Needs of "Carrier in the Sea of Time"
chorned...@hushmail.com
1) Food.
The wooden sailing ships of 15th to 19th century did develop the
ability to carry enough food to feed the crew for months.
In 19th to 20th century, the steam and diesel ships developed the
ability to reliably cross the Atlantic from port to port in less than a
week. This leads me to suspect that they used that reliance to limit
the amount of food stored abroad - except for merchant ships carrying
food as cargo. The strategic warships like carriers stay at sea
slightly longer - but I suspect even they expect that there is a
network of naval bases.
How much food does a carrier have in routine operations? Relative to
crew?
Once they seek a base, what about creating food supply system from
scratch?
This is something that has been tried many times!
Smith of Virginia did it in 1607. Pilgrim Fathers did it in 1620. First
Fleet did it in 1788. Etc. etc.
Observe that a substantial proportion of each of the expedition was
people who were familiar with subsistence farming - in England.
They also knew ahead that they were going to settle and therefore had
stocked food for colonization, over and above the supplies for trip
itself. They also carried seeds and domestic animals.
Nevertheless, they came close to failure. The Pilgrim Fathers had
trouble - that is what Thanksgiving is all about. Virginia had trouble.
Botany Bay had trouble.
A Carrier in the Sea of Time does not carry masses of people
experienced in subsistence farming. It may carry limited numbers of
people with experience in commercial farming - where power tools are
taken for granted. In any case, they have neither the stockpiles of
viable seeds and animals nor food supplies to last till they multiply.
2) Oil.
Oil drilling started in 1850-s. America of 1850-s had tens of millions
of people with comfortable subsistence farming economy, infrastructure
of metal tools, railways et cetera. Oil refining and engines did not
start before 1880-s...
3) Metal tools. A carrier is equipped with huge numbers of metal tools
- built in various factories across USA. The carrier does not carry
tools to make tools in such an extent.
Just look at how hard it is for 200 millions of Soviets or 1 milliard
of Chinese or 20 millions of North Koreans, enjoying at least somewhat
functioning food production and metalworking infrastructure, to
reproduce the weaponry of USA. Kalashnikovs may be effective, simple
and reliable, but they are exported and smuggled from Russia - they are
not manufactured from scratch in every bush and town where they are
needed.
4) Ammunition. See above - and it is expendable, not reusable. Also, it
has limited use for making food or tools or fuel.
So, what can a carrier in the Sea of Time do?
I suspect that they have to build 2 to 4 from scratch in any case.
There is very little to gain by choosing one of the places with the few
artisans - they are poorly skilled and few in number even at best.
On the other hand, it would be vital not to have to rebuild 1 from
scratch. Systems to produce, store and collect food for a few thousand
of people have existed ever since 3000 BC or earlier... Thus, it is
very important to find a functioning system and tap into it without
breaking down that system!
Jack Linthicum
You must feed 6000 plus people. The food crops that developed with the
discovery of the Americas and those that had evolved before then are
available from planting and improvement. Among that 6000 should be
someone or more that can do that. Places in California like Sonoma,
Monterey, Los Angeles and Santa Barbara counties are next to the ocean
and proven superior growing environments. Potatoes from Peru, maize
from anywhere in the Americas, whaet and other grains from Europe and
the Middle east, rice from the orient are all there for improvement and
distrubution.
> 2) Oil.
Oil seeps are available in California and Persia.
>
> 3) Metal tools. A carrier is equipped with huge numbers of metal tools
> - built in various factories across USA. IIRC there are large machine shop facilities aboard modern carriers.
>
> 4) Ammunition. Tell any reloader that he can't make new ammo out of old brass.
>
>
I would presume, on my own prejudice, that if there are members of the
crew that wish to leave they will be allowed to do so. The male-female
ratio would almost require that and the natives might trade their women
for nails as was done in the 18th C. tropics.
I would assume farms with armed men to protect, hunt and explore in
places like the Los Angeles and Sonoma areas at a minimum, Bodega Bay
is available and I have seen a photo of Noyo harbor in 1866 with large
sailing ships. Mendocino coast has lots of timber.
After a period of establishing relations with your various "customers"
a regular system not unlike the ISOTs in the books would evolve. I
would like to see what the jade of Central America would bring in a
Chinese court. Japan had a solid gun making industry in the 16th
century and I would assume they could undertake similar work on orders
or speculation.
Iron is available throughout the world.
http://books.smenet.org/Surf_Min_2ndEd/sm-ch02-sc05-ss00-bod.cfm
chorned...@hushmail.com
Jack Linthicum wrote:
> chorned...@hushmail.com wrote:
> > What does a carrier in the Sea of Time have and need?
> >
> > 1) Food.
>
> You must feed 6000 plus people. The food crops that developed with the
> discovery of the Americas and those that had evolved before then are
> available
They are not "available". They grow in different parts of world, and
not elsewhere.
> from planting and improvement. Among that 6000 should be
> someone or more that can do that.
Ditto about the Virginians of Smith, or Pilgrim Fathers, or First
Fleet.
> Places in California like Sonoma,
> Monterey, Los Angeles and Santa Barbara counties are next to the ocean
> and proven superior growing environments.
South California was settled by Mexicans and Americans, but pretty
sparsely before they built the irrigation systems.
> Potatoes from Peru,
Far away, and wrong climate.
> maize
> from anywhere in the Americas,
Interestingly, though California is somewhere in the Americas, they do
not have maize there. Californian Indians lived for millennia next to
Mexican Indians and Pueblo Indians, and never were able to grow maize
or anything else - they remained hunter-gatherers. Maybe for a reason?
> whaet and other grains from Europe and
> the Middle east,
If you can get there and back.
> rice from the orient
Even if you get it, wrong climate again.
> are all there for improvement
Which takes centuries
> and
> distrubution.
Which takes keeping ships fuelled and functional.
>
> > 2) Oil.
> Oil seeps are available in California and Persia.
What about refineries?
> >
> > 3) Metal tools. A carrier is equipped with huge numbers of metal tools
> > - built in various factories across USA.
> IIRC there are large machine shop facilities aboard modern carriers.
> >
> > 4) Ammunition.
> Tell any reloader that he can't make new ammo out of old brass.
> >
> >
>
> I would presume, on my own prejudice, that if there are members of the
> crew that wish to leave they will be allowed to do so. The male-female
> ratio would almost require that and the natives might trade their women
> for nails as was done in the 18th C. tropics.
>
> I would assume farms with armed men to protect, hunt and explore in
> places like the Los Angeles and Sonoma areas at a minimum,
Getting in a harbour and sending bands of men with guns to explore and
hunt, and others to guard farms, and the rest to farm, is what the
colonizers of Jamestown or Plymouth or Sydney started with. It was not
easy for them - and they came prepared, with much fewer mouths to feed.
> Bodega Bay
> is available and I have seen a photo of Noyo harbor in 1866 with large
> sailing ships. Mendocino coast has lots of timber.
>
> After a period of establishing relations with your various "customers"
> a regular system not unlike the ISOTs in the books would evolve. I
> would like to see what the jade of Central America would bring in a
> Chinese court. Japan had a solid gun making industry in the 16th
> century and I would assume they could undertake similar work on orders
> or speculation.
>
> Iron is available throughout the world.
> http://books.smenet.org/Surf_Min_2ndEd/sm-ch02-sc05-ss00-bod.cfm
In small quantities and poor quality unless and until you build up the
steelmaking infrastructure.
Jack Linthicum
> Jack Linthicum wrote:
> > chorned...@hushmail.com wrote:
> > > What does a carrier in the Sea of Time have and need?
> > >
> > > 1) Food.
> >
> > You must feed 6000 plus people. The food crops that developed with the
> > discovery of the Americas and those that had evolved before then are
> > available
>
> They are not "available". They grow in different parts of world, and
> not elsewhere.
Potatoes not in Peru? Wheat, Rye, Oats not in Europe and the Middle
East? You are a loon.
asp...@pacific.net.au
<jackli...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
>chorned...@hushmail.com wrote:
>> What does a carrier in the Sea of Time have and need?
>>
>> 1) Food.
>
>You must feed 6000 plus people. The food crops that developed with the
>discovery of the Americas and those that had evolved before then are
>available from planting and improvement. Among that 6000 should be
>someone or more that can do that. Places in California like Sonoma,
But can they do it overnight with no tractors, no ploughs, no
machinery of any sort and unskilled labour (the TF sailors count as
such, at best)?
I think not.
Note that yields you would expect from a lot of these crops are quoted
for those grown with modern fertilisers ... unavailable ... irrigation
... unavailable ... and mechanisation ... unavailable.
>Monterey, Los Angeles and Santa Barbara counties are next to the ocean
>and proven superior growing environments. Potatoes from Peru, maize
Once ou *get them from Peru. In any case, there are many varieties,
and it will take time to sort out which are the most suitable ...
without dealing in any way with any of the problems noted above!
>from anywhere in the Americas, whaet and other grains from Europe and
Baffin Island?
Seriously, though. Yields from maize quoted in most sources are for
maize grown with modern fertilisers, irrigation, and mechanisation.
Original yields were much lower ... still better than what was
normally achieved with wheat, say, but lower than you might be fooled
into thinking with modern figures.
>the Middle east, rice from the orient are all there for improvement and
Why would you want Emmer Wheat? Totally unsuitable. This is the late
15th century AD, not BC.
>distrubution.
Rice. Yes. Which, again, requires specialised knowledge and equipment.
>> 2) Oil.
> Oil seeps are available in California and Persia.
And many other places.
Refining it in quantity and at a level of purity that makes the whole
process worthwhile will be the problem.
As I understand it, 1920's refineries had problems refining fuel to
higher than 20 Octane *reliably* ... and I doubt you could get even
1920's tech up and running within 12 months. Probably even within 10
years.
>> 3) Metal tools. A carrier is equipped with huge numbers of metal tools
>> - built in various factories across USA. IIRC there are large machine shop facilities aboard modern carriers.
>>
>> 4) Ammunition. Tell any reloader that he can't make new ammo out of old brass.
>I would presume, on my own prejudice, that if there are members of the
>crew that wish to leave they will be allowed to do so. The male-female
>ratio would almost require that and the natives might trade their women
>for nails as was done in the 18th C. tropics.
>
>I would assume farms with armed men to protect, hunt and explore in
>places like the Los Angeles and Sonoma areas at a minimum, Bodega Bay
>is available and I have seen a photo of Noyo harbor in 1866 with large
>sailing ships. Mendocino coast has lots of timber.
>
>After a period of establishing relations with your various "customers"
>a regular system not unlike the ISOTs in the books would evolve. I
>would like to see what the jade of Central America would bring in a
>Chinese court. Japan had a solid gun making industry in the 16th
>century and I would assume they could undertake similar work on orders
>or speculation.
>
>Iron is available throughout the world.
>http://books.smenet.org/Surf_Min_2ndEd/sm-ch02-sc05-ss00-bod.cfm
Just not in the quantities most people would assume.
I believe experts have calculated that the late 15th century in Europe
was when the continent wide production of iron achieved (and slowly
started to exceed) that estimated to have been achieved at the height
of the Roman Empire ... 20000 tons a year. That's right, no mistake in
the place of the decimal ... twenty *thousand* tons. A year.
Phil
Author, Space Opera (FGU); RBB #1 (FASA); Road to Armageddon;
Farm, Forge and Steam; Orbis Mundi (PGD)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Email: asp...@pacific.net.au
asp...@pacific.net.au
>Jack Linthicum wrote:
>> chorned...@hushmail.com wrote:
>> rice from the orient
>
>Even if you get it, wrong climate again.
>
>> are all there for improvement
>
>Which takes centuries
Well, historically it did ... but the ancients didn't know any damn
thing about the scientific method or plant genetics. We do.
It has been estimated, for example, that you would need c. 200 years
to breed "modern" wheat from ancestral grains ... but that's a special
case for a variety of genetic reasons.
Shortening growing season requirements as was done with Maize and
Wetland Rice could be speeded up considerably and *any* crops would
benefit from our better scientific knowledge and record keeping.
In fact, as far as we can tell from the paucity of records available,
literate farmers who were able to keep records routinely achieved
yields *double* of what non-literate farmers managed in the same
regions.
For example, during the Medieval period monastic yields were routinely
8 bushels per bushel sown vs. the c. 4 bushels per bushel sown
achieved even on a manorial demesne (i.e. the Lord's personal lands)
... better record keeping.
Phil
>Which takes keeping ships fuelled and functional.
>>
>> > 2) Oil.
>> Oil seeps are available in California and Persia.
>
>What about refineries?
>> >
>> > 3) Metal tools. A carrier is equipped with huge numbers of metal tools
>> > - built in various factories across USA.
>
>> IIRC there are large machine shop facilities aboard modern carriers.
Specialised for the sorts of maintenance tasks expected on modern
carriers ... and not for much else.
>> Iron is available throughout the world.
>> http://books.smenet.org/Surf_Min_2ndEd/sm-ch02-sc05-ss00-bod.cfm
>
>In small quantities and poor quality unless and until you build up the
>steelmaking infrastructure.
Well done! It's good to see someone who has done some solid research!
asp...@pacific.net.au
<jackli...@earthlink.net> wrote:
I suspect what he's getting at is that they are ...
a) not all in the one spot ... you have to travel there and get them
and
b) not the modern varieties.
Jack Linthicum
asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
> On 14 Oct 2006 05:27:44 -0700, "Jack Linthicum"
> <jackli...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
> >
> >chorned...@hushmail.com wrote:
> >> What does a carrier in the Sea of Time have and need?
> >>
> >> 1) Food.
>
> But can they do it overnight with no tractors, no ploughs, no
> machinery of any sort and unskilled labour (the TF sailors count as
> such, at best)?
>
> I think not.
I presume you have never been on board a modern carrier. They all kinds
of machinery for moving aircraft and equipment. I could see a rapid
turnover from towing a load of bombs to towing a wide plow. Unskilled
labor? again you need to visit the modern Navy, it's not a bunch of
winos pulled off the streets of Sydney but a heavily skilled group of
people who keep a gigantic city floating and operating.
>
> Note that yields you would expect from a lot of these crops are quoted
> for those grown with modern fertilisers ... unavailable ... irrigation
> ... unavailable ... and mechanisation ... unavailable.
>
> >Monterey, Los Angeles and Santa Barbara counties are next to the ocean
> >and proven superior growing environments. Potatoes from Peru, maize
>
> Once ou *get them from Peru. In any case, there are many varieties,
> and it will take time to sort out which are the most suitable ...
> without dealing in any way with any of the problems noted above!
>
> >from anywhere in the Americas, whaet and other grains from Europe and
>
> Baffin Island?
>
> Seriously, though. Yields from maize quoted in most sources are for
> maize grown with modern fertilisers, irrigation, and mechanisation.
> Original yields were much lower ... still better than what was
> normally achieved with wheat, say, but lower than you might be fooled
> into thinking with modern figures.
>
> >the Middle east, rice from the orient are all there for improvement and
>
> Why would you want Emmer Wheat? Totally unsuitable. This is the late
> 15th century AD, not BC.
Who said Emmer Wheat? Is this another of your I can make up things that
you can't answer routines? All of the food substances will be in the
state that they were in the 14th or whatever century. A skilled person,
and again you have about 5-6 physicians and 40-50 medical corpsmen,
1000 officers with various undergraduate degrees, men who have been
farmers or farmers' sons, electricians, men able to create a solution
to almost any problem given enough time.
