is provided by a modified Boeing jet plane. (See previous NASA uses of Boeing jets to 'piggyback' the American Space Shuttle). From that point, the hypothetical vehicle would accelerate and rise to the edge of atmosphere using attached SCRAMJET engines. At this height of approximately 100 kilometres, the SCRAMJET booster would decouple, and a simple chemical rocket would boost the vessel clear into outer Earth orbit.
b) Rail Launch. The prime alternative believed to be plausible is a rail launching system, where essentially a giant ramp would allow a ground-based vessel to attain signifigant altitude and speed without external power. This has the benefits of the jet 'carrier' launch, but has the drawback of requiring a signifigant investment in ground-based engineering. Several appropriate mountains have been identified. This alternative requires perhaps the largest initial investment, but can reduce the costs of reaching orbit, or even direct one-way moon shots, to the lowest amount. If Canada is to have a signifigant prescence in space and on the Moon over time, this is the reccomended route.
c) Alternative methodologies include preliminary launch from a lighter-than-air platform, which has the drawback of little or no initial velocity, essentially being a static 'drop' launch, but the benefit of being very inexpensive and easy. Also an alternative is conventional rocketry from a ground launch platform. This alternative was not investigated in detail, as preliminary engineering shows a far better economical profile for other launch methods.
2) Orbital Construction
a) Whereas the current state-of-the-art in launch methods does not allow the use of sufficient mass to enable us to provide the safety and redundancy needed, it is the reccomendation of this division to first launch a 'crew capsule' into a stable Low Earth Orbit, and then to follow it with further launches containing the hardware and supplies neccesary to build the actual transit vehicle and landing vehicle, in orbit.
b) The preliminary landing vehicle designs work well enough with any of our launch system parameters that we can launch them in pairs, and the division reccomends sending up two pairs of landers. The fourth lander can be used as a beacon and an emergency landing vehicle during construction, and during the return flight to Earth.
3) Intrastellar Transit.
a) It is the reccomendation of this division that the transit vehicle be provided with a nuclear reactor and ion propulsion system. While this has a low actual impetus of thrust, it is extremely efficient on reaction mass, and allows for more precise astronavigation, due to the long, slow nature of the 'burns'.
b) American astronavigation is a well-developed science, but they put incredibly small amounts of processing power in-vehicle. It is our reccomendation to duplicate the American process as much as possible, and preliminary contacts with our American counterparts indicate a willingness to allow Canadian access to their radars and telemetry radios. This will provide a signifigant cost savings. We also reccomend a signifigantly higher grade of computing power onboard. A modern PC running appropriate software is more than sufficient, and our preliminary design calls for two twos - that is, two protected installations (shielded with water, and part of the reaction mass system in an emergency) each containing two identical machines, all cross-checking each other.
This will allow Canadian astronauts much more computing power than any other nation's.
4) Foreign Body Landing.
a) Given the nuclear nature of our transit drive, our engineers have made available a signifigant payload for the mission, and we reccomend a three-layer backup plan for the actual landing vehicle. Three identical landing vehicles will be provided, allowing a two-party exploration and science team, with one entire lander held in reserve. Each lander should be based off of a mobile 'rover' design, with a relatively massive cargo capability for the landing.
b) The preliminary engineering for the landers has produced multiple designs, but the major commonality is the 'cargo trailer' effect, wherein a cargo module mounts the actual landing rockets, and contains the chemical rockets for return to orbit. These cargo modules contain the 'actual' lander, which is mobile and semi-independant of its module. However, the modules also contain the return rockets, enough for two trips back, allowing each cargo module to 'return' either or both landers. This gives us maximum flexibility for return launches to the transit vehicle. Indeed, the most popular of the preliminary designs specifies a truly massive capability, so that any one return rocket 'pack' can clip onto a lander loaded with both crews and signifigant additional weight, and return it safely to the transit vehicle.
c) The division believes that this massive redundancy is not only desireable, but neccesary. Our worst-case scenario with the current lander design allows one rescue personnel from the transit vehicle to retrieve both landers, including crew and scientific samples.
d) The division believes that there will be no need or call for offensive weaponry on this mission, but has provided for an extensive medical supply, including single shot pressurised gas 'blowguns', with fast-acting anesthetic. Testing has determined that these can be applied through any of the limbs on a spacesuit without endangering the occupant.
5) Return Mission
a) The return of the landers and crew on the Moon's surface to the transit vehicle can be accomplished in quite a wide timeframe, given the massive life support capability granted by the orbital construction and nuclear motor techniques.
b) The return of the transit vehicle is likewise flexible, given the nuclear motor. The transit vehicle will maintain a Lunar orbit whilst the landers are below, and will maintain a running schedule of available 'short windows' for quick transit to Earth. this schedule will be updated with and checked against ground-based calculations here.
c) The transit vehicle itself is not landable, therefore this division reccomends abandoning it on autopilot in earth orbit, and reccomends a geosynchronus orbit for this. The nuclear motor will allow for signifigant stationkeeping over time, and the transit vehicle will provide a very useful platform for additional missions, whether they be orbital or Lunar.
d) the landing vehicles previously used on the Lunar surface can be used for return to Earth, or the Lunar team can be met in Earth orbit by a more specialized landing vehicle. The fourth lander deployed initially can also be a modified or more atmospheric capable version, to allow for the return flight.