Medical department manpower requirements are established through
certain ratios (one physician per 1200 personnel and one corpsman per
150 personnel aboard ship), specialty Navy enlisted classification
(NEC) needs, and the specific assignment of corpsmen and flight
surgeons to the carrier air wing. Table 14-2 depicts this breakdown.
The third column indicates the assets that the air wing brings aboard
when it is embarked.
>
> >distrubution.
>
> Rice. Yes. Which, again, requires specialised knowledge and equipment.
>
> >> 2) Oil.
> > Oil seeps are available in California and Persia.
>
> And many other places.
>
> Refining it in quantity and at a level of purity that makes the whole
> process worthwhile will be the problem.
>
> As I understand it, 1920's refineries had problems refining fuel to
> higher than 20 Octane *reliably* ... and I doubt you could get even
> 1920's tech up and running within 12 months. Probably even within 10
> years.
Do you know what an evaporator is? Every ship has several, aircraft
carriers many, evaporators are distillers of fresh water from salt.
There is a marvelous heat source in that reactor, primitive
distillation is simply heating the substance and
the oldest and most common way to separate things into various
components (called fractions), is to do it using the differences in
boiling temperature. This process is called fractional distillation.
You basically heat crude oil up, let it vaporize and then condense the
vapor.
William Black
<chorned...@hushmail.com> wrote in message
news:1160830661.6...@f16g2000cwb.googlegroups.com...
>
> Jack Linthicum wrote:
> > Iron is available throughout the world.
> > http://books.smenet.org/Surf_Min_2ndEd/sm-ch02-sc05-ss00-bod.cfm
>
> In small quantities and poor quality unless and until you build up the
> steelmaking infrastructure.
>
Nope.
It's good stuff.
The Italian and German armour making centres are making their finest
products at this time.
--
William Black
I've seen things you people wouldn't believe.
Barbeques on fire by the chalets past the castle headland
I watched the gift shops glitter in the darkness off the Newborough gate
All these moments will be lost in time, like icecream on the beach
Time for tea.
Paul J. Adam
Linthicum <jackli...@earthlink.net> writes
>> 4) Ammunition. Tell any reloader that he can't make new ammo out of
>>old brass.
Attributions have got a little odd, but I happily reloaded fired
cases... using shop-bought primers, bullets and powder. You could cast
your own bullets (for lower-velocity weapons) but making your own
primers is a seriously non-trivial undertaking.
--
Scientific results cannot be used efficiently by soldiers who have no
understanding of them, and scientists cannot produce results useful for
warfare without an understanding of the operations.
- Dr. Theodore Von Karman
Paul J. Adam - mainbox{at}jrwlynch[dot]demon(dot)co<dot>uk
Jack Linthicum
For what its worth California's Coast Range is loaded with mercury
mines and Europe had Almaden in Spain.
mike
> >
> > Iron is available throughout the world.
> > http://books.smenet.org/Surf_Min_2ndEd/sm-ch02-sc05-ss00-bod.cfm
>
> In small quantities and poor quality unless and until you build up the
> steelmaking infrastructure.
Its not that hard to make average quality steel, given rich ironore.
Check out Mao's backyard iron blastfurnaces.
Crap by 1960 standards, but better steel than what could be made before
the 20thC
**
mike
**
John Schilling
>On 14 Oct 2006 05:27:44 -0700, "Jack Linthicum"
><jackli...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>>> 2) Oil.
>> Oil seeps are available in California and Persia.
>
>And many other places.
>
>Refining it in quantity and at a level of purity that makes the whole
>process worthwhile will be the problem.
>
>As I understand it, 1920's refineries had problems refining fuel to
>higher than 20 Octane *reliably* ... and I doubt you could get even
>1920's tech up and running within 12 months. Probably even within 10
>years.
I'm fairly certain it *could* be done in ten years, but why would
anyone bother? There's not an engine on board a modern U.S. Navy
warship that could burn high-octane gasoline if you had it, at
least not without a whole lot of pointless hassle.
The aircraft on board an aircraft carrier, and the main engines of
any escorting warships that come along for the ride, are all gas
turbines. Any auxiliary hardware that needs its own engine and is
too small for a turbine, is going to be Diesel, not Otto.
Diesels care about cetane number, not octane number, and they
don't care nearly as much as gasoline engines do. Gas turbines,
are almost omnivorous. Pretty much any form of kerosene will do
for any engine they've got.
Whale oil, for that matter, would be a reasonable substitute. Lots
of whales in the preindustrial seas, and probably not many Greenpeace
members in a U.S. Navy crew.
--
*John Schilling * "Anything worth doing, *
*Member:AIAA,NRA,ACLU,SAS,LP * is worth doing for money" *
*Chief Scientist & General Partner * -13th Rule of Acquisition *
*White Elephant Research, LLC * "There is no substitute *
*schi...@spock.usc.edu * for success" *
*661-718-0955 or 661-275-6795 * -58th Rule of Acquisition *
mike
>
> Refining it in quantity and at a level of purity that makes the whole
> process worthwhile will be the problem.
>
> As I understand it, 1920's refineries had problems refining fuel to
> higher than 20 Octane *reliably* ...
Kerosene has an Octane if around 40.
Before the '20s, Straight Run Gasoline often had Octanes above
80,as the refining processes did not remove as many of the
short chain hydrocarbons as would be the case later.
When Refinery processes were improved, it was for 3 things.
1.consistancy. Easier to keep to a lower octane level. before that,
QC meant each batch of gasoline was slightly different, depending
on how many of those volatiles boiled off. Early Auto drivers would
have a graduated flask to measure the specific gravity of the fluid,
to give an idea on what was in that fuel. closer to 110 octane
Toluene, or 40 Octane Kerosene?
2. The lighter hydrocarbons, when isolated, could be sold for
morethan what Gasoline would sell for. Economics.
3 Related to #2, Tetraethyl Lead made for a cheap boost,
vs including more expensive IsoOctane in the fuel. It also
had a better shelflife in warmer climes, back to #1
> 1920's tech up and running within 12 months. Probably even within 10
> years.
Do do the volume of a '20s Plant, to do millions of barrels a year,
sure.
Enough to keep 6k people supplied in Gasoline/Diesel/JetA?
not a problem.
Turbines have multifuel capabilities. If its fluid, and burns, it will
work in a Turbine.
Back in the bad old days, Kerosene was the desired fluid for lamps.
Not far off for what you want for Jet Fuel. Back to the 1860s
Get a big iron vat.
dump in crude.
Cook. Stir.
this drives off many volatiles(Makes lamps go Boom!) but the first
fluids
were often dumped right into the nearby river.Gasoline exploded too
easy.
Save a bit to sell as patent medicine(as an Anesthetic! who said
Huffing
was a new problem) and paint thinner
Cook more.Pour.
Now you are getting Kerosene and Diesel.
Lamp Oil. Bottle and sell.
Cook More. Lubricating Oils. Can and sell.
Cook More. Sell that Wax and Petroleum Jelly
Cook more. Fill Barrels with Tar and Asphalt. Sell that too.
Dump remainder.
Fill with more Crude Oil, repeat.
This is how Rockefeller started he got rich with the above method.
He got really rich by improving those methods to do basic
cracking with heat and pressure, and continuous feed, than just
using a big hot kettle filled by guys dumping wooden barrels filled
with Crude, the Distillation column
**
mike
**
mike
> 4) Ammunition. See above - and it is expendable, not reusable. Also, it
> has limited use for making food or tools or fuel.
Air Compressor to fill high pressure tank to say, 900 psi
steel tube
fast acting solinoid valve
hopper filled with lead balls.
Paintball marker from Hell, rapid fire, harder hitting and more
accurate
than any 15thC Musket.
Scale it up, a Cannon.
Gunpowder not needed.
**
mike
**
asp...@pacific.net.au
<jackli...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
>asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>> On 14 Oct 2006 05:27:44 -0700, "Jack Linthicum"
>> <jackli...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>>
>> >
>> >chorned...@hushmail.com wrote:
>> >> What does a carrier in the Sea of Time have and need?
>> >>
>> >> 1) Food.
>
>>
>> But can they do it overnight with no tractors, no ploughs, no
>> machinery of any sort and unskilled labour (the TF sailors count as
>> such, at best)?
>>
>> I think not.
>
>I presume you have never been on board a modern carrier. They all kinds
>of machinery for moving aircraft and equipment. I could see a rapid
>turnover from towing a load of bombs to towing a wide plow. Unskilled
I've seen photos. The wheels aren't designed for fields, they'd get
bogged on anything other than pavement.
In any case, how many people on a carrier know how to design a plough?
And ploughs aren't the only things you're gonna need ... seed drills,
unless you plan to sow broadcast, for example, farrows etc.
>labor? again you need to visit the modern Navy, it's not a bunch of
>winos pulled off the streets of Sydney but a heavily skilled group of
>people who keep a gigantic city floating and operating.
Hmm. How many of them know how to farm without modern machinery. For
that matter, how many of them know how to farm *with* modern machinery
(presumably *some*, just not many). Which means they're unskilled
labour for farming.
>> Note that yields you would expect from a lot of these crops are quoted
>> for those grown with modern fertilisers ... unavailable ... irrigation
>> ... unavailable ... and mechanisation ... unavailable.
>>
>> >Monterey, Los Angeles and Santa Barbara counties are next to the ocean
>> >and proven superior growing environments. Potatoes from Peru, maize
>>
>> Once ou *get them from Peru. In any case, there are many varieties,
>> and it will take time to sort out which are the most suitable ...
>> without dealing in any way with any of the problems noted above!
>>
>> >from anywhere in the Americas, whaet and other grains from Europe and
>>
>> Baffin Island?
>>
>> Seriously, though. Yields from maize quoted in most sources are for
>> maize grown with modern fertilisers, irrigation, and mechanisation.
>> Original yields were much lower ... still better than what was
>> normally achieved with wheat, say, but lower than you might be fooled
>> into thinking with modern figures.
>>
>> >the Middle east, rice from the orient are all there for improvement and
>>
>> Why would you want Emmer Wheat? Totally unsuitable. This is the late
>> 15th century AD, not BC.
>
>Who said Emmer Wheat? Is this another of your I can make up things that
>you can't answer routines? All of the food substances will be in the
>state that they were in the 14th or whatever century. A skilled person,
There are no grains being grown in the Middle East that were not being
grown elsewhere in the 15th century *AD*.
There *was* in the 15th century *BC* ... to whit, Emmer Wheat ... no
longer grown commercially as it can't compete with modern varieties,
or even those of the 15th century AD.
>and again you have about 5-6 physicians and 40-50 medical corpsmen,
>1000 officers with various undergraduate degrees, men who have been
>farmers or farmers' sons, electricians, men able to create a solution
>to almost any problem given enough time.
Which they don't have. And their training is in using modern resources
to solve those problems.
Got an infection? No probs ... take these anti ... wait a minute,
didn't we use up all the antibiotics last week?
And look at the 1632 tech discussion group and books for the problems
related to "just" starting to make antibiotics.
>> >> 2) Oil.
>> > Oil seeps are available in California and Persia.
>>
>> And many other places.
>>
>> Refining it in quantity and at a level of purity that makes the whole
>> process worthwhile will be the problem.
>>
>> As I understand it, 1920's refineries had problems refining fuel to
>> higher than 20 Octane *reliably* ... and I doubt you could get even
>> 1920's tech up and running within 12 months. Probably even within 10
>> years.
>
>Do you know what an evaporator is? Every ship has several, aircraft
>carriers many, evaporators are distillers of fresh water from salt.
>There is a marvelous heat source in that reactor, primitive
>distillation is simply heating the substance and
> the oldest and most common way to separate things into various
>components (called fractions), is to do it using the differences in
>boiling temperature. This process is called fractional distillation.
>You basically heat crude oil up, let it vaporize and then condense the
>vapor.
And what did they use in the 1920's? Black Magic?
I presume they used methods such as you suggest would be so simple ...
and got unreliable octane ratings, normally around 20 octane.
Joe Bednorz
>asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>>
>> Refining it in quantity and at a level of purity that makes the whole
>> process worthwhile will be the problem.
>>
<snip much interesting info on fuel refining>
>
>Turbines have multifuel capabilities. If its fluid, and burns, it will
>work in a Turbine.
>
By the end of WWII the Germans were using wood gas to power road
vehicles. A firebox burning wood heated a gastight oven containing more
wood. The outgassed fumes went into a rubberized canvas balloon above
the oven.
That was all on a trailer towed behind the vehicle. Fuel lines of
some sort fed the wood gas to the engine of the vehicle.
Seems like if WWII internal combustion engines could be adapted to
that, more modern ones could as well.
As for the plow problem brought up earlier, the original tractors were
just engines that sat by the edge of the field, pulling the plow on long
cables. Two tractors total, one on each side of the field. As one was
pulling the plow the other was moved into position to plow the next
furrow. (This is from THE FIRST WORLD WAR, by John Keegan. Just read
that part.)
As for designing the plow, I can imagine two guys with Mechanical
engineering degrees getting into a fistfight over it. Meanwhile some
guy who, like me, used to play with an only one-horse plow at his
grandparent's will get together with an old gunny and knock one right
up.
Planting can be handled by coercing, bribing, feeding, etc. locals.
It's my admittedly inexperienced understanding that petty officers are
effective in non-verbally inspiring the unmotivated with a sense of
urgency. Poking a stick into the ground then stuffing a seed into the
hole may be initially difficult, but proper incentive will lead to
improvement.
Testing with seedlings in soil samples treated in various ways ahead
of time would be useful. Someone familiar with tobacco or general
greenhouse growing could be of help.
As for how many know what to do and how to do it,
asp...@pacific.net.au is doing a good job of educating a lot of people
at once.
--
SF at Project Gutenberg: <http://thethunderchild.com/Books/OutofCopyright.html>
Baen Free Online SciFi: <http://www.baen.com/library/>
Baen Free SciFi CDs <http://files.plebian.net/baencd/>
SciFi.com classic/original: <http://www.scifi.com/scifiction/archive.html>
Free SF samples from Baen and Tor: <http://www.webscription.net/catalog.asp>
More links: <http://www.mindspring.com/~jbednorz/Free/>
All the best, Joe Bednorz
Joe Bednorz
>In message <1160828864.5...@e3g2000cwe.googlegroups.com>, Jack
>Linthicum <jackli...@earthlink.net> writes
>>> 4) Ammunition. Tell any reloader that he can't make new ammo out of
>>>old brass.
>
>Attributions have got a little odd, but I happily reloaded fired
>cases... using shop-bought primers, bullets and powder. You could cast
>your own bullets (for lower-velocity weapons) but making your own
>primers is a seriously non-trivial undertaking.
Some of the Union Cavalry in the American Civil War used lever action
repeaters.
Joe Bednorz
Mythbusters on the Discovery Channel used just such a setup on one
show. Somewhere on the 'Net is a site for a PVC air cannon. Did some
cleverness with a metal diaphragm to flex and fire when the pressure in
the reservoir was right.
Of course, a good old fashioned trebuchet would be fun for everyone.
(Kits for a desktop model can be purchased online). Calculating ranges
would be fun. Different colored incendiary payloads to be "fired for
effect" at night would have a salutary effect on the morale of both
sides.
Visual displays might be more important than deadliness. They may not
believe/notice their people are being silently killed when they don't
see a threat they recognize.
A good payload of an eye irritant fired via trebuchet might work best.
Slow enough to see. Highly visible. Disabling without being fatal.
Demonstration would be more important than lethality. That would help
convince people a) to respect and b) that the invaders can be worked
with. Give them a threat they can surrender to.
As for political savvy, any backstabbing middle management type knows
about that. And you can't move high up in a hierarchy without betraying
someone, no matter if it's 0 AD, 1000AD, or 2000AD. Lack of a common
language might even be an advantage here. It's tougher to con someone
you can't smooth talk.
William Black
"Joe Bednorz" <inv...@invalid.invalid> wrote in message
news:6kr3j2d0eduvpj2gk...@4ax.com...
> On Sat, 14 Oct 2006 20:16:13 +0100, Paul J. Adam wrote:
>
> >In message <1160828864.5...@e3g2000cwe.googlegroups.com>, Jack
> >Linthicum <jackli...@earthlink.net> writes
> >>> 4) Ammunition. Tell any reloader that he can't make new ammo out of
> >>>old brass.
> >
> >Attributions have got a little odd, but I happily reloaded fired
> >cases... using shop-bought primers, bullets and powder. You could cast
> >your own bullets (for lower-velocity weapons) but making your own
> >primers is a seriously non-trivial undertaking.
>
> Some of the Union Cavalry in the American Civil War used lever action
> repeaters.
And fifty years before people were using a thing called a 'scent bottle
lock' that tipped some fulminate into a tube before firing.
But you need a nineteenth century chemical industry to make the stuff.
mike
> And fifty years before people were using a thing called a 'scent bottle
> lock' that tipped some fulminate into a tube before firing
Or Maynards papertape roll caps, yes, just like the kiddie capguns
> But you need a nineteenth century chemical industry to make the stuff.
As soon as you can do Alcohol distilation and concentrated acid,
Fulminate of Mercury is possible.
So as soon as you have Alchemists about, you are good to go.
No Mercury? no problem. Gold Fulminate works too, but Ammonia is
needed.
But really, there would be a few who knew enough chemistry to make
Lead Azide or Styphnate. Far safer
**
mike
**
asp...@pacific.net.au
<inv...@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>On 14 Oct 2006 16:54:44 -0700, mike wrote:
>
>>asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>>>
>>> Refining it in quantity and at a level of purity that makes the whole
>>> process worthwhile will be the problem.
>>>
><snip much interesting info on fuel refining>
>
>>
>>Turbines have multifuel capabilities. If its fluid, and burns, it will
>>work in a Turbine.
>>
>
> By the end of WWII the Germans were using wood gas to power road
>vehicles. A firebox burning wood heated a gastight oven containing more
Indeed, the whole of Europe was.
>wood. The outgassed fumes went into a rubberized canvas balloon above
>the oven.
Nope, you're confusing vehicles that used town gas.
The wood burners were fuelled directly from the wood burner.
If you *did* need rubberised canvas, however, see the problem ...
canvas, tick, available! Rubber ... er, sorry.
> That was all on a trailer towed behind the vehicle. Fuel lines of
>some sort fed the wood gas to the engine of the vehicle.
>
> Seems like if WWII internal combustion engines could be adapted to
>that, more modern ones could as well.
It didn't do 'em any good, maintenance wise.
> As for the plow problem brought up earlier, the original tractors were
>just engines that sat by the edge of the field, pulling the plow on long
>cables. Two tractors total, one on each side of the field. As one was
>pulling the plow the other was moved into position to plow the next
>furrow. (This is from THE FIRST WORLD WAR, by John Keegan. Just read
>that part.)
>
> As for designing the plow, I can imagine two guys with Mechanical
>engineering degrees getting into a fistfight over it. Meanwhile some
>guy who, like me, used to play with an only one-horse plow at his
>grandparent's will get together with an old gunny and knock one right
>up.
>
> Planting can be handled by coercing, bribing, feeding, etc. locals.
Indeed it can. What do you feed them with? Slave labour is pretty
inefficient.
Did you know that the Anglo-Saxons used mostly slave labour on their
farms before the Norman conquest, and achieved a return of 2.5-3
bushels per bushel sown. The Normans, within less than a century,
freed all the slaves and made them serfs (sharecroppers in effect) and
this jumped to at least 4 bushels per bushel. Even that proved
inefficient and by the 15th century hired labour replaced serfs mostly
and was achieving even higher yields.
Yet there were still famines. Every year.
Mainly because it was so damn difficult, slow, and costly to move the
grain very far from where it was grown.
The average distance from which a market town drew its grain was 12
klicks ... but that is skewed by the inclusion of places like
Istanbul. If you delete Istanbul it drops to about half that.
>It's my admittedly inexperienced understanding that petty officers are
>effective in non-verbally inspiring the unmotivated with a sense of
>urgency. Poking a stick into the ground then stuffing a seed into the
>hole may be initially difficult, but proper incentive will lead to
>improvement.
Nope. See above. Slave labour is not a good thing.
> Testing with seedlings in soil samples treated in various ways ahead
>of time would be useful. Someone familiar with tobacco or general
>greenhouse growing could be of help.
Where do they get the glass panes from?
No significant glass industry, and what windows there were were pieced
together from small bits of glass in a lead frame. Stained glass
windows, in effect.
> As for how many know what to do and how to do it,
>asp...@pacific.net.au is doing a good job of educating a lot of people
>at once.
No, I know some basic info that others don't. There is a significant
difference, as I have tried to point out, between knowing that, for
example, you have to farm saltpeter and an outline of how it was done
(from memory, piles of manure interspersed with hay, around 8 feet
long and 4' high, well watered with urine every day ... and that's
just the outline ... I wouldn't even guess how well I'd do at getting
it to work).
asp...@pacific.net.au
<inv...@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>On 14 Oct 2006 17:03:01 -0700, mike wrote:
> Of course, a good old fashioned trebuchet would be fun for everyone.
>(Kits for a desktop model can be purchased online). Calculating ranges
>would be fun. Different colored incendiary payloads to be "fired for
>effect" at night would have a salutary effect on the morale of both
>sides.
The Medievals did ... and they used, I believe, differential equations
of a sort to do the range calculations (of course, I'm no
mathematician, so I've probably got the name wrong! they had a better
than "cut and fit" method, anyway.
asp...@pacific.net.au
Indeed.
However, this is not a mass production setup!
Of *course* you could make such things ... in small quantities.
Doing it on an industrial mass production basis is the problem.
mike
> I'm fairly certain it *could* be done in ten years, but why would
> anyone bother? There's not an engine on board a modern U.S. Navy
> warship that could burn high-octane gasoline if you had it, at
> least not without a whole lot of pointless hassle.
As long as there isn't Lead in the fuel, isn't a problem. Not as clean
burning,
but works.
B-36 Bombers used AvGas with the underwing Jets, they didn't haul along
seperate tanks filled with JetA for them.
For diesels, you can in an emergency, mix crankcase oil with gasoline
to get a working fuel.
**
mike
**
mike
> >of machinery for moving aircraft and equipment. I could see a rapid
> >turnover from towing a load of bombs to towing a wide plow. Unskilled
>
> I've seen photos. The wheels aren't designed for fields, they'd get
> bogged on anything other than pavement.
Not that some Chief couldn't come up with the idea of fitting an
aircraft wheel to the rear hubs to get that classic tractor look,
should ground pressure concerns rise to this to pull a plow
http://www.tpub.com/content/aviation/14014/css/14014_215.htm
Post WWII, Farmers started using warsurplus Goodyear tires from
Bombers and Fighters: Gov. was almost giving them away.
Now, price is higher, but some still do this
http://www.nebraskatire.com/ag_tires/airplane_tires.htm
> In any case, how many people on a carrier know how to design a plough?
Isn't rocket science.
**
mike
**
Jack Linthicum
Just a thought, I wonder how much fresh food is in the supply bins on a
carrier? I had thought of corn on the cob, a fairly common offering,
but some of the other foods like peas, beans, fruits etc may be
available already, 21st century born and bred for planting in the 15th
century.
asp...@pacific.net.au
No. That's the problem.
You only *have* "rocket scientists", but you aren't likely to have too
many trained agronomists or mechanical engineers specialising in
farming equipment design in a CVBG.
So your rocket scientists will be screwed.
Oh, sure, they'll get something. *Eventually*. Just hope that you
don't have to rely on their products for the first few years, if not
longer.
"As the farmer who won the lottery said when asked what he was going
to do with his winnings "Keep farming until it's all gone!"
Things are rarely as easy as they look to people who don't have to do
them and haven't had to design them.
Jack Linthicum
Who do you think gets all those ROTC scholarships? Harvard or Cal Tech?
University of Missouri, Penn State University, Iowa University. They
turn out ROTC people regardless of college major, God, you are dead ass
ignorant about the United States.
Out of 1000 officers and however many enlisted (5000?), plus multiple
doctors, dentists, supply types there are more than a few with "real"
backgrounds. I was a worker in a pipeline company, an apprentice
carpenter and an experienced newspaper journalist when I joined the
Navy. Most are like that.
Too bad you are a teacher, you could use some learning.
Paul J. Adam
asp...@pacific.net.au writes
>On 15 Oct 2006 03:40:31 -0700, "mike" <mara...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>Isn't rocket science.
>
>No. That's the problem.
>
>
>You only *have* "rocket scientists",
Actually, you don't have "rocket scientists" either. You've got OMs and
MEOs/WEOs who know how their kit works and who can maintain it,
typically at LRU level. But a lot of the equipment is managed at the
"black box" level: guided weapons are assembled and checked at an
armament depot, and are handled as "wooden rounds" on ship. The 'rocket
scientists' tend to be either back at shore establishments, or working
in industry making & supporting the equipment.
asp...@pacific.net.au
<jackli...@earthlink.net> wrote:
About as dead arse ignorant of the USN and its capabilities as you
seem to be.
How many of these ROTC offices will be trained agronomists or
mechanical engineers specialising in farming equipment?
Of course, even if one or two are agronomists, they will likely have
exactly diddly squat experience in practical farming.
And there's no likelihood than any of said ROTC mechanical engineers
will have experience in designing agricultural machinery ... that's
what they'll pick up as a career after they have *left* the navy.
Look, you cheerful charlie types just want to handwave it all. There's
nothing you're suggesting will be impossible ... with enough time ...
but in this context *all* the things you want to do plus the limited
material and manpower resources you have mean that "enough time" is
gonna be *generations* ... unless you think the CVBG commander can run
a DPRK style economic setup? Even then, you're not gonna be conquering
the world overnight in a year or two ... you'd still be looking at a
generation or two ... or three ... or more.
>Out of 1000 officers and however many enlisted (5000?), plus multiple
>doctors, dentists, supply types there are more than a few with "real"
Doctors who don't know how to treat diseases without modern
technology. How many doctors can make penicillin?
When the dentist's drill burns out, what then? He can't repair it.
Supply types don't actually *make* things, so they're useless.
>backgrounds. I was a worker in a pipeline company, an apprentice
>carpenter and an experienced newspaper journalist when I joined the
>Navy. Most are like that.
And I am sure you could put together pipes. If someone provided you
with the pipes and welding equipment. Which, sadly, doesn't exist
either at all or in any quantity *and*, if there are limited supplies,
can't be replaced.
Do you know how to mine iron ore? Construct a steam engine to dewater
the mine and run the locomotive to carry the ore to the blast furnace
you also built? I would guess not.
They have carpenters in the 15th century ... and *they* know how to
make things without the power tools that soon won't exist because
they've worn out and are irreplaceable. Or do you know how to make
those power tools from the mine in the ground through the blast
furnace to the machine tools to make the parts etc.? I would guess
not.
As for being a journalist. Whoopty do. So what. Can you make a
Gutenberg Style press and operate it? Of course, that wouldn't be
necessary, as Gutenberg has done it already by about 1450 ... but you
can't print money with it, so its of marginal interest to producing a
flintlock rifle ...
>Too bad you are a teacher, you could use some learning.
Well, its fairly obvious who is completely ignorant of anything
resembling a clew as to the nature of the problems being faced in this
scenario unless it involves the application of massive amounts of
handwavium (tm).
Where do you buy yours? You must get a good bulk discount.
asp...@pacific.net.au
<ne...@jrwlynch.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>In message <45342d82...@news.pacific.net.au>,
>asp...@pacific.net.au writes
>>On 15 Oct 2006 03:40:31 -0700, "mike" <mara...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>>Isn't rocket science.
>>
>>No. That's the problem.
>>
>>
>>You only *have* "rocket scientists",
>
>Actually, you don't have "rocket scientists" either. You've got OMs and
>MEOs/WEOs who know how their kit works and who can maintain it,
>typically at LRU level. But a lot of the equipment is managed at the
>"black box" level: guided weapons are assembled and checked at an
>armament depot, and are handled as "wooden rounds" on ship. The 'rocket
>scientists' tend to be either back at shore establishments, or working
>in industry making & supporting the equipment.
I was, of course, talking in generic terms ... but your point supports
mine anyway. Thanks.
Jack Linthicum
Actually I could make a Gutenburg press, they used to use them for page
proofs on the LA Examiner. You assume the worst, a doctor who joined
the Navy so he could avoid treating patients and dentist who couldn't
take a drill to a machine shop and get another, there are many people
on Navy ships who are there because they love the sea and want a nice
pension to use when they leave in 20 years to pursue their goals in
life. BTW you don't have to specialize in anything to think, something
I think has evaded you. I seem to remember a Chairman of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff and Secretary of State who likes to repair old Volvos.
Is that one on your list? This is the United States not some rat hole
place where everyone knows one thing, maybe.
David Loewe, Jr.
Adding sci.military.naval in an attempt to gain more and a broader
range of naval expertise (For instance, what, exactly, does the
machine shop on a CVN have available?)...
For those in smn who have any interest, please either read the
material previously posted in rasfw or shw-i or dredge up your
memories of SM Stirling's Island In The Sea Of Time books (or the
movie The Final Countdown, except the Nimitz stays stuck back in time
OR John Birmingham's Axis Of Time books) for an idea of what is being
attempted in this thread.
>What does a carrier in the Sea of Time have and need?
Why don't we first establish WHAT the Carrier In The Sea Of Time IS?
Three different ideas have been floated - a single CVN (Final
Countdown style), a full CSG (Axis Of Time style) and NCC-1701. Let's
toss out the NCC-1701 sub-thread (as that's TOO easy). So, are we
talking a single carrier or are we talking a Strike Group?
If it's the Strike Group, there's a lot to work with. Strike Group 7
(Reagan), for example, consists of CVN-76, CG-57, DDG-73, DDG-85,
T-AOE-7 and SSN-770.
http://www.reagan.navy.mil/strike_group/strike_group.htm
Strike Group 3 (Stennis) has a different mix - CVN-74, CG-54, FFG-46,
DDG-60, DDG-77, DDG-88, T-AOE-10 and SSN-722.
http://www.cvn74.navy.mil/ships_and_squadrons.html
Composition seems to be somewhat fluid as CG-57 and DDG-73 seem to
have been part of CSG-3 in the past. Suffice it to say, if we go with
a CSG, we likely get one CVN, one or two CGs (almost certainly Ticos),
2 or three DDGs (likely Burkes), possibly an FFG, a T-AOE and one or
two SSNs (almost certainly 688s).