This concludes the prospectus for lunar exploration. The CMAD believes that it has a workable plan for Canada to become a first-rate space power, and being reaping the benefits thereof. Wire Geek - Burning the weak and trampling the dead since 1979Wire Geek - Burning the weak and trampling the dead since 1979
ORANGE I
Manufacturer: Embraer
First Flight: October 8, 1963
Crew: 12
Length: 61 m
Wingspan: 166 m
Height: 20 m
Empty: 900,000 kg
Loaded: 1,600,000 kg
Max Takeoff: 1,700,000 kg
Payload to service ceiling: 480,000 kg
Powerplant: 16x Blanko R-208K turbofans in twin pylon mounts, 68kN each
Max Speed: 800 kmh
Cruise Speed: 600 kmh
Max Range: 3,000 km
Service Ceiling: 26,000 m
The IBAD's Orange series of heavy-lift aircraft were and remain the most massive aircraft ever flown, with the modern Orange III averaging takeoff weights of more than two thousand metric tons. When they were first introduced to the world, no one had ever seen - and only a few had even dreamed - that a plane like that could exist. With nearly nine-tenths of the plane's internal volume held within the broad, gently swept wing, and the control surfaces mounted on twin trailing booms, the cockpit and fuselage seemed almost afterthoughts, as did the tall and unprecedentedly intricate landing gear. These oddities quickly vanished, however, as soon as even the faintest sense of the aircraft's scale began to penetrate - the wheels that seemed so tiny in comparison stood taller than a tall man, and its tail surfaces rose higher than many buildings.
Trivia
- The Orange's four landing gear assemblies carry a total of sixty-four wheels between them. The design was chosen as a direct response to the problems experienced by the American Convair B-36.
- The Orange's carrying capacity has been taken advantage of in numerous publicity stunts, including airlifting a pair of live humpback whales and accompanying seawater from their previous home at the San Francisco Bay Aquarium to a new facility in Toronto.
- Despite its size, the aircraft's flight characteristics are said to be extremely forgiving.
- For the first seven years of its service life, every Orange flight took off and landed on a single runway with a prepared surface only three meters wider than its wheelbase.
- In 1978, a lightened Orange II carrying external fuel tanks in place of payload became the first aircraft to circumnavigate the globe in a single, unrefuelled flight.
- Despite considerable early fears about its potential as a bomber, no Orange has ever flown a deliberate combat mission or delivered an entirely military cargo.
- In 1973, an Argentinian Liberation Force Mirage IIIC intercepted ORANGE I Hull No. 104 Menina de Sao Paulo while it was returning from an orbital launch operation. Four of five missiles launched by the fighter hit, with the last misfiring due to poor maintenence, and both cannon ran out of ammunition before the attacker was driven away by scrambled Imperial Brazilian interceptors. Menina de Sao Paulo landed safely on five remaining engines, was fully repaired, and continues in service to this day.


*headdesk*
Time frame!
My inspiration for starting this was... well, originally, it was Rocket Girls, but some of the websurfing done as a result of that led me to discover the existence of a very old computer game that just seemed, well, neat.
So, anyway, because of that, I'd pictured 'game start' as being in 1960, when OTL's Vostok and Mercury were still in early stages. Shuttle didn't fly 'till the late 70s.
Ja, -n

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"I'm terribly sorry, but I have to kill you quite horribly now."
So, was the original one orange, with "Orange" painted across it in big black letters?

My Unitarian Jihad Name is: Brother Atom Bomb of Courteous Debate. Get yours.

I've been writing a bit.
GREEN I
Manufacturer: Embraer
First Flight: January 20, 1965
Crew: 4
Length: 65.0 m
Wingspan: 33.8 m
Height: 10.2 m
Empty: 80,000 kg
Loaded: 475,000 kg
Max Takeoff: 460,000 kg
Payload to service ceiling: 150,000 kg
Powerplant: 4x Blanko T-860G afterburning turbojets in wing roots (122kN each dry, 200kN each wet), 4x Embraer Type 3 ramjets, outboard ventral (347kN each)
Max Speed: 3,400 kmh
Cruise Speed: 900 kmh
Max Range: 3,600 km
Service Ceiling: 42,000 m
The IBAD's Green series is a large aircraft whose slender fuselage and thin 'double delta' wing are visually dominated by its angular outboard engine pods. The wing root starts roughly a third of the way back from the nose and spreads at a 50 degree sweep until reaching the engine nacelles, after which the sweep increases to 75 degrees for the rest of the wing's length. To increase the amount of room available for payloads, the nacelles are tilted thirty degrees off of the vertical. (OOC: something like this: --//--o--\--) Airflow to the engines is handled by movable shields which slide over the intakes at higher speeds.
Trivia:
- The decreased efficiency shown by the Green's main engines at sea level prevent it from generating enough thrust to become airborne while fully loaded.
- A Green II holds the standing record for highest altitude ever achieved by an air-breathing aircraft - 100,400 m. A Green IV holds the record for highest altitude achieved in controlled flight - 63,600 m.
- Even the last and most fuel-efficient model of the type, the Green V, did not carry sufficient fuel for more than half an hour at full power. Roughly three out of four Green flights require mid-air refueling to make it to their scheduled landing sites at all; none of the remainder land with more than one or two percent of their original fuel load.

BLUE I
Manufacturer: Embraer
First Flight: April 13, 1964
Crew: 1
Height: 2.7 m
Diameter: 1.2 m
Empty Mass: 725 kg
Loaded Mass (including pilot): 810 kg
Acceleration: 3 m/s^2
Endurance: 90 minutes
Delta-V: 70 m/s

BLUE II
Manufacturer: Embraer
First Flight: February 18, 1965
Crew: 1
Height: 5.2 m
Diameter: 1.2 m
Empty Mass: 1,207 kg
Loaded Mass (including pilot): 1,300 kg
Acceleration: 2 m/s^2
Endurance: 12 hours
Delta-V: 178 m/s

PERIHELION
Manufacturer: Mectron
First Flight: April 1, 1964
Height: 13.5 m
Diameter: 1.2 m
Empty Mass: 1,500 kg
Loaded Mass: 14,830 kg
Acceleration: 92 m/s^2
Endurance: N/A
Delta-V: 2,160 m/s

APHELION
Manufacturer: Mectron
First Flight: February 5, 1965
Height: 15.9 m
Diameter: 3.3 m
Empty Mass: 6,100 kg
Loaded Mass: 56,000 kg
Acceleration: 90 m/s^2
Endurance: N/A
Delta-V: 7,820 m/s

Trivia
- The Perihelion was a Helios supersonic cruise missile with a capsule rather than a warhead. The Aphelion was a Perihelion with three unarmed Helioses bolted on as boosters.
- Out of 17 Perihelion flights, 7 resulted in the pilot's losing conciousness. 2 more were fatal. 11 Aphelion flights had six blackouts but no fatalities, mostly due to improved spacesuit design and compensation techniques.

And that just leaves Indigo and Violet. ^_^
Ja, -n

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"I'm terribly sorry, but I have to kill you quite horribly now."