Secondly, if the discussion is to have any meaning, we need to decide
WHEN we are sending the CITSOT to.
Additionally, WHERE it materialises will be important.
--
"Does any one know where the love of God goes
When the waves turn the minutes to hours?"
Gordon Lightfoot
David Loewe, Jr.
>No, I know some basic info that others don't. There is a significant
>difference, as I have tried to point out, between knowing that, for
>example, you have to farm saltpeter and an outline of how it was done
>(from memory, piles of manure interspersed with hay, around 8 feet
>long and 4' high, well watered with urine every day ... and that's
>just the outline ... I wouldn't even guess how well I'd do at getting
>it to work).
Why not just mine it?
--
"It's raining soup and we haven't built any soup bowls."
Dr. Jerry Pournelle
renab...@aol.com
SNIP
Penn State Class of '74 = Army ROTC Scholaship
Dual Degree = Chemiistry & Secondary Education
Primary Specialty = Armor (qualifed as both a tanker & cavalryman)
Alternate Specialty = Nuclear, Biological & Chemical Warfare
If I had a dime for every class I either taught or supervised the
teacheing of while I was in the Army....
I dare say my trainhg as a chemist - my specialty was organic - would
prove useful in this scenario
Penn State is one of of America's Land Grant institutions, specifically
created by Congresss to (I'm paraphrasing) "promote progress and
education in the mechanical and agrricultural arts", As a matter of
fact, its earliest component, chartered by the Commonwealth in 1855,
was the Farmer's High Scool of Pennsylvania.
PSU has a whole undegraduate college - Earth & Mineral Sciences -
offering majors in such things as mining engineering, patroleum
engineering, materials science, etc, as well as subjects such as
geology, forestry, oceanography and meteorology.
The athlletic confernece PSU competes in includes ten other giant
univerities dedicated to the same aim...most of whom are also members
of the he American Association of Land Grant Colleges and Universities
has over one hundred members.(and hosting ROTC is a condition of their
charters, as set forth in the Morrill, Land Grant Act of 1863)
The result? We had lots of engineers and famers and miners in my ROTC
class
So did my dad's (a chemical engineer) - he went to Texas Agricultural &
Mechanical College (now University), the Land Grant school of that
state - which has had one of the biggest ROTC programs in the nation
for many years.
ROAR, LIONS, ROAR!
renab...@aol.com
asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:> How many of these ROTC offices will be
trained agronomists or
> mechanical engineers specialising in farming equipment?
>
> Of course, even if one or two are agronomists, they will likely have
> exactly diddly squat experience in practical farming.
SNIP
Horse crap, a large number of them will be from farm communities.
People study what they are intretsted in, people become intersted in a
subject by being exposed to it. You're just not gonna have that many
people from Center City Philadelphia choosing an agricultural
career.Now, in a city of ober a million inhabitants, you'll have some.
If they're serious, they'll have gonna to Walter B Saul High School of
Agricultural Sciences. Which defeats your argument, beuase working on
th school's instructional farm is part of the curriculum (I know the
details from one of my PSU classmates)
> And there's no likelihood than any of said ROTC mechanical engineers
> will have experience in designing agricultural machinery ... that's
> what they'll pick up as a career after they have *left* the navy.
SNIP
Hardly the bleeding edge of technology - and don't forget, said
engineers won't be going into terra incognita. The farmboys in the crew
will be able to describe what they used back home....."No, Joe, the
blade needs more of a curve to it..."
>
> Do you know how to mine iron ore? Construct a steam engine to dewater
> the mine and run the locomotive to carry the ore to the blast furnace
> you also built? I would guess not.
SNIP
Guessed wrong
I can...not only run it, but maintain it at a basic level
Granddad was a machinist on the Louisiana & Arkansas Railway. I learned
how to set up and run a machine shop - princiaplly the lathe, drill
press and milling machine from him before I was out of my teens ("No
garndson of mine will ever go hungry because they'll always need
machinists"). BTW, the Milling Machine is the King of Macihine Toiols,
with it you can make every other machien tool you'll ever need, to
include other milling machines.
Dad earned money for college by working as a machinists assistannt and
then locomotive fireman on the L & A for seevral years. Learned how to
fire and run a steam locomotive from the diagrams he drew to illustarte
his stories
Moi? I've loved the rails since I was a kid and I learned a tramendoues
amount about
practical railroading from them, but my education really started as a
volunteer at the Kentucky Railroad museum in Louisvaille when I waa on
active dury - note the time period - and never looked back. Due to my
background, I had a pretty damn good idea of the theory, all I needded
was the practical experience. And I've spent my time swinging a sledge
and pounding bad staybolts out of a boiler..I'm no boilermaker or steam
fitter, but I can do a decent job of running maintenenace to get a loco
ove rthe road.
But, it wouldn't be dependent on my skills....for you see, a CVN is
>STEAM< powered, that reactor is nothing but a glorified tea kettle - so you're gonna have steam kitters and boiler makers and water tenders and I don't know what all else to train the semui-skilled.
As far as shade tree mechanics to jury rig and "imagineer" stuff up
(classic example, wind powered closthes washing machines - that became
a familiar sight throughout teh Pacific - built out of 55 gallon drums
and scrap iron by various mambers of the USN Coinstaruction Battalions
during WWII) there'll be plenty of them, too.
You'll be surprsied at the number of guys from farm communities who
have dug out old "one ling" gas enegines or a an ancient steam
threshing machines and reun 'em at the County Fair every year. Lots of
their boys and the neighbor kids end up in the military (the military
is a socially acceptable "ticket out" for a kid with wanderlust and
desire to see more of life than a small town offers). Guess who helps
Dad refurbush and operate those old beasts?
Guess who lerand to uise bailing wire and imagination to keep some
pievce of equipment working to make it through the harvest?
> They have carpenters in the 15th century ... and *they* know how to
> make things without the power tools that soon won't exist because
> they've worn out and are irreplaceable. Or do you know how to make
> those power tools from the mine in the ground through the blast
> furnace to the machine tools to make the parts etc.? I would guess
> not.
AHHHHH OOOOOOOO GGGAHHHH !!!!!
Strawman aletrt! Strawman aletrt!
Who the hell needs powerr toiols for doing carpentry?
Well into this century timber was felled in North America by hand,
skidded (originally by teams of oxen, later by steam skidders and
donkey engines) to saw mills (originally animal, later steam powered
and also progressing from reciprocating to band and radial saws),
before being used to construct structures. I dounbt the hose I'm typing
this from (ca 1910 to 1920) had a single power toool used in its
construction, bsides the saws at the mill.
>
> Author, Space Opera (FGU); RBB #1 (FASA); Road to Armageddon;
> Farm, Forge and Steam; Orbis Mundi (PGD)
SNIP
Are we supposed tom be impressed or something?
.
Gene Ward Smith
Jack Linthicum wrote:
> Just a thought, I wonder how much fresh food is in the supply bins on a
> carrier? I had thought of corn on the cob, a fairly common offering,
> but some of the other foods like peas, beans, fruits etc may be
> available already, 21st century born and bred for planting in the 15th
> century.
It doesn't even always need to be fresh; if you take popcorn and plant
it in the ground, up comes a crop of popcorn.
Peter Bruells
> Well into this century timber was felled in North America by hand,
> skidded (originally by teams of oxen, later by steam skidders and
> donkey engines) to saw mills (originally animal, later steam powered
> and also progressing from reciprocating to band and radial saws),
> before being used to construct structures.
I'm not quite sure that 6 years can be called "well into this century".
asp...@pacific.net.au
<genewa...@gmail.com> wrote:
>It doesn't even always need to be fresh; if you take popcorn and plant
>it in the ground, up comes a crop of popcorn.
Before or after you nuke it?
asp...@pacific.net.au
<jackli...@earthlink.net> wrote:
Great. So could Gutenberg.
>proofs on the LA Examiner. You assume the worst, a doctor who joined
I doubt it. They may have used some sort of flatbed press, but there's
no way it would have been a Gutenberg.
For a start, I am presuming it was made of metal? The frame, not just
the type.
Gutenberg presses were woodframed amongst other things.
>the Navy so he could avoid treating patients and dentist who couldn't
No. I assume that modern doctors are trained, not unreasonably, to
work in a modern technological environment and that their training
does not deal with how to treat people in obsolete ways.
This is, evidently, a common complaint of organisations like Medecins
sans Frontieres for younger doctors from western countries dumped in
then middle of nowhere, as they do.
Doctors know how to, for example, operate ... and prevent infection
... but they do it in ways that assume the availability of bulk
quantities of modern (indeed, *any*) antobiotics. They no longer
follow the antiseptic rules of pre-antibiotic periods ... and, since
modern doctors ...
a) do not know how to make antibiotics (this is a significant
difference from the statement "do not know how modern antibiotics are
made")
and
b) don't have the engineering or other experience to manufacture them
(and, no, bread mould is not gonna help ... like I said, check out the
163x Tech Forum at Baens Bar)
then, as soon as they run out of antibiotics they are essentially
screwed in relation to all the treatments they know how to run.
And that's only one thing. X Ray machines. Ultrasound Machines.
Surgical Drills.
Surgical Dressings, for ghu's sake! This is the 15th century, cloth is
hand made and expensive. And, no, you can't speed things up without
producing more machines ... and read about the problems they had doing
that in the real world. It was easy to come up with designs, but
getting the designs to *work* took a hell of a lot longer.
>take a drill to a machine shop and get another, there are many people
And the machine shop instantly stops producing the 1001 other things
it has to produce for this fantasy of instant world conquest to
happen?
Right!
And, of course, they have the right materials and get it right first
time?
Sure.
They'd be lucky to recreate a pedal powered dental drill.
>on Navy ships who are there because they love the sea and want a nice
>pension to use when they leave in 20 years to pursue their goals in
>life. BTW you don't have to specialize in anything to think, something
>I think has evaded you. I seem to remember a Chairman of the Joint
>Chiefs of Staff and Secretary of State who likes to repair old Volvos.
There being, of course, thousands of old Volvos in the 15th century
and many AutoParts Shops where one can buy the parts to repair them
with?
Not to mention Petrol Stations for the petrol and lubricants. Or
rubber plantations for the tyres or ...
... like I said, there is a difference between knowing, in general
terms, how something is done (more like "knowing something can be
done") and being able to do it right here, right now with no more
knowledge than that and no experience in the specifics.
Something that you seem to be having difficulties grasping.
Sure, eventually they can do most of this stuff ... where "eventually"
has a big enough numerical value. Decades. Generations, more like.
>Is that one on your list? This is the United States not some rat hole
>place where everyone knows one thing, maybe.
In the 15th century it hardly matters what the US of the 21st centry
might be like.
It is, not to put too fine a point on it, irrelevant, immaterial and
fattening.
asp...@pacific.net.au
>
>asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:> How many of these ROTC offices will be
>trained agronomists or
>> mechanical engineers specialising in farming equipment?
>>
>> Of course, even if one or two are agronomists, they will likely have
>> exactly diddly squat experience in practical farming.
>
>SNIP
>
>Horse crap, a large number of them will be from farm communities.
Indeed. They will. And they will have diddly squat knowledge of how to
design and build farm machinery.
Sure, they may have some knowledge of *modern* farm machinery and how
to operate it.
This is of exactly zero relevance as there *is* no such machinery in
the 15th century, and despite massive handwaving, won't be any time
soon ... think 20 years or more. Most likely more.
19th century stuff. Sure. Eventually. Sooner than the 20th century
stuff. That does not mean "right here this instant" ... and, since, as
I noted, knowledge of 20th century farm machinery operation is all
that's likely to exist, designing and building a horse drawn combine
harvester *that works* ... and the tools to build the tools to build
the tools to build it ... is gonna take a nontrival amount of years,
too.
And, of course, these people love farming so much they *stayed on the
farm* ...
... oh. They didn't?
QED.
>> And there's no likelihood than any of said ROTC mechanical engineers
>> will have experience in designing agricultural machinery ... that's
>> what they'll pick up as a career after they have *left* the navy.
>
>SNIP
>
>Hardly the bleeding edge of technology - and don't forget, said
It is to someone who doesn't have any background in it.
And it will take time. And the first prototypes will take longer to
design and produce than the cheerful charlie fantasists assume, and
the first prototypes won't work, or won't work very well ... assume
many years of testing, extended by the complete lack of resources to
make all this stuff and the severe lack of resources to make this
stuff from.
>engineers won't be going into terra incognita. The farmboys in the crew
>will be able to describe what they used back home....."No, Joe, the
>blade needs more of a curve to it..."
Sure, they know about tractor drawn ploughs. Problem #1 - no tractors.
>> Do you know how to mine iron ore? Construct a steam engine to dewater
>> the mine and run the locomotive to carry the ore to the blast furnace
>> you also built? I would guess not.
>
>SNIP
>
>Guessed wrong
>
>I can...not only run it, but maintain it at a basic level
Nope. Guessed right.
You don't know how to mine ore. Don't know how to build a blast
furnace and all the intermediate steps I didn't mention but which,
most assuredly, you completely, totally, 100% lack any knowledge of.
>Granddad was a machinist on the Louisiana & Arkansas Railway. I learned
>how to set up and run a machine shop - princiaplly the lathe, drill
>press and milling machine from him before I was out of my teens ("No
>garndson of mine will ever go hungry because they'll always need
>machinists"). BTW, the Milling Machine is the King of Macihine Toiols,
>with it you can make every other machien tool you'll ever need, to
>include other milling machines.
And, eventually, that'll work ... for large enough temporal values of
"eventualy" ...
... but not until you have the tool steel to make them from, and that
simply does not exist in the 15th century and there is no
infrastructure to allow it to be produced in mass industrial
quantities that you will need or even to mine the ore and the coal
you'll need.
So the fact that you could, theoretically, use the tools that may or
may not exist on the CVBG to make things with raw materials that you
have no way of processing, mining, refining, transporting ...
... well, non-cheerful charlies probably have gotten the idea about
100 posts ago.
>But, it wouldn't be dependent on my skills....for you see, a CVN is
>>STEAM< powered, that reactor is nothing but a glorified tea kettle -
>so you're gonna have steam kitters and boiler makers and water tenders
>and I don't know what all else to train the semui-skilled.
Irrelevant without the tools and resources. And, no, the tools and
resources on the CV aren't anywhere near enough.
Yes, *eventually* (for large enough temporal quantities of
"eventually") you could parlay those tools into an industrial
infrastructure to make such things, just not in any time soon.
Decades. Generations. More.
>> Author, Space Opera (FGU); RBB #1 (FASA); Road to Armageddon;
>> Farm, Forge and Steam; Orbis Mundi (PGD)
>Are we supposed tom be impressed or something?
Only if you want to be. I have certain things I am moderately proud to
have done, and this (or slight variations on it) has been my sig since
around 1990, so it could hardly be construed as anything exceptional.
Phil
Author, Space Opera (FGU); RBB #1 (FASA); Road to Armageddon;
Farm, Forge and Steam; Orbis Mundi (PGD)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Email: asp...@pacific.net.au
Jack Linthicum
renab...@aol.com wrote:
> > Who do you think gets all those ROTC scholarships? Harvard or Cal Tech?