Necratoid

You know... with all those color named missions, you have a serious flaw... They are going to paint it in multiple colors and going to have a national pride movement forcing aestetics on the crafts. Which means a large loss of fuel getting literally tons of paint into space. Which is why NASA stopped painting their booster rockets.
I'd do something involving the top 3rd of Africa (I'm not up for the small details or doing story write ups so someone can take this one)... Basically the opposite of the elite, small forces most countries use. The idea is to set up a relay style chain of space stations to the moon. The first being in orbit above the Sahara where my launch pads are.
The main goal of station 1 is to be an oribital launch pad to build station number 2. Station2 to build stuff for station 3 and so on. Ships that get in orbit are largely ment to stay there and be used as parts for the stations and the craft going inbetween them. Crews are minimal and intended as grunt labor for building the station. Controls are much simplified and intended to be operable by someone with minimal education or intelligence to the point of trained monkey tapping buttons to keep the pictures in the crosshairs. Once in orbit the cargo ships (that got up their by booster rockets) are get close to the station at which point they will be brought inside and scrapped for parts. Parts for both the station itself and the craft to move between the stations while in orbit. Once orbital craft are mobile we can use some of them to fetch the launched pods and cut down on active rockets to get to the station being on the crafts. Thus letting us get more fuel in orbit without wasting time changing the basic lauch craft design too much. Parts for the reentry pods are taken up an average of enough to make 1 pod every 6 flights 1 pod comes down for every 8-10 ships up. This seeming overstock of parts is because only around 80 percent of the ships are successfully put in space by design... Splash downs are in the Atlantic.
The numbers average better in reality however (most of the time)... expedable, low skill labour and mass production have their draw backs... however the ultimately the plan is to make 4-5 stations that get closer and closer to the moon until it becomes possible to drop as much material on the moon in cushioned contains as possible. While every one else is worried about getting their and putting a flag in some random crater we will spam space with stuff until we have the ability to build a colony and keep enough supplies coming so that even if the firs 2-5 moon stations fail we will have enough material to build the next one and intigrate the quality parts that all the other countries wasted time on while we were colonizing the moon.
A ground based remote system takes up most of the computing power and command and control (Station 1 eventually being a near equal). The stations have constant signals controlling/moniurting them from the ground and the lower numbered stations. Most important highly trained works and scientists will be in these to locations until the conditions are good enough that its worth sending them there... also accidences and screw up are far less likely to take out anyone improtant. Docking and orbital rockets are what most of the computational shipboard computers are for. All tech is modular and anything that can freeze is on the outside of the cargo shuttles and the scuba like life support is worn for the few hours they take to get into orbit and into the station bays.
Stations themselves wll contain a large hydroponics section that is a dumping ground for water from waste and the dehumidifiers that are pnuematically send water through the station toward the center. The filtration systems are among are most ungraded and reaserached tech as clever plans the grunt labor personal are part of the resource hauling. On the side away from the Eath, and both sides in Stations 2 and up a large flat planel of a lanch pd will be placed. Around the Hydronics and critical systems will be the crew quarters followed by ware housing and then docking bays. Solar power is also handy as it can not only help with the station power, but the ground based HQ and the rest of the country.
Prior to being sent up the the crew with be quarentined and fattened up during training for 3 months. Anyone a with plague that isn't cured by the end of the first month is stuck redoing that month with a different group, booted from the program, or tranfered to another operation As the crew is trained, healed, and fattened up will be better prepared for when they go on low rations once in orbit... the terrible conditions most of this dictationship grew up in will serve them well as the lackluster rations will be of negligable concern as it is not so bad without the normal plagues and miserable weather. Also the weight will be burned off by work and the exercise they do on station (which is all geared towards power generation (threadmills and pshing the bars connected to the spinning poles kind of thing). No matter how bad the conditions start off on the stations, it won't be long before they are better than many of the villages in my domain. As an added bonus the tech developed this way can be given to the populous and those smart enough to be grunts will be familar with most of the tech involved.Idiot proofing testing can be conducted using live idiots and I'll look better for giving out the stuff... unless it is very, very badly designed. At which point the designers are spending field time wilth the grunts in space... nothing like self preservation to inspire engineering compitance.

CattyNebulart

Japan in the meantime, after some dismal failures to improve their rockets, decides to spend most of it's research on miniaturization to make the equipment lighter.
To that end they also decide to use (small) 16 year old girls as astronauts, since they are lighter than a full grown person, and require less oxygen. (Why yes, this is just blatantly ripping of rocket girls. No, I do not wish to participate, I just thought it deserved a mention.)
E: "Did they... did they just endorse the combination of the JSDF and US Army by showing them as two lesbian lolicons moving in together and holding hands and talking about how 'intimate' they were?"
B: "Have you forgotten so soon? They're phasing out Don't Ask, Don't Tell."
INDIGO
Manufacturer: Embraer
First Flight: August 2, 1966
Crew: 2 to 6, depending on mission
Length: 31.2 m
Wingspan: 19.0 m
Height: 4.9 m
Empty: 66,000 kg
Loaded: 149,600 kg
Payload to LEO: 19,080 kg
Payload to GTO: 2,900 kg
Powerplant: 4x Mectron KR-9 kerosene/liquid oxygen iris nozzle rocket engines (1.25MN each)
Endurance: 800 hours
Delta-V: 7,100 m/s
The Indigo is a lifting body, a stretched, flattened teardrop shape with control fins but no wings. While the vast majority of its hull is completely reusable, the highest performing components are mass-produced and replaced after every flight. Its heat shielding has three main components - the nose-cone and leading edges of the body and winglets are single-use ablative caps, identical to the sort of reentry shielding used on most orbital capsules. The dorsal surface is an advanced ceramic composite known as Reinforced Carbon-Carbon, while the ventral is covered by an array of less effective but somewhat sturdier silicate aerogel tiles. Cockpit visibility, such as it is, is provided by a row of quartz crystal panes along the ventral edge of the nose cone. The cargo bay and radiator vanes are also positioned ventrally.
Trivia:
- In both reentry and parasite carry postures, the Indigo is upside down.
- The distinctive deep blue underside seen at takeoff and in most publicity shots is actually a lightweight plastic kinetic shield designed to protect the delicate RCC dorsal heat shield from impact damage, and is discarded before that flight's carrier Green transitions to supersonic flight.
- Indigo hull number 112, Esperanca, hosted the first reported human sexual activity in space. Both participants later said that it was highly disappointing.
- The choice of kerosene as primary propellant was made because all other candidates for the role tended to sublimate or break down during the supersonic portion of the launch flight.

And... just one left! The Greens and Oranges, BTW, are mostly bare metal with signature go-faster stripes.
Ja, -n

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"I'm terribly sorry, but I have to kill you quite horribly now."
VIOLET
Manufacturer: Mectron
First Flight: March 20, 1967
Crew: 5
Height: 24 m
Diameter: 13.8 m (34.8 including 'wings')
Empty: 27,600 kg
Loaded: 143,500 kg
Powerplant: 1x Mectron HR-5 liquid hydrogen/liquid oxygen rocket engine (450 kN)
Endurance: 140 hours (Block I), 210 hours (Block II), 400 hours (Block III), 3,500 hours (Block IV or higher)
Delta-V: 6,200 m/s
The Violet spacecraft looked very much like the skeleton of a shed that had been stuffed full of junk. The original Block I Violets, Azalea and Dendrobium, were assembled from six component blocks, all of identical size and proportions - 4.7 by 4.7 by 12 meters, the dimensions of the Indigo's cargo bay. The command and service sections were docked end-to-end and the four fuel sections mounted at ninety-degree intervals around the latter. Two 12 meter by 22 meter solar panels were mounted to opposing fuel sections, providing electrical power and radiative surface.
Trivia -
- The hastily designed 'Jumper' that Brazilian astronauts used for their early moon landings was never part of the plan; the Violet itself had originally been designed to land on the surface of the Moon and return to Earth orbit fully intact. This approach was abandoned once the actual cost of an individual Violet spacecraft became apparent.
- The Jumper is the smallest man-rated LOH rocket ever flown; that type was chosen so as to allow multiple trips between surface and orbit within a single mission, since the Jumper could then be refuelled from the larger Violet's fuel tanks.
- Despite common perception, Violet Blocks are not technical generations of production, but flight configurations. Block II configuration adds one mission and one fuel module for a total of eight and Block III an additional one of each for ten. Block IV, with fourteen fuel modules, separate propulsion, power, and supply modules, a 'hanger' module with purpose-built reusable lander, and instrument and habitat modules on opposite ends of a rotating carousel, masses well over a hundred tons even empty and nearly five times that when fully fueled. Only one Block IV has ever been assembled, as this level of ability is superfluous for anything other than visiting superior planets.


...done.
Yeesh, way to overwhelm me with your optimism, guys. ^_^ Given the alternate history video thing posted in General I'm kinda surprised.
Ja, -n
(Not even a comment on the shuttle equivalent being topsy turvy? Shame, shame.)

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"I'm terribly sorry, but I have to kill you quite horribly now."