> > University of Missouri, Penn State University, Iowa University. They
> > turn out ROTC people regardless of college majoring.
>
> SNIP
>
> Penn State Class of '74 = Army ROTC Scholaship
>
> Dual Degree = Chemiistry & Secondary Education
>
> Primary Specialty = Armor (qualifed as both a tanker & cavalryman)
>
> Alternate Specialty = Nuclear, Biological & Chemical Warfare
You remind of my first section leader at OCS, Dairy farmer upstate New
York (I have seen him at work), educator at Penn State Harrisburg, the
usal run of jobs on a DER First Lieutenant, Comms Boss, etc. Roommate
in Hawaii is another, First Lieutanent on a DD..
(at) the nation's third oldest college of engineering and science,
(he) is responsible for the university's external relations, including
its news service, development office, corporate relations, alumni
programs and university publications. He helped develop the school's
first comprehensive corporate relations program and as an adjunct
professor in the Department of Biology and Biotechnology has maintained
an active research program.
Before joining Worcester Polytechnic, he was director of research at
Geo-Marine, Inc., an engineering consulting firm in Dallas, Texas. He
was also the president of an investment concern in the greater
Worcester area.
>From 1990-95, he was a member of the National Sea Grant Review Panel, a
15-member, independent citizens advisory committee.
(he) received a B.S. in zoology from Yale University in 1958. Following
service as a naval officer, he received an M.A. in zoology in 1965 from
the University of Texas, Austin. He received his Ph.D. in biological
oceanography from Harvard University in 1969. His principal research
interests involve the organization of oceanic ecosystems and natural
resource management.
Two doofii in a sea of time, they were not alone in their abilities.
asp...@pacific.net.au
<dlo...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>On Sun, 15 Oct 2006 10:06:52 GMT, asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>
>>No, I know some basic info that others don't. There is a significant
>>difference, as I have tried to point out, between knowing that, for
>>example, you have to farm saltpeter and an outline of how it was done
>>(from memory, piles of manure interspersed with hay, around 8 feet
>>long and 4' high, well watered with urine every day ... and that's
>>just the outline ... I wouldn't even guess how well I'd do at getting
>>it to work).
>
>Why not just mine it?
Sure, just voyage to Chile and set up the entire guano industry ...
but that doesn't help, as what you get is Sodium Nitrate and you need
Potassium Nitrate, and that means ...
"The sodium nitrate is purified and then reacted in solution with
potassium chloride (KCl, sylvite), from which the less-soluble
potassium nitrate is precipitated out."
... so you've added another step and more complex industrial
chemistry.
And don't try it on seriously suggesting that you can get the Haber
Process up and running overnight, either.
The process eventually used (not in the 15th century) ...
"Historically, nitre-beds were prepared by mixing manure with either
mortar or wood ashes, common earth and organic materials such as straw
to give porosity to a compost pile typically 1.5 metres high by 2
metres wide by 5 metres long. The heap was usually under a cover from
the rain, kept moist with urine, turned often to accelerate the
decomposition and leached with water after approximately one year. The
liquid containing various nitrates was then converted with wood ashes
to potassium nitrates, crystallized and refined for use in gunpowder."
... wikipedia
Note the bit about "approximately one year" for the process.
Jack Linthicum
asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
> On 15 Oct 2006 15:12:54 -0700, "Jack Linthicum"
> <jackli...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
> >
> >asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
> >> On 15 Oct 2006 06:42:36 -0700, "Jack Linthicum"
> >> <jackli...@earthlink.net> wrote:
> >>
> >> >
> >> >asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
> >> >>
> >> >> "As the farmer who won the lottery said when asked what he was going
> >> >> to do with his winnings "Keep farming until it's all gone!"
>
> >> Supply types don't actually *make* things, so they're useless.
>
> I doubt it. They may have used some sort of flatbed press, but there's
> no way it would have been a Gutenberg.
>
> For a start, I am presuming it was made of metal? The frame, not just
> the type.
>
> Gutenberg presses were woodframed amongst other things.
Bingo, that's the bird. Ever see a rocker with two rollers?
>
>
> a) do not know how to make antibiotics (this is a significant
> difference from the statement "do not know how modern antibiotics are
> made")
>
> >take a drill to a machine shop and get another, there are many people
If the Captain or Admiral has an abcessed tooth the drill will get
priority. And I think if the ship is nuclear-powered, as all but one of
our carriers are, the drill will get its electrical.
Most medical schools in the US teach things like the creation of
antibiotics, I had a high schoolmate who wanted to be a research
pharmacist, he was told to take the full pre-med and medical doctor
course because they were the same. He did duty as a doctor for an LST
squadron and research for a large pharmacutical company.
These are just people I knew, the dairy farmer educator the PhD
oceanographer, etc. The Volvo line was to illustrate that there are
people with one job and probably a hobby. You are a very narrow person,
you assume everybody else goes by "one reference" to make a living,
that people in the military know how to do just one thing. Sorry.
ncw...@hotmail.com
Joe Bednorz wrote:
> On 14 Oct 2006 16:54:44 -0700, mike wrote:
>
> By the end of WWII the Germans were using wood gas to power road
> wood. The outgassed fumes went into a rubberized canvas balloon above
> the oven.
>
> some sort fed the wood gas to the engine of the vehicle.
>
> Seems like if WWII internal combustion engines could be adapted to
> that, more modern ones could as well.
>
Actually, I suspect that the opposite is true. WWII internal
combustion engines had a much simpler design than modern ones. That
would make them much easier to adapt to a different fuel. For example,
the one reason why the Trabent was a good car for the DDR was that it's
simpler engineering made it easier to maintain and keep running than
its western contempories - important when you can't rely on a network
of garages and manufacturers of spare parts.
Cheers,
Nigel.
asp...@pacific.net.au
<jackli...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
>asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>> On 15 Oct 2006 15:12:54 -0700, "Jack Linthicum"
>> <jackli...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>>
>> >
>> >asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>> >> On 15 Oct 2006 06:42:36 -0700, "Jack Linthicum"
>> >> <jackli...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>> >>
>> >> >
>> >> >asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>
>> >> >>
>> >> >> "As the farmer who won the lottery said when asked what he was going
>> >> >> to do with his winnings "Keep farming until it's all gone!"
>>
>> >> Supply types don't actually *make* things, so they're useless.
>>
>> I doubt it. They may have used some sort of flatbed press, but there's
>> no way it would have been a Gutenberg.
>>
>> For a start, I am presuming it was made of metal? The frame, not just
>> the type.
>>
>> Gutenberg presses were woodframed amongst other things.
>
>
>Bingo, that's the bird. Ever see a rocker with two rollers?
Bzzt. Nope. No rollers. Think a giant screw press.
And what part of ...
"... like I said, there is a difference between knowing, in general
terms, how something is done (more like "knowing something can be
done") and being able to do it right here, right now with no more
knowledge than that and no experience in the specifics"
... were you incapable of understanding?
All of it, evidently.
Just so you might finally grasp it ... yes, sure, I am sure they teach
the basic generic theory of how to make antibiotics.
For ghu's sake, on that basis *I* "know" how to make antibiotics ...
you need mouldy bread.
Except that information is worse than bloody useless. You might like
to read about the difficulties the discoverers of Penicillin had in
finding a strain that was usably strong.
Then you might like to read what happened to the first patient they
treated with it ...
... he *DIED* ...
... because they couldn't produce enough in lab conditions.
And producing it in mass quantities requires materials you don't have,
lots of electrical equipment which you don't have and would have to
fabricate from scratch ... all with the *very* limited machinery set
that is specialised for repairing aircraft mostly ... and which is, of
course, entirely involved, 2400/7, in building the 1001 things that
you must have to build anything even remotely resembling an industrial
base.
If the docs are blindly lucky, they *might* get a strain of the
penicillin bacillus that is strong enough to be effective ... rolling
a 19 on 3d6, so to speak ... and, if they do, which is by no means
certain, they would probably be able to produce enough to make the
admiral better for a few days before it runs out and he dies.
As for the remaining 5999 sailors? They're screwed.
>These are just people I knew, the dairy farmer educator the PhD
>oceanographer, etc. The Volvo line was to illustrate that there are
>people with one job and probably a hobby. You are a very narrow person,
>you assume everybody else goes by "one reference" to make a living,
>that people in the military know how to do just one thing. Sorry.
And you seem to buy handwavium in orbital achieving quantities.
You don't have the slightest clew as to what is involved in what you
so blithely handwave.
jackli...@earthlink.net
Yeah, like a wine press from whence it came, a variation doesn't have
to press each page as a separate sheet but has two rollers , one for
ink, one for pressing. An improvement on Gutenberg, who in 1422 would
be wandering around between Mainz and Strasbourg, preparatory to
arriving in the latter in 1434. Would he like to know about the
two-roller system? Or would he like to hand ink each take and clean the
excess ink off by hand and then set the top plate over the bedded text,
as was done up into the 19th century? Maybe learn early that oi-based
inks are superior to water-based inks? And paper-making, it was just
reaching France from Italy in the 15th Century.
You, as usual, have missed Gutenberg's real invention, the moveable
type locked into place. The first use of interchangeable parts in a
machine.
IsaacKuo
> 1) Food.
I notice that everybody seems obsessed with the most
difficult solution to the food problem--farming plants.
It requires getting things exactly right many months in
advance of figuring out whether or not you're going to
succeed. It forces you to gamble your survival on
one fixed spot, giving up the potential advantage of your
carrier's mobility. Worst of all, there's no possibility
of anyone of the crew having particularly useful expertise
in farming with ancient plants and supplies.
Instead, consider hunting and/or fishing. Assuming a
USN carrier, there are going to be quite a lot of crew
who are very familiar with hunting for food--even with
weapons as primitive as a bow and arrow. I think you'd
want to choose some place with abundant game.
One good thing is that if the first place you try out isn't
as good for hunting as you hoped, you can use the
carrier to move somewhere else and try again.
Fishing isn't as familiar, but it could potentially be
lucrative once the crew figure it out. The carrier has
a lot of bombs and explosives, which can be used
to turn a lot of swimming fish into floating food.
Could the crew adapt cluster bomb bomblets into
individual use units?
So, where would be a good place for hunting and
fishing? And what would be the best strategies for
preserving food for the winter?
Perhaps the crew could put together huge punt guns
for slaughtering penguins en masse. The cold
environment could minimize the difficulties of
food preservation.
Isaac Kuo
mike
> On 16 Oct 2006 00:03:44 -0700, renab...@aol.com wrote:
>
> that's likely to exist, designing and building a horse drawn combine
> harvester *that works*
Count the Horsies pulling this Holt Combine
http://www.scienceclarified.com/images/uesc_01_img0018.jpg
Going to Horse powered means 1/3 or crops goes right to Fodder.
One of the Reasons Farmers became more productive was the Horsies
not eatin a good bit of the Crop. The only advantages Horses have
is Reproduction an Manure. Everything else, Engines did far better.
This 1945 Massy Harris 21 did more work, faster, than the Holt above
http://webapp1.dlib.indiana.edu/collections/cushman/full/P04473.jpg
You only 'feed' the tractor when working, unlike the Horse
http://www.horsetackreview.com/article-display/859.html [1] , plus
gallons of clean water, and if you think Modern Folk have trouble
redoing Machinery, wait till they have to take care of animals.
> Sure, they know about tractor drawn ploughs. Problem #1 - no tractors.
Its scale. A farm horse could pull a one Bottom Plow. Pulling a three
Bottom Plow took a team of Pulling Horses. A difference between them,
and a Hitch Horse too.
While almost any 1st gen tractor(12 HP at the drawbar) could do a
three Bottom Plow without trouble,22 would let you do a Five Bottom
Plow, http://www.geocities.com/hartparrtractors/2240.html
for a typical Kerosene powered unit of that era. Some used dual fuel,
Gasoline for starting and Kero for running: easier starts.
> ... but not until you have the tool steel to make them from, and that
> simply does not exist in the 15th century and there is no
Most of the 'Big Iron' tools is just that, lots of sandmolded poured
cast iron.
cheap, lasts long time while dimensionally stable, and 'wears like
Iron'
You use the HS Steel and/or Carbide cutters for machining
the bores and ways, the tooling, of which, exists in the Machine Shop
> So the fact that you could, theoretically, use the tools that may or
Do Exist
> may not exist on the CVBG to make things with raw materials that you
> have no way of processing, mining, refining, transporting ...
Like Colonial Steelmaking using BogIron and seashells for the calcium,
since Ore&Limestone wasn't nearby?
[1] Depending, twenty pounds of Hay&Grain may not be enough for
an Idle Horse, let alone one thats working hard
**
mike
**
asp...@pacific.net.au
I missed no such thing. I merely pointed out that you wouldn't have to
reinvent printing.
As usual, I note you have failed to respond to anything substantive.
chorned...@hushmail.com
IsaacKuo wrote:
> chorned...@hushmail.com wrote:
> > What does a carrier in the Sea of Time have and need?
>
> > 1) Food.
>
> I notice that everybody seems obsessed with the most
> difficult solution to the food problem--farming plants.
> It requires getting things exactly right many months in
> advance of figuring out whether or not you're going to
> succeed. It forces you to gamble your survival on
> one fixed spot, giving up the potential advantage of your
> carrier's mobility.
It does, however, have the advantage of supporting large numbers of
people in limited area, and thereby also simplifying communications and
transport, as well as being more reliable in long term. There was a
reason ancients switched to agriculture when they could...
> Worst of all, there's no possibility
> of anyone of the crew having particularly useful expertise
> in farming with ancient plants and supplies.
>
> Instead, consider hunting and/or fishing. Assuming a
> USN carrier, there are going to be quite a lot of crew
> who are very familiar with hunting for food--even with
> weapons as primitive as a bow and arrow.
And 6000 mouths to feed. I think that the general population density of
hunter-gatherers is in the magnitude of 1 person per 20 square
kilometres. That means occupying 120 000 square kilometres free for
taking, in groups small enough to deal with transportation...
there is no such area in the world of 1442. The last big empty plot of
land was New Zealand, and that got claimed by the Maori moa hunters a
century or so earlier.
> I think you'd
> want to choose some place with abundant game.
> One good thing is that if the first place you try out isn't
> as good for hunting as you hoped, you can use the
> carrier to move somewhere else and try again.
>
> Fishing isn't as familiar, but it could potentially be
> lucrative once the crew figure it out. The carrier has
> a lot of bombs and explosives, which can be used
> to turn a lot of swimming fish into floating food.
> Could the crew adapt cluster bomb bomblets into
> individual use units?
>
> So, where would be a good place for hunting and
> fishing? And what would be the best strategies for
> preserving food for the winter?
Or another season poor of game...
>
> Perhaps the crew could put together huge punt guns
> for slaughtering penguins en masse. The cold
> environment could minimize the difficulties of
> food preservation.
And get them in trouble keeping warm and finding fuel.
A band of 105 sailors, with state of the art equipment and arms tried
to feed themselves in a cold area in 1848. Guess what, not a single one
of them survived.
You could consider the stories of castaway and shipwrecked European
parties from the 15th to 19th century Age of Exploration. A carrier
group in the Sea of Time is in a broadly similar situation, but worse
off, because:
there is no home to go to, and no chance of rescue
during 20th and 21st century, the sailors and armies have grown used to
radio communications and the certainty of search and rescue efforts.
Whereas until 19th century, sailors knew they would be assumed lost.
renab...@aol.com
SNIP
Duuuhhhhhh.....What years is this? Ya don't say.....
OK, "well into tte 20th Century"
IsaacKuo
chorned...@hushmail.com wrote:
> IsaacKuo wrote:
> > I notice that everybody seems obsessed with the most
> > difficult solution to the food problem--farming plants.
> > It requires getting things exactly right many months in
> > advance of figuring out whether or not you're going to
> > succeed. It forces you to gamble your survival on
> > one fixed spot, giving up the potential advantage of your
> > carrier's mobility.
> It does, however, have the advantage of supporting large numbers of
> people in limited area, and thereby also simplifying communications and
> transport, as well as being more reliable in long term. There was a
> reason ancients switched to agriculture when they could...
All in good time, perhaps, but in the meantime hunting
and fishing will be easier and far less risky to get going.
In the near-mid term, I think fishing of some sort
is the best bet for sustainable permanent settlement.
Modern fishing knowledge is more directly applicable
than modern agriculture knowledge. It will take time to
build suitable fishing boats and related equipment,
of course, but my gut feeling is that it's going to be
more straightforward than trying to develop sustainable
agriculture.
> > Instead, consider hunting and/or fishing. Assuming a
> > USN carrier, there are going to be quite a lot of crew
> > who are very familiar with hunting for food--even with
> > weapons as primitive as a bow and arrow.
> And 6000 mouths to feed. I think that the general population density of
> hunter-gatherers is in the magnitude of 1 person per 20 square
> kilometres. That means occupying 120 000 square kilometres free for
> taking, in groups small enough to deal with transportation...
You're assuming a steady state situation with limited
transportation capability. These people have a nuclear
carrier, so they can go from one place to another with
high concentrations of food and plunder large swathes
of wildlife at a time (like dodos or walruses or penguins
or giant tortoises).
> > I think you'd
> > want to choose some place with abundant game.
> > One good thing is that if the first place you try out isn't
> > as good for hunting as you hoped, you can use the
> > carrier to move somewhere else and try again.
> > Fishing isn't as familiar, but it could potentially be
> > lucrative once the crew figure it out. The carrier has
> > a lot of bombs and explosives, which can be used
> > to turn a lot of swimming fish into floating food.
> > Could the crew adapt cluster bomb bomblets into
> > individual use units?
> > So, where would be a good place for hunting and
> > fishing? And what would be the best strategies for
> > preserving food for the winter?
> Or another season poor of game...
> > Perhaps the crew could put together huge punt guns
> > for slaughtering penguins en masse. The cold
> > environment could minimize the difficulties of
> > food preservation.
> And get them in trouble keeping warm and finding fuel.
> A band of 105 sailors, with state of the art equipment and arms tried
> to feed themselves in a cold area in 1848. Guess what, not a single one
> of them survived.
They didn't have a nuclear reactor to keep them warm,
nor any clue about how to survive in cold areas.
European sailors of the time and in particular British
explorers were incredibly ignorant of basic survival
skills. That was an age when British explorers
felt that they should "conquer" mother nature rather
than adapt and live with it. That's how come British
explorers could die horrible deaths while the natives
all around them survived just fine.
> You could consider the stories of castaway and shipwrecked European
> parties from the 15th to 19th century Age of Exploration. A carrier
> group in the Sea of Time is in a broadly similar situation, but worse
> off, because:
> there is no home to go to, and no chance of rescue
> during 20th and 21st century, the sailors and armies have grown used to
> radio communications and the certainty of search and rescue efforts.
> Whereas until 19th century, sailors knew they would be assumed lost.
A carrier in the Sea of Time isn't a shipwreck, though. They
have a working ship, and can use it to their advantage.
Also, modern USAians are disproportionately going to be
familiar with basic survival skills. They already have
actual practice trying to live in the wildnerness, due to
The Boy Scouts and hiking/hunting outings. These
recreational "outdoorsman" pursuits are a very modern
phenomenon. Sure, it's nothing compared to the "real thing",
but it's a heck of a lot closer than anything 15-19th century
sailors would have experienced.
Isaac Kuo
Oliver Neukum
> chorned...@hushmail.com wrote:
>> What does a carrier in the Sea of Time have and need?
>
>> 1) Food.
>
> I notice that everybody seems obsessed with the most
> difficult solution to the food problem--farming plants.
> It requires getting things exactly right many months in
> advance of figuring out whether or not you're going to
> succeed. It forces you to gamble your survival on
> one fixed spot, giving up the potential advantage of your
> carrier's mobility. Worst of all, there's no possibility
> of anyone of the crew having particularly useful expertise
> in farming with ancient plants and supplies.
You have a lot of trade goods. As long as you retain
transport capacity, you'll get grain.
Regards
Oliver
Jack Linthicum
I have mentioned that any carrier will have a very large supply of
fresh food on board and such as vegetables and fruits will be available
for providing seeds and planting same. Two places mentioned, California
and Texas, have very large amounts of game in this time, California's
central Valley has been called a serengetti with all forms of hooved
animals and birds. Texas seems to be in the same style.
http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/HH/hch7.html
Decision probably rests on whether you prefer hurricanes to earthquakes
and the Atlantic to the Pacific. Natives will be a problem both places
with disease perhaps making them less so.
Joe Bednorz
Those are good points. Nice to get a substantive response from
someone who reads for comprehension.
--
SF at Project Gutenberg: <http://thethunderchild.com/Books/OutofCopyright.html>
Baen Free Online SciFi: <http://www.baen.com/library/>
Baen Free SciFi CDs <http://files.plebian.net/baencd/>
SciFi.com classic/original: <http://www.scifi.com/scifiction/archive.html>
Free SF samples from Baen and Tor: <http://www.webscription.net/catalog.asp>
More links: <http://www.mindspring.com/~jbednorz/Free/>
All the best, Joe Bednorz
asp...@pacific.net.au
>asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>> On 16 Oct 2006 00:03:44 -0700, renab...@aol.com wrote:
>>
>> that's likely to exist, designing and building a horse drawn combine
>> harvester *that works*
>
>Count the Horsies pulling this Holt Combine
>http://www.scienceclarified.com/images/uesc_01_img0018.jpg
>
>Going to Horse powered means 1/3 or crops goes right to Fodder.
Well, probably not that much, but you're right, it was always a
limiting factor for pre-mechanised farming equipment.
>> ... but not until you have the tool steel to make them from, and that
>> simply does not exist in the 15th century and there is no
>
>Most of the 'Big Iron' tools is just that, lots of sandmolded poured
>cast iron.
Yeah. Right, and you get a whole 200 lbs from a big bog ... once a
generation.
>cheap, lasts long time while dimensionally stable, and 'wears like
>Iron'
And there's damn little of it.
As i noted, there is substantial evidence in recent archaeology that
Europe didn't reach iron production (indeed, *metal* production)
levels achieved by the Roman Empire at its height (say the 2nd century
AD) again until around the 16th-17th centuries.
And what was that production level?
20000 tons a year. That's right *twenty THOUSAND* tons. A *YEAR*. For
the *WHOLE* of Europe.
Unless you believe that Europe is entirely covered by bogs of great
depth, at 200 lbs or so per big bog, once every 20 years or so, you're
not getting anything commercially valuable from that source.
The only reason it was significant at the time was because *SO LITTLE*
iron was produced in Scandinavia.
>> So the fact that you could, theoretically, use the tools that may or
>
>Do Exist
May exist. And if they do, don't exist in any quantity and are of
materials that are, almost literally, irreplaceable.
>> may not exist on the CVBG to make things with raw materials that you
>> have no way of processing, mining, refining, transporting ...
>
>Like Colonial Steelmaking using BogIron and seashells for the calcium,
>since Ore&Limestone wasn't nearby?
At 200 lbs per bog per 20 years you're not producing anything much.
And that's the point. 20kt per year not exceeded till the 16th-17th
century (and the big increases came in the 18th century).
The infrastructure simply isn't there and couldn't be produced
overnight, and one CVBG workshop that employs, what, 100 machinists?,
isn't gonna change that in anything less than a generation, probably
longer.
asp...@pacific.net.au
wrote:
You have a small amount of nonrenewable trade goods, which will
probably get you grain for the first year, no more.
CVBG PXs (or whatever they call them) are not supermarkets with
bottomless supply chains.
Shawn Wilson
<asp...@pacific.net.au> wrote in message
news:4537ff28...@news.pacific.net.au...
> 20000 tons a year. That's right *twenty THOUSAND* tons. A *YEAR*. For
> the *WHOLE* of Europe.
Uh, how much do you imagine the Nimitz needing? 20,000 tons a year is
a LOT
(unless you're an entire modern nation).
David Loewe, Jr.
>Do you know how to mine iron ore? Construct a steam engine to dewater
>the mine
Don't you just love the very nerve of this guy? To assume that the
fracking NAVY has no experience in dewatering spaces...
>and run the locomotive to carry the ore to the blast furnace
>you also built? I would guess not.
--
"Doctor, Doctor, help me please, I know you'll understand
There's a time device inside of me, I'm a self-destructin' man."
Raymond Douglas Davies
David M. Palmer
<asp...@pacific.net.au> wrote:
> On 16 Oct 2006 00:20:27 -0700, "Gene Ward Smith"
> <genewa...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >It doesn't even always need to be fresh; if you take popcorn and plant
> >it in the ground, up comes a crop of popcorn.
>
> Before or after you nuke it?
That's obvious.
By harvest time, according to you:
they are out of ammunition because the marines tried to take over the
world in 6 months by locking their guns into full auto and spraying
randomly;
the nuclear reactor is out of fuel;
everybody's dying of pernicious anemia because Europe produced only
20,000 tonnes of iron a year and that's not enough for 6000 crew
members and nobody in the entire fleet can think of another source of
iron;
the machine shop has been boarded up because the only tool it had broke
its hacksaw blade;
all the electronics is useless because it takes AA batteries;
nobody on the entire ship knows any technology that was invented before
Y2k, therefore the only pumps and other machines that can be produced
are the ones that the natives already know how to make;
and the natives don't know anything and aren't willing to work for the
ship anyway, because there is absolutely nothing on a 21st century
warship that has any trade value whatsoever;
because a huge modern high-efficiency oil refinery is not something you
can knock together over a weekend, there's no fuel for anything;
everybody is freezing to death because the matches have run out and
anyway Europe has been deforested;
within 6 months the entire crew is reduced to paleolithic technology
and painting their feces on cave walls in an attempt to preserve the
remnants of their culture that are most relevant to their situation:
Gilligan's Island (only without the Professor's coconut-based radio
battery because they didn't have a single smart person in the entire
battle group);
everybody gives up and commits suicide because it will take two decades
to build up a sufficient industrial base to advance the world by four
centuries.
Therefore, you obviously want to nuke the popcorn before you plant it
so you can harvest it in its popped state at the end of the
season--with no functioning microwave oven the unpopped crop isn't
going to do you much good.
--
David M. Palmer dmpa...@email.com (formerly @clark.net, @ematic.com)
asp...@pacific.net.au
Sounds reasonable.
<grin>
asp...@pacific.net.au
wrote:
60 tons a day, spread across the length and breadth of Europe, doofus.
asp...@pacific.net.au
<dlo...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>On Sun, 15 Oct 2006 22:02:42 GMT, asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>
>>Do you know how to mine iron ore? Construct a steam engine to dewater
>>the mine
>
>Don't you just love the very nerve of this guy? To assume that the
>fracking NAVY has no experience in dewatering spaces...
Don't you just love the very nerve of this guy? To assume that the
fracking 21st Century NAVY has ANY experience in constructing Newcomen
or Watt Steam engines with the infrastructure available in the 15th
century ...
>>and run the locomotive to carry the ore to the blast furnace
>>you also built? I would guess not.
I would guess not, then.
mike
> Yeah. Right, and you get a whole 200 lbs from a big bog ... once a
> generation.
Several Generations, it seems, for Connecticut BogIron
http://www.yale.edu/peabody/collections/min/CT_Minerals_Pt1.pdf
----------
...and for some eighty years thereafter what iron was made in
Connecticut was produced in the little forges, and, until the
discovery of the Salisbury limonite deposits in 1734,
from bog ore
Because of the superior quality of the iron made from it, the
Salisbury limonite, soon after its discovery, took the place of
bog ore in the northwestern portion of the State, but elsewhere
the bog ore was in use until about 1850 or 1860.
...
LIMONITE or Brown Hematite, in the dense form was by
far the most important iron ore of the State. It has the same
chemical composition as the bog ore....About 1734 came the
first discovery, at Salisbury, of the great deposits of limonite
in the northwest portion of the then colony of Connecticut.
For several years the ore was used only in forges, the resulting
iron being of such excellent quality and becoming.so famous that
forge-masters came long distances to obtain the ore, which they
carried back in their leather saddle-bags. Thereafter, although as
previously noted, bog ore was used. it was to a constantly
decreasing extent until about 1860...
...As of 1837, Dr. Shepard listed 11 Connecticut furnaces in
blast, producing over 6,000 tons of pig iron annually while forges
in the vicinity of Kent were credited with the production of 300
tons of wroughtiron
-----------
Enough BogIron to keep you going till other Iron Ore is
mined elsewhere
**
mike
**
Jack Linthicum
You are riding on 100,000 tons of steel and other metals, there are 80
or so aircraft on board, each a source of metals for a long period of
time. Metal would not seem to be a problem. Food might be. Someone
somewhere in these threads mentioned making sailboats out of motor
whaleboats. I have sailed on same in the Phillipines and Hawaii, not
really a problem.
David Loewe, Jr.
>On Mon, 16 Oct 2006 20:33:09 -0500, "David Loewe, Jr."
><dlo...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>
>>On Sun, 15 Oct 2006 22:02:42 GMT, asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>>
>>>Do you know how to mine iron ore? Construct a steam engine to dewater
>>>the mine
>>
>>Don't you just love the very nerve of this guy? To assume that the
>>fracking NAVY has no experience in dewatering spaces...
>
>Don't you just love the very nerve of this guy? To assume that the
>fracking 21st Century NAVY has ANY experience in constructing Newcomen
>or Watt Steam engines with the infrastructure available in the 15th
>century ...
Don't you just love the very nerve of this guy? To assume that none
of the solutions that the Navy uses for dewatering is adaptable to the
situation...
>>>and run the locomotive to carry the ore to the blast furnace
>>>you also built? I would guess not.
>
>I would guess not, then.
--
"I would like to take you seriously, but to do so would affront
your intelligence."
- William F. Buckley, Jr.
Andrew Robert Breen
David Loewe, Jr. <dlo...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>On Tue, 17 Oct 2006 08:36:50 GMT, asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>
>>On Mon, 16 Oct 2006 20:33:09 -0500, "David Loewe, Jr."
>><dlo...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>>
>>>On Sun, 15 Oct 2006 22:02:42 GMT, asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>>>
>>>>Do you know how to mine iron ore? Construct a steam engine to dewater
>>>>the mine
>>>
>>>Don't you just love the very nerve of this guy? To assume that the
>>>fracking NAVY has no experience in dewatering spaces...
Damage control specialists ought to be able to think of something
that'll work. One of their main jobs is getting water out of awkward
spaces, under circumstances where you might not be able to count on the
main pumps being intact.
>>Don't you just love the very nerve of this guy? To assume that the
>>fracking 21st Century NAVY has ANY experience in constructing Newcomen
>>or Watt Steam engines with the infrastructure available in the 15th
>>century ...
Initially I'd be looking at something like an improved Savery engine (no
moving parts bar the valves), or think laterally and go for a Stirling
engine, which although it needs some decently good machining (do-able)
gets you around the difficulty of boiler-making. Or pick your site
and sink drift workings into a hillside, with the drainage going to
a parallel level deeper in the hill. It was done in the 18th century
quite a lot, and those deposits (of coal or iron) haven't been worked
out in the 14th century. It means more digging, but you're in the happy
position of having quite a lot of explosives and some demolition experts.
You'll be able to make much faster headway with those assets.
--
Andy Breen ~ Not speaking on behalf of the University of Wales, Aberystwyth
Feng Shui: an ancient oriental art for extracting
money from the gullible (Martin Sinclair)
asp...@pacific.net.au
<dlo...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>On Tue, 17 Oct 2006 08:36:50 GMT, asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>
>>On Mon, 16 Oct 2006 20:33:09 -0500, "David Loewe, Jr."
>><dlo...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>>
>>>On Sun, 15 Oct 2006 22:02:42 GMT, asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>>>
>>>>Do you know how to mine iron ore? Construct a steam engine to dewater
>>>>the mine
>>>
>>>Don't you just love the very nerve of this guy? To assume that the
>>>fracking NAVY has no experience in dewatering spaces...
>>
>>Don't you just love the very nerve of this guy? To assume that the
>>fracking 21st Century NAVY has ANY experience in constructing Newcomen
>>or Watt Steam engines with the infrastructure available in the 15th
>>century ...
>
>Don't you just love the very nerve of this guy? To assume that none
>of the solutions that the Navy uses for dewatering is adaptable to the
>situation...
Don't you just love the very nerve of this guy? To assume that any of
the solutions used by the 21st century Navy are reproducible on the
scale needed to produce the machinery to dewater the mines that
building an industrial infrastructure would require?
Ya gotta love it, though ... he's prepared to show his complete lack
of anything resembling historical knowledge to the whole world every
time he drools on his keyboard!
chorned...@hushmail.com
Ah, that is a clue to a problem.
The crew of a carrier will not be carrying any smallpox. So,
introducing smallpox to Americas is out.
They will be having some strains of influenza. But not awfully many,
and with no live hens and cocks aboard, that would limit damage.
There was no malaria in New World before Columbus, thus no reason not
to live in a swamp. A modern carrier group initially in good health may
not be carrying/introducing any.
Look at the Pilgrim Fathers - who had the skills and supplies to get
farming started, as well as guns. The first English explorers in early
17th century found the Massachusetts Bay area settled by numerous and
hostile Indians, and sailed on to Virginia. In 1615...1617, there was a
smallpox epidemy that devastated the natives. In 1620, the Pilgrim
Fathers found the Indians few in number and friendly.
A carrier group arriving in 1442 would find much more Indians and much
less game in either California or Texas than the European explorers of
17th-18th century did.
Jack Linthicum
IIRC the killer the Spanish brought was measles. Who knows what some of
the common diseases of today, common cold for instance, carried by
everyone, would do to an exposed population? Notice that parents of
small children that are sent to day-care centers and schools are always
catching something from their kids. One set of sniffles might be
someone else's plague.
I would like a cite for that last sentence.
John Elliott
: Therefore, you obviously want to nuke the popcorn before you plant it
That may be desirable, but it won't be possible. In the worst-case
scenario you outlined, the carrier force won't have been able to bypass the
Permissive Action Links on their nuclear bombs. Or if they had, they'd have
wasted them all destroying Rome, Byzantium, London, Beijing, Paris and so
on, and there wouldn't be any left to drop on the popcorn :-)
--
John Elliott
John Schilling
<ne...@jrwlynch.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>In message <1160828864.5...@e3g2000cwe.googlegroups.com>, Jack
>Linthicum <jackli...@earthlink.net> writes
>>> 4) Ammunition. Tell any reloader that he can't make new ammo out of
>>>old brass.
>Attributions have got a little odd, but I happily reloaded fired
>cases... using shop-bought primers, bullets and powder. You could cast
>your own bullets (for lower-velocity weapons) but making your own
>primers is a seriously non-trivial undertaking.
Non-corrosive Boxer primers, sure.
Corrosive Berdan primers would be almost trivial, especially if you've
got a bit of electricity to help with the chemistry. Reasons why modern
reloaders don't do this, are left as an exercise for the student :-)
Corrosive Boxer primers, you'd want cheap, semi-expendable, semi-skilled
labor for the assembly, but that could probably be arranged. If you're
cutting a deal where the local farmers are growing your food, you'll
probably be able to arrange some farmers' daughters to be loading your
ammunition.
And you've got other reasons for wanting some farmers' daughters to
be hanging around, of course.
--
*John Schilling * "Anything worth doing, *
*Member:AIAA,NRA,ACLU,SAS,LP * is worth doing for money" *
*Chief Scientist & General Partner * -13th Rule of Acquisition *
*White Elephant Research, LLC * "There is no substitute *
*schi...@spock.usc.edu * for success" *
*661-718-0955 or 661-275-6795 * -58th Rule of Acquisition *
David M. Palmer
<j...@seasip.demon.co.uk> wrote:
No, using a bomb to pop corn is definitely overkill, unless it's movie
night and you're making it for the entire crew.
Instead, you just drop the kernels into the primary coolant loop of the
reactor and pull them out after they've passed through the core.
It's a shame they don't use liquid sodium coolant in naval reactors.
Then you would just need to add chlorine to salt it.
Unfortunately, the alchemical techniques of the day aren't up to the
task of sythesizing diacetyl, so there would be no way to make the
popcorn butter-flavored with the technology of the time.
On the other hand, that means that you won't be subjected to the
hazards of Popcorn Worker's Lung disease while working the nuclear
reactor in a smallpox-infested primitive world. If you have developed
an injury or disease due to working with artificial butter flavoring,
please click here to contact a lawyer.
http://www.butterflavoringlunginjury.com/
If you are currently in the fifteenth century, please remain on hold
for a few hundred years until personal injury lawyers are spawned.
asp...@pacific.net.au
<sigh>
"nuke" = "microwave"
"nuke it" = "microwave it"
<sigh>
David Loewe, Jr.
>On Tue, 17 Oct 2006 19:38:37 +0100, John Elliott
><j...@seasip.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>
>>In rec.arts.sf.written David M. Palmer <dmpa...@email.com> wrote:
>>: Therefore, you obviously want to nuke the popcorn before you plant it
>>
>> That may be desirable, but it won't be possible. In the worst-case
>>scenario you outlined, the carrier force won't have been able to bypass the
>>Permissive Action Links on their nuclear bombs. Or if they had, they'd have
>>wasted them all destroying Rome, Byzantium, London, Beijing, Paris and so
>>on, and there wouldn't be any left to drop on the popcorn :-)
>
><sigh>
>
>"nuke" = "microwave"
>
>"nuke it" = "microwave it"
>
><sigh>
Don't you just love it when the asshole who couldn't recognize that
everyone else in the sub-thread was talking about NCC-1701 gets
hoisted on his own petard?
--
"The trick is to stop thinking it is `your' money."
- IRS auditor
David Loewe, Jr.
>20000 tons a year. That's right *twenty THOUSAND* tons. A *YEAR*. For
>the *WHOLE* of Europe.
Don't you just love how this guy keeps blathering on and on about
20,000 tons a year from a level of technology that the CVN will be
well beyond?
--
"I wouldn't recommend sex, drugs or insanity for everyone, but they've
always worked for me."
- Hunter S. Thompson
asp...@pacific.net.au
Don't you just love it when poor lowbrau doesn't even understand
slang?
Sad, really, but I guess his mommy will eventually spank him for
throwing a temper tantrum for not getting his own way.
asp...@pacific.net.au
<dlo...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>On Mon, 16 Oct 2006 22:01:11 GMT, asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>
>>20000 tons a year. That's right *twenty THOUSAND* tons. A *YEAR*. For
>>the *WHOLE* of Europe.
>
>Don't you just love how this guy keeps blathering on and on about
>20,000 tons a year from a level of technology that the CVN will be
>well beyond?
Don't you just love someone so stupid that they can't grasp the
problem ... and, indeed, don't even recognise how stupid they are?
Sad, but don't worry, lowbrau, mommy will be along for your potty
mouth session with the soap oh so soon.
IsaacKuo
asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
> On Wed, 18 Oct 2006 07:43:02 -0500, "David Loewe, Jr."
> <dlo...@mindspring.com> wrote:
> >On Wed, 18 Oct 2006 07:11:06 GMT, asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
> >>On Tue, 17 Oct 2006 19:38:37 +0100, John Elliott
> >><j...@seasip.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> >>>In rec.arts.sf.written David M. Palmer <dmpa...@email.com> wrote:
> >>>: Therefore, you obviously want to nuke the popcorn before you plant it
> >>> That may be desirable, but it won't be possible. In the worst-case
> >>>scenario you outlined, the carrier force won't have been able to bypass the
> >>>Permissive Action Links on their nuclear bombs. Or if they had, they'd have
> >>>wasted them all destroying Rome, Byzantium, London, Beijing, Paris and so
> >>>on, and there wouldn't be any left to drop on the popcorn :-)
> >><sigh>
> >>"nuke" = "microwave"
> >>"nuke it" = "microwave it"
> >><sigh>
> >Don't you just love it when the asshole who couldn't recognize that
> >everyone else in the sub-thread was talking about NCC-1701 gets
> >hoisted on his own petard?
I'm reminded of an unrelated case of someone recently being
unable to detect the satire in a spoof review of Battlestar
Galactica. (In a different newsgroup--completely unrelated.)
> Don't you just love it when poor lowbrau doesn't even understand
> slang?
...but in that other case, the guy in question was at least able
to easily recognize the satire once it was pointed out.
Isaac Kuo
Wayne Throop
: Don't you just love it when poor lowbrau doesn't even understand slang?
Even better is when somebody can't recognize jokes without an emoticon.
Wayne Throop thr...@sheol.org http://sheol.org/throopw
Scott Lurndal
>On 15 Oct 2006 06:42:36 -0700, "Jack Linthicum"
><jackli...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>>asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>>> You only *have* "rocket scientists", but you aren't likely to have too
>>> many trained agronomists or mechanical engineers specialising in
>>> farming equipment design in a CVBG.
>>>
>>> So your rocket scientists will be screwed.
>>>
>>> Oh, sure, they'll get something. *Eventually*. Just hope that you
>>> don't have to rely on their products for the first few years, if not
>>> longer.
>>>
>>
>>Who do you think gets all those ROTC scholarships? Harvard or Cal Tech?
>>University of Missouri, Penn State University, Iowa University. They
>>turn out ROTC people regardless of college major, God, you are dead ass
>>ignorant about the United States.
>
>About as dead arse ignorant of the USN and its capabilities as you
>seem to be.
>
>How many of these ROTC offices will be trained agronomists or
>mechanical engineers specialising in farming equipment?
>
What gives you the idea that someone needs to be a "trained agronomist"
or "mechanical engineer" to design farm equipment? Quite a few
of the CBG crew will have family farm experience, which after 18 or
so years, gives them a pretty good handle on what exists and the
agronomical principles by which they operate their farm. Add in
4H and FFA leadership roles for the teenagers, and you've a considerable
base of _experience_ rather than book learning to rely on.
Neither a tractor nor a plow are rocket science. I don't believe
that one would need large combines or specialized harvesters to
effectively increase farm output in the time period in question. A
binder and a threshing machine (although there are few of us left who
actually have used them) are pretty simple tech and can be pulled
by horses. A mower, hayrake and hayloader can also be designed to
be horsedrawn.
That's just the enlisted crew. Add in the ROTC-trained officers and
you have a _wide_ variety of bachelor degrees in, yes, mech e, agron,
vet med, com sci, aero, electronics, you name it.
scott
Scott Lurndal
>On 16 Oct 2006 00:03:44 -0700, renab...@aol.com wrote:
>
>>
>>asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:> How many of these ROTC offices will be
>>trained agronomists or
>>> mechanical engineers specialising in farming equipment?
>>>
>>> exactly diddly squat experience in practical farming.
>>
>>SNIP
>>
>>Horse crap, a large number of them will be from farm communities.
>
>Indeed. They will. And they will have diddly squat knowledge of how to
>design and build farm machinery.
Phil, you are just digging yourself deeper into a hole. Farm machinery
isn't rocket science. Any farm kid would have no problem working with
the machine shop on the carrier to design and build very effective farm
machinery. Including plows (a couple of bits of steel), tractors
(an engine with wheels, and potentially a PTO, although that is not
necessary), a hayrake, a mower, all those things are dead simple to
design and build.
>
>Sure, they may have some knowledge of *modern* farm machinery and how
>to operate it.
Modern farm machinery on a family farm was designed in the first half
of the 20th century and has only marginally changed since. Exclusive of
large combines and harvesters (which aren't necessary to improve yields
in the time frame in question) the simple stuff is dead simple.
>
>This is of exactly zero relevance as there *is* no such machinery in
>the 15th century, and despite massive handwaving, won't be any time
>soon ... think 20 years or more. Most likely more.
Boloney. I could easily design horse-drawn single mouldboard plow
in a week or less, and a well-equipped shop on a carrier could crank
it out in another week. We're not talking about building $500,000
combines here. Horse-drawn grain drill, maybe a couple of additional
weeks. Mower? A sickle and an eccentric plate. Driven from the
steel wheel on the mower via a simple flat-link chain. Such
equipment is still being used on many family farms because it works
and is dead simple for even the farmer to repair.
Note that the rest of the carrier battle group escorts are basically
steam driven providing the escort crew with the knowledge and experience
to build very effective steam-driven machinery.
>
>19th century stuff. Sure. Eventually. Sooner than the 20th century
>stuff. That does not mean "right here this instant" ... and, since, as
>I noted, knowledge of 20th century farm machinery operation is all
>that's likely to exist, designing and building a horse drawn combine
>harvester *that works* ... and the tools to build the tools to build
I was using "a horse drawn combine harvester" in the 1980's. They
still exist (albeit now tractor drawn). We called it a binder and
used it to harvest oats.
You are seriously over-estimating the difficulty of this.
scott
asp...@pacific.net.au
wrote:
>: asp...@pacific.net.au
>: Don't you just love it when poor lowbrau doesn't even understand slang?
>
>Even better is when somebody can't recognize jokes without an emoticon.
Indeed, lowbrau is a sad case.
asp...@pacific.net.au
wrote:
>asp...@pacific.net.au writes:
>>On 16 Oct 2006 00:03:44 -0700, renab...@aol.com wrote:
>>
>>>
>>>asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:> How many of these ROTC offices will be
>>>trained agronomists or
>>>> mechanical engineers specialising in farming equipment?
>>>>
>>>> Of course, even if one or two are agronomists, they will likely have
>>>> exactly diddly squat experience in practical farming.
>>>
>>>SNIP
>>>
>>>Horse crap, a large number of them will be from farm communities.
>>
>>Indeed. They will. And they will have diddly squat knowledge of how to
>>design and build farm machinery.
>
>Phil, you are just digging yourself deeper into a hole. Farm machinery
>isn't rocket science. Any farm kid would have no problem working with
Scott, no one says they won't be able to do it *ever* but that it will
not be done overnight as many of the idiots here have implied.
Nor will it be trivial without pre-existing blueprints and experience
in *making* rather than *using*.
You will note that there is significant support for this position from
the better informed posters.
Joe Bednorz
Tractors can be greatly simplified from modern ones. The original
tractors sat on the edge of the field and pulled the plow with cables.
The source is John Keegan's THE FIRST WORLD WAR. Much less wear and
tear on the tractor. Less worry about bogging down in the field.
Steering is much less of a problem, etc., etc.
>I don't believe
>that one would need large combines or specialized harvesters to
>effectively increase farm output in the time period in question. A
>binder and a threshing machine (although there are few of us left who
>actually have used them) are pretty simple tech and can be pulled
>by horses. A mower, hayrake and hayloader can also be designed to
>be horsedrawn.
Not to mention starting small and working up.
>
>That's just the enlisted crew. Add in the ROTC-trained officers and
>you have a _wide_ variety of bachelor degrees in, yes, mech e, agron,
>vet med, com sci, aero, electronics, you name it.
>
Most of the naysayers seem convinced that technology is all or
nothing. Breen's excellent post on pumps to drain mines gives the lie
to that.
--
SF at Project Gutenberg: <http://thethunderchild.com/Books/OutofCopyright.html>
Baen Free Online SciFi: <http://www.baen.com/library/>
Baen Free SciFi CDs <http://files.plebian.net/baencd/>
SciFi.com classic/original: <http://www.scifi.com/scifiction/archive.html>
Free SF samples from Baen and Tor: <http://www.webscription.net/catalog.asp>
More links: <http://www.mindspring.com/~jbednorz/Free/>
All the best, Joe Bednorz
David Loewe, Jr.
>On Wed, 18 Oct 2006 07:47:10 -0500, "David Loewe, Jr."
><dlo...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>>On Mon, 16 Oct 2006 22:01:11 GMT, asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>>
>>>20000 tons a year. That's right *twenty THOUSAND* tons. A *YEAR*. For
>>>the *WHOLE* of Europe.
>>
>>Don't you just love how this guy keeps blathering on and on about
>>20,000 tons a year from a level of technology that the CVN will be
>>well beyond?
>
>Don't you just love someone so stupid that they can't grasp the
>problem ... and, indeed, don't even recognise how stupid they are?
>
>Sad, but don't worry, lowbrau,
You've gotta love it when your opponent is such a child that he drags
out the old schoolyard make fun of the other guy's name trick.
Hint: It's not pronounced "low."
>mommy
You've gotta love it when your opponent opens wide and inserts his own
foot.
My mother has been dead for 26+ years now. She's not going to save
your ignorant ass from getting your head handed to you.
>will be along for your potty
>mouth session with the soap oh so soon.
Amusing. Phil the Aussie Sheila wants someone to wash out my mouth
with soap and I haven't even written any curse words. Any more
moronic over-reactions you want to trot out here Aussie Sheila?
--
"To the last, I grapple with thee; From Hell's heart, I stab at thee;
For hate's sake, I spit my last breath at thee."
-Herman Melville, "Moby Dick"
aspqrz
David Loewe, Jr. wrote:
> On Wed, 18 Oct 2006 14:02:58 GMT, asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>
> >On Wed, 18 Oct 2006 07:47:10 -0500, "David Loewe, Jr."
> ><dlo...@mindspring.com> wrote:
> >>On Mon, 16 Oct 2006 22:01:11 GMT, asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
> >>
> >>>20000 tons a year. That's right *twenty THOUSAND* tons. A *YEAR*. For
> >>>the *WHOLE* of Europe.
> >>
> >>Don't you just love how this guy keeps blathering on and on about
> >>20,000 tons a year from a level of technology that the CVN will be
> >>well beyond?
> >
> >Don't you just love someone so stupid that they can't grasp the
> >problem ... and, indeed, don't even recognise how stupid they are?
> >
> >Sad, but don't worry, lowbrau,
>
> You've gotta love it when your opponent is such a child that he drags
> out the old schoolyard make fun of the other guy's name trick.
>
> Hint: It's not pronounced "low."
>
> >mommy
>
> You've gotta love it when your opponent opens wide and inserts his own
> foot.
>
> My mother has been dead for 26+ years now. She's not going to save
> your ignorant ass from getting your head handed to you.
Oh, dear. Sensitive spot, eh?
Life sucks ... maybe your nurse can do the same for you?
Potty training, that is.
Phil
Bill Snyder
<inv...@invalid.invalid> wrote:
>
> Tractors can be greatly simplified from modern ones. The original
>tractors sat on the edge of the field and pulled the plow with cables.
>The source is John Keegan's THE FIRST WORLD WAR. Much less wear and
>tear on the tractor. Less worry about bogging down in the field.
>Steering is much less of a problem, etc., etc.
Indeed, the name was originally "traction engine."
--
Bill Snyder [This space unintentionally left blank.]
John Schilling
>Joe Bednorz wrote:
>> On 14 Oct 2006 16:54:44 -0700, mike wrote:
>> By the end of WWII the Germans were using wood gas to power road
>> vehicles. A firebox burning wood heated a gastight oven containing more
>> wood. The outgassed fumes went into a rubberized canvas balloon above
>> the oven.
>> That was all on a trailer towed behind the vehicle. Fuel lines of
>> some sort fed the wood gas to the engine of the vehicle.
>> Seems like if WWII internal combustion engines could be adapted to
>> that, more modern ones could as well.
>Actually, I suspect that the opposite is true. WWII internal
>combustion engines had a much simpler design than modern ones.
>That would make them much easier to adapt to a different fuel.
Why is this relevant, when there are no internal combustion engines
on a modern U.S. Navy aircraft carrier?
Well, OK, there are - technically, a jet aircraft engine is an
internal combustion engine, and a relatively simple one. But
it is clear from the context that by "internal combustion engine",
you and everyone else are referring to otto-cycle gasoline-fueled
piston engines, and the United States Navy pretty much *does not
use these any more*. There aren't going to be any on board the
"Carrier in the Sea of Time", and there won't be much reason
for the temporal refugees to try and build any.
So why do we care what sort of fuel they want and how picky they
are about it?
--
*John Schilling * "Anything worth doing, *
*Member:AIAA,NRA,ACLU,SAS,LP * is worth doing for money" *
*Chief Scientist & General Partner * -13th Rule of Acquisition *
*White Elephant Research, LLC * "There is no substitute *
*schi...@spock.usc.edu * for success" *
*661-951-9107 or 661-275-6795 * -58th Rule of Acquisition *
Fred J. McCall
:On Mon, 16 Oct 2006 22:01:11 GMT, asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
:
:>20000 tons a year. That's right *twenty THOUSAND* tons. A *YEAR*. For
:>the *WHOLE* of Europe.
:
:Don't you just love how this guy keeps blathering on and on about
:20,000 tons a year from a level of technology that the CVN will be
:well beyond?
Even stupider, he defeats his own point. Ok, the entire (mild) steel
production of Europe is 20k tons per year. The carrier group has more
steel than that and better quality.
How much would THAT be worth?
--
"Some people get lost in thought because it's such unfamiliar
territory."
--G. Behn
mike
> On 16 Oct 2006 03:33:19 -0700, ncw...@hotmail.com wrote:
> >Actually, I suspect that the opposite is true. WWII internal
> >combustion engines had a much simpler design than modern ones.
> >That would make them much easier to adapt to a different fuel.
Old engines with low compression(under 5:1) could be run on
kerosene with reduced power, if the engine was hot and you
had adjust the spark advance, or alcohol with mixture adjustments
Modern flexfuel can run alcohol to gasoline, the computer adjusts,
no loss in power, but mileage varys
> Why is this relevant, when there are no internal combustion engines
> on a modern U.S. Navy aircraft carrier?
No Turbine on the aircraft tractors
http://www.tpub.com/content/aviation/14014/css/14014_215.htm
And really, a gas turbine on a farm tractor that won't get above
12 MPH .... why? Diesels much better choice, you need torque.
Farm marchinery, that you rate at gallons per hour used.
Turbines too thirsty
**
mike
**
aspqrz
Fred J. McCall wrote:
> "David Loewe, Jr." <dlo...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>
> :On Mon, 16 Oct 2006 22:01:11 GMT, asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
> :
> :>20000 tons a year. That's right *twenty THOUSAND* tons. A *YEAR*. For
> :>the *WHOLE* of Europe.
> :
> :Don't you just love how this guy keeps blathering on and on about
> :20,000 tons a year from a level of technology that the CVN will be
> :well beyond?
>
> Even stupider, he defeats his own point. Ok, the entire (mild) steel
Really? By pointing out that the work that steel they need coal, which
is not mined in commercial useful types or quantities?
Please *do* pay attention.
Phil
John Schilling
>John Schilling wrote:
>> On 16 Oct 2006 03:33:19 -0700, ncw...@hotmail.com wrote:
>> >Actually, I suspect that the opposite is true. WWII internal
>> >combustion engines had a much simpler design than modern ones.
>> >That would make them much easier to adapt to a different fuel.
>Old engines with low compression(under 5:1) could be run on
>kerosene with reduced power, if the engine was hot and you
>had adjust the spark advance, or alcohol with mixture adjustments
"Spark advance"?
There are no engines on an aircraft carrier that have spark plugs,
and no reason why anyone on a temporally-displaced aircraft carrier
would want to make an engine with a spark plug.
>> Why is this relevant, when there are no internal combustion engines
>> on a modern U.S. Navy aircraft carrier?
>No Turbine on the aircraft tractors
>http://www.tpub.com/content/aviation/14014/css/14014_215.htm
But no gasoline either. No spark plugs. No "internal combustion
engine" in the sense people here are (mis)using the term.
Do you not understand that diesel is *different* than gasoline?
David Loewe, Jr.
>On Wed, 18 Oct 2006 16:45:13 GMT, thr...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop)
>wrote:
>
>>: asp...@pacific.net.au
>>: Don't you just love it when poor lowbrau doesn't even understand slang?
>>
>>Even better is when somebody can't recognize jokes without an emoticon.
>
>Indeed, lowbrau is a sad case.
Babbles poor Sheila after she missed the emoticon and pedantically
opined that "nuke" means ONLY to "microwave."
--
"I have never made but one prayer to God, a very short one: "O Lord,
make my enemies ridiculous." And God granted it."
- Voltaire
mike
>
> There are no engines on an aircraft carrier that have spark plugs,
> and no reason why anyone on a temporally-displaced aircraft carrier
> would want to make an engine with a spark plug.
other than that gas engines are easier to make than diesels,
lower CR on the piston means the whole engine can be lighter.
Diesels need to be overbuilt.
ICE can run on kerosene with low compression ratios, as I posted,
since the question was on WWII era multifuel ability
**
mike
**
Alfred Montestruc
John Schilling wrote:
> On 18 Oct 2006 20:29:21 -0700, "mike" <mara...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> >John Schilling wrote:
> >> On 16 Oct 2006 03:33:19 -0700, ncw...@hotmail.com wrote:
> >> >Actually, I suspect that the opposite is true. WWII internal
> >> >combustion engines had a much simpler design than modern ones.
> >> >That would make them much easier to adapt to a different fuel.
>
> >Old engines with low compression(under 5:1) could be run on
> >kerosene with reduced power, if the engine was hot and you
> >had adjust the spark advance, or alcohol with mixture adjustments
>
> "Spark advance"?
>
> There are no engines on an aircraft carrier that have spark plugs,
I think you are most likely mistaken. Small engines used to power
small vehicles used to move aircraft and ordinence on both the flight
and hanger decks, also small engines used to power welding kits and
such like.
> and no reason why anyone on a temporally-displaced aircraft carrier
> would want to make an engine with a spark plug.
I can think of many.
Diesel engines must be much stronger (as they have much higher
compression ratios), have tighter machine tolerences, and require timed
fuel injection, all of which are a big pain in the behind from a
manufacturing point of view. Turbine engine tolerences are a SOB to do
and you need very good computational fluid dynamics or the equal of it
(super sonic wind tunnles) to design the blades (roter or stator) and
flow paths in general. Otto cycle engines are simple and robust.
>
>
> >> Why is this relevant, when there are no internal combustion engines
> >> on a modern U.S. Navy aircraft carrier?
>
> >No Turbine on the aircraft tractors
>
> >http://www.tpub.com/content/aviation/14014/css/14014_215.htm
>
> But no gasoline either.
That is not what the site he quoted states.
"A/S32A-30 AIRCRAFT GROUND SUPPORT EQUIPMENT TOWING TRACTOR.-The
A/S32A-30 tow tractor (fig. 9-1) is a 6-cylinder,
gasoline-powered, four-wheel, heavy-duty vehicle with a three-speed
transmission. The tractor frame is a welded steel
one-piece unit. "
You are pathetic.
David Loewe, Jr.
BTW, if you want to try that soc.history.what-if only trick in
earnest, you might try deleting the comma...
>On Tue, 17 Oct 2006 07:27:42 -0500, "David Loewe, Jr."
><dlo...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>>On Tue, 17 Oct 2006 08:36:50 GMT, asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>>>On Mon, 16 Oct 2006 20:33:09 -0500, "David Loewe, Jr."
>>><dlo...@mindspring.com> wrote:
>>>>On Sun, 15 Oct 2006 22:02:42 GMT, asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>Do you know how to mine iron ore? Construct a steam engine to dewater
>>>>>the mine
>>>>
>>>>Don't you just love the very nerve of this guy? To assume that the
>>>>fracking NAVY has no experience in dewatering spaces...
>>>
>>>Don't you just love the very nerve of this guy? To assume that the
>>>fracking 21st Century NAVY has ANY experience in constructing Newcomen
>>>or Watt Steam engines with the infrastructure available in the 15th
>>>century ...
>>
>>Don't you just love the very nerve of this guy? To assume that none
>>of the solutions that the Navy uses for dewatering is adaptable to the
>>situation...
>
>Don't you just love the very nerve of this guy? To assume that any of
>the solutions used by the 21st century Navy are reproducible on the
>scale needed to produce the machinery to dewater the mines that
>building an industrial infrastructure would require?
Don't you just love the very nerve of this guy? Phil the Aussie
Sheila assumes that there's no way to ramp up to building an
industrial infrastructure.
>Ya gotta love it, though ... he's prepared to show his complete lack
>of anything resembling historical knowledge to the whole world
The carrier is bringing back advanced technology. Ignoring how that
technology can be utilized is the mark of a small minded individual.
Are you sure that you're not a Florensis?
>every time he drools on his keyboard!
--
"I don't mind you *thinking* I'm stupid, but don't *talk* to me like
I'm stupid."
- Harlan Ellison
Paul Harman
news:v9edj2hqqlhnvvhcv...@4ax.com...
> On Wed, 18 Oct 2006 21:39:41 GMT, asp...@pacific.net.au wrote:
>>Indeed, lowbrau is a sad case.
>
> Babbles poor Sheila after she missed the emoticon and pedantically
> opined that "nuke" means ONLY to "microwave."
Will you two just get a room already!
Paul